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This article somehow implies a moral obligation on Oracle's behalf to either modify their licence or code to be gpl compliant. I sincerely hope they don't as t

This article somehow implies a moral obligation on Oracle's behalf to either modify their licence or code to be gpl compliant. I sincerely hope they don't as the GPL brigade is getting louder in their intolerance of other licences.

chimeracoder 11y ago
> the GPL brigade is getting louder in their intolerance of other licences. I really don't see much evidence of this, certainly not from the FSF/SFC, who specifically do not discourage use of free licenses that are GPL-compatible, such as the BSD and MIT licenses[0]. The anti-GPL crowd is much more vocal about their distaste for the GPL, especially on forums like HN. The issue at hand is the use of a license which is not compatible with the GPL. No matter which way you slice it, that's a massive inconvenience to everyone, and pretty much nobody wins as a result. (As for relicensing, it is literally impossible to change the license of Linux at this point, because the rights are held by thousands of contributors individually (some of whom are dead, and tracking copyright as it passes across estates is a notoriously difficult task[1]). If there's ever going to be a reconciliation between ZFS and Linux, it would require Oracle to relicense ZFS under any one of the many GPL-compatible licenses.) [0] They do, incidentally, discourage the use of the terms "BSD license" and "MIT license", arguing that those are ambiguous and should be deprecated in favor of "3-clause BSD license" and "X11 license", respectively. But that has nothing to do with the discussion at hand, which is about the use of the actual licenses themselves and the terms they represent, not the names that people use to call them. [1] Even figuring out if a given book can be reprinted is prohibitively difficult for publishers, and that's with works that only have one single author.
- Sleaker 11y ago
  I think you got it backwards, the massive inconvenience for everyone is that Linux is using the GPL and people don't want to have to deal with all the re-licensing compatibility bullshit just to be able to distribute a binary of some other FOSS. seriously, CDDL is FSF/OSI approved. Sure, Oracle could resolve it by switching to a GPL compatible license, but the problem is not oracle's clearly free software. The problem is GPL forcibly does not allow perfectly fine open source licensed software to be distributed in binary form due to it's copyleft.
  - davexunit 11y ago
    The GPL is not to blame here, it's doing its job.
  - chimeracoder 11y ago
    > seriously, CDDL is FSF/OSI approved. ...as is the GPL, which is also written by the FSF. I'm not sure what point you're trying to make by saying this. Many FSF/OSI-approved licenses are not pairwise-compatible with each other. It's not limited to either the GPL or the CDDL. > but the problem is not oracle's clearly free software. The problem is as much Oracle as it is Linux. Especially since, as noted in other comments, the CDDL was created specifically to be incompatible with Linux's license. > The problem is GPL forcibly does not allow perfectly fine open source licensed software to be distributed in binary form due to it's copyleft. This isn't an accurate description either of the GPL or of the incompatibility at play here.
    - mh8h 11y ago
      I agree, many of the open source licenses are not pairwise-compatible. But the fact that GPL is a strong copyleft license makes collaboration more difficult. And the idea that CDDL was made specifically to be incompatible with GPL is at best a speculation. See Bryan Cantrill's video about the history of Solaris [0] and about different licenses [1] [0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-zRN7XLCRhc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-zRN7XLCRhc [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pm8P4oCIY3g https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pm8P4oCIY3g
      - chimeracoder 11y ago
        > But the fact that GPL is a strong copyleft license makes collaboration more difficult. The problem is that both the GPL and the CDDL prevent further restrictions to the license. This actually has very little to do with the copyleft; plenty of other licenses (including the CDDL) prevent further restrictions on redistribution, even without imposing a copyleft.
  - geofft 11y ago
    GPL is "clearly free software" too, and FSF/OSI approved too. The problem is that the GPL and the CDDL both have no-further-restrictions clauses, as mentioned in the article: > 6. …You may not impose any further restrictions on the recipients' exercise of the rights granted herein. > 3.4 … You may not offer or impose any terms on any Covered Software in Source Code form that alters or restricts the applicable version of this License The situation would be exactly the same if, say, Linux were under the CDDL and ZFS were under the 4-clause BSD license, or the OpenSSL license, or Creative Commons, or the MPL 1.0, or whatever. The GPL and the CDDL both have exactly the same "problem" here.
ossreality 11y ago
> the GPL brigade is getting louder in their intolerance of other licences. I can't even
mbreese 11y ago
I like how the article implies that Oracle could "simply" relicense code that has been around for a decade. Nothing is that "simple".
- rdtsc 11y ago
  It is a lot simpler for them to re-license than to re-license the Linux kernel. I think that was the point.
  - mioelnir 11y ago
    Only by a linear factor. Current OpenZFS is no longer the Sun released ZFSv28 code of old. Oracle does not have the copyright for these important, non-trivial parts. If the point of the SFC is that those 10 years of non-Oracle/SUN development can be ignored, than on the same basis all the extensions to Linus' code can be ignored as well and he can simply relicense. But that is not something they want to argue, since they rely on ownership transference of some of those parts.
csirac2 11y ago
I read it as pointing out that it's not up to Canonical to defacto re-license other people's work. Only the copyright holder can do that.
- vacri 11y ago
  I read the article as "Despite the SF Conservancy grasping for any money at all to merely keep the lights on, we're going to waste time pursuing a licensing issue which boils down to "distribute the binary, not okay; distribute the source + tell user to 'make', okay". The essence of these two positions is pretty subtle, and not something that I think a running-on-fumes organisation should be pursuing. I started donating to them last month; this article makes me wonder if I should retract that. What Canonical is doing isn't really violating the spirit of the distribution of ZFS - fundamentally, what is the difference between 'binary' and 'source + make' in this context? It's still intended to be shared. The article is a legal opinion, it took a fair amount of time to write, and talks about a lot of communication with other parties.
  - csirac2 11y ago
    > "distribute the binary, not okay; distribute the source + tell user to 'make', okay" That's literally what the GPL says. Look, I'm not a GPL zealot. The only thing even vaguely worth releasing, I've released 2-clause BSD. But we can't just pick which bits of a license we feel good about and ignore the bits we don't - that doesn't exactly make a strong case for potential GPL violators to give a shit about copyright. It's crappy behaviour from Canonical. I think there's another strategic motive here, they know they're stretching things a lot here but perhaps they see this as a catalyst to finally see some movement on ZFS licensing by various parties (or maybe they're acting on VMWare's behalf by sucking energy away from SC's VMWare case)
    - vacri 11y ago
      No, the essence of the GPL is about providing the source code. It's "you can't provide binaries without also providing source code", not "you can't do binaries". > But we can't just pick which bits of a license... Talk to people who work in legal aid agencies, and they'll tell you about triaging their limited resources; that they sometimes have to leave heartbreaking cases alone because other cases are more important. My point isn't about the technicalities of the case, it's about a group that is desperate for funds to merely 'keep the lights on' not triaging their limited resources appropriately. On a tangent, I also wholeheartedly disagree with their contention that "almost there" is more painful than "absent". That is a piece of political bullshit (and I've recently ranted on progressives pissing on each other here https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11133321 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11133321) and it smells to me more like they've got an axe to grind with Canonical and are looking for ammunition. It smells doubly that way because they give Debian a pass principally because they merely label the software 'contrib', and only secondarily because no binary is in contrib, only source. Short form: The SFC wants to chase down GPL violators and has suboptimal funds. Would you prefer them to spend their resources chasing down the violations where the offender provides no source code, or the violations that can be sidestepped by typing 'make' into a terminal? Do you honestly believe that Oracle would be moved a single jot by Canonical putting up a wiki page that says "type make!" rather than provide the binary directly?

chimeracoder 11y ago

> the GPL brigade is getting louder in their intolerance of other licences. I really don't see much evidence of this, certainly not from the FSF/SFC, who specifically do not discourage use of free licenses that are GPL-compatible, such as the BSD and MIT licenses[0]. The anti-GPL crowd is much more vocal about their distaste for the GPL, especially on forums like HN. The issue at hand is the use of a license which is not compatible with the GPL. No matter which way you slice it, that's a massive inconvenience to everyone, and pretty much nobody wins as a result. (As for relicensing, it is literally impossible to change the license of Linux at this point, because the rights are held by thousands of contributors individually (some of whom are dead, and tracking copyright as it passes across estates is a notoriously difficult task[1]). If there's ever going to be a reconciliation between ZFS and Linux, it would require Oracle to relicense ZFS under any one of the many GPL-compatible licenses.) [0] They do, incidentally, discourage the use of the terms "BSD license" and "MIT license", arguing that those are ambiguous and should be deprecated in favor of "3-clause BSD license" and "X11 license", respectively. But that has nothing to do with the discussion at hand, which is about the use of the actual licenses themselves and the terms they represent, not the names that people use to call them. [1] Even figuring out if a given book can be reprinted is prohibitively difficult for publishers, and that's with works that only have one single author.

Sleaker 11y ago
I think you got it backwards, the massive inconvenience for everyone is that Linux is using the GPL and people don't want to have to deal with all the re-licensing compatibility bullshit just to be able to distribute a binary of some other FOSS. seriously, CDDL is FSF/OSI approved. Sure, Oracle could resolve it by switching to a GPL compatible license, but the problem is not oracle's clearly free software. The problem is GPL forcibly does not allow perfectly fine open source licensed software to be distributed in binary form due to it's copyleft.
- davexunit 11y ago
  The GPL is not to blame here, it's doing its job.
- chimeracoder 11y ago
  > seriously, CDDL is FSF/OSI approved. ...as is the GPL, which is also written by the FSF. I'm not sure what point you're trying to make by saying this. Many FSF/OSI-approved licenses are not pairwise-compatible with each other. It's not limited to either the GPL or the CDDL. > but the problem is not oracle's clearly free software. The problem is as much Oracle as it is Linux. Especially since, as noted in other comments, the CDDL was created specifically to be incompatible with Linux's license. > The problem is GPL forcibly does not allow perfectly fine open source licensed software to be distributed in binary form due to it's copyleft. This isn't an accurate description either of the GPL or of the incompatibility at play here.
  - mh8h 11y ago
    I agree, many of the open source licenses are not pairwise-compatible. But the fact that GPL is a strong copyleft license makes collaboration more difficult. And the idea that CDDL was made specifically to be incompatible with GPL is at best a speculation. See Bryan Cantrill's video about the history of Solaris [0] and about different licenses [1] [0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-zRN7XLCRhc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-zRN7XLCRhc [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pm8P4oCIY3g https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pm8P4oCIY3g
    - chimeracoder 11y ago
      > But the fact that GPL is a strong copyleft license makes collaboration more difficult. The problem is that both the GPL and the CDDL prevent further restrictions to the license. This actually has very little to do with the copyleft; plenty of other licenses (including the CDDL) prevent further restrictions on redistribution, even without imposing a copyleft.
- geofft 11y ago
  GPL is "clearly free software" too, and FSF/OSI approved too. The problem is that the GPL and the CDDL both have no-further-restrictions clauses, as mentioned in the article: > 6. …You may not impose any further restrictions on the recipients' exercise of the rights granted herein. > 3.4 … You may not offer or impose any terms on any Covered Software in Source Code form that alters or restricts the applicable version of this License The situation would be exactly the same if, say, Linux were under the CDDL and ZFS were under the 4-clause BSD license, or the OpenSSL license, or Creative Commons, or the MPL 1.0, or whatever. The GPL and the CDDL both have exactly the same "problem" here.

ossreality 11y ago

> the GPL brigade is getting louder in their intolerance of other licences. I can't even

mbreese 11y ago

I like how the article implies that Oracle could "simply" relicense code that has been around for a decade. Nothing is that "simple".

rdtsc 11y ago
It is a lot simpler for them to re-license than to re-license the Linux kernel. I think that was the point.
- mioelnir 11y ago
  Only by a linear factor. Current OpenZFS is no longer the Sun released ZFSv28 code of old. Oracle does not have the copyright for these important, non-trivial parts. If the point of the SFC is that those 10 years of non-Oracle/SUN development can be ignored, than on the same basis all the extensions to Linus' code can be ignored as well and he can simply relicense. But that is not something they want to argue, since they rely on ownership transference of some of those parts.

csirac2 11y ago

I read it as pointing out that it's not up to Canonical to defacto re-license other people's work. Only the copyright holder can do that.

vacri 11y ago
I read the article as "Despite the SF Conservancy grasping for any money at all to merely keep the lights on, we're going to waste time pursuing a licensing issue which boils down to "distribute the binary, not okay; distribute the source + tell user to 'make', okay". The essence of these two positions is pretty subtle, and not something that I think a running-on-fumes organisation should be pursuing. I started donating to them last month; this article makes me wonder if I should retract that. What Canonical is doing isn't really violating the spirit of the distribution of ZFS - fundamentally, what is the difference between 'binary' and 'source + make' in this context? It's still intended to be shared. The article is a legal opinion, it took a fair amount of time to write, and talks about a lot of communication with other parties.
- csirac2 11y ago
  > "distribute the binary, not okay; distribute the source + tell user to 'make', okay" That's literally what the GPL says. Look, I'm not a GPL zealot. The only thing even vaguely worth releasing, I've released 2-clause BSD. But we can't just pick which bits of a license we feel good about and ignore the bits we don't - that doesn't exactly make a strong case for potential GPL violators to give a shit about copyright. It's crappy behaviour from Canonical. I think there's another strategic motive here, they know they're stretching things a lot here but perhaps they see this as a catalyst to finally see some movement on ZFS licensing by various parties (or maybe they're acting on VMWare's behalf by sucking energy away from SC's VMWare case)
  - vacri 11y ago
    No, the essence of the GPL is about providing the source code. It's "you can't provide binaries without also providing source code", not "you can't do binaries". > But we can't just pick which bits of a license... Talk to people who work in legal aid agencies, and they'll tell you about triaging their limited resources; that they sometimes have to leave heartbreaking cases alone because other cases are more important. My point isn't about the technicalities of the case, it's about a group that is desperate for funds to merely 'keep the lights on' not triaging their limited resources appropriately. On a tangent, I also wholeheartedly disagree with their contention that "almost there" is more painful than "absent". That is a piece of political bullshit (and I've recently ranted on progressives pissing on each other here https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11133321 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11133321) and it smells to me more like they've got an axe to grind with Canonical and are looking for ammunition. It smells doubly that way because they give Debian a pass principally because they merely label the software 'contrib', and only secondarily because no binary is in contrib, only source. Short form: The SFC wants to chase down GPL violators and has suboptimal funds. Would you prefer them to spend their resources chasing down the violations where the offender provides no source code, or the violations that can be sidestepped by typing 'make' into a terminal? Do you honestly believe that Oracle would be moved a single jot by Canonical putting up a wiki page that says "type make!" rather than provide the binary directly?