7 ms·

Does Oracle own the code for all of the existent OpenZFS code that Canonical imported? If not, then doesn't there exist the same issue that all of the develope

by dsp1234 11y ago

Does Oracle own the code for all of the existent OpenZFS code that Canonical imported? If not, then doesn't there exist the same issue that all of the developers would also need to relicense?

ori_b 11y ago
Companies generally require copyright assignment.
ajross 11y ago
Arrgh. The same issue in principle, but not in practice. "All the developers" of OpenZFS are Oracle Corporation, plus a few dozen other folks we can grep from the commit log. And if they don't consent and Oracle does, surely the community can duplicate the effort quickly. In practice (that word again) all the meaningful copyright to ZFS sits inside Oracle headquarters. It's just not the same. (Also, as another poster points out, it's possible that all OpenZFS copyright is already assigned to Oracle -- I have no particular knowledge)
- dsp1234 11y ago
  No need to "Arrgh.". I'm asking serious questions that seem relevant, in which I'm interesting in getting actual opinions. And if they don't consent and Oracle does, surely the community can duplicate the effort quickly. it's possible that all OpenZFS copyright is already assigned to Oracle -- I have no particular knowledge As a reference, the AUTHORS[0] file from the 'zfs on linux' project that was imported into ubuntu lists 73 authors not including the Oracle developers, which appear to be both individuals (gmail accounts, etc) and multiple individual businesses (nexenta, ovh, etc) This still seems to fall in to the category of "It's must be easy for you, because I could totally do it in 2 hours" that developers (such as myself) sometimes fall into where a task is deemed 'easy' because the complexity is hidden. It really seems like neither could easily relicense, so there is no magic wand. [0] - http://kernel.ubuntu.com/git/ubuntu/ubuntu-xenial.git/diff/zfs/AUTHORS?id=b65ce14d3445e8fe69b5d59aaaf2699319714179 http://kernel.ubuntu.com/git/ubuntu/ubuntu-xenial.git/diff/z...
  - ajross 11y ago
    Sorry, I'm compelled to emit another "arrgh". Look, ZFS on linux is a comparatively small community project with a comparatively small number of developers as such things go. To argue that this requires significant hassle to relicense is... probably correct. If Oracle were to relicense ZFS under GPLv2, the community would have to do some work (in the worst case asymptote: they'd have to duplicate the work that's already been done). To argue that this is somehow of equivalent complexity to relicensing the entire Linux kernel is... I dunno, I've used up my "arrgh" for this post. Seriously, I don't understand what you're arguing here.
    - dsp1234 11y ago
      Seriously, I don't understand what you're arguing here. I'll try to be a little clearer, but it's basically what I started with and ended with (which you actually appear to agree with) 1.) SFC says 'in this context, Oracle could make everyone's life easier by waving their magic relicensing wand' 2.) I say 'That's not much of an argument.' 3.) I say 'lists 73 authors not including the Oracle developers, which appear to be both individuals (gmail accounts, etc) and multiple individual businesses (nexenta, ovh, etc)' 4.) I say 'It really seems like neither could easily relicense, so there is no magic wand.' In other words, there is no 'magic wand' because even if Oracle magically did there thing it would not fix the issue that FSC has with Canonical because the actual 'ZFS on Linux' code would still be licensed as CDDL. So it's 'not much of an argument' because it would be hard (if even possible) to get every ZoL contributor to relicense, and thus doesn't solve the problem. To argue that this is somehow of equivalent complexity You seem to be getting stuck on some issue of relicensing being equivalent. From a mathematical point of view, I'm sure you could assign some probability to both events (with Linux relicensing having a smaller chance), but it seems like for all intents and purposes, it's zero (even if Oracle relicensed). Do two events have to have equivalent complexity in order to be basically irrelevant as FSC argument? Seems to me like it's just FSC finger-pointing as rhetorical trick (and thus my pointing out it's lack of merit)
      - belorn 11y ago
        VLC re-licensed their project and they had 300 authors. When people talked about the feasibility of re-license linux to gplv3 (as a thought experiment), people talked about several thousands of authors under the time period of almost 30 years. Several of them are dead. But the discussion here also lack a significant detail; the target license for which ZFS would switch to. Commenters here on HN has said (unsourced) that the original developers has expressed an opinion that it all would be better if ZFS would be Apache licensed. That way it would be compatible with both GPLv2 and CDDL licensed contributions, and everyone would stop bugging ZFS about it.
- qaq 11y ago
  Majority of ZFS (all?) developers left SUN after it was acquired by Oracle.
  - SoftwareMaven 11y ago
    That part doesn't matter. Ownership of work done by SUN employees would have been transferred to SUN, then transferred to Oracle. Ownership of work done by Oracle employees would have been transferred to Oracle. It's only the non-SUN/Oracle bits that matter.
    - qaq 11y ago
      Point is Oracle does not own a copyright on a lot of the openZFS contributions so they by themselves can not relicense it.
- cyphar 11y ago
  > Arrgh. The same issue in principle, but not in practice. "All the developers" of OpenZFS are Oracle Corporation, plus a few dozen other folks we can grep from the commit log. That's just patently not true. All of the BSD and Illumos guys all are the main source of ZFS talent. > (Also, as another poster points out, it's possible that all OpenZFS copyright is already assigned to Oracle -- I have no particular knowledge) No, that was how it worked before the OpenSolaris proprietarisation fiasco. Now, everyone retains the copyrights IIRC.
dap 11y ago
No. Despite what other replies to your post have said, several companies (and many individuals) have contributed large pieces to ZFS, and they still hold copyright.
- carussell 11y ago
  Unless a project published under CDDL includes a conspicuous notice saying that no future versions published by Sun shall apply to the software, then the project is totally at the whim of Sun, who is allowed to relicense it under whichever terms it wants, at any time. See my other comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/edit?id=11177827 https://news.ycombinator.com/edit?id=11177827

by dsp1234 11y ago

Does Oracle own the code for all of the existent OpenZFS code that Canonical imported? If not, then doesn't there exist the same issue that all of the developers would also need to relicense?

ori_b 11y ago

Companies generally require copyright assignment.

ajross 11y ago

Arrgh. The same issue in principle, but not in practice. "All the developers" of OpenZFS are Oracle Corporation, plus a few dozen other folks we can grep from the commit log. And if they don't consent and Oracle does, surely the community can duplicate the effort quickly. In practice (that word again) all the meaningful copyright to ZFS sits inside Oracle headquarters. It's just not the same. (Also, as another poster points out, it's possible that all OpenZFS copyright is already assigned to Oracle -- I have no particular knowledge)

dsp1234 11y ago
No need to "Arrgh.". I'm asking serious questions that seem relevant, in which I'm interesting in getting actual opinions. And if they don't consent and Oracle does, surely the community can duplicate the effort quickly. it's possible that all OpenZFS copyright is already assigned to Oracle -- I have no particular knowledge As a reference, the AUTHORS[0] file from the 'zfs on linux' project that was imported into ubuntu lists 73 authors not including the Oracle developers, which appear to be both individuals (gmail accounts, etc) and multiple individual businesses (nexenta, ovh, etc) This still seems to fall in to the category of "It's must be easy for you, because I could totally do it in 2 hours" that developers (such as myself) sometimes fall into where a task is deemed 'easy' because the complexity is hidden. It really seems like neither could easily relicense, so there is no magic wand. [0] - http://kernel.ubuntu.com/git/ubuntu/ubuntu-xenial.git/diff/zfs/AUTHORS?id=b65ce14d3445e8fe69b5d59aaaf2699319714179 http://kernel.ubuntu.com/git/ubuntu/ubuntu-xenial.git/diff/z...
- ajross 11y ago
  Sorry, I'm compelled to emit another "arrgh". Look, ZFS on linux is a comparatively small community project with a comparatively small number of developers as such things go. To argue that this requires significant hassle to relicense is... probably correct. If Oracle were to relicense ZFS under GPLv2, the community would have to do some work (in the worst case asymptote: they'd have to duplicate the work that's already been done). To argue that this is somehow of equivalent complexity to relicensing the entire Linux kernel is... I dunno, I've used up my "arrgh" for this post. Seriously, I don't understand what you're arguing here.
  - dsp1234 11y ago
    Seriously, I don't understand what you're arguing here. I'll try to be a little clearer, but it's basically what I started with and ended with (which you actually appear to agree with) 1.) SFC says 'in this context, Oracle could make everyone's life easier by waving their magic relicensing wand' 2.) I say 'That's not much of an argument.' 3.) I say 'lists 73 authors not including the Oracle developers, which appear to be both individuals (gmail accounts, etc) and multiple individual businesses (nexenta, ovh, etc)' 4.) I say 'It really seems like neither could easily relicense, so there is no magic wand.' In other words, there is no 'magic wand' because even if Oracle magically did there thing it would not fix the issue that FSC has with Canonical because the actual 'ZFS on Linux' code would still be licensed as CDDL. So it's 'not much of an argument' because it would be hard (if even possible) to get every ZoL contributor to relicense, and thus doesn't solve the problem. To argue that this is somehow of equivalent complexity You seem to be getting stuck on some issue of relicensing being equivalent. From a mathematical point of view, I'm sure you could assign some probability to both events (with Linux relicensing having a smaller chance), but it seems like for all intents and purposes, it's zero (even if Oracle relicensed). Do two events have to have equivalent complexity in order to be basically irrelevant as FSC argument? Seems to me like it's just FSC finger-pointing as rhetorical trick (and thus my pointing out it's lack of merit)
    - belorn 11y ago
      VLC re-licensed their project and they had 300 authors. When people talked about the feasibility of re-license linux to gplv3 (as a thought experiment), people talked about several thousands of authors under the time period of almost 30 years. Several of them are dead. But the discussion here also lack a significant detail; the target license for which ZFS would switch to. Commenters here on HN has said (unsourced) that the original developers has expressed an opinion that it all would be better if ZFS would be Apache licensed. That way it would be compatible with both GPLv2 and CDDL licensed contributions, and everyone would stop bugging ZFS about it.
qaq 11y ago
Majority of ZFS (all?) developers left SUN after it was acquired by Oracle.
- SoftwareMaven 11y ago
  That part doesn't matter. Ownership of work done by SUN employees would have been transferred to SUN, then transferred to Oracle. Ownership of work done by Oracle employees would have been transferred to Oracle. It's only the non-SUN/Oracle bits that matter.
  - qaq 11y ago
    Point is Oracle does not own a copyright on a lot of the openZFS contributions so they by themselves can not relicense it.
cyphar 11y ago
> Arrgh. The same issue in principle, but not in practice. "All the developers" of OpenZFS are Oracle Corporation, plus a few dozen other folks we can grep from the commit log. That's just patently not true. All of the BSD and Illumos guys all are the main source of ZFS talent. > (Also, as another poster points out, it's possible that all OpenZFS copyright is already assigned to Oracle -- I have no particular knowledge) No, that was how it worked before the OpenSolaris proprietarisation fiasco. Now, everyone retains the copyrights IIRC.

dap 11y ago

No. Despite what other replies to your post have said, several companies (and many individuals) have contributed large pieces to ZFS, and they still hold copyright.

carussell 11y ago
Unless a project published under CDDL includes a conspicuous notice saying that no future versions published by Sun shall apply to the software, then the project is totally at the whim of Sun, who is allowed to relicense it under whichever terms it wants, at any time. See my other comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/edit?id=11177827 https://news.ycombinator.com/edit?id=11177827