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Some of us are very concerned about licensing at all times. I'd wager such steadfast concern is ultimately what helped Linux in matters of SCO v. IBM over the m

Some of us are very concerned about licensing at all times. I'd wager such steadfast concern is ultimately what helped Linux in matters of SCO v. IBM over the matters of IBM's JFS file system. ZFS is very much in a grey area, and in turn, a huge turn off for many.

josteink 9y ago
> ZFS is very much in a grey area Really? How so? And if so, what about all those proprietary GPU-driver kernel-modules from AMD and Nvidia which definitely are not compatible with the GPL? Are they a gray area too? And if they're not a gray area... Why is it suddenly a problem that the ZFS kernel-module is not licensed in a GPL-compatible manner? I'm not trying to sound facetious, but I honestly can't see the distinction here. And Linux distros left and right have been distributing closed-source kernel-modules for GPUs for a long time now. So what's the problem? What am I missing?
- riffraff 9y ago
  Closed GPU drivers are made by the companies, which have interest in graphic cards being sold, and not sueing linux users. ZFS on the other hand is owned by Oracle which has no interest in people using linux, nor ZFS if it's not on their proprietary stuff.
  - wizeman 9y ago
    The license incompatibility is on the GPL side, not on the ZFS / closed GPU side. The only ones which could sue are the Linux kernel developers.
    - Manozco 9y ago
      Which includes Oracle, so they could sue Canonical and/or zfs users if I understand everything correctly
      - kayfox 9y ago
        Doesn't Oracle provide a version of ZFS on its Linux?
        riffraff 9y ago
        they don't
    - belorn 9y ago
      Publish the source code files only under GPL and Linux kernel developers will be happy. You might get intro trouble with the ZFS side however, since the CDDL license says: "must also be made available in Source Code form and that Source Code form must be distributed only under the terms of this License". If the Source Code form is only under the terms of the GPL, then the above condition is not met. The law suit would thus come from the ZFS side.
- vetinari 9y ago
  The crucial difference is in distribution, not in usage. AMD and Nvidia distribute a binary module with a thin shim. It is the user who builds this shim and inserts into his kernel. Neither AMD, Nvidia nor any Linux vendor[1] distribute any binary, that links into GPL-ed kernel. The combination is done by the user. And so does the ZoL project. They have the same trade-offs as AMD and Nvidia. It is just much more difficult to install Linux on a filesystem not supported by the installer, than not have working 3D acceleration at setup time though. [1] the distributions take care to have them in separate, third party repos and if you look more closely, you will find they are being build on the user machine using dkms, akmod or similar mechanism. That also trows a wrench into things if you want to use Secure Boot too.
- cyphar 9y ago
  Yes, the proprietary drivers have always been an ethical and legal grey area. However, the way a proprietary driver is distributed is different to how ZFS is distributed. Proprietary drivers are distributed as object code that is then built to be a kernel module on the user's machine. This means that at no point does Nvidia or AMD distribute a Linux kernel module with proprietary code. There are arguments however that distributions which distribute this auto-build scheme by default may also be in violation of the GPL. ZFS is distributed by Canonical as a fully functional kernel module. There's a lot of gray areas because there have not been many legal cases on derived works and the GPL. The GPL itself has held up in court on copyleft grounds, of course. Also, you've got the fact that in the case of proprietary graphics drivers, the threat is that the Linux kernel community would sue Nvidia or AMD. The threat with ZFS is that Oracle (who is a member of the Linux kernel community) would sue people using ZFS (they could also then sue for patent infringement).
  - wizeman 9y ago
    I know in the past NixOS did the same for the ZFS kernel module: prior to NixOS installation, it was able to download the ZFS source code, build it and then load it from inside the installer Live CD/USB while it was running, and this would require just a couple of commands. I don't know if this is still true nowadays or if they just distribute the ZFS kernel module directly in the Live installer.
  - jdboyd 9y ago
    If combining gpl and cddl in a redistributed file is a violation of gpl but not cddl, then what would the holder of the copyright of the cddl code be able to sue about? I think the concern is that a contributor to Linux might sue, just like in the Nvidia/and case.
    - cyphar 9y ago
      Oracle is a contributor to Linux, so they could sue from the GPL side. While Nvidia and AMD also are Linux contributors, the fact they ship proprietary modules would make it hard to argue that they aren't implicitly permitting users to redistribute it (and thus they would be forced to license their drivers under GPLv2). Not to mention that ZFS is covered by Oracle patents. CDDL provides a patent license, but it might be possible for Oracle to sue you for patent infringement if you're distributing code in a way that complicates the licensing. Not that I'm saying that's likely, but Oracle has enough money to ruin you if they want to.
- yellowapple 9y ago
  This is resolvable if you think of a driver "shim" that's a derivative work of both a GPL'd codebase (e.g. Linux) and a non-GPL'd codebase (GPU drivers). It's possible for the GPU driver's proprietary license to permit linking without license restrictions, meaning that a "shim" kernel module which loads the binary blob can be under the kernel's copyleft license without problem (since while it's a derivative work of both the module and the blob, only one license is copyleft). (I don't know if this is what AMD/Nvidia actually do ToS-wise, but it's at least feasible). Doing this for ZFS is harder, since the shim would have to be a derivative work of both a GPL'd codebase and a CDDL'd codebase, neither licenses of which are compatible with one another. Dual-licensing is probably illegal, as is just picking one over the other. IANAL, though, and I might be grossly misunderstanding the problem.
  - belorn 9y ago
    Using a shim to do a legal workaround seems to me as a trick that is unlikely to ever get past a judge. In all other form which people try to do legal workaround in order to turn illegal to legal, it seems that the law don't generally take kindly to it and either explicitly forbids it or just treat the trick as inconsequential to the end result. For example, we have shims in form of dummy organizations, straw owners, money launderer and so on. Neither of those kind of shims work to turn something illegal to legal. Why would some dummy code that sits between two incompatible software work any better in the legal system?
    - yellowapple 9y ago
      "Neither of those kind of shims work to turn something illegal to legal." There's nothing illegal here to try to turn legal, though. If the blob's license permits other software to interface with it without restriction, then the shim is free to be under the GPL per the terms of the other work from which it's derived (Linux). The only way there'd be anything illegal here would be if the blob itself is a derivative work of Linux, and if that's the case, then the blob itself is illegal (since it would be subject to the GPL), regardless of the shim and regardless of whether or not it's distributed as part of a Linux distribution.
boomboomsubban 9y ago
>ZFS is very much in a grey area, and in turn, a huge turn off for many. There is a grey area in distribution, there isn't one about using ZFS. Even the FSF, the group who believe the CDDL and GPL can't be distributed together, say "Privately, You Can Do As You Like." https://www.fsf.org/licensing/zfs-and-linux https://www.fsf.org/licensing/zfs-and-linux
- vertex-four 9y ago
  If I know that Canonical can't legally distribute ZFS in whatever format to me, and yet I use Canonical's distribution of ZFS, isn't there a legal risk there? After all, it would turn out that I have no license to use said distribution of ZFS as such a license was never conferred to me by someone with the legal right to do so. Generally speaking, courts would probably give me the benefit of the doubt if I had no reason to believe that they couldn't distribute it to me - but as I knew they couldn't (the issues with ZFS and the Linux kernel are well-documented), and I knew I'm using it, they'd probably hold me in violation of copyright.
  - boomboomsubban 9y ago
    >If I know that Canonical can't legally distribute ZFS in whatever format to me, and yet I use Canonical's distribution of ZFS, isn't there a legal risk there? If you somehow knew that any form of distribution was illegal that would be the case. I haven't heard anyone saying that's the case, distributing it bundled with GPL software is potentially breaks the GPL.
- cyphar 9y ago
  The CDDL also has patent clauses and so it's conceivable that a user of OpenZFS which received it in a way that violates the OpenZFS license could be liable for patent infringement of an Oracle patent. And there have been many cases of companies suing users of software over patents. Another issue is that you should always get software like your filesystem from your distribution. We do a lot of work making sure that your systems can be safely updated, and making sure that upstream bugs are fixed for our distribution. Even community distributions put a lot of effort into that work. As someone who works on maintaining a distribution (I work for SUSE and contribute to openSUSE), I would guess that most people underestimate how much work you need to devote to maintaining the software in a distribution.

josteink 9y ago

> ZFS is very much in a grey area Really? How so? And if so, what about all those proprietary GPU-driver kernel-modules from AMD and Nvidia which definitely are not compatible with the GPL? Are they a gray area too? And if they're not a gray area... Why is it suddenly a problem that the ZFS kernel-module is not licensed in a GPL-compatible manner? I'm not trying to sound facetious, but I honestly can't see the distinction here. And Linux distros left and right have been distributing closed-source kernel-modules for GPUs for a long time now. So what's the problem? What am I missing?

riffraff 9y ago
Closed GPU drivers are made by the companies, which have interest in graphic cards being sold, and not sueing linux users. ZFS on the other hand is owned by Oracle which has no interest in people using linux, nor ZFS if it's not on their proprietary stuff.
- wizeman 9y ago
  The license incompatibility is on the GPL side, not on the ZFS / closed GPU side. The only ones which could sue are the Linux kernel developers.
  - Manozco 9y ago
    Which includes Oracle, so they could sue Canonical and/or zfs users if I understand everything correctly
    - kayfox 9y ago
      Doesn't Oracle provide a version of ZFS on its Linux?
      - riffraff 9y ago
        they don't
  - belorn 9y ago
    Publish the source code files only under GPL and Linux kernel developers will be happy. You might get intro trouble with the ZFS side however, since the CDDL license says: "must also be made available in Source Code form and that Source Code form must be distributed only under the terms of this License". If the Source Code form is only under the terms of the GPL, then the above condition is not met. The law suit would thus come from the ZFS side.
vetinari 9y ago
The crucial difference is in distribution, not in usage. AMD and Nvidia distribute a binary module with a thin shim. It is the user who builds this shim and inserts into his kernel. Neither AMD, Nvidia nor any Linux vendor[1] distribute any binary, that links into GPL-ed kernel. The combination is done by the user. And so does the ZoL project. They have the same trade-offs as AMD and Nvidia. It is just much more difficult to install Linux on a filesystem not supported by the installer, than not have working 3D acceleration at setup time though. [1] the distributions take care to have them in separate, third party repos and if you look more closely, you will find they are being build on the user machine using dkms, akmod or similar mechanism. That also trows a wrench into things if you want to use Secure Boot too.
cyphar 9y ago
Yes, the proprietary drivers have always been an ethical and legal grey area. However, the way a proprietary driver is distributed is different to how ZFS is distributed. Proprietary drivers are distributed as object code that is then built to be a kernel module on the user's machine. This means that at no point does Nvidia or AMD distribute a Linux kernel module with proprietary code. There are arguments however that distributions which distribute this auto-build scheme by default may also be in violation of the GPL. ZFS is distributed by Canonical as a fully functional kernel module. There's a lot of gray areas because there have not been many legal cases on derived works and the GPL. The GPL itself has held up in court on copyleft grounds, of course. Also, you've got the fact that in the case of proprietary graphics drivers, the threat is that the Linux kernel community would sue Nvidia or AMD. The threat with ZFS is that Oracle (who is a member of the Linux kernel community) would sue people using ZFS (they could also then sue for patent infringement).
- wizeman 9y ago
  I know in the past NixOS did the same for the ZFS kernel module: prior to NixOS installation, it was able to download the ZFS source code, build it and then load it from inside the installer Live CD/USB while it was running, and this would require just a couple of commands. I don't know if this is still true nowadays or if they just distribute the ZFS kernel module directly in the Live installer.
- jdboyd 9y ago
  If combining gpl and cddl in a redistributed file is a violation of gpl but not cddl, then what would the holder of the copyright of the cddl code be able to sue about? I think the concern is that a contributor to Linux might sue, just like in the Nvidia/and case.
  - cyphar 9y ago
    Oracle is a contributor to Linux, so they could sue from the GPL side. While Nvidia and AMD also are Linux contributors, the fact they ship proprietary modules would make it hard to argue that they aren't implicitly permitting users to redistribute it (and thus they would be forced to license their drivers under GPLv2). Not to mention that ZFS is covered by Oracle patents. CDDL provides a patent license, but it might be possible for Oracle to sue you for patent infringement if you're distributing code in a way that complicates the licensing. Not that I'm saying that's likely, but Oracle has enough money to ruin you if they want to.
yellowapple 9y ago
This is resolvable if you think of a driver "shim" that's a derivative work of both a GPL'd codebase (e.g. Linux) and a non-GPL'd codebase (GPU drivers). It's possible for the GPU driver's proprietary license to permit linking without license restrictions, meaning that a "shim" kernel module which loads the binary blob can be under the kernel's copyleft license without problem (since while it's a derivative work of both the module and the blob, only one license is copyleft). (I don't know if this is what AMD/Nvidia actually do ToS-wise, but it's at least feasible). Doing this for ZFS is harder, since the shim would have to be a derivative work of both a GPL'd codebase and a CDDL'd codebase, neither licenses of which are compatible with one another. Dual-licensing is probably illegal, as is just picking one over the other. IANAL, though, and I might be grossly misunderstanding the problem.
- belorn 9y ago
  Using a shim to do a legal workaround seems to me as a trick that is unlikely to ever get past a judge. In all other form which people try to do legal workaround in order to turn illegal to legal, it seems that the law don't generally take kindly to it and either explicitly forbids it or just treat the trick as inconsequential to the end result. For example, we have shims in form of dummy organizations, straw owners, money launderer and so on. Neither of those kind of shims work to turn something illegal to legal. Why would some dummy code that sits between two incompatible software work any better in the legal system?
  - yellowapple 9y ago
    "Neither of those kind of shims work to turn something illegal to legal." There's nothing illegal here to try to turn legal, though. If the blob's license permits other software to interface with it without restriction, then the shim is free to be under the GPL per the terms of the other work from which it's derived (Linux). The only way there'd be anything illegal here would be if the blob itself is a derivative work of Linux, and if that's the case, then the blob itself is illegal (since it would be subject to the GPL), regardless of the shim and regardless of whether or not it's distributed as part of a Linux distribution.

boomboomsubban 9y ago

>ZFS is very much in a grey area, and in turn, a huge turn off for many. There is a grey area in distribution, there isn't one about using ZFS. Even the FSF, the group who believe the CDDL and GPL can't be distributed together, say "Privately, You Can Do As You Like." https://www.fsf.org/licensing/zfs-and-linux https://www.fsf.org/licensing/zfs-and-linux

vertex-four 9y ago
If I know that Canonical can't legally distribute ZFS in whatever format to me, and yet I use Canonical's distribution of ZFS, isn't there a legal risk there? After all, it would turn out that I have no license to use said distribution of ZFS as such a license was never conferred to me by someone with the legal right to do so. Generally speaking, courts would probably give me the benefit of the doubt if I had no reason to believe that they couldn't distribute it to me - but as I knew they couldn't (the issues with ZFS and the Linux kernel are well-documented), and I knew I'm using it, they'd probably hold me in violation of copyright.
- boomboomsubban 9y ago
  >If I know that Canonical can't legally distribute ZFS in whatever format to me, and yet I use Canonical's distribution of ZFS, isn't there a legal risk there? If you somehow knew that any form of distribution was illegal that would be the case. I haven't heard anyone saying that's the case, distributing it bundled with GPL software is potentially breaks the GPL.
cyphar 9y ago
The CDDL also has patent clauses and so it's conceivable that a user of OpenZFS which received it in a way that violates the OpenZFS license could be liable for patent infringement of an Oracle patent. And there have been many cases of companies suing users of software over patents. Another issue is that you should always get software like your filesystem from your distribution. We do a lot of work making sure that your systems can be safely updated, and making sure that upstream bugs are fixed for our distribution. Even community distributions put a lot of effort into that work. As someone who works on maintaining a distribution (I work for SUSE and contribute to openSUSE), I would guess that most people underestimate how much work you need to devote to maintaining the software in a distribution.