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> how anyone would object to it OpenBSD is objecting to it like so[1]: > [...] In particular, if you use code under the Apache 2 license, some of your rights

> how anyone would object to it OpenBSD is objecting to it like so[1]: > [...] In particular, if you use code under the Apache 2 license, some of your rights will terminate if you claim in court that the code violates a patent. > A license can only be considered fully permissive if it allows use by anyone for all the future without giving up any of their rights. If there are conditions that might terminate any rights in the future, or if you have to give up a right that you would otherwise have, even if exercising that right could reasonably be regarded as morally objectionable, the code is not free. > In addition, the clause about the patent license is problematic because a patent license cannot be granted under Copyright law, but only under contract law, which drags the whole license into the domain of contract law. But while Copyright law is somewhat standardized by international agreements, contract law differs wildly among jurisdictions. So what the license means in different jurisdictions may vary and is hard to predict. [1] https://www.openbsd.org/policy.html https://www.openbsd.org/policy.html

chandlerc1024 8y ago
True. FWIW, this is really the only strong objection we've heard to the overall direction of this change.
- notaplumber 8y ago
  And considering all the interesting work that OpenBSD is doing to Clang, i.e: retguard [0] [1], ROP gadget reduction framework [2]. Ignoring the fact that two major open source *BSD operating systems use and ship LLVM/Clang as their default system compiler. Their entire system compiled with clang, LLD as the default linker for an increasing number of supported platforms. A ports tree with between 10,000 (OpenBSD) to 30,000 (FreeBSD) ports compiled with Clang, maintaining patches upstreams won't take.. .. You might think that objection would be listened to more readily, or do the interest of a handful of corporations hold greater weight? OpenBSD will undoubtedly be forced to fork LLVM 8, and likely have to take on the burden of asking individual developers to dual-license contributions they backport going forward. This will place them in a similar position they had with GCC, since the GPLv3 license change. [0] https://github.com/openbsd/src/commit/e688c2b0648a80551cf7353d9f455c7cbb98f13c https://github.com/openbsd/src/commit/e688c2b0648a80551cf735... [1] https://github.com/openbsd/src/commit/9866f44de26a847eaed067d23d8660b7dca51614 https://github.com/openbsd/src/commit/9866f44de26a847eaed067... [2] https://github.com/openbsd/src/commit/c0f0c565f0b312e55b410ba69f4b621a01ef54cb https://github.com/openbsd/src/commit/c0f0c565f0b312e55b410b... Mark Kettenis formal rejection on behalf of the OpenBSD project: http://lists.llvm.org/pipermail/llvm-dev/2017-April/112300.html http://lists.llvm.org/pipermail/llvm-dev/2017-April/112300.h...
  - chandlerc1024 8y ago
    FreeBSD is OK with the license, so AFAIK, it is just OpenBSD. We did listen, but we have specific goals that after a great deal of discussion are best addressed with the approach of the Apache 2 license. The objection was to those goals in many ways, not to the particular mechanisms. And we really did listen to the concerns about the goals (specifically providing strong protection against patent issues) but there was strong consensus in the community that this was a real problem we wanted to address, and so we moved forward. I am truly sad that this will cause issues w/ the OpenBSD community, but we had consensus and needed to make progress.
    - apotheon 8y ago
      I think I know what you mean when you say "consensus" here, but that's not what "consensus" really means. Perhaps you want a word more like "majority".
tadfisher 8y ago
The last objection doesn't make any sense. This is a license, so it is a grant of rights under contract law no matter what rights are granted or terminated. If you sue someone for breach of copyright, inevitably the case will be "dragged into contract law" if the defendant claims to have a license to the copyright. I don't believe there is a distinction between patent and copyright here, as a grant of either via a license is a contract.
- apotheon 8y ago
  Software licensing is not necessarily related to contract law. Many software licenses do not fully qualify as contracts, because they are just a grant subject to qualification, rather than an (assumed) agreement between parties about terms of exchange or something to that effect. I'm not entirely sure how patent grant drags in contract law, though. It might be the fact that it implies reciprocal patent grants. You might have to ask a lawyer for the distinguishing issue here.
ksec 8y ago
I may be completely talking out of my bottom. The reason for relicensing were to do with Patents. Do ALL Patents have be under Contract law and not under Copyright law? Or it is actually possible to have a license that fits the spirit of BSD, with GPL compatibility while having patents protection without the objection of OpenBSD ideals?

chandlerc1024 8y ago

True. FWIW, this is really the only strong objection we've heard to the overall direction of this change.

notaplumber 8y ago
And considering all the interesting work that OpenBSD is doing to Clang, i.e: retguard [0] [1], ROP gadget reduction framework [2]. Ignoring the fact that two major open source *BSD operating systems use and ship LLVM/Clang as their default system compiler. Their entire system compiled with clang, LLD as the default linker for an increasing number of supported platforms. A ports tree with between 10,000 (OpenBSD) to 30,000 (FreeBSD) ports compiled with Clang, maintaining patches upstreams won't take.. .. You might think that objection would be listened to more readily, or do the interest of a handful of corporations hold greater weight? OpenBSD will undoubtedly be forced to fork LLVM 8, and likely have to take on the burden of asking individual developers to dual-license contributions they backport going forward. This will place them in a similar position they had with GCC, since the GPLv3 license change. [0] https://github.com/openbsd/src/commit/e688c2b0648a80551cf7353d9f455c7cbb98f13c https://github.com/openbsd/src/commit/e688c2b0648a80551cf735... [1] https://github.com/openbsd/src/commit/9866f44de26a847eaed067d23d8660b7dca51614 https://github.com/openbsd/src/commit/9866f44de26a847eaed067... [2] https://github.com/openbsd/src/commit/c0f0c565f0b312e55b410ba69f4b621a01ef54cb https://github.com/openbsd/src/commit/c0f0c565f0b312e55b410b... Mark Kettenis formal rejection on behalf of the OpenBSD project: http://lists.llvm.org/pipermail/llvm-dev/2017-April/112300.html http://lists.llvm.org/pipermail/llvm-dev/2017-April/112300.h...
- chandlerc1024 8y ago
  FreeBSD is OK with the license, so AFAIK, it is just OpenBSD. We did listen, but we have specific goals that after a great deal of discussion are best addressed with the approach of the Apache 2 license. The objection was to those goals in many ways, not to the particular mechanisms. And we really did listen to the concerns about the goals (specifically providing strong protection against patent issues) but there was strong consensus in the community that this was a real problem we wanted to address, and so we moved forward. I am truly sad that this will cause issues w/ the OpenBSD community, but we had consensus and needed to make progress.
  - apotheon 8y ago
    I think I know what you mean when you say "consensus" here, but that's not what "consensus" really means. Perhaps you want a word more like "majority".

tadfisher 8y ago

The last objection doesn't make any sense. This is a license, so it is a grant of rights under contract law no matter what rights are granted or terminated. If you sue someone for breach of copyright, inevitably the case will be "dragged into contract law" if the defendant claims to have a license to the copyright. I don't believe there is a distinction between patent and copyright here, as a grant of either via a license is a contract.

apotheon 8y ago
Software licensing is not necessarily related to contract law. Many software licenses do not fully qualify as contracts, because they are just a grant subject to qualification, rather than an (assumed) agreement between parties about terms of exchange or something to that effect. I'm not entirely sure how patent grant drags in contract law, though. It might be the fact that it implies reciprocal patent grants. You might have to ask a lawyer for the distinguishing issue here.

ksec 8y ago

I may be completely talking out of my bottom. The reason for relicensing were to do with Patents. Do ALL Patents have be under Contract law and not under Copyright law? Or it is actually possible to have a license that fits the spirit of BSD, with GPL compatibility while having patents protection without the objection of OpenBSD ideals?