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The proprietary firmware is in another git repository [1], there are no blobs in the mainline kernel to my knowledge. Further, distributions ship this firmware

The proprietary firmware is in another git repository [1], there are no blobs in the mainline kernel to my knowledge. Further, distributions ship this firmware as a separate package, so it's not bundled with the kernel. This approach appears to be fairly similar to what OpenBSD does [2]. This doesn't seem too different from how the Linux community treats other licence-incompatible software such as OpenZFS. [1] https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/firmware/linux-firmware.git https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/firmware/lin... [2] http://firmware.openbsd.org/firmware/ http://firmware.openbsd.org/firmware/

nix23 6y ago
Oh whait...why is then ZFS such a big problem? Just put it in a different repo at kernel.org right? Well on the other hand, no one wants ZFS in the mainline kernel, it is perfect like it is, at least for me :)
- morning_gelato 6y ago
  I'm not sure what you mean by ZFS being such a big problem, the CDDL license is considered incompatible and therefore OpenZFS isn't going to be considered for upstreaming. Also, most of OpenZFS development is driven by companies that use it with the Linux kernel, so clearly there isn't that much of a problem with using OpenZFS and Linux. It's pretty similar to how the BSDs may not allow something in base due to licensing, but will allow it in ports/pkg. If you're asking why OpenZFS is not hosted kernel.org, why would kernel.org host an out of tree kernel module that is never going to be upstreamed? Firmware on the other hand is needed to initialize and use a ton of hardware, and so it makes sense to have a central repository for vendors to submit required firmware. More importantly, why would the OpenZFS community even want to be on kernel.org when they support multiple operating systems and have also not pushed for upstreaming? I really don't think OpenZFS is being treated any better or worse than other license-incompatible kernel modules. I just don't see how you can characterize it as zealtory any more so than FreeBSD wanting to remove all GPL'd software from base [1], or OpenBSD sticking with Clang 8 in base because of the switch to the Apache 2.0 license [2]. It's pretty normal for software projects to care about licensing. [1] https://wiki.freebsd.org/GPLinBase https://wiki.freebsd.org/GPLinBase [2] https://lists.llvm.org/pipermail/llvm-dev/2017-April/112300.html https://lists.llvm.org/pipermail/llvm-dev/2017-April/112300....
  - yjftsjthsd-h 6y ago
    Of course ZFS can't be upstreamed (anymore than assorted blobs), but Linux devs have expressed outright animosity towards ZFS: https://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=ZFS-On-Linux-5.0-Problem https://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=ZFS-On-L... > My tolerance for ZFS is pretty non-existant. Sun explicitly did not want their code to work on Linux, so why would we do extra work to get their code to work properly?
    - morning_gelato 6y ago
      Sure, but that's been Greg KH's stance on pretty much every kernel module that has no chance of going upstream [1]. "Simple, get your kernel driver into the main kernel tree (remember we are talking about drivers released under a GPL-compatible license here, if your code doesn't fall under this category, good luck, you are on your own here, you leech)." Also in the post you are citing, the technical change makes no reference to ZFS [2] or implies that the motivation is to break out of tree modules. The upstream community simply doesn't even consider out of tree projects when making changes. Whether that's good or bad is another discussion, but I don't see anything that's specific to ZFS. I should also note that to my knowledge, OpenZFS (formerly ZoL) was the only (open source) ZFS implementation that utilized vectorized checksums. At the very least FreeBSD's in-tree ZFS did not have vectorized checksums, as that was listed as one of the features FreeBSD would gain by moving to OpenZFS [3]. So the cited change didn't break ZFS, it just meant those checksums weren't as fast as they used to be. [1] https://www.kernel.org/doc/Documentation/process/stable-api-nonsense.rst https://www.kernel.org/doc/Documentation/process/stable-api-... [2] https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/torvalds/linux.git/commit/?id=12209993e98c5fa1855c467f22a24e3d5b8be205 https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/torvalds/lin... [3] https://lists.freebsd.org/pipermail/freebsd-current/2018-December/072422.html https://lists.freebsd.org/pipermail/freebsd-current/2018-Dec...
      - nix23 6y ago
        >good luck, you are on your own here, you leech Man i just love that warm, lovely atmosphere in that project..and thats not even the leader....ahem sorry dictator (and he is even proud of that)

nix23 6y ago

Oh whait...why is then ZFS such a big problem? Just put it in a different repo at kernel.org right? Well on the other hand, no one wants ZFS in the mainline kernel, it is perfect like it is, at least for me :)

morning_gelato 6y ago
I'm not sure what you mean by ZFS being such a big problem, the CDDL license is considered incompatible and therefore OpenZFS isn't going to be considered for upstreaming. Also, most of OpenZFS development is driven by companies that use it with the Linux kernel, so clearly there isn't that much of a problem with using OpenZFS and Linux. It's pretty similar to how the BSDs may not allow something in base due to licensing, but will allow it in ports/pkg. If you're asking why OpenZFS is not hosted kernel.org, why would kernel.org host an out of tree kernel module that is never going to be upstreamed? Firmware on the other hand is needed to initialize and use a ton of hardware, and so it makes sense to have a central repository for vendors to submit required firmware. More importantly, why would the OpenZFS community even want to be on kernel.org when they support multiple operating systems and have also not pushed for upstreaming? I really don't think OpenZFS is being treated any better or worse than other license-incompatible kernel modules. I just don't see how you can characterize it as zealtory any more so than FreeBSD wanting to remove all GPL'd software from base [1], or OpenBSD sticking with Clang 8 in base because of the switch to the Apache 2.0 license [2]. It's pretty normal for software projects to care about licensing. [1] https://wiki.freebsd.org/GPLinBase https://wiki.freebsd.org/GPLinBase [2] https://lists.llvm.org/pipermail/llvm-dev/2017-April/112300.html https://lists.llvm.org/pipermail/llvm-dev/2017-April/112300....
- yjftsjthsd-h 6y ago
  Of course ZFS can't be upstreamed (anymore than assorted blobs), but Linux devs have expressed outright animosity towards ZFS: https://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=ZFS-On-Linux-5.0-Problem https://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=ZFS-On-L... > My tolerance for ZFS is pretty non-existant. Sun explicitly did not want their code to work on Linux, so why would we do extra work to get their code to work properly?
  - morning_gelato 6y ago
    Sure, but that's been Greg KH's stance on pretty much every kernel module that has no chance of going upstream [1]. "Simple, get your kernel driver into the main kernel tree (remember we are talking about drivers released under a GPL-compatible license here, if your code doesn't fall under this category, good luck, you are on your own here, you leech)." Also in the post you are citing, the technical change makes no reference to ZFS [2] or implies that the motivation is to break out of tree modules. The upstream community simply doesn't even consider out of tree projects when making changes. Whether that's good or bad is another discussion, but I don't see anything that's specific to ZFS. I should also note that to my knowledge, OpenZFS (formerly ZoL) was the only (open source) ZFS implementation that utilized vectorized checksums. At the very least FreeBSD's in-tree ZFS did not have vectorized checksums, as that was listed as one of the features FreeBSD would gain by moving to OpenZFS [3]. So the cited change didn't break ZFS, it just meant those checksums weren't as fast as they used to be. [1] https://www.kernel.org/doc/Documentation/process/stable-api-nonsense.rst https://www.kernel.org/doc/Documentation/process/stable-api-... [2] https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/torvalds/linux.git/commit/?id=12209993e98c5fa1855c467f22a24e3d5b8be205 https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/torvalds/lin... [3] https://lists.freebsd.org/pipermail/freebsd-current/2018-December/072422.html https://lists.freebsd.org/pipermail/freebsd-current/2018-Dec...
    - nix23 6y ago
      >good luck, you are on your own here, you leech Man i just love that warm, lovely atmosphere in that project..and thats not even the leader....ahem sorry dictator (and he is even proud of that)