4 ms·
Think of it like a blackbox reimplementation, not porting existing code to another language: https://github.com/uutils/coreutils/blob/244693f50e224abf72686305c
by Aissen 3y ago
Think of it like a blackbox reimplementation, not porting existing code to another language:
https://github.com/uutils/coreutils/blob/244693f50e224abf72686305cbc784fd5f3b022d/CONTRIBUTING.md?plain=1#L17-L21 https://github.com/uutils/coreutils/blob/244693f50e224abf726...
- cmrdporcupine 3y agoCan we truly believe that not a single one of these authors didn't peak over at the GNU coreutils source to get a handle on how something there worked?
- Aissen 3y agoYou can believe it or not, but please stop spreading FUD disguised as a question. If you have proofs, you can post them, and then interested people can try to dissect them.
- nairboon 3y agoThat warning was added 2 months ago.
- Aissen 3y agoMaybe they got tired of people making unsubstantiated remarks that were never made for bsdutils, busybox or toybox ? Just look at the level of the current HN discussion.
- nairboon 3y agoIs this discussion about bdsutils? Why do you dismiss the whole legal discussion as 'unsubstantiated remarks'? It is certainly a valid issue for a non-GPL rewrite of a GPL software.
- Aissen 3y agoI dismiss it because I haven't seen substantiated remarks; i.e proof that anyone actually looked at the source of coreutils to do the the reimplementation.
- pama 3y agoNobody has to look at the code to violate the GPL though. An acccidental identical implementation or one spewed out by an LLM counts as a simple translation would largely place the new code under GPL at a technical level. I don’t see the point really for not simply adding rust to enhance a fork of gnu binutils, except for the license change, and the license change is super hard to defend in the long term future when it will be easy to identify translations of the original code.
- Aissen 3y ago> Nobody has to look at the code to violate the GPL though Accidental identical implementation of something trivial aren't covered by copyright, see the Oracle vs Google lawsuit. LLM completions are something else entirely.
- pama 3y agoAgreed on the accidental reimplementation of something trivial. The distinction of what is trivial will be harder to clarify in the future, however the language models in the future can also help identify the provenance of substantial parts of the code and eventually it will be easier for GNU, if they care, to have a strong argument. I suspect GNU will not care until somebody plays foul, so GNU can wait for a long time until that happens and until the tools are substantially better. I just find it a little sad that the effort is bifurcated into competing camps. Maybe eventually gnu binutils will also start a rust clone for parts of their binutils and make this effort obsolete at the technical level.
- sokoloff 3y agoGPL is based on copyright law. Independent creation is a defense against copyright infringement under US copyright law. (How could it not be?)
- LaGrange 3y agoThey have hundreds of contributors and they don't audit them. This is not a blackbox reimplementation.
- Aissen 3y ago> They have hundreds of contributors and they don't audit them Thank you for copying the SCO FUD playbook, I hadn't heard that one in a while: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fear,_uncertainty,_and_doubt#SCO_v._IBM https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fear,_uncertainty,_and_doubt#S...
- LaGrange 3y agoSee, the difference here is that SCO was scum, and in this case the people who re-implement GPL tools on permissive licenses are scum.
- andrewshadura 3y ago[flagged]
- LaGrange 3y ago[flagged]