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I'm confused. If Berkeley received a GPL license for Plan9, doesn't that mean they can redistribute it under the GPL? From the GPL: You can redistribute it an

I'm confused. If Berkeley received a GPL license for Plan9, doesn't that mean they can redistribute it under the GPL? From the GPL: You can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation; version 2 of the License. I'm assuming "it" in this case refers to the Plan 9 code.

pierrebai 13y ago
4ad is just nit-picking. The labs still only distribute Plan 9 under its own license. Now Plan 9 is available also underthe GPL, but the labs doesn't distribute that version. it's only relevant if they continue to work on it and don't continue to share their changes under the GPL. At worst, there will be a fork under GPL and they will slowly diverge.
- 4ad 13y ago
  My understanding is that the Berkley guys develop akaros and have no interest in maintaining a Plan 9 fork (they just want to integrate some Plan 9 code). Of course, other parties are free to fork the GPL version (not that this will ever happen).
  - lotsofmangos 13y ago
    (not that this will ever happen) Now I'm tempted to do it just to prove a point. edit, just looked it up on github - https://github.com/niktischenko/plan9 https://github.com/niktischenko/plan9 https://github.com/newemu/plan9 https://github.com/newemu/plan9 https://github.com/jamiepg1/plan9 https://github.com/jamiepg1/plan9 oh, and mine now - https://github.com/lotsofmangos/graveRobbers2 https://github.com/lotsofmangos/graveRobbers2 Thanks by the way, I'm going to have to play with it now :)
    - 4ad 13y ago
      Sure, have fun. We'll speak again in one year to see your (and other forks) progress.
      - lotsofmangos 13y ago
        Cool, I'll meet you by the third tree in the old field by the path. Bring biscuits and wear a green hat.
        marshray 13y ago
        Should a body meet a body Coming through the rye, Should a body kiss a body, Need a body cry? O Jenny is all wet, poor body, Jenny is seldom dry: She draggled all her petticoats, Coming through the rye!
      - mattl 13y ago
        Look forward to it. If you meet me online by Grubb's tavern, I will show you where the treasure is hidden.
  - _delirium 13y ago
    Now that there's a GPL version, it does mean other developers of Linux derivatives, or of Linux itself, could mine bits and pieces of the code, though, just like Akaros is doing. I agree a long-running GPL-licensed Plan9 fork isn't that likely, but now that there's even a one-time dump of the code under the GPL, it removes the legal barrier to kernel devs cherrypicking pieces of the Plan9 code and integrating them into patches. For example, the developers of Linux's v9fs implementation can now borrow code from Plan9's 9p implementation, if they choose.
    - 4ad 13y ago
      That's true, although I doubt that will happen as well. Time will tell. FWIW, Ron Minnich wrote the Linux v9fs. He was very involved with Plan 9, for example the Blue Gene port. He know ports Plan 9 bits into Akaros.
  - klueska 13y ago
    Your understanding is correct
4ad 13y ago
Sure they can. So what? The "real" Plan 9 continues to be developed and distributed by the labs as LPL. I don't know if the Berkley guys just got a bag of GPL code or if this is a continuous agreement, and they'll get subsequent, more recent code in the future. In the meantime, code from Bell Labs is LPL.
- _delirium 13y ago
  > The "real" Plan 9 continues to be developed and distributed by the labs Are there still employees on the project? I had been under the impression that the entire core dev team left in 2003, mostly for Google, and that Alcatel-Lucent no longer staffs the project. Looking through the last-modified dates in the source tree, there are a handful of edits in the last few years, but not very many, and the only specific people I can find who've worked on plan9 in the past 5 years are all external to Bell Labs (e.g. the 9front people).
  - 4ad 13y ago
    There's definitely more activity outside the labs than inside, however there are still a few Bell Labs people who work on it. For example, the new MIPS kernel was entirely labs work.
    - rbanffy 13y ago
      MIPS? Who's using MIPS these days? Retrogeeks excepted, of course.
      - 4ad 13y ago
        Most routers are MIPS. There are probably more MIPS devices coming out each year than ARM devices, it's just that they are in very small devices and now in fancy phones.
        vidarh 13y ago
        Last I saw, the estimated number of units shipped for ARM was around 3 billion, with MIPS and PPC at around 500 million, and x86 somewhere in the 300m-400m range. EDIT: These are per year for all of them.

pierrebai 13y ago

4ad is just nit-picking. The labs still only distribute Plan 9 under its own license. Now Plan 9 is available also underthe GPL, but the labs doesn't distribute that version. it's only relevant if they continue to work on it and don't continue to share their changes under the GPL. At worst, there will be a fork under GPL and they will slowly diverge.

4ad 13y ago
My understanding is that the Berkley guys develop akaros and have no interest in maintaining a Plan 9 fork (they just want to integrate some Plan 9 code). Of course, other parties are free to fork the GPL version (not that this will ever happen).
- lotsofmangos 13y ago
  (not that this will ever happen) Now I'm tempted to do it just to prove a point. edit, just looked it up on github - https://github.com/niktischenko/plan9 https://github.com/niktischenko/plan9 https://github.com/newemu/plan9 https://github.com/newemu/plan9 https://github.com/jamiepg1/plan9 https://github.com/jamiepg1/plan9 oh, and mine now - https://github.com/lotsofmangos/graveRobbers2 https://github.com/lotsofmangos/graveRobbers2 Thanks by the way, I'm going to have to play with it now :)
  - 4ad 13y ago
    Sure, have fun. We'll speak again in one year to see your (and other forks) progress.
    - lotsofmangos 13y ago
      Cool, I'll meet you by the third tree in the old field by the path. Bring biscuits and wear a green hat.
      - marshray 13y ago
        Should a body meet a body Coming through the rye, Should a body kiss a body, Need a body cry? O Jenny is all wet, poor body, Jenny is seldom dry: She draggled all her petticoats, Coming through the rye!
    - mattl 13y ago
      Look forward to it. If you meet me online by Grubb's tavern, I will show you where the treasure is hidden.
- _delirium 13y ago
  Now that there's a GPL version, it does mean other developers of Linux derivatives, or of Linux itself, could mine bits and pieces of the code, though, just like Akaros is doing. I agree a long-running GPL-licensed Plan9 fork isn't that likely, but now that there's even a one-time dump of the code under the GPL, it removes the legal barrier to kernel devs cherrypicking pieces of the Plan9 code and integrating them into patches. For example, the developers of Linux's v9fs implementation can now borrow code from Plan9's 9p implementation, if they choose.
  - 4ad 13y ago
    That's true, although I doubt that will happen as well. Time will tell. FWIW, Ron Minnich wrote the Linux v9fs. He was very involved with Plan 9, for example the Blue Gene port. He know ports Plan 9 bits into Akaros.
- klueska 13y ago
  Your understanding is correct

4ad 13y ago

Sure they can. So what? The "real" Plan 9 continues to be developed and distributed by the labs as LPL. I don't know if the Berkley guys just got a bag of GPL code or if this is a continuous agreement, and they'll get subsequent, more recent code in the future. In the meantime, code from Bell Labs is LPL.

_delirium 13y ago
> The "real" Plan 9 continues to be developed and distributed by the labs Are there still employees on the project? I had been under the impression that the entire core dev team left in 2003, mostly for Google, and that Alcatel-Lucent no longer staffs the project. Looking through the last-modified dates in the source tree, there are a handful of edits in the last few years, but not very many, and the only specific people I can find who've worked on plan9 in the past 5 years are all external to Bell Labs (e.g. the 9front people).
- 4ad 13y ago
  There's definitely more activity outside the labs than inside, however there are still a few Bell Labs people who work on it. For example, the new MIPS kernel was entirely labs work.
  - rbanffy 13y ago
    MIPS? Who's using MIPS these days? Retrogeeks excepted, of course.
    - 4ad 13y ago
      Most routers are MIPS. There are probably more MIPS devices coming out each year than ARM devices, it's just that they are in very small devices and now in fancy phones.
      - vidarh 13y ago
        Last I saw, the estimated number of units shipped for ARM was around 3 billion, with MIPS and PPC at around 500 million, and x86 somewhere in the 300m-400m range. EDIT: These are per year for all of them.