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Comment by rrdharan | Hacker News Reader

> alleviate fears that VMWare might have that complying would leave them vulnerable

I don't think this is the case. VMware (and their lawyers) have studied the GPL and genuinely do not believe they are not complying with its requirements.

This isn't the typical "shady hardware vendor embeds modified busybox" situation where the (in this case alleged) lack of compliance is out of laziness, fear or ignorance.

[Disclaimer: as per my other comment, I used to work at VMware, and am inherently biased in that sense, although I also happen to agree with VMware on the whole ESXi/vmklinux situation.]

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I didn't study the busybox connection, but why would anyone think vmkernel and vmklinux could be "reasonably considered independent and separate works in themselves" especially considering the source from the sfconservancy site linked to in the article?

I don't think anyone considers vmklinux independent, and indeed vmklinux is itself open-sourced (in a kludgey but compliant way): https://my.vmware.com/group/vmware/details?downloadGroup=ESX...

The debate has always been about whether the vmkernel is itself a derived work of vmklinux or Linux.

Can vmware replace the linux kernel and vmklinux, and still have a functioning vmkernel?

Ie, for some definition of independence and separation, how independent are vmklinux and vmkernel, and how separated are they in function and use? Could one simply remove the linux parts and plug in a different unix like kernel?

With two independent work I should be able to put them each on a different computer and have a meaningful result from doing so. Two work can have a cumulative effect when brought together, but independent they need to still be meaningful and working on their own. If I arbitrary separate a program, I can obviously not do so since they will not start, function proper or produce a meaningful effect on their own.

I asked why anyone would think that vmklinux (the linux derivative) and vmkernel were independent.

Please refer to the quote from the license I've provided, and belorn's thought experiment here.