The issues are caused by GPL, while BSD is, well, BSD licensed.
That was said by one lousy youtube comment without any explanation, Ubuntu has no problems with it...and i bet they have lawyers, i think it was in that vid:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-zRN7XLCRhc
It's also crazy, nearly no distro has a problem shipping ultra-proprietary software (firmware), but has a big discussion about CDDL, no one wants ZFS in the Kernel tree, imagine Linus has control over it and has no clue was ZFS even is:
https://linux.slashdot.org/story/20/01/19/0059251/what-linus...
Maybe, some could say that the GPL2 is really awkward, but you have to know that Microsoft and Apple have their own opensource license too...big business is awkward.
I hope I didn't write bs, however here is the talk of you want to know more and with more details: https://youtu.be/Zpnncakrelk (leaping the chasm from proprietary to open: a survivor's guide)
As usual Bryan Cantrill is just brilliant at explaining stuff.
Edit: just to be explicit: it was NOT about keeping stuff out of Linux.
He makes another poor turn when he says that the CDDL kept stuff out of Linux, but "not because of the CDDL but because of perceptions of the GPL" (i.e. IHVs didn't want to deal with the GPL). The license and the choice of using it are two different things. Sun could have written a license that was not GPL (to satisfy IHVs) but was compatible with GPL. They did not. Danese Cooper, who was part of that effort, says this was on purpose, and stated it on record ( http://caesar.ftp.acc.umu.se/pub/debian-meetings/2006/debcon... from 27:30). I guess Bryan was one of those engineers Danese mentions as "having some biases" back then. It was certainly obvious, at the time, what a careful avoidance of a license compatible with the biggest Solaris competitor would have resulted in, from a practical and commercial standpoint.
Why? Why even care about GPL? It's 100% compatible to MIT/BSD/ISC and that's enough, even Linus said that he probably would choose the ISC today, he chose mainly the GPL because GCC had it...and now they have GPLv3 (an absolute shit decision if you ask me).
Licenses are not adopted in a vacuum. The license is what made GCC what it was when Linus had to pick a license, and arguably what made Linux what it is today. A "BSD Linux" would have likely ended up the same way BSD systems have: a largely academic project routinely cannibalized by behemoth closed-source companies.
The question, yesterday and today, is really "why not care about the GPL?". The rights it grants are what made the F/OSS ecosystem what it is today. If you want to grant more rights to your users and developers, by all means use a less restrictive but compatible license like modified BSD, or MPL 2. It's easier to do that without fear of withering, now that opensource is the de-facto default choice in a lot of fields. It definitely was not as easy back in the '90s or early '00s, which is when the GPL effectively fought the war for the whole field.
If you choose to stick with pre-MPL2 derivatives, though, you are clearly not interested in granting users and developers the same basic rights as the GPL.
It's just a different vision, if you want real freedom and want to work with a community go with BSD/MIT.
>ended up the same way BSD systems have: a largely academic project routinely cannibalized by behemoth closed-source companies.
That's BS, just look at how Netflix and Dell EMC work with FreeBSD. And for example Juniper, they learned a lesson not working with the community and fell far behind because of that.
All of these licenses would have avoided the problems we see with ZFS' adoption of CDDL or other MPL1 derivatives.
Today. Not in the '90s cut-throat "pirates of SV" environment.
As far as I know there were never any serious attempts at making GPLed alternatives to Apache httpd, nginx and BIND.
Obviously each project and field has a story; licensing and timing are both part of it.
I would also argue that we are eventually going to pay for the ecosystem refusal to adopt GPL3, which is effectively "closing" away the software at another layer.
MySQL was always the more popular database, true. But it was also the one technically inferior, a PHP of databases.
As for GPL3 - on the contrary, the problem is the adoption of GPL3, which forced many parties to switch to non-GPL alternatives. But it also gave boost to Open Source alternatives, putting an end to the unhealthy monopoly of GNU toolchain.
Those are the same sort of businesses that, back in the '90s, would take BSD code and ship it without giving anything back. They were using GPL code only because they could respect the letter of the license while ignoring the spirit, thanks to coincidental technological changes (the move from PCs to server-based architectures). This problem keeps coming up and promotes a parasitic business model.
We'd be better served in the long run, as an ecosystem, by trying to find business models that work with GPL3.
In the same talk, Simon Phipps disagrees with her assessment and later said he was furious at her spiteful comment. Now, almost fifteen years later, nobody else had corroborated her claim despite there being no reason to protect Sun anymore.
There is still a reason to protect themselves, of course, from a historical judgement that wouldn't appear particularly kind.
We haven't read the same flames, then...
Of course I haven't read every discussion about it, but I have read quite a few. I think someone would have to both confirm that the incompatibility was intentional and argue it was the correct choice to to get much hate about it.
It seems to me that Mr Cantrill is more aware of the business side, while you're more keen on the philosophical side.
Yeah twiddling the source and everything, but if you didn't choose it in the first place that wouldn't happen.
> ditch patent protection [...] would create real problems for everyone
What problem, exactly?
The patent-protection clauses of the CDDL are at odds with the spirit and practice of open licenses anyway, since they are voided as soon as the relevant code is modified.
So basically, the cddl ships clauses that are pointless and likely to be disregarded in practice and in court. Losing them would make no difference whatsoever.
The CDDL clauses are not voided when the code is modified. Where did you get that idea? What you are saying is plain fantasy.
Jesus Christ you are absolutely right I hadn't seen the issue under that light.
It's the difference between "mere aggregation" and "derived work". The kernel+ZFS can be considered a derived work from both, so it has to obey both licenses (GPL2 and CDDL) at the same time; on the other hand, the firmware is completely independent from the kernel, so the licenses (GPL2 and the proprietary license) apply separately to each component.
> Ubuntu has no problems with it...and i bet they have lawyers
On the other hand, Fedora has problems with it as a kernel module (but they do ship it as a ZFS FUSE module, see https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/ZFS), and they do have lawyers (Red Hat's lawyers review all the licenses for Fedora, and they consider the CDDL to be incompatible with the GPL: https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Licensing:Main).
What?? No why?...no one of those project is derived from each other, ZFS is a module (on all platforms i think).
>and they consider the CDDL to be incompatible with the GPL
https://zonena.me/2019/01/the-cddl-is-not-incompatible-with-...
That's the important part:
>You may distribute the Executable form of the Covered Software under the terms of this License or under the terms of a license of Your choice, which may contain terms different from this License, provided that You are in compliance with the terms of this License and that the license for the Executable form does not attempt to limit or alter the recipients rights in the Source Code form from the rights set forth in this License.
>To reiterate, executable forms of CDDL source code can be under ANY license you want.
That means your compiled ZFS module package can even be under GPL2 or 3 or beerware ;)
Once compiled, the ZFS module is a derived work from both the Linux kernel and ZFS.
> > You may distribute the Executable form of the Covered Software under the terms of this License or under the terms of a license of Your choice [...] does not attempt to limit or alter the recipients rights in the Source Code form from the rights set forth in this License.
> That means your compiled ZFS module package can even be under GPL2 or 3 or beerware
I trust the Red Hat lawyers on this matter more than someone who is not a lawyer (from that page: "While it's true that I am not a lawyer [...]"). And from what I understand (I'm also not a lawyer), that clause in the CDDL applies only to the compiled result; but the GPL requires that, if the compiled result is distributed as GPL, the corresponding source code also be available under the GPL. So you cannot distribute your compiled ZFS module package under GPL2 unless the corresponding source code can also be distributed under GPL2.
Really? So if i compile something with gcc it is a derived work from gcc and gcc is derived work from my bin? Or when i make a firefox extension it's a derived work of firefox? Compile the nvidia module...a derived work from linux?
>I trust the Red Hat lawyers on this matter more than someone who is not a lawyer
But he can read :) but hey whatever, really not interested if linux has something good like DTrace ZFS or Crossbow, they like the NIH-Syndrome and i am ok with that too.
Yes. This is why the "libgcc exception" (https://www.gnu.org/licenses/gcc-exception-3.1.en.html) exists. The issue is that parts of runtime libraries which come with gcc are statically linked into the compiled executable; without that exception, the result would have to be under the GPL.
The same issue happens with Linux kernel modules. Many functions they need are only defined as macros or inline functions in the headers (since ZFS is a filesystem, just take a look at how many inline functions there are in include/linux/fs.h). And even outside of these, many functions are so closely coupled to the internal data structures of the kernel (and the data structures themselves are also exposed to modules) that any module using them could be considered a derived work of the kernel.
And in any case, there's an easy way to prove something does not constitute a derived work: just show that it can work outside of the codebase it's allegedly a derived work of. The reason NVidia is safe is that they provide the same driver for FreeBSD.
The ZFS source code probably isn't a derived work, but the compiled module might be.
The parent actually explained it pretty well.
To be fair to FSF however, they have to my knowledge never actually said anything else. What they do say is that they will enforce the license at that distinction, a conclusion RMS arrived at many years ago when apple tried to make proprietary addons to GCC. The reasoning, as provided by a consulted lawyer Eben Moglen at the time, was that a judge would likely see it as creating a single derivative work out of the linked parts, and as such you need a copyright license. This story has been mention in a few talks because so far no one has yet to challenge FSF in court and prove it wrong, which is a fight that at least Eben Moglen have been all this years willing (and possible wanted) to take up if given the opportunity.
As a bright line in the sand the concept has served FSF well, but it is not a supreme court decision that defines what a derivative work is under software. It could be that the line should be drawn much more narrower, but personally my bet is the opposite. Courts are rarely on the side that want to abolish copyright control or limit its scope.
Fedora has problems with it :)
As for ESX, that has gone to court:
https://www.zdnet.com/article/linux-developer-abandons-vmwar...
Ahh its ok for the driver but not for net-code?
https://www.theregister.com/2020/08/04/gpl_condom_nvidia_lin...
See that's exactly the Linux Problem...
By the way...Linus is not ok with a ZFS GPL shimlayer:
The difference is that they cannot afford to leave every Nvidia GPU owner out.
I keep getting down voted, maybe I am too annoying for HN. But I'll risk it in the hopes this is helpful, in the social and psychological space.
First of all, I have been in awe of ZFS since... ever. But FS were not my curiosity, OS was, so I installed OpenSolaris and Illumos in VMs, a few times to get used to how these things install. No work, just play. That's me. I was sad Apple did not adopt ZFS, but they did develop a read-only something, kernel extension, I think, don't recall. And there is some support from the generous for OpenZFS on OS X (idk about macOS). Why not ZFS? Because it is different and complicated, and it takes dedication to learn. Had Apple adopted it as the native FS, I would have been forced to learn it, so that is why it made me sad. I need that kind of motivation. But many are this way to some extent. Everyone is industrious and everyone is lazy. When you can learn easily, you learn. When you must learn, you learn. When you get older, you just want to keep doing things the old way, the way you know how, and you can do that for 12+ hours a day and yet learn nothing new.
Linus is just a man. I'm glad the penguinistas have faded into the background, and I am happy for Linux, but fail to see that it was any better than NetBSD when the fanatics were vocal. Linux would have benefitted from not changing a lot of userland stuff that was changed from *NIX for no rational reason, but probably just for ignorance and arrogance. Just MHO. But now Linux is important. It just is what it is.
So Linus is insanely industrious, and also lazy just like most. How often does he learn something new, how often does he just work like a mad dog without learning anything new? Just a man, perhaps a very smart man, but no more. And he is imperfect. And I strongly suspect, by the public evidence of the tell-tale symptoms, he has an identifiable personality disorder, and it is the one that includes the symptom of an unwillingness or inability to recognize the problem. But IIRC, he did admit to things, and supposedly took time off to work on himself. But this can't be cured by the patient, though it, oddly enough, can be cured, one of the few mental illness than can be cured, not just maintained, but only after getting evaluated by a professional, and treated, and the treatment is easy, just sitting with the pro and talking twice a month for 45 minutes for up to two years. At least my understanding of it, it can be cured in two years or less depending on its severity, though rarely ever is. This is not criticism, it is compassion. Presidents get this. Captains of industry get this. Winning NFL quarterbacks get this. And it is not any surprise the Lord of the Linux kernel can get this. And I wish him the best.
We're all allowed to be incorrect and imperfect. But those that stand out get better, because they try. But as far as laziness is concerned, because I am lazy, too, and I believe most are, I can't fault anyone for being lazy and not learning new stuff, especially in order to have a better understanding of it to be able to say something about it that makes sense.
However, those that do change themselves for the better, those that are not lazy and learn new things, should be applauded, and given gratitude for the possibility that their example will be followed... hopefully by me, too.