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Sun Considering GPL For OpenSolaris
Posted by
kdawson
on Mon Nov 13, 2006 06:31 PM
from the it's-spreading dept.
from the it's-spreading dept.
narramissic writes, "At an event today to formally open-source Java, Jonathan Schwartz, Sun's president and CEO, and Rich Green, the company's senior VP of software had an exchange in which Schwartz put Green on the spot about using GPL for OpenSolaris: 'Are you averse to changing the license, Rich Green?' Schwartz asked. 'Certainly not,' Green responded, prompting the Sun CEO to fire back in a half-joking manner: 'Will you GPL Solaris, Mr. Green?' 'We will take a close look at it,' Green said, adding that it was possible that the familiarity and comfort level many developers have with the GPL may result in Sun adopting it for OpenSolaris." Another note about Sun's decision to use the GPL for Java comes from reader squiggleslash, who writes: "According to Jonathan Schwartz, the decision of Novell and Microsoft to '(suggest) that free and open source software wasn't safe unless a royalty was being paid' is what prompted Sun to finally come down on using the GPL for Java. So I guess every cloud has a silver lining."
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Money Pressure (Score:4, Interesting)
Novell and Microsoft do not.
Re:Money Pressure (Score:5, Funny)
Yep. Microsoft doesn't make [xbox.com] any [microsoft.com] money [microsoft.com] from hardware sales [zunescene.com] at all. No siree. Not a dime. And Novell never made anything from hardware sales either [everything2.com].
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Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Which *version* of the GPL (Score:5, Informative)
More interesting than this, IMHO, is to note that for Java they choose to use the "GNU GPL v2 only" (plus Classpath exception) license, not the more common "GPL v2 or any later version".
This is what the Java FAQ says about it:
And, from this InfoQ article [infoq.com] about the GPLed Java:
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Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
That would be awesome! (Score:5, Interesting)
Of course, there'd be a problem with that whole "gnu's NOT unix" thing...
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
I think Sun made a very clever choice with the CDDL for Solaris. It's Free, and the Linux guys can't just take the best bits
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Device drivers
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
And I'm sure that there wouldn't be any little companies from Utah [sco.com] that wouldn't just LOVE to see that Unix code REALLY get imported into the Linux kernel.
Where's those guys with their "itsatrap" tags when you need them?
Re:ZFS (Score:4, Insightful)
I'd love to see all this in Linux but I'm thinking even if it were GPLed there would be a lot of work to do to port it. And of course after its ported, the Linux devs would probably make a big stink about accepting it using lines like "a file system should only put files on a block device!" ZFS however is a different approach to storing files and in many ways much better.
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Excellent (Score:5, Interesting)
This could be a bigger boon than a lot of people realize. The licensing differences between Solaris and Linux are one of several factors slowing them from adopting ideas and code from one another. OpenSolaris users could benefit from ease of importing more cutting edge features from Linux. Linux could benefit by having access to some of the cleaner implementation ideas from Solaris. I've felt for some time that much of what holds linux back is the unwillingness to adopt newer and better features out of a fear that a given distribution will be less compatible with others and because Linux is trying to wear many hats. Too many decisions are made to benefit its use as a server or make it easier to use on a portable, while leaving it behind others for a workstation.
I'm keeping my fingers crossed.
Re:Excellent (Score:5, Insightful)
Linux would get DTrace, ZFS, etc. Those techs are about as cutting edge as it gets. What would Solaris get?
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Re:Excellent (Score:5, Insightful)
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Great, but will it change anything? (Score:4, Interesting)
More cool stuff in Solaris? (Score:4, Informative)
The thing that I always hear talk about is dtrace (currently CDL, and tightly integrated with the Solaris kernel), but looking at the WP article [wikipedia.org] on it, apparently it's been partially brought over to BSD and OS X. Then there are also containers and that "self-healing" fault-isolation system, which I don't pretend to understand.
Perhaps there are just as many cool, compelling features in Darwin that aren't talked about, and deserve being shared with Linux and other OSes
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Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Actually, quite a number of folks who are my consulting customers use Darwin (really BSD) sources as the "reference copies" of programs they're adapting for their own use.
This is in part because of the good quality of the code, and the company which stands behind it. In part it is because of the larger BSD community who stands semi-invisibly behind Apple... some customers really understand the strength of community. And finally, for the license-paranoid, in part this is because of the use of the very old
Yeah sure... (Score:3, Insightful)
A company the size of Sun does not move that quickly, especially so far as legal matters go. Besides, there has been talk of GPLing Java before Christmas for months.
Sun saw a chance to take a shot at Microsoft/Novell and they took it. Can't say I fault them, but its fairly obviously a lie.
Re:Yeah sure... (Score:4, Interesting)
There's been talk of open sourcing it by Christmas, and reports that it might be under the GPL (and reports that it might be under a different license.)
That does not prove, however, that the Novell/MS deal didn't prompt the final decision for Sun. Certainly, they'd already done the analysis and had a pretty good idea of the pluses and minuses of the various options. But certainly the Novell/MS deal remixed those slightly, and might have tipped things in the GPL.
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Yeah Right (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Another dumb move (Score:5, Informative)
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Re:Another dumb move (Score:4, Insightful)
Not to mention the fact that, although it is true that Sun is gradually open sourcing all of its software, most of what Sun makes it enterprise software. What company is really going to use Sun's RFID software to run a warehouse floor, or use Sun's identity management software to manage authentication and access control for an entire enterprise, and not get a support contract from Sun? Open sourcing this type of stuff probably doesn't impact Sun's sales negatively one iota. Open sourcing Java may be riskier, but I'm curious to see how it really pans out.
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Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Re:BSD License (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:GPL DTrace for teh win! (Score:4, Interesting)
When you can get an open-sourced carrier-grade OS like (Open)Solaris at no cost,
why still Linux?
OpenSolaris surely currently lacks a lot of (x86) hardware support, no drivers
for widespread hardware, etc. - but as more and more users actively use and
support OpenSolaris, more and more vendors will provide those.
What I don't like about Linux - Linux (and a lot of Linux software), that is - is
the neverending story of changing APIs - use something, update something else - Oops.
I have a Linux system here, with at least three different versions of, e.g., BerkeleyDB.
1.85 compat, 3.something, 4.idontknow. API changes, incompatibilities, you name it.
Ever tried to compile popular Linux software on another Un*x? Whenever I encounter some
piece of GPL-licensed software, I can almost guarantee it won't compile on Solaris, Tru64,
You want DTrace? Zones? Use Solaris. Is there any technical reason (no politics, please) where
using Linux actually offers any benefit?
(Yes, "smc" and all those java-based admin utilities suck. But commandline-based alternatives
do exist.)
This is not a flamebait. Serious answers will be appreciated.
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