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"For Use on Free Operating Systems, Only!"
green pizza asks: "In looking at the license for Open Motif, I noticed the clause that prohibits its use on non-Free OSes. While I realize that this is for their own licensing reasons, I couldn't help but wonder how such a clause could help Linux and other Free OSes. Just imagine, the large proprietary commercial empires wouldn't be able to roll a truly Free piece of software into their commercial apps and claim their own innovation, or worse, try to snuff out a grass-roots open project. I think such a clause would be a win-win situation for Linux." I can see arguments both for and against such a clause in free software licenses. How do you feel on the subject?
My major problems with such a clause is that it prevents interoperability. Just imagine: if most of the standard GNU tools had this clause, Cygwin would not exist, and Mozilla would not have the impact that it does today...neither would BIND or Apache. I feel that such a clause would do more to limit the ability of Open Source to penetrate new markets, and it won't help get Open Source into the enterprise where Closed Source software reigns supreme.
I don't think so. One would have to go to the trouble of getting a free libc like glibc or the BSD libc to run on the non-free OS, but once done they could use the more-viral-then-normal-GPL on a otherwise non-free OS.
Or on a few where the libc is all ready free, like Mac OS X where the libc is (as far as I know) part of the BSD licensed part, but the OS as a whole is clearly non free (in either sense of the word) there wouldn't even be trouble involved.
Very good point. Isn't some of the microcode on that Pentium processor un-free? What about the design of some of the ASICs? I'll bet the electricity comes from a generator that may have a Windows machine controlling it!
The GPL only comes in to play when I wish to distribute software.
I provide support for a small Dharma group that does a lot of work translating texts from Tibetan to English. As a consequence, almost everybody in the group has a computer. We even have an IS policy: everybody has to run Windows. (Needless to say, I did not set this policy! :')
We have an additional problem - we have all vowed to behave ethically, even to people who are not behaving ethically towards us. A consequence of this is that I have to be very careful about how I copy software. Even though we aren't exactly rolling in cash, I won't pirate software.
This gives me a nice in for showcasing the good qualities of free software. I grabbed a copy of abiword the other day and installed it on one of the nuns' computers, and she was really excited - it's a free piece of software that can read Word documents and can be used for real work. So she doesn't have to spend $300 on a copy of Word. Furthermore, because the software is open source, and already supports Unicode, I am pretty sure I can modify it to support Tony Duff's GPL'd Tibetan fonts that the Trace Foundation recently released.
So this means that we can ship a free, WYSIWYG Tibetan word processor along with all the Tibetan documents we'll be sending around. This is *very* exciting. It's also good for the Free Software community, because it means that lots of people are suddently going to start using a piece of Free Software. They'll be running it on Windows at first, but as time goes on I'm hoping to wean our group off of Windows and onto Linux or NetBSD.
The end result: more market share for Open Source software. The cause: Open Source software for Windows. We'll see what happens...
See http://www.debian.org/social_contract, section 6 of the Debian Free Software Guidelines.
In a word, limiting software distribution, in any form, makes said software non-free.
I don't know. I'm used to Slashdot editors telling me how it is. You sure you can't help me out here?
So what about running OpenMotif under Windows under VMware under Linux?
What about it?
Both Windows and VMWare are proprietary, non-open source pieces of software. Just because they're both running under Linux doesn't mean squat.
Let me ask you this - just because you're holding something I own, does that change the fact that I own it?
Cheers,
Tim
It's official. Most of you are morons.
What is the difference fundamentally between saying
"that piece of software you own can only be used on OSes that we approve of"
and "that DVD you own can only be played on devices we approve of"
The definition of Open Source, as detailed in the Licenses in question is as follows.
These clauses say nothing about disallowing distribution or use on "non-free" operating systems as the original poster implied. Review definition above and compare it to the word "non-free".
Additionally, Open Group is willing to provide an alternative license for the software, as stated by the License. This caveate emptor is very similar to what Trolltech used to do with Qt. It is also a clause that keeps the Open Group API and software in the "non-free" branch of Debian. For example, this is the information on the libmotif package:
--
assert(expired(knowledge));
I believe that the reason is that the OpenMotif authors are trying to get the best of both worlds. If you notice, OpenMotif is Motif ("The public license will allow the release of the Motif source code, as a product called Open Motif"). However, OpenMotif isn't licenced for "non-free" operating systems because "The existing commercial release of Motif continues to be available for non-Open Source distribution".
In other words, some companies paid for the right to distribute Motif on non-Open Source platforms, and T.O.G. wants to retain that business. However, on Open Source platforms, T.O.G. has competition that has undercut their position in the market (MooTIF, for example) and effectively prevented Motif from entering the arena, since few companies are willing to pay for a licence to distribute a product that can otherwise be obtained for free. This OpenMotif licence is T.O.G.'s attempt to regain some "Open Source platform" ground for Motif without disturbing the paying customers (too much).
"values of beta will give rise to dom!"
Ok, this seems like a good thing at first. But what about partially-free OSs? I'm assuming this license would NOT let someone use Open Motif on something like Mac OS X, which has lots of non-Free stuff on top of Free stuff (OTOH, you could use Open Motif on Darwin!)
So that begs the question of where do you draw the line? How much non-free stuff added to a free OS makes it non-Free? There has to be some allowance, or any Linux distro that came with some bundled commercial app would be non-Free (or worse, even Debian would become non-Free if someone installed some non-Free utility or driver on it).
But Mac OS X becomes an interesting question. You could replace the kernel of Mac OS X with the kernel from Darwin - they're identical - and what you truly would have is a bunch of non-free userland stuff running on a Free kernel.
What do people think?
-- "Those who cast the votes decide nothing. Those who count the votes decide everything." -Joseph Stalin
I'm not a GNU zealot, or generally outspoken in the Freesoftware movement. I use Linux almost exclusivly, and urge others to at least try it. I say this only so you know my background, and that I'm not a zealot OR biggot.
.jpg I made with the Gimp in Paint Shop? That I can't use an open-source driver to power a proprietary device?
I'm really against this. Free Software should be just that. Free. If I get a piece of free software, I expect the source code to be there, so I can go through, and change things to work better for me. I also expect the ability to change it enough to run on my systems.
Maybe I'm wrong, and expecting too much. Maybe I, as an end user, shouldn't expect this kind of freedom, but if something's labeled as free software, this is what I expect. A license that says I can modify it, and use it to suit my needs.
In my opinion, free software should not be restricted by what you use it in conjunction with. If I want to port vi to BeOS, I should be allowed to. And if you think that this is going to start and stop with Windows, you are wrong. How big of a change would it to be to say that I can't open a
There should be restrictions on open sourced programs, but I think these restrictions should be
to protect the user, not restrict him.
Don't make money off someone else's free software, and don't tell me how to use it.
Check out my sysadmin blog!
for some software at least.
I think for software such as web browsers and office suites, attaining "critical mass" is a hugely important step. You can go from always playing catchup to the most widely used standard setting software (office, ie) to actually having people exchange documents in your native format and testing their webpages in your browser.
Pigeonholing your software to only be usable on OSes which are in the vast minority is not going to help this cause.
Hell, it probably hurts the OSes in these cases. A reasonable way to try to get people to migrate off closed source OSes like windows would be to provide useful software ON windows that is also available on free OSes. If at some point they find that they can use the SAME software on another OS that happens to be free, switching will seem like much less of a hassle. Of course, the free OS needs to be easy to use...
My "Open Source License" (Legally binding in the state of Virginia) secretly indoctrinates you into the Open Source Army which, once it becomes large eough, will march on Redmond. I may add a first born child clause at some point too. Or a root beer one. Yes, software licensing CAN be fun!
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
Free software is only truly free if it has no restrictions on where it can be used. The GPL only protects the author and encourages giving back to the community, but it does not in any way restrict my use of the software. I'm all for protection of the author's rights, but this is going a step too far.
do you remember when OS/2 was kind of popular (you might not, since it was before linux became mainstream)? did you read the license with any M$ product at that time? it restricted the product's use to windows, in an effort to keep that software from being used under Win-OS/2. check it out...
Apache is a nice example here. It runs fine on Windows and I suspect quite a few NT admins have chosen to run apache over IIS for price/performance issues.
Hopefully these sys admins will see that open source can provide a very high quality solution and perhaps their next server will be Linux.
As open source projects get more mature I really think that more work should be put into porting them to windows and macos. Having a user using OpenOffice instead of M$Office is excellent and puts them one step closer to adopting a free OS.
If you write GPL software and release the source people can do whatever the hell they want with it. If they want to port it to MS's OS then that's their perogative. Artifically limiting what people can do with free software is the first step in the slippery slope towards complex restrictive EULA hell.
I wouldn't want free OS's to prosper if the only way it could be done would be to use microsoftian licensing terms.
Free software should prosper because it's a better model, not because people are forced into it so they can use certain programs. I can't stress enough how similair this is to microsoft. Why do you use windows? Because everybody in your office uses Word and you have to as well. you have no choice.
Ironically, I believe that a restriction such as "for use on free OSes only" would make software non-free under the GNU definition.
While the advantages of such a "super-viral" licensing restriction are clear, it is probably going too far. Heck, the BSD-licence fans already say that the GPL goes too far and is going to strangle free software in excessive idealism. I'm not sure I agree, but I would prefer that free software just remain free, even for people who want to use it with other non-free software.
Note that this restriction is *not* necessary to prevent companies from rolling the software into their proprietary product. The GPL already prevents that.
-Rob
Ever since petty politics and silly ideologies like this got involved in computers, and people began idolizing their machine and the software on it, rather than treating it like a TOOL that it was meant to be, computing has completely lost the effect of wide-eyed wondernment it used to have on me. The awe of a beautiful game (and it was usually games that impressed me) is now sullied by the catcalls of "..but does it run on linux??" and petty infighting.
How sad.
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How is free defined, legally, in this sense? There are enough variants of it, judging by the trolls, to make this very shady as well. (It runs within our proprietary app upon the *free* linux operating system...)