Apple Plans To Release Rendezvous As Open Source

Snuffub writes "According to MacCentral, Apple announced during an interview today that they would be releasing Rendezvous, their implementation of the zeroconf standard, under an open source license. I can't see this as being anything but great news for everyone involved -- the community gets a mature implementation of an emerging technology, and Apple benefits as more devices are created to support Rendezvous. For everyone interested, you'll be able to download the source from Apple's site in a couple weeks." uglyhead69 adds: "The article is light on details and doesn't mention what license will be used, but it's probably safe to assume that it's the APSL."

Comments

Peripherals!

[Anonymous Coward]

The last Stevenote showed this off, a PowerbookG4 being walked in range of a Rendezvous enabled HP printer, they were configured on the fly by the OS and in seconds they were able to print to it. No wires, multiple users, no configuration. Besides iTunes p2p music library (it automatically locates other Rendezvous enabled Mac's and adds their music library to yours, streaming wise, it doesn't actually transfer the music ;) )

Many, many possibilities here.

Smart business move

[Infonaut]

This is one way Apple can align themselves more closely with users of other *NIX OSes. By helping to improve easier connectivity between various non-MS OSes, Apple is essentially saying: "Look, you can now easily hook into a Windows network on a Mac. But, you can do even more if you're using a network with OS X, Linux, BSD, et. al."

From Apple's point of view, anything that puts Microsoft outside a large pool of functionality is good. Essentially, it's an attempt to conduct a reverse embrace and extend. Take something that was already there, improve it, then give it back.

Apple isn't doing this out of selfless motives. But the fact is, they're doing it. Pretty cool indeed. I've been using 10.2 since the public release, and I'm impressed by Rendezvous, and I can't wait to use it with Linux as well.

My implementation

[The-Dork]

I implemented one of the Zeroconf internet drafts on Linux for a class project. It can be found here.
It is in no way a complete implementation, but got me an 'A' grade :)

I forsee a hiccup...

[DarkVein]

If Apple uses the APSL, then the source code could not be used in Linux. I'm uncertain if Debian would accept any APSL submissions.

The issue to my mind is that Rendezvous needs popular adoption, and rapid acceptance would be best. If Apple has it in mind to emphasis Windows' network reliablity, then a GPL license would allow the technology to be integrated into Linux, and percolate into FreeBSD via ports. If Apple wants the most rapid adoption a source license can provide, the BSD license would be best, but then Microsoft would be free to embrace & extend.

This is why I root for the GPL in this case. Rendezvous is very cool technology, so Microsoft would either have to ignore it, attack its mindshare, impliment its own version, or bend knee to the GPL. Their own implimentation would be inferior for a time, and due to demand and early deployment, Microsoft would be unfairly judged as having an incompotent implimentation, rather than a primitive one. This would add pressure to move to non-Microsoft platforms. This is good for Apple, because non-Microsoft means Unix, and in many cases, that means MacOS X.

That's aside, however. I'm afraid that an APSL license would cause the source to stagnate except for the eyes of a few Wizards that learn from the implimentation and then develop their own (L)GPLed version.

I think I'm rambling.