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Plan9 is now Officially Open Source
DrSkwid writes "The OSI have approved the revised license for the plan 9 operating system according to attendees returning from this year's Usenix Bof."
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How long until SCO claim that SCO IP was stolen and put into plan9?
There is no god
So, is this operating system from outer space as well?
"We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars." - Oscar Wilde
There is no hidden in http://plan9.bell-labs.com/plan9dist/license.html .
this year's Usenix Bof
Usenix Bof? Sounds like what happens when a bunch of greasy, miserable nerds decide to play doctor in the server room.
It's not too shabby:
Plan 9 is designed around the basic principle that all resources appear as files in a hierarchical file system (namespace) which is unique to each process. These resources are accessed via a network-level protocol called 9P which hides the exact location of services from the user. All servers provide their services as an exported hierarchy of files.
Features
The dump file system makes a daily "snapshot" of the filestore available to users
Unicode character set support throughout the system
Advanced kernel synchronization facilities for parallel processing
ANSI/POSIX environment emulator (APE)
Plumbing, a language driven way for applications to communicate
Acme - an editor, shell and window system for programmers
Sam - a screen editor with structural regular expressions
Support for MIME mail messages and IMAP4
Security - there is no super-user or root, and passwords are never sent over the network
There is no god
it's the bunny rabbit that lends itself to the business-saavy of this OS!
must.. have.. the bunny OS!!
Latest release notes
Download the source (Warning: requires identification--privacy advocates maybe be excluded here)
This is really great news for Linux. For too long we've been trapped in the out-moded hierarchical/graphical paradigm. Plan 9, with its revolutionary "factotum" and "secstore" structures, could really provide a breadth of fresh hair to the Linux kernal, putting it head and shoulders above Windows.
What is Plan 9, anyway? All I could gather from the website before it was slashdotted into oblivion is that their logo is really fucking cute.
It is sooo coool. It is more than just a typical OS. Is is a distributed OS. Really. Not a cluster like you often think about. Before you look at the screen shots and say "boy, that looks crappy", read the design.
Yes, you're absolutely right. A screenshot is irrefutable evidence of the basic structure of an operating system.
Indeed, untill I had seen a screenshot or two, I had no idea how to write in C, now I'm rewriting Linux from a monolithic kernel to a micro kernel, thanks to the power of screenshots!
dammit.. another operating system to try out.... and only 2 computers.
I write code.
This is great news for the Open Source community. While Plan9 is often rediculed as being outdated, it no doubt has its share of novel and useful algorithms, which may now be incorporated into more mainstream open source OSes such as Linux and the HURD (yes, it's still around).
Open sourcing OS code has proven to be a good way to keep ailing systems relevant in the current marketplace. It kept BeOS and VMS from dying in obscurity, and even helped BSD limp along for a few more years.
I predict nothing but good things from GNU/Plan9. Hopefully Debian will introduce a Plan9 distro, to go with their Darwin, HURD, and Linux distrii. I still have a few spare boxen lying around that I could use this on.
Boromir, son of Faramir, King of Gondor and Minas Tirith
With TRON and now Plan 9 falling into the hands of OSS the move to have the operating systems of computers taken over by old sci-fi movies is happening.
Ah... another slashbot humour cliche is born. *sniff* WE WILL HAVE SCO JOKES FOR YEARS! REJOICE IN THE NETWORK-TV-LIKE LACK OF ORIGINALITY!
Beowulf clusters of those! SCO claims infringement! Hot grits down Natalie Portman's pants!
Is the fact that, while the entire OS was mapped around Dennis Ritchie's involvement, he died halfway through the making of the OS.
Eventually, a bad double - in the form of the CEO's dentist - was brought in to replace Ritchie - the result being that the first half of the Plan9 OS is decent, but the last half is just terrible.
Oh, and it turns out that the CEO is a cross-dressing lunatic, whose obsession with C-grade OSes (like BeOS, NetBSD, NeXT, Apple OS9, OS2 Warp, etc) eventually led to him living out the rest of his life if relative obscurity and poverty. Sad, really... but, it might make a decent movie... nah.
Although the intent does not conflict with the GPL I think the requirment of commercial distributors to defend contributors against certain suits might be a show stopper beacause of how it's written. But IANAL; can someone comment on this?
The policy of the United States is worse than bad---it is insane. -- Ludwig von Mises, Economic Policy(1959)
crap. it prevents you from exporting to NORTH KOREA. is also REQUIRES you to legally defend the people you sell/give it to from any lawsuits based on said product..
in summary..
it is not open source, it is a TRAP
After the QNX thread a bit ago, this is probably the best news possible. Plan 9 is a nicely evolved version of UNIX, it is very scaleable, and 'orthogonal' (you can run a new version of the window manager in a window in the old one!).
If there ever was a viable alternative to the monolithic unices then Plan 9 is probably it.
Macro kernels are pretty much like turtles and sharks, very well adapted to living today, but dinosaurs nonetheless. Let's give this one the attention it deserves and see how it stacks up against the 'hurd', time to evolve !
MP3 Search Engine
Anyone with experience with both Plan9 and J2EE care to comment on similarities/differences?
ObSCOComment: System V represented many resources as files. This must be derivitative of SysV. Get the lawyers ready!
CS Professors wrote a book about Plan 9. Ive played with the vmware image. Its some cool stuff - though a bit weird in terms of the UI metaphores - but then agian _everything_ is a file.
Props to my profs Bischof and Schreiner.
/* Lobster Stick To Magnet!*/
My first subject line was 'Cool', but then I changed it. Why? Well, I have been interested in Plan 9 for a long time. I especially like the services-based architecture. In many ways it is a project with an awful lot of potential. But...
Problem 1: What is it good for? Right now Plan 9 has no compelling applications and a dearth of the applications most people use daily. This might be fixed soon as people port things like OpenOffice to it, but don't hold your breath.
Problem 2: It is a research tool, and may never be more than that. Chances are, any truly compelling features in Plan 9 will soon find their way into Linux and even MS Windows.
Problem 3: Overcoming the installed base. It took Linux nearly ten years to achieve name recognition, and it still is running a distant third on the desktop. What does Plan 9 offer that would make me, or you, want to spend time installing and learning it? Especially considerint Problem 2 and Problem 1.
Problem 4: Wrong direction. In my opinion the real important projects right now are ones that are removing the distinctions between OSs. Cross platform tools like Python, Chandler, Mono and Mozilla. Using standards-based DHTML as the UI. Why add another platform to the mix when the real goal is to become platform agnostic?
It all sums up to the same issues that squeak smalltalk has: Everything about it is great, but no-one uses it for anything real.
Of course all these problems I describe are based on my opinions, needs and preferences. Your mileage may vary. But I be most people's won't...
- -
Are you an SF Fan? Are you a Tru-Fan?
Yeah, but now it's been posted to slashdot, loads of people are bound to rush out and code/port bells, whistles, flashing lights, and all sorts of stuff to make it look 1337.
On a more serious note, it's a reinvention of unix with the benefit of hindsight by the original inventors AFAIK. Read the specs - it has loads of wacky and inventive features. It runs on a cluster of PCs instead of a single processor, for example.
If I seem short sighted, it is because I stand on the shoulders of midgets
i wonder if this new revised license has fixed any of those problems?
here is the statement from RMS.
When I saw the announcement that the Plan 9 software had been released as "open source", I wondered whether it might be free software as well. After studying the license, my conclusion was that it is not free; the license contains several restrictions that are totally unacceptable for the Free Software Movement. (See http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html.)
I am not a supporter of the Open Source Movement, but I was glad when one of their leaders told me they don't consider the license acceptable either. When the developers of Plan 9 describe it as "open source", they are altering the meaning of that term and thus spreading confusion. (The term "open source" is widely misunderstood; see http://www.gnu.org/gnu/philosophy/free-software-fo r-freedom.html
Here is a list of the problems that I found in the Plan 9 license. Some provisions restrict the Plan 9 software so that it is clearly non-free; others are just extremely obnoxious.
First, here are the provisions that make the software non-free.
You agree to provide the Original Contributor, at its request, with a copy of the complete Source Code version, Object Code version and related documentation for Modifications created or contributed to by You if used for any purpose.
This prohibits modifications for private use, denying the users a basic right.
and may, at Your option, include a reasonable charge for the cost of any media.
This seems to limit the price that may be charged for an initial distribution, prohibiting selling copies for a profit.
Distribution of Licensed Software to third parties pursuant to this grant shall be subject to the same terms and conditions as set forth in this Agreement,
This seems to say that when you redistribute you must insist on a contract with the recipients, just as Lucent demands when you download it.
1. The licenses and rights granted under this Agreement shall terminate automatically if (i) You fail to comply with all of the terms and conditions herein; or (ii) You initiate or participate in any intellectual property action against Original Contributor and/or another Contributor.
This seemed reasonable to me at first glance, but later I realized that it goes too far. A retaliation clause like this would be legitimate if it were limited to patents, but this one is not. It would mean that if Lucent or some other contributor violates the license of your GPL-covered free software package, and you try to enforce that license, you would lose the right to use the Plan 9 code.
You agree that, if you export or re-export the Licensed Software or any modifications to it, You are responsible for compliance with the United States Export Administration Regulations and hereby indemnify the Original Contributor and all other Contributors for any liability incurred as a result.
It is unacceptable for a license to require compliance with US export control regulations. Laws being what they are, these regulations apply in certain situations regardless of whether they are mentioned in a license; however, requiring them as a license condition can extend their reach to people and activities outside the US government's jurisdiction, and that is definitely wro
Was the Plan9 license ever changed? I know for a while the FSF had a page listing the reasons why they don't consider Plan 9 a "free" OS regardless of the openess of it's source (blah blah, difference between open and free, blah blah, speech, blah blah, gratis).
...so basically I'm too lazy to use the internet to answer my questions... please find answers for me slashdot!
I think it'd be really great if Plan9 were released under a more "free" license.
The reasons aren't obvious. I've seen this myth before, notably from Microsoft employees. The idea that you can be "infected" by simply looking at GPLd code is nonsense. The GPL explicitly covers only derived works of the code. If you looked at a GPLd algorithm and reimplemented it, somebody would have a hell of a time arguing in court that it was "derived". This is doubly the case for the vast majority of GPLd code, which is written by people who don't have huge piles of cash and who probably have a disdain for the legal system as well.
The idea that some random geek, or even a big company, is going to sue you on a legal platform as wobbly as "judge, he looked at it, so the rest of his work is clearly based on ours" is somewhere slightly above absolute zero and in any case applies just as equally to proprietary code, as the case of SCO shows.
Ironically, proprietary code is generally far more "infectious". I work on Wine - if I were to have seen the Windows code, I would be immediately banned from working on it, indeed, probably I'd be banned from working on most GPLd code. The EULA for Windows is extremely vague about such things, and Microsoft have armies of lawyers and it's quite feasable for them to sue me or others on a virtually non-existant legal basis. The reverse is not true.
I see that this post has been marked as a troll. I'm not sure it was, but this FUD should not be propogated any further regardless.
Most of the time you don't have the right to freely redistribute copyrighted material from books.
You don't want to accidently read a book for obvious reasons.
Some things are more important than an animated rat
Just like in TV, where giant letters and synthesised voices show how important a computer is. :)
Is the site powered by Plan 9? I wonder because it seems to have been suffering from the /. effect.
You say things that offend me and I can deal with it. Can you?
Problem 1: What is it good for?
Problem 3: What does Plan 9 offer that would make me, or you, want to spend time installing and learning it?
These seem to be the biggest "issues" you propose, which you fully address in your other problem: Problem 2: It is a research tool, and may never be more than that.
Many people seem to forget that there are many many many OSs out there that aren't flavors of *nix or Windows which are used for research purposes. There are quite a few which would make great multi-purpose systems if given the proper attention (Nemesis comes to mind) but never become as such because their features are integrated into other systems. But the need for development into other types of kernel structures, memory management, et al, is what keeps the OS world alive.
Contrary to popular belief, Linux can't do everything.
It extends the "everything is a file" paradigm to it's proper conclusion and gets rid of root.
Will it take over the world and replace Unix? No but it has a lot of very good ideas which can help direct future Linux and Unix development.
Government of the people, by corporate executives, for corporate profits.
John Fogerty sued for sounding like John Fogerty!
Fortunately, he won that case, but who knows how a similar case in the computer industry would turn out?
Curb CO2 emissions: Kill yourself today!
This is really great news for Linux. For too long we've been trapped in the out-moded hierarchical/graphical paradigm. Plan 9, with its revolutionary "factotum" and "secstore" structures, could really provide a breadth of fresh hair to the Linux kernal, putting it head and shoulders above Windows.
While it is nice that the new license conforms to the requirements of the Open Source folks, that does not mean it is compatible with the GNU General Public License (GPL) under which Linux is written. Indeed, not even all free software licenses are compatibel with the GPL (though the vast majority certainly are), and as yet I have not been able to find any commentary from the FSF on whether the modified license qualifies as "free", much less is GPL compatible (the old one certainly wasn't, as RMSes comments posted to this thread quite definitely explain).
So, before getting too excited about Plan 9's potential contribution to Linux, we need to first find out whether or not the licenses are even compatible, so that code can be shared between the two projects.
The Future of Human Evolution: Autonomy
While researching cluster software for my current project, I read some whitepapers showing the differences between Plan 9, Beowulf, Mosix and others. I recommend that read.
Non-Linux Penguins ?
These news are funny when Slashdot's poll is "Worst Sci-Fi Movie Ever".
ESR has some info on Plan9 OS, wich include this footnote:
Prescriptive grammar:linguistics
Very nice. Shame my laptop won't work with Plan-9, I was tempted to put a copy on it.
/ .
If you found the Plan-9 FAQ but saw the URL to the Plan-9 wiki was broken, try http://plan9.bell-labs.com/wiki/plan9/plan_9_wiki
"What would really be cool is if some of the GUI concepts made it over to Linux..."
They already have. Have a look at these:
9wm - a window manger that acts like 8 1/2 from Plan 9
Wily - a clone of Plan 9s programmers editor, Acme (v cool)
There's also WindowLab, another window manager which uses the same window resizing system as Plan 9.
I'm sure there's more that I don't know of...
Our web server and FTP server serve the same files. /hidden is the exception to the rule, meaning that you can't list that directory using the FTP server (or the web server). We use it for things we don't want people stumbling upon. The license files were kept there when we were doing the initial OSI approval, and we just haven't moved them yet.
The reasons aren't obvious. I've seen this myth before, notably from Microsoft employees. The idea that you can be "infected" by simply looking at GPLd code is nonsense.
Indeed you are correct. Imagine it like this. I write books for a living. I read a detective novel. Therefore I am banned from writing a detective novel. .. Erm, I don't think so.
Ironically, proprietary code is generally far more "infectious". I work on Wine - if I were to have seen the Windows code, I would be immediately banned from working on it, indeed, probably I'd be banned from working on most GPLd code.
While the Wine developers might or might not do this, there would be nothing illegal about working on Wine, provided you didn't do the obvious things like cutting and pasting large chunks of code.
Rich.
libguestfs - tools for accessing and modifying virtual machine disk images
I worked on this license. It is NOT viral.
It's basically the IBM license but changed not to be viral. Contributions must be covered by the same license, but that only applies if you declare your changes to be a Contribution.
If you want to take the code and go work on a closed project, no problem.
everything in UNIX is modelled as a "file", whereas in Plan9 everything is modelled after a "burrito"
UNIX makes extensive use of the commandline and pipe metaphor, while Plan9 has a chaw spitbucket metaphor.
UNIX programmers are very wealthy and considered to be generally cool by all, whereas Plan9 programmers generally only are popular with other Plan9 programmers. This leads to inbreeding and other nasty stuff which is why AT&T was forced to put a stop to it.
We do IP address checks to make sure you're in a country that the U.S. allows us to export crypto to, and that is all.
There's occasionally talk on LKML of using 9P, the universal Plan9 protocol, in Linux.
9P is the filing protocol, but *everything* in Plan9 is a file, so it's a universal protocol. It allows you to do things like nest devince namespaces, so you can have windowing systems inside windowing systems without any extra work.
Napster-to-go says "Fill and refill your compatible MP3 player", which is a lie. It's not MP3. It's WMA with DRM.
https://lists.cse.psu.edu/archives/9fans/2003-June /025148.html
Fortunately, he won that case, ...
Yeah, but he also lost!
SteveM
Don't talk about compatable. GPL isn't compatable with BSD license, so we can't use your guy's code. You guys can take all you want, but we can't take. I like how GPL is "free".
Please.
First, which part of "this will contribute to Linux" didn't you understand? Linux has absolutely nothing to do with the FreeBSD license, so spreading your divisive nonsense in this thread is woefully off-topic.
Second, the FreeBSD license is perfectly compatible with the GPL. It is also compatible with Microsoft's proprietary license, not to mention anyone elses. The fact that the GPL isn't compatible with FreeBSD (meaning you can't take GPLed code and incorporate it into FreeBSD-licensed code), and the fact that Microsoft's proprietary license is likewise incompatible, is entirely irrelevant.
Indeed, that one-way compatability was a deliberate decision made by the FreeBSD folks...who valued the developer's freedom to incorporate their hard work into proprietary products over the protection of the freedom of future developers and users. Which is a perfectly legitimate stance to take, though it just so happens to be in disagreement with the decision by the GPL folks to protect their users and derivative developers freedoms above even their own.
It is extraordinarilly disingenuous to criticize one free licenses philosophy and imply it to somehow be improper, when the very same license has led to FreeBSD code being included in products which protect neither the developers, nor the users freedom, such as Microsoft's usage of the FreeBSD network stack. Before lambasting the thousands of volunteers who have contributed millions of man hours for FREE, to enhance your FREEDOM, merely because you disagree with the aspects of freedom they choose to emphesize over the ones you would emphesize (if any, which I find questionable in this particular troll), perhaps you would like to address the use of FREE code in products that strip all said FREEDOMs away? Until you justify lambasting the 1-way compatability between two free licenses while ignorning the same 1-way compatability between FreeBSD and virtually every proprietary license, your entire argument devolves to hypocritical grandstanding, misinformation, and spin.
The GPL is free. FreeBSD is free. In different ways, with different protections, different emphesises on different aspects of freedom, and with different consiquences. Most of us who use FreeBSD are perfectly comfortable with this, and understand the differences that are part of the diversity of our community. Most of us who use GNU/Linux are likewise understanding and appreciative of both schools of thought, and can recognize the advantages and limitations of both.
It is only the few zealots on either side, and much more commonly divisive trolls like yourself, for whome this concept poses such difficulty.
The Future of Human Evolution: Autonomy
As the grandparent stated, hat you create is not automatically a derived work of everything you've seen. If it were, Disney would own the entire creative output of humanity (who didn't watch their IP as a child?)
What can be automatic is trade secrets. Here, there is precident (though I'm not sure how much) for presumption of automatic disclosure. Those who have seen MS code are forbidden to work on similar code elsewhere not because it would be a derived work but because it would reveal to the world some mystical MS essence.
We're safe from all that here. Nothing that can be publicly downloaded from the web can be a trade secret.
Sig:Why copyright isn't a fundamental human right
If you're wondering how Plan 9 differs from Unix, check out:
http://plan9.bell-labs.com/sys/doc/9.html
When it comes to licensing, the BSD fanatics (as opposed to mere BSD fans, of which I are one) are one of the few groups in the world that can make RMS look like a moderate.
The GPL is not viral! If you take MS's code and stick it in your program, they can (and will) sue you for copyright violation. If you take Joe's GPL'd code and stick it in your program, Joe can (and might) sue you for copyright violation, OR you can release your work under the GPL and everything's hunky-dory. Note the "OR" there. That's a new freedom you didn't have before. It may not be the freedom you want, but it's still a damn freedom you didn't have before. And hurling insulting terms like "viral" simply because someone doesn't give you every bloody permission you might possibly ever want, when the law doesn't require them to give you ANY permissions at all, is pathetic and whiney.
We have 38 system calls, along with 10 now-deprecated calls.
Kernel functionality is added by serving more files from the kernel, not by adding calls. For example, there's no time(2) system call -- programs read /dev/time instead. And so on.