XFree86 4.4 Released

puriots0 writes "XFree86 version 4.4 is finally out! Grab it while it's still hot, if you don't mind the recent licensing changes... And if you don't care about the license, but the maintainers of your distribution do, this might be the only way to get it for the moment." The XFree86 people seem very eager to claim that the new license is nothing bad; see their FAQ. However, people who have reviewed it, such as RMS and Branden Robinson, think differently. It looks as if the XFree86 people have a short timespan to either rethink their license changes or be dropped from every/almost every Linux distribution in favor of a forked codebase.

Comments

From the FAQ

[Space cowboy]

What about GPL-compatibility?

The 1.1 license is not GPL-compatible. To avoid new issues with application programs that may be licensed under the GPL, the 1.1 licence is not being applied to client side libraries.

So, it seems that the main reason for a fork is no longer an issue ? No-one is going to be writing a new X-Server (well, I guess some of the embedded folks might, but that's about all I can think of), and they state that there's no issues with any client programs that you link with ... No problem for most of us then, unless it's for political reasons.

My position is that if you write/own the code you get to say how it's used. I don't think there's *any* argument against that, and I can see why they want to promote themselves in this world where perception is all. The issue is that all decisions have consequences - which may be why client-programs are not part of the deal :-) I seriously doubt that XFree86 *want* a code fork, and I think that freedesktop.org will give them a serious run for their money if the fork goes ahead.

I wonder if the forking argument itself (please say that correctly :-) has gathered sufficient momentum to cause the predicted split though - that would be a pity if so. For all that KDE and Gnome are competing desktops, and they have both co-evolved to their benefit over time, I think two competing windowing-system standards might have a harder time co-evolving... If they didn't, you'd have to wonder why there were 2 in the first place!

Simon.

Re:From the FAQ

[Ed Avis]

It prevents you including GPL-licensed code in an X server derived from XFree86; that is enough reason for Debian to avoid the new release, it seems.

Interesting that the FAQ now acknowledges that the 1.1 licence does not permit redistribution under the GPL; before, the XFree86 people were insisting that in their opinion it was allowed. Unless I'm confusing two different licences here.

Re:From the FAQ

[petabyte]

No, from what I'm told, the main reason to fork is the attitude taken by some members of the XFree Core Team. As you said, its their code and they can do what they want but the forking has already happened:

Xouvert
Freedesktop
Cygwin X

Personally I don't see myself ever using XFree 4.4 and am looking forward to a complete release of fd.o. When that happens, I'll likely be moving everything I can off XFree but that's just me.

Re:From the FAQ

[Nuclear Elephant]

No-one is going to be writing a new X-Server

On the contrary, FreeDesktop.org is writing one, and it's A. much more promising (supports some neat things too like drop shadows and translucent menus), and B. based on the original XFree86 libraries.

Re:From the FAQ

[mmurphy000]

So, it seems that the main reason for a fork is no longer an issue ? No-one is going to be writing a new X-Server (well, I guess some of the embedded folks might, but that's about all I can think of), and they state that there's no issues with any client programs that you link with ... No problem for most of us then, unless it's for political reasons.

I think part of the concern is over long-term intent. Mr. Dawes says applying the license to client-side libraries is "deferred", implying that it might be applied sometime later, though it appears that he thinks GPL compatibilty for the client-side libraries is somewhat important.

...I can see why they want to promote themselves in this world where perception is all.

Apache used to have an advertising clause and dropped it, yet people still know about Apache. Moreover, the number of people who will even notice these "advertisements" are fairly few -- how many ordinary folk are going to read and understand these lists of attributions? If they want XFree86.org to be on everyone's lips (for positive reasons), they'll need something more than this clause.

Re:From the FAQ

[platipusrc]

I think that what you're referring to is the Apache 2.0 license that had a clause about patents that some said conflicted with the GNU GPL but that the Apache Group said did not. I'm not sure, but I think the Apache 2.0 license has been revised further to make it more clear that it is GNU GPL compatible.

Re:From the FAQ

[plcurechax]

It prevents you including GPL-licensed code in an X server derived from XFree86; that is enough reason for Debian to avoid the new release, it seems.

Huh? It is well known that you cannot freely mix BSD (old 4 clause or new 3 clause) licensed code with GPL code in the same code base. You would have to make it entirely GPL, which is the 'viral' nature of GPL that BSD fans complain about.

Re:From the FAQ

[Ianoo]

Xouvert is dead. If you don't believe me check their mailing lists.

Re:From the FAQ

[pe1rxq]

They should stop complaining about it.....
I find it ironic that they choose a license that specificly allows relicensing and brag about its abilities and at the same time complain when somebody actually does it.....

BTW since microsoft used the BSD license ip stack doesn't that make their EULA just as viral by this logic?

Jeroen

Re:From the FAQ

[plcurechax]

BTW since microsoft used the BSD license ip stack doesn't that make their EULA just as viral by this logic?


Yes, you cannot take any Microsoft changes to the BSD tcp/ip stack and re-introduce them back into BSD code bases, since the EULA prevents that.

Re:From the FAQ

[AndyS]

I think that the reason this is coming up now is BECAUSE of all the threats of forks. I think these people want to make everything else seem like a complete fork.

Re:From the FAQ

[msh104]

indeed, it is very neat. the problem is that all the drivers will need to be rewritten/ported. you can't just write wrappers around the old drivers. right now we only have fbdev/vesa stuff and some other stuff you really don't want to use right now. getting the drivers finisched right now is more important then ever.

Re:From the FAQ

[TheLinuxSRC]

According to Xouvert's home page a release is scheduled for April 1, 2004. Of course that could be some kind of april fool's joke....

Re:From the FAQ

[Ann Elk]

Except that Microsoft does not use the BSD IP stack.

• I worked for nearly 10 years in the Windows NT networking group.
• I worked very closely with the guys who wrote the TCP/IP stack that shipped with NT 3.51 and later.
• I know the NT TCP/IP sources very well.
• There is some residual BSD sources in the resolver (DNS client) code (most of which has been rewritten), and in the piece-of-shit FTP client, but not in the TCP/IP stack.

Re:From the FAQ

[lussmu]

much more promising (supports some neat things too like drop shadows and translucent menus),

And why on earth is that promising? Where, oh where are you trying to take Linux? I thought Linus said this was the year Linux is going to break through to the desktop - if so, I think we should mainly focus on finishing up the user interface and making it more robust, not on stupid interface modification like shadows and transparency that only make it more difficult to do anything remotely useful, but look cool.

Re:From the FAQ

[msh104]

just wondering, why do you think many of the windows 2000 folks upgraded to XP? because it had a shiny happy interface. it might not be a good reason to upgrade, but it is a fact that 99% of the users love eye candy over stability/usability/security whatever. I myself think kde and such have enough eye candy already. I really can't care is they use real or fake transparantie. I agree with you that it is time to work on creating stable good code. there is allready enough candy for everybody.

Re:From the FAQ

[Ed Avis]

I think there may be a licence incompatibility in that any work derived from the BSD code must give credit in docs and help screens, but the GPL does not have any such restriction, so if you tried to distribute the work under the GPL then you would have lost the restriction about giving credit, and (by some legal theory I don't understand and which may or may not exist) the people who get the code from you and try to exercise their rights under the GPL would be infringing the copyright on the BSD-licensed code.

Similarly, if I had some code that said 'you can use this but only while doing a handstand' and tried to combine it with GPL'd code, I couldn't distribute the resulting work under the GPL because people receiving it wouldn't know about the handstand condition. I would have to distribute it under 'GPL plus handstand' - but then this wouldn't be allowed by the GPLd code I started with, since you're not allowed to add extra restrictions.

Re:From the FAQ

[Alan Cox]

Advertising clauses are a nightmare to manage and for anything with a UI really the wrong way to get noticed.

An XFree86 logo during the X server startup would get noticed!

Re:From the FAQ

[Guspaz]

Yep, the resolver link is pretty obvious just by the file structure used alone;

c:\winnt\system32\drivers\etc\hosts

And under *nix:

/etc/hosts

Gee, a bit of a similarity there, you think?

Re:From the FAQ

[Nuclear Elephant]

If Linux is going to even have a chance at breaking through to the desktop world, it has to stop looking like crap. With a little customization, and FreeDesktop, I was able to make my desktop look like this: http://www.nuclearelephant.com/images/screenshot.j pg which could compete with a crappintosh any day...but little features and ATTENTION TO DETAIL (something that's missing in Linux) is one of the big reasons the average non-tech individual's going to want to use it. I'd love to see hover expansion and other features too....while I agree stability and functionality is more important, an aesthetically pleasing interface is critical to desktop assimilation.

Re:From the FAQ

[bigredgiant1]

I think you're forgetting that the Y project was put back into motion. The goals of that project already overcome those of the current X. With enough effort the Y project could take over if needed.

Re:From the FAQ

[HaraldNH]

The reason to fork is basically something that has turned into a pissing contest, with attitudes on all sides. It will either blow over, or it will happen. If it does, the loosers will be the Open Source community and the users (us).

The basic problem with forking X, is that it is such a huge and rather un-structured code base. Which means that we are probably talking about a few dozens of people who are able to maintain and develop the stuff. A few of these are in the UNIX-companies around, a couple are at fd.o, and by far the largest group is at XFree86. And I've not seen these people talking about defecting to some other project.

Re:From the FAQ

[be-fan]

The underlying framework supports drop-shadows and translucent menus, but can be used for much more:

- OpenGL will be used for drawing, so you can have very rich, yet fast, vector-graphics based applications.

- Back-buffering each window (which is what enables transparency and shadows) allows you to eliminate all sorts of flicker and lag during resizing and window moving.

- New extensions (Composite + XDamage) allow for clever window managers to do useful things like Expose-style features, screen-scrapers (for things like VNC), magnification tools, etc.

Re:From the FAQ

[Anonymous Coward]

if so, I think we should mainly focus on finishing up the user interface and making it more robust

You're right, of course. As the project manager of Anyone Anywhere Who Has Ever Written Any Free Software, I will make sure to let them know that shadows and transparency are officially pushed back to 2005, and all man hours are to be spent on Robustosity.

I'll also redirect the efforts of those guys in France who were writing ANOTHER image gallery program. Seriously, don't we have enough? We're working on Robustness now, guys! Pay attention!

Re:From the FAQ

[Anonymous Coward]

Eh? Linux isn't going to have "even a chance" if it doesn't have gumdrop widgets, translucency, drop-shadows and other visual frills which add NOTHING to productivity?

Ah yeah, because Windows 95 never had a chance did it? Not MacOS before X? You have no idea what you're talking about. Desktop success comes via a strong application base, reliability, ease-of-updating and other factors.

It's in no way "critical", as other OSes have shown. Besides, your "even a chance" is nonsensical, as Linux desktop adoption has surpassed Apple's. It's still small, but it's growing rapidly.

Re:From the FAQ

[baxissimo]

Please back up your outrageous claims with some real data. I, for one, upgraded to XP only because the IT folks told me I had to. I'm not sure why they decided everyone needed to upgrade, but I'm pretty sure it wasn't because they wanted everyone to have more eye candy. And when I did finally upgrade, I immediately turned off all the silly PreSkool fluff and made it look like Win95/2000 again.

And besides, even if you're right, Linux is in a different place in the "hierarchy of needs" than Windows right now. Windows users haven't had to worry about lack of useful documentation or easy configuration for years, so they can afford to obsess over eye candy more than poor Linux users who have enough trouble just getting their printing to work

More effort should be going to providing more usable and better documented GUIs, not making more eye candy. But this is open source, and people work on what they want to work on. And people don't want to work on making things usable. There's no fun in that. You can't post to Slashdot saying "hey! i was just up programming all night -- check out my new highly usable CUPS setup wizard". No one will care, because the folks reading Slashdot all got CUPS working ages ago. What do they care if it's now easier to do? But you can post "check out these super new transparent menus!" and all the 14-year olds will gasp in awe and amazement and call you a h4X0r 60D.

Re:From the FAQ

[Citizen of Earth]

No, from what I'm told, the main reason to fork is the attitude taken by some members of the XFree Core Team.

More than simple attitude, the 1.1 license is a bold declaration that you can't trust them.

Re:From the FAQ

[Crypto Gnome]

I wonder if the forking argument itself (please say that correctly :-) has gathered sufficient momentum

Eye'm from Eyerlnd, ewe insensitive clod! Me mothr made me kiss the Blarney stone when eye wuz young, and eye've never been able to forget its gritty flavor. As sure as they're leprechauns in Eyerlnd, you know eye'm always forking careful to forking say things correctly.

Re:From the FAQ

[macshit]

It is well known that you cannot freely mix BSD (old 4 clause or new 3 clause) licensed code with GPL code in the same code base.

No, it's not `well known', and in fact, it's not true!

The revised (`3 clause') BSD license is perfectly compatible with the GPL. Since 99.9% of all `BSD licensed' code uses the revised BSD license, there's basically no problem at all.

Of course the resulting aggregate program must have its source distributed (&c) as part of its source uses the GPL, but that's pretty obvious if you're using GPL'd source code.

[The original (`4 clause') BSD license is indeed incompatible with the GPL, but that's largely academic, as no one actually uses that anymore.]

Re:From the FAQ

[FauxPasIII]

> It prevents you including GPL-licensed code in an X server derived from
> XFree86; that is enough reason for Debian to avoid the new release, it seems.

Debian just moved X 4.3.0 into the unstable tree about a week and a half ago; I don't think any of us Debianistas were really worried about seeing XFree 4.4 in any of the three main Debian trunks this year anyway. ;)

Re:From the FAQ

[Guido von Guido]

I think this "Windows 2000 TCP stack based on BSD's" thing is a bit of an urban legend. Clearly they used parts of it in various spots, but if they had based it on BSD's it would obviously work much better...

Re:From the FAQ

[macshit]

Windows users haven't had to worry about lack of useful documentation or easy configuration for years, so they can afford to obsess over eye candy

Hmmm, where is this `useful documentation' you speak of? The windows documentation I'm familiar with (not happily, but sometimes you gotta do unpalatable things) is for the most part completely useless, e.g., it simply restates what is already obvious, without giving any deeper insight or addressing common problems...

Re:From the FAQ

[Anonymous Coward]

I know the NT TCP/IP sources very well.

Yeah, and now so do we.

Re:From the FAQ

[Hooded One]

The old one had four clauses, the fourth being the advertising clause. The new one has only three.

Re:From the FAQ

[macshit]

The old/original BSD license had 4 `clauses' of which one required you to mention Berkeley in any advertising/documentation for the end product. This `advertising clause' was, as you might imagine, not only a huge practical problem, but incompatible with the GPL.

The revised BSD license -- which almost all current `BSD licensed' software uses -- deleted the advertising clause, removing the conflict with the GPL.

Re:From the FAQ

[samhalliday]

that is without a doubt, the most unscientific experiment i have ever seen.

have you ever considered a career in the social sciences?

Re:From the FAQ

[NateTech]

He could just find another test like that which shows M$ to be faster and then go to work in their Marketing department. :-)

Re:From the FAQ

[Ann Elk]

The oh-so-lame FTP client was always based on BSD. It's pretty gross code, and no one wanted to touch it. Only the minimum work was done to make it build and (sort of) run under NT.

The telnet client has a strange history. At one point (back in NT 3.1 and 3.5, I think) it was basically just the normal Windows terminal app. Someone had the bright (?) idea to have it talk to a virtual serial port. So, a driver implemented the virtual serial port, which talked to a user-mode helper service, which issued the socket calls to talk to the remote telnet server. Now, just imagine the ring transitions, imagine the context switches, imagine the buffer copies. And, of course, imagine the total lack of performance.

Later (NT 3.51 maybe?) the virtual serial port bullshit was ripped out, and the terminal app was hacked into being a (slightly less lame) telnet client.

For Win2K (maybe) and XP (for sure) a "new" telnet client was shipped. I've never seen the source to this version, so I do not know its origin. However, looking at its structure in a debugger, I would guess that it's not BSD based. It uses threads and async I/O, handles different language locales, etc. In other words, it appears very un-BSD like. But that's just my hunch.

Re:Licensing

[MooKore 2004]

Its not just linux, the BSDs are against these changes too. Ironicly too, since their licence used to be like this one.

Great!

[Anonymous Coward]

I can't wait for the major distributions to drop xfree86 and for there to be a replacement for it. Xfree has been great while it lasted, but it's very crufty and a replacement would be welcome.

We'd probably go through growing pains associated with transfers to other graphical servers, but in the end the best will win.

Re:Licensing

[pe1rxq]

No, in a little while they will prove that nomatter what companies/organizations do it will continue fine without them....
The great thing about free software is that you can only be in control as long as you don't piss off a critical set of developpers.

Jeroen

Question...

[j0nkatz]

Story says "XFree86 4.4 Released"
What's it been released from?

Re:Question...

[dzym]

"mortal coils".

rimshot, etc.

What other alternatives?

[brainkiller]

What other alternatives are there to Xfree?

Re:What other alternatives?

[Sweetshark]

Freedesktop X server
y windows

Re:What other alternatives?

[larry bagina]

There are some commercial X Servers for linux (MetroX, for example). Of course, if XFree86 isn't free enough for you, you probably wouldn't touch MetroX with a 10-foot pole. Solaris uses something else for XWindows (and it includes display postscript). Of course, that's not "free" either.

PicoGUI and Berlin (or whatever they renamed themselves this week) are still in the development stage. GTK and some games can run under direct vga acess too.

Re:What other alternatives?

[wed128]

there's the freedesktop.org xserver, as well as directfb, Y and other "non-x" things...

Re:What other alternatives?

[David McBride]

Y Windows is currently under heavy development and not yet suited for end-users -- and is unlikely to be so for a while.

Re:What other alternatives?

[mst76]

All alternatives suffer from a lack of (accelerated) drivers.

Re:What other alternatives?

[Anonymous Coward]

DirectFB.

Re:What other alternatives?

[NanoGator]

"What other alternatives are there to Xfree? "

Windows, but if the license of X is what really bugs you...

Re:What other alternatives?

[David McBride]

You probably mean the Y server, not X. And we're using Arch, not CVS.

Andy Suffield has been working on the project; he's got some stuff up at http://people.debian.org/~asuffield/.

By the way, the modifications to libiterm required to support Y have already entered Debian Unstable, so you don't have to install that seperately now.

Re:What other alternatives?

[Via_Patrino]

There's also Xfree86 4.4rc2 it's still old license and a good start to a fork.

Re:What other alternatives?

[BiggerIsBetter]

I've found Xi Graphics to have a very good X Server. Only real problem is that it doesn't handle Nvidia cards. It's very fast too.

Re:What other alternatives?

[Anonymous Coward]

> that's bullshit.
> freedesktops server is just build on xfree86. same drivers.

I think you've confused freedesktop with Xouvert. Xouvert is a fork from XFree86, but they don't appear to have any of their own code yet, and people have been questioning if the project is still alive. The freedesktop Xserver is an independent implementation, based on Keith Packard's Kdrive Xserver. From the freedesktop Xserver FAQ:

Q: Couldn't we just write a wrapper for XFree86 drivers and use them?

A: Essentially, no. There are a large number of calls from XFree86 drivers into XFree86's DDX layer. Furthermore, XFree86 drivers don't support acceleration in the same way, so offscreen pixmaps wouldn't be supportable as far as I know.

Re:What other alternatives?

[Mr. Piddle]

What other alternatives are there to Xfree?

Well, if you are a purist and don't mind a lack of drivers, you can go straight to using X11R6. This is the foundation for every UNIX vendor's windowing system, too (except for, uh, the drivers).

Xserver

[MooKore 2004]

Maybe its time to get more people looking at Xserver?

Re:Xserver

[Nuclear Elephant]

I'd switch to FDO if they would write some GLX extensions and add a few more user interface features. As of now it looks awesome, is architected well, but it's a tad slow and useless without GLX. (I'm using the ATI version)

Re:Xserver

[erikharrison]

XServer is an experimental project, based off of KDrive. It is -

1) An experimental driver architecture

2) An expertimental set of X extensions, dependent on the new driver architecture for performance reasons

3) The umbrella for the Keiths more mainstream extensions to X, including XDamage (which is a dependency for the compositing extension).

According to the guys on the XServer list, the XServer is not only not ready for prime time, but it may not ever be a real canidate for an XFree replacement because of it's experimental nature.

So they stick to the new license...

[Anonymous Coward]

Here's the deal.. if the new license isn't such a big deal, why doesn't the XFree group revert ot the old one? There is something in the new license that is really important to them, so its not exactly a minor wording change. If this were a lot of trouble over nothing, they would have backed off to a license they've _been_ releasing code under for years. I'll stick with the version that people with more legal experience than me say is best. I thank RMS and the distros for watching out for me by keeping up with these licensing issues.

Re:So they stick to the new license...

[mehaiku]

"why doesn't the XFree group revert ot the old one?"

Let's not please. Have you seen how fast the latest Linux 2.6.3 kernel is? Now imagine combining that with the speed of the latest KDE 3.2.0. What ingredient is still missing? A forked, reworked, optimized Xserver perhaps? Please Xfree group, for the love of God, keep the license as it is.

Re:So they stick to the new license...

[MoneyT]

Because as they say over and over, the old license didn't directly address binary only distributions. The new one does.

Re:So they stick to the new license...

[leereyno]

The problem is that this isn't a legal issue, its a political/ideological one. The fact that the FSF crowd coaches ideological arguments in legal terms doesn't mean there is a legal issue here.

The FSF doesn't like the new license and begins telling people that it is incompatible with the GPL. Does that mean they are right? Does the GPL mean whatever the FSF decides it means that week? Or, in a country governed by the rule of law, does it mean no more and no less that what it be proven to mean in court? I don't know about you, but I tend to believe the latter

More importantly, what exactly is the FSF supposed to do about people who don't agree with their current take and make use of Apache/XFree86-4.4 anyway? Are they going to sue them? Do they have the money, let alone the ability convince a court that the suit isn't frivilous? More importantly, can they afford the ill will that would result?

I personally don't understand why XFree considers this change so important, but neither do I see it as a harmful one. They are not attempting to make any changes to how anyone uses their code, only asking that they receive recognition for their work. Isn't that something that RMS has been whining about for years with his GNU/Linux nonsense? He "corrects" people for calling Linux Linux every chance he gets. In fact I read an article where the author claimed that RMS refused to give an interview unless the article used his preferred terminology.

What's good for the goose is good for the gander.

Lee

Re:So they stick to the new license...

[mst76]

The FSF doesn't like the new license and begins telling people that it is incompatible with the GPL. Does that mean they are right?

I don't know, but from the FAQ it seems that The XFree86 Project Inc. agrees with the FSF here.

They are not attempting to make any changes to how anyone uses their code, only asking that they receive recognition for their work. Isn't that something that RMS has been whining about for years with his GNU/Linux nonsense? He "corrects" people for calling Linux Linux every chance he gets.

RMS can ask recognition from distributors, but he can't legally demand it. XFree86 just changed their license so that they can.

Re:So they stick to the new license...

[mcc]

The FSF doesn't like the new license and begins telling people that it is incompatible with the GPL. Does that mean they are right? Does the GPL mean whatever the FSF decides it means that week?

Well, the FSF did a very good job of backing up their claim that it is incompatible with the GPL. They pointed to the exact sections where the incompatibility occurs. Most people, including a number of the major Linux distributions, seem to agree with the FSF on this interpretation.

The "this week" comment is misleading. The FSF has never changed their opinion on the correct interpretation of the GPL and has tried to make the implications of this interpretation as clear as possible from day one.

More importantly, what exactly is the FSF supposed to do about people who don't agree with their current take and make use of Apache/XFree86-4.4 anyway? Are they going to sue them?

If someone alters a GPL program such that the code is linked with code from an incompatible license, the copyright holder of that code is within their rights to order the distributor of the mixed code to stop. If that distributor does not stop, the copyright holder is within their rights to sue the distributor to make them stop.

If the FSF were the copyright holder, they probably would sue if they absolutely had to in order to ensure compliance with the GPL. The FSF does hold the copyright on many open source projects, so this is a possibility.

Do they have the money, let alone the ability convince a court that the suit isn't frivilous?

Actually, yes, the main function of the FSF is to serve as a central copyright repository for open source and trust fund for the legal defense of those copyrights.

More importantly, can they afford the ill will that would result?

Can the open source software community afford to exist in a manner in which licenses are addressed in a slapdash, "oh that's close enough" manner? Since the nature of Open Source is to coordinate input from many contributors, the exact manner in which the rights and licensing to that input is marshalled is of extreme importance. The rights framework for open source needs to be clear and solid.

Moreover, I'm not sure exactly how much ill will the FSF would garner for enforcing the requirement that if you redistribute GPLed code you follow the terms of the GPL, especially since, well, if the GPL isn't going to be complied with then why does it exist in the first place? The only ill will this would generate is among people who don't think anything should be GPLed ever, and they hate the FSF anyway, so what's the loss?

Re:So they stick to the new license...

[jellomizer]

Well there are problems with sticking to the old license is because it didn't clearly explain how the authors wanted people to use their software. RMS is just a Free Software extremist, although you should thank him for his contributions to the Free Software community, you cant think of him as some master of right and wrong, good and evil, and worthy and unworthy. From all I heard and read about him he seems to be a very polarized person where what is believes is right is the only truth while anyone who disagrees with his is evil. Sure he is a smart man but the smartest man can be wrong. RMS often fails to realize the most people need to make money to live and not live off a "Genus Grant" from colleges. What the XFree86 License just adds is the persons recognition to the projects in all distributions of it. So now when these people want to get an other job (that makes them money to live) They can reference their contribution to Xfree86 in their resume and they can back it up by showing their name in any distribution it comes with. I do feel sorry for you if you are grateful for a small percentage of people who alert you when they see something they think is wrong. It is to bad you cannot think for yourself.

Re:So they stick to the new license...

[calambrac]

yeah, so here's what we have to thank the FSF and RMS for protecting us from:

Version 1.1 of XFree86 Project License.

Copyright (C) 1994-2004 The XFree86 Project, Inc.
All rights reserved.

Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy of this software and associated documentation files (the "Software"), to deal in the Software without restriction, including without limitation the rights to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicence, and/or sell copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions:

1. Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright notice, this list of conditions, and the following disclaimer.
2. Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution, and in the same place and form as other copyright, license and disclaimer information.
3. The end-user documentation included with the redistribution, if any, must include the following acknowledgment: "This product includes software developed by The XFree86 Project, Inc (http://www.xfree86.org/) and its contributors", in the same place and form as other third-party acknowledgments. Alternately, this acknowledgment may appear in the software itself, in the same form and location as other such third-party acknowledgments.
4. Except as contained in this notice, the name of The XFree86 Project, Inc shall not be used in advertising or otherwise to promote the sale, use or other dealings in this Software without prior written authorization from The XFree86 Project, Inc.

THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED ``AS IS'' AND ANY EXPRESSED OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE ARE DISCLAIMED. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE XFREE86 PROJECT, INC OR ITS CONTRIBUTORS BE LIABLE FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS OR SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS INTERRUPTION) HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER IN CONTRACT, STRICT LIABILITY, OR TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) ARISING IN ANY WAY OUT OF THE USE OF THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGE.

come on, this is the great threat to freedom? you have to include a line of text acknowldeging XFree86 where you already acknowledge other people? please. let's focus on something that matters.

Re:So they stick to the new license...

[flossie]

Here's the deal.. if the new license isn't such a big deal, why doesn't the XFree group revert ot the old one?

Perhaps it is a big deal after all. Pure speculation, but it is possible that incompatability with the GPL is a deliberate attempt to prevent future changes to Xlib from being used by the freedesktop.org project now that they have packaged the library separately. I don't really see what useful purpose that would serve, but maybe things just got very, very bitter between the various personalities involved.

Re:So they stick to the new license...

[Alan Cox]

ex-Free86 8)

Re:So they stick to the new license...

[azzy]

The reason the two are incompatible is the fault of the XF86 people, as they are the ones making the recent change that caused the incompatability. If all was fine, then GPL suddenly changed and expected others to change to accomodate it, then any incompatability would be the fault of the GPL.

Re:So they stick to the new license...

[azzy]

I thought the new restriction required sme sort of advert of XF86 being used.. not advertising the name of everyone to have worked on it (though I could be wrong). If I am right, then Joe Bloggs can't point to anything new to show he worked on it. However he can, and could point at his copyright notices in the source code. No change is surely needed for that?

Re:So they stick to the new license...

[zhenlin]

Right. Like GPL compatibility.

This is like 4-clause BSD, which was also incompatible with the GPL.

The GPL does not require this crediting -- therefore, any licence that does is not compatible.

Re:So they stick to the new license...

[calambrac]

XFree86 isn't claiming GPL compatibility. They say so in their FAQ. GPL compatibility is beside the point.

The point is, "What constitutes 'free as in freedom'?" Is it only the GPL? I don't know, maybe I was so wrapped up in jamming on the idea of open and available source code that I missed the memo. I think the BSD licenses are free, and not weak. I think any license that says, here, take it... sounds pretty free. But then, I'm young, and haven't spent years thinking of clever names like "copyleft".

After reading the actual license in contention, you have to admit that what they are asking for is hardly an infringement on the core principles of free software, esp. if you were okay with their previous license. The annoying part extends a request for credit to binary distributions, as has long been requested in the case of source code distributions, and then only if you're already extending credit to someone else, but it in no way hinders any of the privileges afforded by other 'free' software.

I mean, this is what distributions are justifying their decision to exclude XFree86 software on? They don't want to add a line of text giving credit where it's due? Other posters have suggested that there may be some politics involved; it sounds a lot more plausible, though I don't know any of the details of all that. In the meantime though, let's get another SCO story, or talk about how much Microsoft sucks, or maybe rap about Taco Bell vs. Taco Bueno. This seems pretty weak in comparison.

Re:So they stick to the new license...

[10101001 10101001]

> Does the GPL mean whatever the FSF decides it means that week? Or, in a country governed by the rule of law, does it mean no more and no less that what it be proven to mean in court?

Fine, the FSF states that the GPL and such and such license are incompatible. Maybe you don't agree, and you're certainly allowed to go off and treat them as compatible. And if someone gets sued over it because of what you did, you'll be held responsible if they're proven to be incompatible along with anyone else who knew you included such and such licensed code with the GPL code. I'd personally rather side on caution, especially when what the FSF is saying doesn't sound like FUD. I don't need a court telling me using a stapler to commit murder is homicide.

Re:So they stick to the new license...

[Grievre]

Linux is a kernel, not an OS. Calling an entire
system "Linux" is just incorrect. GNU/Linux is a
specific term which signifies the combination of
the GNU system and the Linux kernel, however, it
is also incorrect, as many of the core components
of a linux-based system (sysvinit, lilo, fsck,
modutils/module-init-tools) are not part of the
GNU system, but neither are they part of "Linux".

A bare-bones linux-based system is
generally comprised of GNU libc, GNU bash, GNU
fileutils, sysvinit, module-init-tools, fsck,
LILO (or alternately, GRUB), some sort of
packaging system (optional), and Linux itself.

in some cases, most of those tools are replaced
by something like busybox, in which case the
system contains no strictly GNU programs at all.

What part of that can be considered the operating
system? If you go by what is required to make
programs work, then it's just the kernel, a shell
(whether it be ash, bash, csh...), and a glibc.

If the program doesn't use the shell, that's not
needed, but it might. If the program is
statically linked, it doesn't need glibc, but
most programs aren't.

If you say "I use linux", you are correct.
If you say "my machine runs linux", that's right.
If you say "linux is a better OS than windows",
you might realize that most of what makes the
system what you would consider an OS is not,
in fact, part of Linux.

What???

[Azureflare]

What do you mean? How will it be the downfall of linux? Some people don't like the way a project is going, so they start a fork with the same codebase. People choose the best of the two forks, and then most people go to the new fork.

Sure, it seems bad while it's happening, but in the end you get a better product. Often projects get way too political and forking is a way to bypass that bureaucratic nightmare.

Re:What???

[Rick Zeman]

What do you mean? How will it be the downfall of linux? Some people don't like the way a project is going, so they start a fork with the same codebase. People choose the best of the two forks, and then most people go to the new fork.
Sure, it seems bad while it's happening, but in the end you get a better product. Often projects get way too political and forking is a way to bypass that bureaucratic nightmare.

Do you get a better product? Maybe...BUT, and this a big but, what about the products that have to choose which fork to follow when they've diverged far enough to be incompatible? Which version of X am I going to write GeeWhizMaGraph to use? These forks are even worse overall than distro fragmentation looking at linux at a macro level.
Whoever modded my original post as flamebait can bite me. Get a clue.

Re:What???

[pe1rxq]

The nice thing about X is that it doesn't matter for your app which server is runngin...
Its called a 'standard' and its a nice thing to have.

The only thing you will have to choose is the library you compile your app against. Very vew apps use the xlibs directly. And even then the various forks of xlib are still compatible.

Jeroen

Re:What???

[MoneyT]

But what happens when they fork the standards? Maybe a bunch of developers don't like the standards anymore. ANd who decides on these stnadards anyway?

Re:What???

[Azureflare]

I agree your original post didn't deserve a flamebait rating. However, I will say I don't believe that forks will cause fragmentation; in fact, I think different distros contribute to the versatility of linux. That's my own opinion, and you're entitled to your own =)

I'm not so sure incompatibility issues are a problem with forks, because most programmers try to get people to use their fork, and they won't intentionally break stuff. This is true even when you are making a new version of an application.

Of course, there IS a difference between forking and using a different prog for the graphical display; it would upset a lot of things if something other than X was used as a desktop; but if that alternative was close to X, then all it would take is some rewrites and dep changes (OK so it would be more complicated, but not impossible) and then everything would be fine after that change.

As you point out, some of what happens, re. forking is destructive, but it is also very constructive (i.e. competition) and I don't think it means linux will die.

I don't know if Xfree86 is completely impossible to fix at this point; I hope the Xfree team aren't intentionally writing their license to cause problems with GPL, but if they are, then a fork with the xfree codebase prior to the license change won't cause major compatibility issues because it's basically 4.4 before the 4.4 license. I'm not exactly sure when the new license takes effect or which codebase the fork can start from; I'm not terribly familiar with the project. I'm sure there are many others here who are posting/have posted on this subject.

Aarrr...

[wesman83]

the GPL be a harsh mistress....

Re:Licensing

[Technonotice_Dom]

Divide and conquer...

We're fighting ourselves on this issue. Not until this licensing problem is sorted out will big companies be able to take deploying Linux based desktop machines seriously...

Lets make it as complex as possible for everyone

[microbox]

It's apparent that IP laws are more and more important to people who job is to write software.

It's time for a redesign, anyway.

[Sheetrock]

The average person is greatly confused by the myriad issues involved with X, such as fonts, the third mouse wheel, TV-Out, printing, and the jillion interfaces available via desktop shells (for which there is no analogue in the Windows world).

Maybe a simpler and GPLed implementation is in order. There's got to be a bunch of tweaks for speed available for the X86 platform that would be possible in something not intended to run in safe mode all the time.

Re:It's time for a redesign, anyway.

[temojen]

The average person is greatly confused by the myriad issues involved with X, such as fonts,

The average person doesn't need to know about xfs, or font dirs etc. Their distribution vendor takes care of this.

the third mouse wheel,

Again, the distribution vendor takes care of this.

printing

Printing is not an X issue, for the same reason that embroidering is not. It's a completely different medium.

and the jillion interfaces available via desktop shells (for which there is no analogue in the Windows world)

Again, the average user does not need to know about this. The distribution vendor chooses a default, and if the user has a reason to prefer a different one (which implies they already know about them), they may select a different environment. KDE software runs in GNOME, and vice-versa, and motif/CDE/XLib, etc software still runs in either, or neither, or twm, fvwm, etc.

there's got to be a bunch of tweaks for speed available for the X86 platform

XFree86 runs on a lot more platforms than just x86, which is a good thing now that 64 bit commmodity CPUs are coming out. Even AMD64 is likely to break those optimizations.

something not intended to run in safe mode all the time.

What does "safe mode" have to do with XFree86? Most of the users are on UNIX-like systems (Linux, FreeBSD, OpenBSD, Solaris, etc). If you want to run an X Server on Windows 95, you're free to try one of the commercial implementations.

Re:It's time for a redesign, anyway.

[Brandybuck]

Maybe a simpler and GPLed implementation is in order.

Simpler. That means none of the complex stuff that confuses newbies. If you need TV-out, screw you. If you need printing, screw you. If you need that third mouse wheel, screw you. Truetype only, so go away you smelly unwashed Type1 font user!

GPLed implementation. If you think the current license controversy is worrisome, wait until you get X libraries under the GPL! NOTHING can be an X application unless it's under the GPL, because the GPL is not compatible with anything but itself. That means no Blackbox (and most of its derivatives). No KWin or Kicker for KDE. Nothing that's under the Artistic, BSD, MIT, MPL, etc. licenses will be allowed. If you can't understand why this is a problem, stop drinking the FSF Kool-Aid and wake up!

Re:It's time for a redesign, anyway.

[TheRealSlimShady]

the third mouse wheel

Holy hell man, my mouse only has one wheel - I can't see where they'd put the other two...

Re:It's time for a redesign, anyway.

[Brandybuck]

Sure, but still, you can link BSD-licensed code with a GPL-licensed library.

Only if the resulting executable is licensed under the GPL. Since the FSF considers dynamic linking to be derivation, I am FORBIDDEN to distribute any BSD licensed work that links to GPL libraries.

Re:Licensing

[msh104]

no, this is a good move from the distro side. x11 needs to be gpl compatible. it is madness to rewrite all the progs using it. I really hope freedesktop shows there head in this round. they truly have a great potential.

Question

[Anonymous Coward]

The XF86 project is distributing the 4.4 code under only the new license.

Have any of the individual XF86 *contributors* come forward and said their portions of 4.4 may be used under the previous license at the user's option?

Re:Question

[Anonymous Coward]

The "new license" ONLY covers code which is (C) The XFree86 Project, Inc.

A lot of stuff, eg. some video drivers, come (and came) under different licenses.

Re:Question

[polin8]

The only code that has changed license is the code Copyright Xfree86. Alan Cox, for example, refused to have his contributions under the new scheme. Individual contributors who retained copyright of their code can choose not to allow the new license. It doesn't solve the problem though.

Re:Question

[ajv]

I am a contributor and I am happy for my portions of the code (the Matrox drivers and documentation) to be relicensed under the new license. I've already told IBM that, and XFree86.

Why?

Because the GPL does not suit many forms of development, and if you wanted *ANY* drivers at all, you have to get the documentation. The competition between chipset manufacturers is extremely fierce, and they don't let just anyone access to their code.

Matrox, for example, provide you with a binary BIOS blob to work with, and you can't get this unless you sign an NDA. If the GPL was out there, the blob would become infected. Viola, no Matrox driver.

The fervour of some to be *all* GPL is misplaced and wrong. The GPL is not the be and end all of licenses, nor is itself perfect. The fact that it is deliberately broken with respect to other software in itself a flaw.

This license change will affect only contributors who wish to submit their code as GPL'd code rather than under the XFree86 license. They can always contribute their work to the driverless freedesktop.org, or they can give up a bit of license purity and actually get some work done.

And people wonder why Microsoft is winning.

Oh REALLY?!?!?

[ZuperDee]

It looks as if the XFree86 people have a short timespan to either rethink their license changes or be dropped from every/almost every Linux distribution in favor of a forked codebase.

Am I the only one here who thinks it is possible that license change or not, some distributions are getting ready to dump XFree86 in ANY case, due to the other problems it has, like the general arrogance of the core developers, and the lack of a truly open development community, which is largely their doing?

Seriously, I don't think the license change is the major reason, but simply the right occasion for dumping XFree86. Even if they were to revert the license change tomorrow, I for one would still favor seeing forks like Freedesktop.org's server make it into distros, because I believe the license change is only one of MANY indications that XFree86 has far deeper problems that I'm not so sure can be fixed so easily. Just like many organizations and projects in real life, the PEOPLE behind the project are the greatest asset, and I think the XFree86 core team has failed to recognize this. Unless the core team gets a total attitude makeover, I doubt this will ever change.

Re:Oh REALLY?!?!?

[calc]

They will be moving to the alternatives once they are actually ready. For example, the freedesktop.org xserver hasn't had an official release yet, and isn't ready for general use. From what one of the Debian X Maintainers told me Debian will be moving completely over to freedesktop.org packages once they are ready for use.

How so?

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't see linux being hurt by this, only XFree86.

In my opinion, the sooner Linux drops XF86, the better it will be for Linux.

Re:Licensing

[Nothinman]

No, it's an advantage. If MS suddenly changed the MSHTML license that said it couldn't be used by free programs what would happen? The only choice would be to get a new HTML renderer like Gecko, because XFree is open source we can take the code that is still under the free license and fork a new copy under a free license.

The last version of X?

[Ars-Fartsica]

This is the first version of X that many of its end packagers (linux distros, bsds, etc) have explicitly rejected. What will be the motivation to pursue further development that no one is using? This group just (xFree) 86'd themselves with petty sqaubbling. Thanks for the memories but I think its goodnight Vienna for XFree86.

Re:Licensing

[pe1rxq]

What happens when closed source developpers stop developping? What if they get another job?
If the company doesn't wan't to develop anymore your screwed, otherwise they would have to hire new programmers....

The free software alternative is better:
No matter what the original author does, you can always do (or have done) it yourself. And that is just asuming you are the only one that cares.
If the project is really interesting someone will eventually pick it up or replace it.

A rational person that doesn't see that is blind.

Jeroen

Re: None, for users.

[plcurechax]

What other alternatives are there to Xfree?

There are not suitable alternatives for end-users on Linux and BSD on recent hardware. freedesktop.org is an experimental play-area for developers where exciting new features are currently being developed not mundane things like updated drivers for newer video cards (Radeon 9600, 3rd party 9200LE, newer Intel 845 series, etc.), not robust "production quality" software for end-users, Xouvert doesn't actual have any unique code of their own the last time I looked, and Y Window system is more an idea and a work in progress.

Hopeful about the post-X era

[Ars-Fartsica]

Can we get rid of a system that resolves all dependencies internally? (would like to finish a compile this year)

Can we get rid of the X11R6 subdir? (once again, stop thinking X is a world to itself)?

Just two suggestions for the post-XFree86 era.

Re:Hopeful about the post-X era

[afidel]

Uhhh, moving those tools out of the X11R6 subdir would break anything that expects those files to be there. Besides it's part of the Linux Standard Base and therefore not likely to be changed after all of the work that went into LSB.

Re:Hopeful about the post-X era

[Ars-Fartsica]

Uhhh, moving those tools out of the X11R6 subdir would break anything that expects those files to be there. Besides it's part of the Linux Standard Base and therefore not likely to be changed after all of the work that went into LSB.

Well the LSB can be modified. Its not intended to encode sloppy practices and bad design. Just make some symlinks to honor the past and move on. As for "breaking everything"...this is ridiculous. The distro vendor should be able to resolve this change trivially even without a symlink.

Face it, the X file layout is broken!

Re:Hopeful about the post-X era

[Majix]

Can we get rid of the X11R6 subdir? (once again, stop thinking X is a world to itself)?

Yes. This is being done for the Freedesktop.org X server. See here for more information. And about time! Another thing is that the horrible imake system is being removed (I personally would like to see it taken out behind the barn and shot). Looks like these guys are serious about dragging X into the 21st century.

It's Fresco

[kentyman]

Berlin was renamed Fresco quite a while ago, and has not changed names since.

Debian avoiding the new release??

[niom]

XFree86 4.3 just got into Debian unstable. Debian won't arrive at avoiding 4.4 until eight or nine months from now.

Re:Debian avoiding the new release??

[sewagemaster]

you might find this useful...
http://wiki.debian.net/index.cgi?Debian KDE

Re:Debian avoiding the new release??

[CBravo]

It will be another three years before it enters stable. I still have time :-).

Re:Debian avoiding the new release??

[calc]

I'm not going to upload KDE 3.2 to sid until KDE 3.2.1 is released. The KDE 3.2 release had so little testing done to it that they immediately released required interim fixes to kmail for it among other things like kwifi not even being compilable. There are already 10MB+ of diffs from KDE 3.2 -> KDE 3.2 BRANCH (3.2.1), 3.2 BRANCH is supposed to be just bug fixes so that should tell you 3.2 should be avoided. ;) You can always use the experimental (READ BUGGY UPSTREAM SOURCE) debs as mentioned on http://wiki.debian.net/DebianKDE.

Re:Debian avoiding the new release??

[calc]

Debian will probably switch to freedesktop.org packages much quicker than previous XFree86 packages due to upstream finally maintaining them properly. XFree86 was monolithic, freedesktop.org is not. XFree86 never cared about non-x86 architectures, it appears freedestkop.org will. XFree86 was a closed development model, freedesktop.org isn't...

I've said it before and I'll say it again

[Anonymous Coward]

Linux will get nowhere in the consumer market for as long as any user-- anywhere-- has to be aware of the existence of the XF86Config file.

As someone who cares not about the license

[smartin]

Whats new in 4.4, the site seems to be /.ed. Can a Karma whore please post come release notes.

Re:As someone who cares not about the license

[plcurechax]

* Several stability issues with the support for the Intel 830M, 845G, 852G, 855M and 865G integrated graphics chipsets have been fixed. Some limitation related to the driver's use of the video BIOS remain, especially for some laptops.

* The nv driver for NVIDIA cards has been updated as follows:

* Support added to the nv driver for the GeForce FX 5700, which didn't work with XFree86 4.3.
* The driver now does a much better job of auto-detecting which connector of dual output cards the monitor is attached to, and this should reduce or eliminate the need for manual XF86Config overrides.
* The 2D acceleration for TNT and GeForce has been completely rewritten and its performance should be substantially improved.
* TNT and GeForce cards have new XvPutImage adapter which does scales YUV bit blits.

The SiS driver has seen major updates, including:
* Support for 661/741/760 and support for 330 (Xabre).
* Merged Framebuffer mode.
* Support for DVI, and much more.
* DRI for 300 series (300/305, 540, 630, 730) is supported again.

A new driver for several VIA integrated graphics chipsets has been added.

* The mouse driver has some support on Linux and FreeBSD for auto-detecting the device to use. This makes it unnecessary to supply this information in the XF86Config file in most cases.

* XFree86 4.4 supports IPv6, based on the code contributed by Sun Microsystems, Inc. to X.Org.

* The Mesa version used for OpenGL(R) 1.3 and DRI driver support has been updated to 5.0.2.

* FreeType 2 updated to version 2.1.4. ...

And XFree86 Inc. has shown to be willing to talk

[Anonymous Coward]

The XFree86 Inc. (that is their board) has shown to be willing to discuss actual issues and concerns. If you look at the first reply to RMS's message in the XFree86 Forum, it is from David Dawes of XFree86 and his willing ness to discuss concerns about the license change.

It is not clear why XFree86 has to modify their license to suit a Linux distribution, which is suppose to be a compilation of Free/Open Source Linux software, not a dictator of Open Source.

If these arm chair lawyers are so concerned about GPL, why don't they write a new X Window System from scratch, and release it for free/Free under the GPL.

Re:Licensing

[GimmeFuel]

But you're always dependent on the developers.

You're always dependent on some developers, not necessarily the same developers as you've always had.

What happens if the developers just stop developing?

What happens if the developers just stop developing a closed-source product?

With an abandoned closed-source product, you've got nothing to do except look for an alternative, use the old version, or write one yourself from scratch.

With an abandoned open-source product, you can get new devs on your team, or the code can be forked. No open source project is truly abandoned if there is continued interest in developing it.

Hurting DESKTOP linux?

[xanthines-R-yummy]

This may not hurt "real" linux users, but what about granny who's just getting into linux? How will the new liscensing issues affect distros like Lindows and Lycoris whose main target demographics are noobs and windows converts?

This isn't rhetorical! I'd really like to know!

Re:Hurting DESKTOP linux?

[Ice_Balrog]

Is poor old granny going to be tethered to her P4/Radeon forever?

Not really, Xouvert (a XFree86 fork) or Xserver (a new x server from freedesktop.org) will just replace XFree86 soon. When they are ready, the distros will just switch to them in the background, and granny won't even notice.

And you realize...

[Karpe]

that by posting it on slashdot, you just ruined what might have been "the only way to get it for the moment", don't you?

But if we have to f'up the server right, how about linking to the release notes?

It won't hurt them.

[MooKore 2004]

It is KDE and Gnome that affect them, and they are both working hard to be freindly to them. Granny doesn't know about Xfree86, all she sees is the freindly K icon to launch her programs. XFree86 4.3 is already good enough, Lycoris and Lindows don't even use the latest versions (KDE 2.2 for Lycoris and KDE 3.0 for Lindows.

Re:It won't hurt them.

[jejones]

Eh? Elsewhere it's been said that drivers have to be rewritten for the freedesktop.org software, and I'm sure it has to be rewritten for Y. Graphics card makers are notorious for refusing to release the information required to allow open source drivers--suppose they refuse to write more than one version, and stick with XFree86? PCI Express will take over from AGP, if I read the chipset roadmap articles rightly just this morning...so if the manufacturers stick with providing binary-only drivers for XFree86, how will anyone, much less Granny, be able to use a free X?

Re:It's sad ...

[Nugget]

This is, in effect, nothing more than saying "Everyone can get along just great if only you people would just agree with me."

RMS designed the GPL to be hard to work with. It seems a bit myopic to now act all surprised that it is working as designed and to try to blame everyone else for its inflexible nature.

That the GPL can't coexist with other licenses was a design goal of the GPL. It's unreasonable to be upset with deverlopers using other licenses for this fact which is beyond their control.

already was incompatible

[puppy0341]

grep through the sources and you'll see it was incompatible before.
I don't see the problem with the new "Give us credit where you give others credit" license.

XFree86 and licensing

[Sandmann]

I think it is worth pointing out that back in 1998 The Open Group (now known as X.org) changed the licensing of X R6.4 to be proprietary, and only backed down when XFree86 and David Dawes explained exactly what they could with their proprietary server.

XFree86 is the reason we have a free software X server today. It is quite ironic that slashdot is now hating XFree86 because of licensing.

Re:XFree86 and licensing

[leandrod]

> back in 1998 The Open Group (now known as X.org) changed the licensing of X R6.4 to be proprietary, and only backed down when XFree86 and David Dawes explained exactly what they could with their proprietary server.

Not quite. I had a sideline participation at the time, emailing the X folks and putting them in contact with RMS.

In fact RMS and X were working out an agreement to GNU GPL the whole shebang, thus keeping it free while preserving The Open Group's interests, but XFree was adamant against it.

That move at the time would have preserved X.org, which today is basically a non-entity.

Re:Licensing

[pe1rxq]

And not having the need for this backing is the great thing. The moment this backing dissapears for a closed source program you have no option what so ever. If that happens to an open source program than you can still use it, make legal copies of it and can even improve it.

You see software as a product, you should regard is as infrastructure. Somehow a society manages to build and support a road system.... and its not by magic.
When the original builder is gone you can still use the road, and if you don't know how to fill a hole you get somebody to do it for you. And if you are really lucky you will get some community of road users to do it collectivly (something like a government perhaps?)

Jeroen

Re:features?

[Ice_Balrog]

IIRC, mostly new drivers and updates to old ones.

Not much in the way of new features are in XFree86, if you really want new and shiney, get freedesktop.org's Xserver.

Re:It's sad ...

[Nugget]

The GPL is much more encumbered than the XFree license. Who are you to say which emcumberments should be allowed and which are "stupid"?

Either you believe that programmers should be free to license their code as they see fit, or you don't. It's not Freedom if the community is going to deny the legitimacy of licenses that RMS didn't write.

So we stick with 4.3. Big deal.

[nurb432]

Instead of freaking out, we as a community just drop 4.4 out the window, and stick with 4.3 until a viable alternative X server comes out.

As long as someone still develops drivers for 4.3, its not the end of the world. ( yes, its a major speed bump and makes the OSS world look stupid for the bickering.. but its not a show stopper )

And remember its just the XF86Free implementation that is hosed up now, not the X11 protocol..

This has no effect on Granny

[spitzak]

Say everybody *has* to use XFree4.4 and the license clause is as obnoxious as possible (ie far worse than it apparently actually is). What would happen is that every single program will print on startup "Portions of this are based on work by the XFree86 Consortium" or something like that. This has zero effect on end users or Grammy. Plenty of Windows programs print pages and pages of such copyright stuff in their About box and end users really don't care.

The problem is for developers, who don't want to be requried to print this message (but will do so if there was no alternative) and some legal problems with combining this with some code (of which there are alternatives that could be used if necessary).

The best equivalent would be to ask how users of MS Word are affected by a contract dispute between Microsoft and one of their programmers. If they fired him then the resulting program might be different, but to the end user it is meaningless.

When Announcing A New Version Of Something

[vigilology]

Perhaps it's best to list the main changes or include a link to the changelog.

Re:When Announcing A New Version Of Something

[rzei]

Or even better, wait until there's at least one mirror accepting connections.. *sigh* no mirror seems to have been updated.. Here are the release notes.

torrent anyone?

another nice article...

[gerbouille]

there's a nice article on OSnews which looks back on the whole XFree86 affair of past year ...

Re:features?

[plcurechax]

I just want a gui that works nice. What features are in the new X?

X is a low-level windowing system, not a desktop environment like CDE, KDE, GNOME, (or twm :).

It's new features are support for newer video cards, bug fixes and work arounds for broken video cards (and Dell laptop BIOSes with regards to VESA modes and 845 chipsets), IPv6 support, new version of Mesa (OpenGL 3D support), and FreeType (font library).

Re:Licensing

[(H)elix1]

These licensing problems and forks will turn out to be the downfall of Linux.

I'd call forking natural selection... and while it can be painful, I would say it makes things stronger. Projects that head out into the weeds loose mind share (developers, users, 'buzz' if you will..) and disappear. The beauty of Linux is you get to scratch your itch. Often others share the same problem, and may share a solution. Someone running the project goes off into a wild tangent, good for them. Might be a little pain as you switch to something that is more aligned to what you were after, but odds are you can.

A personal example? I let myself get lulled into the RPM package management and really felt like I got the shaft when RH dropped the 'non-enterprise' user who did not have mad cash for per machine/per year subscriptions. All the packaged distros seemed to share the same Achilles heel (in my mind). Hunkered down and went Gentoo rather than putting energy into Fedora. If ebuilds fade away, I'll look at the app-get thing...

Forking thins the hurd (-1, terrible joke)

About the ad clause

[PotatoHead]

These guys are wanting some attention, so they whine a little and get nothing. Then they force the issue and get the wrong sort.

Seems to me, credit is given where credit is due. If they actually were doing something worth really knowing about, wouldn't they actually get it? We have been seeing little spats happen for long enough now to raise a few eyebrows. Personally, I suspect some deeper problems behind this.

We need an active X development group that does everything it can to enable *nix systems to continue to develop. We don't need these petty squabbles.

Those of us who know what X brings to the table are happy using X. Replacing it really should not be an option at this point; however, I see plenty of folks not happy with X as it is today.

This is exactly why they are not getting the attention they crave. The job is not being done well enough plain and simple.

Fork or no, this is going to continue to be a problem until a group forms that can step up to the plate and hit a few home runs. Will it be the XFree guys or somebody else?

Whoever gets X development moving as it needs to will get all the attention they need. Stupid license clauses won't cut it.

Re:About the ad clause

[mungtor]

This is exactly why they are not getting the attention they crave. The job is not being done well enough plain and simple.

Generally, I find the inverse is true. The when a job gets done well enough, the people who do that job are taken for granted and very rarely given recognition for the work that they do. (Invisible or in Trouble)

XFree may not be the "best", but it is ubiquitous because it works. That's a lot more than can be said for many GPL'd projects.

Re:It's sad ...

[Nugget]

The discussion right here on the page you are reading clearly demonstrates that in the minds of many people XFree86 should not have this freedom. I see more people who are distressed because XFree has chosen a license which is not the GPL than I see people who are distressed over the actual terms of the Xfree86 license. It seems that that choosing a non-GPL license is an untenable and damnable offense in the eyes of some who are now calling for the prejudicial abandonment of XFree86 for strictly dogmatic reasons.

It's one thing to not accept a license because headstands are uncomfortable. It's an entirely different and worse thing to denounce a developer for choosing a license that isn't the one you favor. I see far more of the latter going on here than I see the former.

Finally, The GPL does demand more than your vague perception of it appears to encompass. However, that's not really relevant to my point.

So Theo joined the FSF huh?

[ThrobbingGristle]

It's not just FSF that has problems with this...

OpenBSD project isn't including code with the new license either:

http://marc.theaimsgroup.com/?l=openbsd-misc&m=1 07 696705911864&w=2

You, my good man, are a troll.

Just Wondering If This Is What Dawes et al. Want?

[judmarc]

I noticed when Googling around about Dawes that (besides the fact that apparently he lives rather close to me) he is running a business based on X, offering stuff like automagic configuration (at least some of which has made it into the X CVS). Could dropping the latest X from the major Linux distros leave Dawes as the only game in town for enterprises seeking the most enterprise-ready solution? And he wouldn't have to take responsibility for pulling it from his competition....

X servers on Freedesktop

[Alan Cox]

There are two X servers on freedesktop.org. One is Keiths experimental server the other is the X.org tree which is XFree 4.4 without the license change bits and with other stuff, and most of the people Dave Dawes fired working on it.

The x.org server is very much ready for prime time

Embroidering!

[Imperator]

That's what Linux needs! Proper support for embroidering! I hope the fd.o people get around to this soon. Linux really has opportunities in the market for embroidered devices...

4.4rc2 is still old license

[Via_Patrino]

4.4rc2 is still old license

Re:It's sad ...

[gl4ss]

many people feel that it's stupid for xfree86 people to do this because for practicalitys sake most people can't start using it(4.4) 'right'. they knew it too, they knew that it would be an issue and would hinder it's adaptation, yet they chose to ignore that fact. it's little things like that why the distros are looking elsewhere for alternatives(and are likely to jump boat as soon as they can).

of course if they just want to keep(turn it back into) it as an academic research project then by all means changing the license this way is a great move(nah, even for that there would be better ways).

what you're supposed to do when you see somebody doing something that you think is very stupid? tell them that "YOU RULE!!! GO GO GO GO!!!"? or make a blunt statement that their actions don't seem to make sense?

gpl demands more, that is true, but more projects use it (and have chosen it) and gpl compatibility seems to be quite an issue!

Re:It's sad ...

[rsheridan6]

You're free to write code with any license you want, and you're equally free to let code with a license you don't like languish in disuse and obscurity. That's freedom.

For users too

[Alan Cox]

As with as Keith's work there is the x.org reference server tree on freedesktop.org, which is basically 4.4 without the contaminated bits. I suspect the fact this tree was close to ready for full release has something to do with the sudden appearance of XFree 4.4, but maybe I'm just cynical.

"Careful with that X eugene"

Re:It's sad ...

[Heretik]

If I write a GPLed library, I DON'T WANT some selfish asshole of a developer linking against it to develop his proprietary application.

If said developer wants exclusive proprietary control over his code... he can write his code his f*king self.

"86'd" defined.

[Ars-Fartsica]

86ed

Remember XFree...

[sla291]

XFree is dying, maybe.

Most say that it sucks. I say it's not perfect but check this website : http://www.lynucs.org/

and you'll see that X can really make your desktop very eye-candy. (well, perhaps you already knew ;)

Don't blame XFree too much.. we're pretty all using it, even it may be the time to move on.

What's the license change?

[Lothsahn]

I've been reading through the slashdot stories/posts, and I cannot seem to find anywhere what the problem with the new license is. The fact that xfree86.org is down doesn't help either.

Could someome tell me:
a) What is the license change?
b) Why it is so harmful?

Re:What's the license change?

[Arker]

They added an advertising clause.

Re:What's the license change?

[Anonymous Coward]

The sibling poster said simply that they added an advertising clause. This may not explain why everyone is in such a furor about it, so I'll explain.

The advertising clause simply requires that people who use the software give credit to the XFree86 organization where other credit is given. If you don't give credit to anyone, then just including the license (which I believe is required anyway) is enough.

Now, why is this such a big deal? Lots of people on Slashdot are wondering this. Why not give credit where it is obviously due? The truth is, nobody is upset about giving credit where credit is due. People are upset about GPL-compatibility.

See, BSD 3-clause licenses and the old X license were GPL compatible, which means that they can be relicensed under the GPL. That means that if I write a program and put it under the GPL, and I also want to use X libraries, I don't have any problems. As you probably know, much of what makes X11 usable on the desktop is GPL'd.

So basically, the problem isn't actually the advertising clause, the problem is that, if, for example, libXext is licensed in a way that is GPL-incompatible, then every GPL program that uses it suddenly can't use it anymore (this is all of GNOME, for example.)

So the problem is much more than just the advertising clause. It's about making X legally incompatible with most of the X apps used on linux today.

And from the BSD side of things, even OpenBSD (who hates the GPL with a passion) is critical of the new license, because it's wording isn't similar enough to legacy BSD licenses.

Re:It's sad ...

[Brandybuck]

which predates the OpenSource movement, and all this other Free licenses

It predated the name "Open Source", but it did not predate all other Free and Open Source licenses. The BSD and MIT licenses are two that predated the GPL. In addition, the idea of Free Software predates the GPL by at least two decades, though it was RMS who first insisted on the capitalization of the term.

if you Beleive in Free Software, there is no real reason to use a license other than the GPL.

If you believe in Democracy, there is no real reason to vote for any but the Democrat Party candidate! Now be a good citizen and vote like I tell you to vote...

Re:Licensing

[tigga]

Its not just linux, the BSDs are against these changes too. Ironicly too, since their licence used to be like this one.

Is it true? I know about Theo being picky, but FreeBSD and NetBSD folks seem to be indifferent..

Re:From the FAQ (re GPL + APL-2.0)

[H4x0r Jim Duggan]

I'm not sure, but I think the Apache 2.0 license has been revised further to make it more clear that it is GNU GPL compatible

Unfortunately not. Instead of fixing the problem, the Apache group made a public statement to say that the incompatibility doesn't exist. - The problem arose from the press release of the Apache License-2.0, in which they gave "GPL compatibility" as a justification for the new license. Note that if you combine a GPL'd and an APL'd work, it's the GPL'd works license that is infringed, so the decision isn't up to the Apache group. The Apache guys might need a good clothes line.

From FSF's license list: The Apache Software License, version 2.0: This is a free software license but it is incompatible with the GPL. The Apache Software License is incompatible with the GPL because it has a specific requirement that is not in the GPL: it has certain patent termination cases that the GPL does not require. (We don't think those patent termination cases are inherently a bad idea, but nonetheless they are incompatible with the GNU GPL.)

happened several times to my company

[Ender Ryan]

The tiny company I work for has had this happen several times over the past several years(3 times in under 7 years IIRC).

One program is a mass-emailing program which we use to send newsletters to our subscribers(yes, real paying subscribers, not spam :), which we bought because it had support for the databases we use. The other was a mass-faxing software/service, and the last was a subscription... thingymabob(never came in contact with that one myself, and it was 6 years ago).

All three of the above mentioned products were discontinued and caused us much trouble, one even being a program which expired after a certain period.

I am a big free software advocate, but I don't have to do any advocacy at my work, other than pointing out software that meets our needs. I have mostly been able to let the advantages of free software speak for itself.

but, but, but, STFU

[Ender Ryan]

Jesus Christ on a fucking broken Crutch, STFU already. "But what if they stop developing," "what if it forks," "which fork do I follow," "but what if this," "what if that," WHAT IF I DRIVE A METAL SPIKE THROUGH YOUR FUCKING BRAINS?!?!

*Cough* Ahem... What I mean is, this has happened before and it will happen again and is nothing to be too concerned about. There can be brief periods of pain, but it's generally not too bad.

Cheers.

Follow the money....

[crmurphey]

The furor over the license is generated by commercial interests and little else. Look at where the criticism of the license comes from. Is it a vendor that has sold repackaged XFree86 as a product for years and stands to benefit from calling it their own product?

Once you filter out FUD from vendors, what issues are left?

Even RMS claimed that the new "license requirement qualifies as free software".

RMS also claims that the new licensing policy will "eliminate the (GPL) incompatibility with applications".

It seems pretty clear once you filter out the noise....

Re:Follow the money....

[Anonymous Coward]

RMS also claims that the new licensing policy will "eliminate the (GPL) incompatibility with applications".

No, the page you pointed to does not say that. Read the fucking
page again.

Re:Follow the money....

[dvdeug]

The furor over the license is generated by commercial interests and little else.

I've heard Theo deRaad and Branden Robinson come out against this license, and neither of them are connected to commercial interests. The furor comes from someone creating yet another license with the obnoxious, unliked, BSD advertising clause (which NetBSD and OpenBSD has worked to remove from their systems, and Berkeley removed from all the original BSD code) and applying it to an ancient codebase that has always been licensed under the most liberal of terms.

The fork has already happened.

[mst76]

It appears to be pretty recent, and not yet advertised, but freedesktop.org has forked Xfree86 from 4.4 RC2. Note: this independent from their own experimental X server to which everybody is referring (but which is not really ready for consumption yet). If XFree86 doesn't revert to the old license, distributors are likely going to package the freedesktop fork. It remains to be seen if the major XFree86 developers will follow.

RMS doesn't like it?

[EvilAlien]

Someone should tell the XFree86 people, because they seem to think otherwise. The bit on the XFree86 Project License Modification says:

The XFree86 Project, Inc is announcing that it has made a change to its license effective with the Third Release Candidate for the 4.4.0 series. This licence, like our previous, is fully free, (how do we know this? no less than the world authority on free software, RMS, has said so) and it's the hope of the XFree86 Project to no longer allow non-free licences into our tree so we can become a fully free-software compliant X product.

Whatever the issue is, Open Source is going to suffer for this squabble. The GPL acting as a roadblock to integration of new technology for the desktop is just going to prove Microsoft's point that the license is eeeeevvuuuuull. I think this may do more real damage to "The Cause" then the fiaSCO.

Re:RMS doesn't like it?

[Alan Cox]

Actually I think the unfortunate thing is that people have spent a year being pseudo-nice to each other instead of just forking the tree when Keith got kicked out. Thats probably done more harm than good.

The problem with the license is one of changes. You can't go around springing new licensing suprises on people without expecting them to be upset - whatever the license (as MS themselves have found ...)

Now its over everyone can back to work sanely and Dave Dawes can go and do his own thing in Dawes-space, or throw in the towel and contribute to the X.org tree. I still hope the latter because I don't think Dave Dawes did anything maliciously or without belieiving he was doing the right thing for X, he just seems to have been wrong.

Alan

Alan

Re:Licensing

[Crypto Gnome]

Forking thins the hurd (-1, terrible joke)

Forking is natural. Without it there wouldn't be a hurd needing thinning in the first place. (-2, *really* terrible joke)

Really?

[mindstrm]

Whether the GPL says you have to keep copyright notices or not, stripping copyright notices without permission is already illegal under copyright law. So is fraud.

Claiming someone elses work as your own can constitute fraud. Stripping copyright notices can get you in trouble with the authors as well.

Note that I'm talking about the source here, not the output of the program itself. If the output used to have a banner that said who made it.. that does not need to be kept.

Remember, the GPL only licenses you to do some stuff.. it does not remove copyright law.

In fact, being forced to keep a list of contributors in the source of copywritten code should be just FINE, and in fact, encouraged, by everyone...

Re:And XFree86 Inc. has shown to be willing to tal

[macshit]

It is not clear why XFree86 has to modify their license to suit a Linux distribution, which is suppose to be a compilation of Free/Open Source Linux software, not a dictator of Open Source.

Of course they don't `have to' do anything. But whether they (or you) like it or not, Debian and other distros have a fair amount of influence, and if they all move to some other system, the XFree86 project could end up being marginalized, and I doubt they want that.

If these arm chair lawyers are so concerned about GPL, why don't they write a new X Window System from scratch, and release it for free/Free under the GPL.

Because they don't have to -- they can just take XFree86 4.3.xxx and fork it. Easy!

[and thus the beauty of free software is illustrated.]

Confused with the window manager again

[dbIII]

If Linux is going to even have a chance at breaking through to the desktop world, it has to stop looking like crap. With a little customization

X is not the top level, the window manager and the applications give you the user interface, and if your window manager looks like crap then use another one.

Enlightenment (www.enlightenment.org) has been around for quite a few years now, and can look like a lot of different things - but if you give it 64 virtual desktops with a different background image on each and turn on all special effects it will run very slowly. If you use a sane configuration it will run OK on a pentium 90 with 32MB.

There are also many others which have been developed since then - there is more software available than what comes with your distribution.

One final thing - gnome is not X, it is a whole suite of different programs, which is why it takes so long to start up. The whole idea of there being one program that does everything is just an artifact of the Microsoft court case - your web browser is NOT part of your operating system, and the gnome panel is NOT part of X, they are seperate programs.

Re:Confused with the window manager again

[Nuclear Elephant]

You are absolutely correct, but the fundamental support for certain functions needs to be there in order to code these things into higher-level applications. Presently it is not - when FDO did its shadowing completely software-rendered (no hardware acceleration) it was too slow to use.

With my tinfoil hat on...

[jejones]

Isn't MS laughing over this whole affair?

Graphics card makers refuse to release info allowing Open Source drivers to take full advantage of their hardware; heck, people gush over the major proctalgia of NVidia's driver that you get to recompile every time there's a kernel upgrade.

Now XFree86 decides to change its license in a way that is incompatible with GPL, so that Linux distributions refuse to use XFree86 4.4. The free alternatives (freedesktop.org, Y, etc.) need rewritten drivers. Does anyone think the hardware vendors will write multiple drivers when it's hard enough to pry one out of them?

PCI Express is on its way, and the claim is that it will kill AGP. How long will one be able to survive with a free X, or XFree86 4.3? (Not a rhetorical question; I don't know enough about the hardware to say, and really would like an answer.)

Re:With my tinfoil hat on...

[Grievre]

Uh... you get to recompile DRM with every kernel upgrade, as well as ALSA, i2c etc and just about any other kernel module. nvidia's driver isn't unique in this.

The actual problem is...

[leonbrooks]

...that BSD and the new XFree86 licence require you to acknowledge the authorship and GPL forbids you from adding restrictions not in the GPL - including an advertising clause.

I would be happy to see the licence backed out and the major distributors voluntarily add a splash screen giving major credits and referring the viewer to a website with extended acknowledgements.

I would be just as happy to see a GPL "A" variant arise which was GPL plus advertising clause. This would allow you to GPLA-license BSD code which you are modifying, effectivly getting the GPL's sterner protection but without treading on the intentions and rights of the original authors.

Of course, if you're working from a no-advertising BSD licence, these problems evapourate. Personally, I'd like to see XFree86 with a splash screen since it'd give you something to read while KDE (or whatever) starts, and it'd overwrite the splash screen from NVidia (or other manufacturer) who are not at all shy about claiming credit for stuff.

Re:The actual problem is...

[bigblondguy]

yeah, you would probably love it until about the 50th time it came up... This is one of the reasons I dont use windows anymore. If you want to add that kind of thing to your computer, feel free, but keep it away from mine.

Re:*Copyright law* prevents that, not the EULA.

[rking]

Re-introducing the Microsoft changes to the BSD code-bases would be distribution, and the BSD doesn't require derivative apps to allow free redistribution. Hence the whole difference between BSD and GPL licenses.

The EULA has nothing to do with it.

Likewise with the GPL. It's copyright law that prohibits redistributing code without permission. The GPL, like the Microsoft EULA, does not give you permission to redistribute the code under a BSD license. Consequently, unless you have some other permission, copyright law prohibits you from doing so.

"Virality" is equally meaningful or meaningless in both cases.

Let's talk about something other than the licence

[osho_gg]

OK. Enough talking about licence changes. How about talking about the new release and what new exciting things it provides? I browsed through the entire release notes and could not find a single thing that will get me excited about trying out the new release. Nothing like, xrandr in 4.3 release or sub-pixel anti-aliased fonts in 4.1/4.2. In fact, nothing other than bug fixes that would benefit X for desktop user. I guess Keith Packard's absense is being felt in this release notes. Am I missing something that you noticed?

New tell the rest of the story

[leonbrooks]

Fedora, Mandrake, OpenBSD and others have also "no thanksed" the new licence.

XFree86 has been willing to talk, but not (quoth Theo deRaadt) to "use the same words" as every other advertising-clause BSD licence. Talk the talk, yes, but walking the walk hasn't happened much.

I would personally be happy to add a splash screen or whatever, but not to be required to so do.

Hi Alan, I think you've struck the basis for...

[leonbrooks]

...at least 99% of known squabbles. (-:

I find it much more productive to start from the premise that I'm wrong, even if it goes squarely against my nature.

But what if...

[leonbrooks]

...there were no more hypothetical questions?

Some clarifications

[jaaron]

Did you read the most recent ASF position on this? The matter is due to a misunderstanding how patents work under the ASL versus how they work under the GPL. The matter will probably not be completely resolved until there is a better understanding of software patents and/or a court case involving patents and these open source license.

One important point: GPL-compatibility was not the only "justification for the new license" by a long shot. That was one of many goals, but not the main point of the license.

So, there has been progress on this issue, but it's not as clear cut as you make it out.

The GPL license should change

[Anonymous Coward]

"It looks as if the XFree86 people have a short timespan to either rethink their license changes or be dropped from every/almost every Linux distribution in favor of a forked codebase." So you're going to fork X from an ealier version bvcause you don't want to be forced to put the author's names in the documentation? Sounds like GPL is a little inflexible, and maybe it should be changed. In general the GPL is a lot more restritive than the X license anyway.

Re:The GPL license should change

[Anonymous Coward]

The problem isn't about not wanting too put the Aurthor's name(s) in the documentation, the problem is that the GPL doesn't allow you too be forced too do so (that isn't free). And you're right the GPL is a little inflexible when it comes too freedom, and changing the GPL would defeed the purpose of that licens. With that said, I do however believe that it is the authors right (and freedom) to choose which licens his/hers software is released under.
And I'm sad by this imcompatibility, and strongly hope that the problems will be resolved, and NO forking isn't the solution.

Re:Let's talk about something other than the licen

[FullCircle]

Keith and other motivated devs couldn't get anything into X in the first place, that is why they left.

And THAT is why there is nothing big in this release.

Are you for real?

[bonch]

as Linux desktop adoption has surpassed Apple's

Ahahaha...you're referring to that debunked Slashdot article, aren't you?

Even if Linux DID surpass OS X, it's doing extremely poorly considering OS X kicks Linux's ass in the apps department.

No

[0x0d0a]

Two reasons why the GPL shouldn't be changed:

* One: the GPL covers *far*, *far* more software than XFree86. The XFree86 codebase, large as it is perhaps a hundredth of a percent of the GPLed software out there.

* Two: This is not about the license so much as political crap about XFree86. Some people have wanted to fork for a while and are just looking for a reason.

Frankly, I think XFree86 is a lousy thing to fork, because it's the sort of software that's a bitch to maintain, but if KP is up to it, freedesktop.org may be worthwhile. He certainly has the backing of a lot of people, and RH's been making moves towards switching to freedesktop.org for a while.

Dear Ann,

[Wolfier]

You're fired.

Bill

XFree86/freedesktop-kernel interaction?

[0x0d0a]

Alan,

I dunno how much you dabble with the related code, but how likely is a fork of X going to be to cause issues with the fact that X interfaces with kernel modules...say, freedesktop.org wants to go one way, and XFree86 wants to go another...which supporting code goes in the kernel, or is that a non-issue? I know that it's already caused fun for the Red Hat packagers, who never really expected to have to support multiple XFree86-libs-style packages...

Re:features?

[cheesybagel]

And a bad low-level windowing system at that. The 2D drawing API is something out of the stone age. The color system for one, is horribly complicated. Only supporting 24-bit displays helps cut the insanity somehow, since this way you sidestep the braindamaged palette allocation routines.

I should know, since I actually had to program on it. It also has no native support for alpha blending, anti-aliasing, double buffering, splines or beziers, anything that was leading edge back in the 1980s. Don't talk to me about extensions. This sort of thing should be standard be now. If the platform does not natively support it the API should provide software emulation. I don't want to make several application backends, reinvent the wheel so my program will work on all Linux desktops for something basic like double buffering.

Some concepts are nice. Like network graphics capability. That is a good thing. But I still think the best idea would be just to make a new windowing system and build X11 compatibility on top of that. Like Apple did with MacOS X.

curses everywhere

[Ragica]

I think this is ncurses big chance for a come back. Everyone looking for XFree86 alternative, look no further!

Re:Why are they supporting SCO?!

[Anonymous Coward]

Why in the "F" word are people putting time and effort into supporting SCO rubbish?!?! The entire world should do everything it can to make its products INCOMPATIBLE with their stuff.

No. One of the nice things I like about the Linux world is the software respects me the user, instead of trying to control me. I avoid software that doesn't respect me. Now SCO incompatibilies won't effect me, but I will boycott such software on principle.

Now, if someone decides they don't want to put in the time and effort to make their code compatible with SCO software, that is an entirely different matter. That I have no problem with. But neither will I criticize hackers for maintaining compatibility.

From what I've heard, SCO stuff is already outdated, and given the recent direction of the company, they don't need help in driving their customers away.