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Solaris DTrace To Be Ported to FreeBSD
daria42 writes "It looks like Sun's famous Dynamic Tracing tool - one of the best features in Solaris 10 - is getting ported to FreeBSD. Sun open-sourced the code back in January and it has been picked up by FreeBSD developer Devon O'Dell. The tool provides insanely great advanced performance analysis and debugging features for server software. Good to see some result come out of the Sun open-sourcing process." From the article: "O'Dell told ZDNet Australia the aim of the project -- which commenced a month ago -- was that all scripts and applications that utilised DTrace under its native Solaris environment should be able to run in FreeBSD with no changes. While FreeBSD's existing ktrace function was similar to DTrace, it was limited in scope, according to O'Dell. 'FreeBSD implements a somewhat similar facility for dynamically instrumenting syscalls for any given application,' he said."
I'm not sure how this benefits Sun, but something as awesome as this, I'm willing to assume it's altruism, and I appreciate it.
Nothing great was ever achieved without enthusiasm
Why would this occasion a license change? It's a *port*, as in, the code will now run on more systems than it used to. Licensing doesn't have anything to do with that; it's still fundamentally the same codebase, so I'm sure the code will still be covered by the same licensing terms it already was released under.
To create a BSD-licensed version, someone would have to *clone* it, which is different from porting.
Cut that out, or I will ship you to Norilsk in a box.
I'd be willing to bet there's a shitload of FreeBSD web servers out there, since I manage twelve of them, myself.
Linux has its uses and is great for many tasks, but only Gentoo comes close to the ports system and how well it manages software installation.
Either way, I'm hoping that yes, it will be ported to Linux as well, if it hasn't been already.
as not many people use FreeBSD ;-)
...and that's their loss. I think that 75% of those who give FreeBSD a (serious) try will stick to it. It's the best thing since Amiga OS, and I'm happy to run it both on my desktop, and for my router+web/ftp-server in the wardrobe.
I think the point of the moderation of the parent had to due with being offtopic with Drace in order to trash FBSD and cause a flamewar.
I do agree with the parent poster as well since the threading and the code quality has made many old FBSD timers leave and work on Dragonfly. I no longer run FBSD as a result.
But I wold mod the parent down for the that reason. However I would mod him up if it was a general FBSD post about i/o or BSD vs Linux story.
http://saveie6.com/
My guess is that any kernel changes will go into the FreeBSD base under the BSD license, and the DTrace tool itself will keep its current license and will be installed from the ports collection.
Also, I don't think FreeBSD is committed to removing all non-BSD code.
You had me at "dicks fuck assholes".
Certainly, licensing should be a primary issue. Before one does anything with a program, there needs to be an answer to the questions, "Who does it belong to? What am I allowed to do with it?" At the very least, those questions ought to be answered "Mine," and "Whatever I want." Ideally, it should be answered, "Ours, and we want." If it doesn't belong to you and you can't do certain things with it, you can only get by ignoring this for so long until it becomes a major issue.
The GNU system exists because of free software; linux is what it is today because of free software. Licensing becomes an issue when the software doesn't belong to you and you don't have the freedom to do stuff with it.
Your stance seems to contradict your "use what works best!" mentality. When there is a licensing issue, the water may be calm at the moment, but in the future some IP owner could potentially destroy your project or deny your use. Do you really want that to happen? You won't think it's so usable when your project is taken away from you (and this can happen in more ways than one).
On a side note, I totally agree with you that FreeBSD is an easier target than linux. linux is more fragmented than FreeBSD (and don't get me wrong, this is a strength in many aspects, but it does make broad system changes more difficult).
Certainly, licensing should be a primary issue.
no no no... Licensing *is* secondary. Considering it primary is a sign of the dementia that is affecting the world today. A dementia that the GPL was created exactly to *fight*!
Follow the spirit of GPL, not the license itself.
I think that what will end up happening is this:
Modifications I need to make to already BSD licensed code will remain BSD licensed. New pieces of code I write to get it working that are not taken from Sun will be BSD licensed. Everything else will be porting work and will be CDDL.
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