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Sun Considering GPL For OpenSolaris
narramissic writes, "At an event today to formally open-source Java, Jonathan Schwartz, Sun's president and CEO, and Rich Green, the company's senior VP of software had an exchange in which Schwartz put Green on the spot about using GPL for OpenSolaris: 'Are you averse to changing the license, Rich Green?' Schwartz asked. 'Certainly not,' Green responded, prompting the Sun CEO to fire back in a half-joking manner: 'Will you GPL Solaris, Mr. Green?' 'We will take a close look at it,' Green said, adding that it was possible that the familiarity and comfort level many developers have with the GPL may result in Sun adopting it for OpenSolaris." Another note about Sun's decision to use the GPL for Java comes from reader squiggleslash, who writes: "According to Jonathan Schwartz, the decision of Novell and Microsoft to '(suggest) that free and open source software wasn't safe unless a royalty was being paid' is what prompted Sun to finally come down on using the GPL for Java. So I guess every cloud has a silver lining."
Remember, SUN makes money on hardware.
Novell and Microsoft do not.
You are being MICROattacked, from various angles, in a SOFT manner.
Sorry for the fanboyish response, but I think releaseing various parts of Open Solaris under the GNU license would lead to some great developments. As I understand it, that would enable a lot of features of the Solaris kernel to be imported into Linux and vice-versa.
;)
Of course, there'd be a problem with that whole "gnu's NOT unix" thing...
This could be a bigger boon than a lot of people realize. The licensing differences between Solaris and Linux are one of several factors slowing them from adopting ideas and code from one another. OpenSolaris users could benefit from ease of importing more cutting edge features from Linux. Linux could benefit by having access to some of the cleaner implementation ideas from Solaris. I've felt for some time that much of what holds linux back is the unwillingness to adopt newer and better features out of a fear that a given distribution will be less compatible with others and because Linux is trying to wear many hats. Too many decisions are made to benefit its use as a server or make it easier to use on a portable, while leaving it behind others for a workstation.
I'm keeping my fingers crossed.
It certainly removes one barrier. But look at Darwin. It's open source, but who else but a handful of people outside of Apple are working on it? So the point is not to knock the potential change. The point is will developers flock to Solaris as a result of this? Slowly but surely or not fast enough?
There's been talk of open sourcing it by Christmas, and reports that it might be under the GPL (and reports that it might be under a different license.)
That does not prove, however, that the Novell/MS deal didn't prompt the final decision for Sun. Certainly, they'd already done the analysis and had a pretty good idea of the pluses and minuses of the various options. But certainly the Novell/MS deal remixed those slightly, and might have tipped things in the GPL.
Hm...
.. - without spending hours for #ifdef'ing and patching the source.
When you can get an open-sourced carrier-grade OS like (Open)Solaris at no cost,
why still Linux?
OpenSolaris surely currently lacks a lot of (x86) hardware support, no drivers
for widespread hardware, etc. - but as more and more users actively use and
support OpenSolaris, more and more vendors will provide those.
What I don't like about Linux - Linux (and a lot of Linux software), that is - is
the neverending story of changing APIs - use something, update something else - Oops.
I have a Linux system here, with at least three different versions of, e.g., BerkeleyDB.
1.85 compat, 3.something, 4.idontknow. API changes, incompatibilities, you name it.
Ever tried to compile popular Linux software on another Un*x? Whenever I encounter some
piece of GPL-licensed software, I can almost guarantee it won't compile on Solaris, Tru64,
You want DTrace? Zones? Use Solaris. Is there any technical reason (no politics, please) where
using Linux actually offers any benefit?
(Yes, "smc" and all those java-based admin utilities suck. But commandline-based alternatives
do exist.)
This is not a flamebait. Serious answers will be appreciated.
I put the "wild" preface there for a reason. The FSF is a great organization, but sometimes they are a bit nutty. Eben has some heavy insight into things from a legal and IBM perspective, and is tied directly to important figures in these matters. He likely heard a rumor or two and pieced it together as something far larger than it was. I have no sources other than what I heard at that meeting.
The FSF has been listing a Free version of Java as a top priority for the past few years, stating that it is the largest hole in the Free Software community. See http://www.fsf.org/campaigns/priority.html. The FSF shouldn't announce the GPL'ing of Java, but it should respond to the announcements by commending Sun, removing GCC/Java from it's priorities list, and/or getting Stallman to amend his Java rant.My bad, I got it backwards (which is odd, since I'm a Solaris admin). That was added as an afterthought.
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