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Sun Looks To GPL3 For Java, Solaris

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the community-friendly dept.

daria42 writes "Sun is leaning toward changing the license for Java and Solaris to the GNU GPL version 3. The article has some insightful comments from Sun boss Jonathan Schwartz. '"Will we GPL Solaris? We want to ensure we can interact with the GPL community and the Mozilla community and the BSD community," he says.'"

5 of 164 comments (clear)

  1. That's a reasonable choice by velco · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Seems pretty normal for Sun to not be willing to give away years of hard work, without getting anything back.

  2. Should OpenSolaris be dual licensed via CDD by anandpur · · Score: 4, Interesting

    CAB/OGB Position Paper # 20070207 version 0.6
    Topic: Should OpenSolaris be dual licensed via CDDL and GPLv3

    http://www.opensolaris.org/jive/thread.jspa?thread ID=23699&tstart=0
    http://lwn.net/Articles/221543/

  3. Not too long ago.... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Somebody asked linus if he would be willing to put the license for the next kernel up to a vote. His reply was: "Sure, write your own kernel, license it how you want it, and see how many people use it."

    Be careful what you wish for...

  4. Interesting point by babbling · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I used to think that GPL is the only way to go. I share my code, so why shouldn't others using my code (assuming they distribute software) have to share their modifications to it, as well?

    Well, I've since found one good use for BSD-like licenses. They're good for situations where what you care about the most is that people are using your code. For example, I think some of the Vorbis code was released under BSD so that companies producing proprietary software would add Vorbis support, hopefully leading to widespread adoption of Vorbis.

  5. Has this any implications for the Linux kernel? by jimicus · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I'd be interested to see if this might result in things like zfs being ported natively to the Linux kernel (rather than the current FUSE-based solution).

    But then... if Sun go for GPLv3, I'm not certain that can coexist within the same kernel as a bunch of GPLv2 code.