For the most part I agree with you. You create something, you're not getting paid for it, you're doing it for the greater good but you still want to get something out of it. What I think you're missing though is that you are adding your contributions to a MUCH larger code base than what you're contributing and one of the things you get is the ability to build on all the other contributors code.
I don't mean this to diminish individual contributions but to point that there is more benefit to you than just what you might get in the future. Let me give you an example but keep in mind I'm not a lawyer and I have no connection to sun, this is just my understanding.
Let's say you have a great idea for a small business appliance. You want to build it on a unix type OS and want to use an open source one so you don't have to pay licensing fees. You select OpenSolaris as your OS and you build your software stack on top of that. You use DTrace to tune your application for the best results. In doing so you discover some ways to speed up a few system calls and make changes to some CDDL'd code. You also add some of your own libraries and modules. The only thing you are required to give back are the modifications to the CDDL'd files. Anything else you built on top of that you can license any way you want. Now you start selling this appliance and do pretty well and don't have to worry about giving the technology you're earning money from to anyone else. If someone else later looks at your CDDL'd contributions and finds a way to improve them, you can benefit from that as well.
My understanding of the GPL is that if your software stack tightly integrates with the GPL'd code it is considered a derivative work and needs to be licensed under a GPL compatible license. If you link to CDDL'd code you don't have to worry about that just like if you link to LGPL'd code you don't either. Some of the GNU System libraries are licensed under the LGPL, some under the GPL with exceptions for linking and some under just the plain GPL.
That's what I think Sun is trying to do with OpenSolaris. This may not be your type of thing. Maybe you just like to hack at OS code for fun in your spare time and the notion that someone else has joint ownership doesn't sit well with you. That's understandable.
Again, my main point isn't that copyright assingment/joing copyrights is a great thing but rather that Sun isn't the only one doing this. FSF, Mozilla, Novell are ones I can think of off the top of my head. From the perspective of these organizations, it makes sense.
This doesn't really matter. It's been years since Kodak has been the top bw paper manufacturer. It seems that the majority of their sales have been to more professional labs than to the small darkroom market. The biggest supplier is probably Ilford. There are also other less popular manufacturers that make what some people consider higher quality paper such as Oriental. These companies are smaller and they can make a successful business case for continuing to produce bw paper more thann Kodak can.
I've probably made thousands of black and white prints and I have never printed on kodak black and white paper. Although I do like their color papers when I print color.
I shoot digital as well as traditional film and I do my own printing for color and black and white as well as color and I also send stuff out to digital printers as well. Traditional film printing, especially from larger negatives can be a lot nicer than digital. Especially when it comes to black and white. A nice hand printed black and white print on fiber paper has a certain depth and richness that you can't achive on dye based papers.
There's no need to start making your own emulsions. There are still plenty of other options.
"Why? Linux can oficially switch to GPL-3, and leave however many files this is a problem for licensed under GPL-2. The files don't go away just because a new license is released."
That may be true of the drivers but not some of the main files. It looks like the GPL v3 may not be compatible with v2 because it places further restrictions. Maybe I'm wrong about this and if so, prove to me otherwise.
Looks like your problem is with assigning copyright (in the case of FSF) or letting your copyright be co-owned (in the case of Sun). That's fine, I'm not trying to argue why you should do that but rather give my opinion on why those groups would want that.
These are oviously straw man arguments but... FSF and RMS, at least to me, seem more about ethics and morality which are more subjective than freedom. Who is to say that GPLv4 won't have to some clause that requires you to take in a homeless person if you use the code commercially? It's not likely but we just don't know what the future holds. Who will run FSF after RMS passes. Same goes for Sun too. In the end it's about trust.
The safety net is that even if they decide to switch licenses or whatever, the code that has previously been released under CDDL or GPLv2 will always be around and can always be that way. So even if Linus or Sun do this, then all the other developers can continue to use the code that was licensed the old way. They just can't use the new stuff licensed with the new license only. If most of the developers don't want to switch the new stuff probably won't matter. The converse is true too. You as a developer can't decide to take all your marbles and go home just because you own the copyright, even if exclusivly. Whatever you release is out there forever. You can't take it back.
"So what are you saying, that when GPL-3 comes out, Linus will be having some kind of psychotic episode where he is unable to find himself to get aproval?"
No, what I'm saying is that if Linux goes to GPL v3 and GPL v2 is not compatable Linus will have to hunt down the other contributors whose files do not specify "any later version" in their license. Linus isn't the only contributor to the kernel and not all the code is licensed in a way that it can be redistributed under GPL v3. More likely, something in the GPL v3 will appeal to someone like RedHat and they would want to switch. Though things may not be bad if that happens, there is that potential and that is why the FSF and Sun try to make provisions in that regard.
It's good for Linus to not agree to license his code under a license that doesn't exist yet but it's not good if you're a commercial company that might need to relicense their OS at a later time. If sun wanted to relicense OpenSolaris under the GPL 5 years from now, the contributor agreement gives them that power. THey can't relicense your code and keep it. Meaning if you release something to them under the CDDL and down the road they decide they want to keep their new stuff private, the CDDL'd code is still out there, free and clear under the license. This is the same for other open source licenses.
To try and put it another way, lets say I'm writing a book and I use a open source type license on it. I do it in a wiki style online after I write the first 10 chapters. I allow people to work off a copy of my work. They can write their own book off my base but I require them to give me back the changes to my chapters. They can add their own chapters and keep them to themselves if they want. If I like what they send me back I can include it in my book or not. Since I asked for co copyright of the work they contributed back into my chapters I can choose to later decide to relicense it with a closed license, write the last chapter and start publishing it. That last chapter isn't available for others to copy, nor are the changes that I made on the closed version, but the previously open work is still available for others. They can choose to write their own last chapter(s) (not based off my last chapter) and publish it themselves. That's the bad side of the coin and it's not all THAT bad. The other is I may decide I want to give it a freer license later, or even make it public domain. Since I co own the copyright I can do that without asking others. Some people may not like that either. The point is that the FSF and Sun both see the need for this. If anyone is going to find it bad that Sun is wants it, they should find fault with the FSF for wanting the same thing as well.
From what I've read so far I don't think v3 will get much traction anyway. The provision that closes the ASP loophole will probably cause a lot of problems for people. For companies like Google and IWon that patch their own kernels and don't always send the changes back (since tey don't technically distribute linux) there might be some resistance to GPL v3. They may not want to share their code with their competitors. For people that create income producing websites based off of GPL technology they may choose to avoid GPL v3 because they don't want to dillute their revenue.
Since I'm one of the people you quoted, let me try and explain my opinion.
Amazon.com is calling this a "Thank You" to it's customers. The title of the press release is "Amazon.com to Thank Customers with 10th Anniversary Event Featuring Bob Dylan, Norah Jones, and Bill Maher"
They're kind of creating an anniversary special like you would see for some TV shows. But if someone like David Letterman creates an anniversary special, he's going above and beyond to deliver a better product (TV show) to his consumers (viewers). They are doing a higher budget, longer running version of what the viewer is already 'buying'. These types of shows are a bit self indulgent but it's ok because it's a special enhancement of the product. They are also not pitched as a Thank You but rather a Celebration. The hosts humbly thank the viewers and others involved at some point.
Amazon.com is doing the exact opposite. Their product isn't this type of entertainment. If they wanted to thank consumers they could have decided to give something back to consumers based on what they go to amazon.com for. They could have also done something to reward some of the people that actively volunteer their reviews. Those reviews add value to their site. Some other people had good suggestions such as free shipping for the anniversary.
What this looks like to me is an webcast informercial and a reward to it's employees. That's fine, but don't bill it as a "Thank You" to customers.
I think it's great that Amazon wants to reward it's employees but it seems like they are trying to combine an employee event with a marketting effort and in the end will probably not be succesful with either. Do something great for your employees, there's no problem with that, they work hard. Do something good for your customers, that's good too, they are the most important part of your business. If Amazon decided to buy all their employees a Hummer, that's fine by me (I'm not a shareholder) but don't submit a press release saying you're doing it as a thank you for customers because it makes the employees happier, safer and more confident which makes the services they offer to consumers better.
Some people say "well it's the thought that counts". I Don't think people understand what this means. Based on the reaction from a lot of people here, it seems amazon.com didn't put enough thought into this. They thought about doing something for their consumers, but the thought of doing something for someone else isn't what is meant. "Well I did it for you" just sounds self aggrandizing to me. Let me try and put it into a context more on our level (I know I'm not the CEO of some multi billion dollar corp and chances are you aren't either). Lets say you want to buy a book as a gift for a friend that's getting into pottery. You can go in and just pick up the best selling pottery book or you can try and find out more details about what types of pottery your friend is interested in, compare that to other things you know about them including if they like to read long technical type stuff or more relaxed short examples with pictures, know what level they're at and spend time looking for the book that you think would fit them best. In the latter scenario there was a lot more thought put into it. This is what "it's the thought that counts" means. If you do all that but you fail to hit your mark, your effort is still appreciated. If you nail it you really show the person that you've spent the time to understand them instead of just knowing a few obvious facts. Some of my favorite gifts people have given me have been among the most inexpensive that I have reaceived because they have done this while I've had some hefty gift cards expire because they were at places I didn't want anything from.
It's not how much time, effort or money you put into acquiring something for someone. It's how you show someone you care enough about them to know who they are. Obviously there are different levels of expectation. If your new neig
People have been able to do a lot with carrier pigeons. I'm surprised you guys never figured out how to take that to another level with kangaroos. That would solve your problem. You guys have an abundance of a natural dellivery person roaming around. Do something with it. You can't just keep waiting for inovation to fall from the sky.
" As an Amazon.com employee, I'd be more than happy to send you some pictures of the company picnic.;-P"
I'll pass on that but I did a search of Norah Jones on images.google.com. Feel free to take photos at the concert in case there are any wardrobe malfunctions.
Hmm.. that reminds me. I think the last book I bought from amazon was on concert photography and that was years ago before I moved. I started becoming skeptical of women that are taller than me and didn't want them to have my new address.
From now on I'm buying all my books from local bookstores. I'll just use amazon.com to help filter through titles, then go to a local shop, sit down and go over the books enjoying the coffee and wifi until I decide on my purchases. I'll even take a picture of me handing the money to the other boostore and send it to amazon.
That's one thing I hate, corps rewarding their employees and making it seem like they're doing it for the consumer. Why don't they post pictures of the company picnic too.
That's my point. The person licensing the code has to include that statement for future versions to apply. The person may choose not to in which case future versions don't apply.
Looks like there's also a bunch of files that don't include that clause. Including files that Linus holds the copyright to. I don't think he put that statment in the main COPYING file for nothing. Some specifically state version "2 only" or version 1. This one was cute.
This driver is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify
it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
the Free Software Foundation; version 2 of the License.
If you want to use any later version of the GNU GPL, you will probably
be allowed to, but you have to ask me and Tekram
before.
"Version 3 of the GPL, when it does arrive, won't necessarily apply to Linux, however. Linux leader Linus Torvalds specifically chose version 2 of the GPL to govern Linux--but omitted a provision that would permit using a later version of the license."
Now I'm not trying to say Linux is bad for not having this provision. I mean who's to say what GPL3 will look like, or the post-RMS GPLs. My point is that not all of the linux kernel can be used with future licenses. For Sun, a commercial and public company, it needs a little more assurance and specifies co-ownership if it needs to do anything in the future. They aren't stealing anything from you.
If you read that quote directly, the licensor has to specifically state "any later version" in the license. "If each program lacked the indirect pointer, we would be forced to discuss the change at length with numerous copyright holders, which would be a virtual impossibility. In practice, the chance of having uniform distribution terms for GNU software would be nil."
So if the file doesn't say "Version 2 of the GPL or any later version" then that clause does not apply.
If you look at the linux kernel readme it says "It is distributed under the GNU General Public License - see the
19 accompanying COPYING file for more details. "
Also note that in the COPYING file it specifically states
"Also note that the only valid version of the GPL as far as the kernel
is concerned is _this_ particular version of the license (ie v2, not
v2.2 or v3.x or whatever), unless explicitly otherwise stated."
And there were only a couple files I found that explicityly stated it.
Next time, know what you're talking to before you call bullshit. This is from the 2.6.11 kernel. I didn't look at 2.6.12
"If I contribute to Linux, I don't have to assign the copyright to Linus."
No you don't but the FSF recommends that you assign your copyright to them for GPL'd code. Sun is asking for joing ownership. You don't give up your copyright completely. When GPL v3 comes out, if Linus wants to upgrade to it he'll have to track down all the copyright holders to get their permission to relicense it. Didn't something like this already happen?
"This was just the thing I needed to convince me to try Open Solaris. Hopefully porting drivers from Linux and the *BSD's to Open Solaris won't prove too difficult."
BSDs more likely than Linux because of licensing restrictions. Although a good number of drivers for the linux kernel are written as modules and don't have to have to be GPL'd. In fact there are a number of drivers that are released under a BSD license as well as proprietary, binary-only drivers. Also more hardware venders might support the Solaris x86 platform. nVidia released Solaris 10 x86/x64 drivers.
" Yes, Linux is such a "mess" that Sun have been _forced_ to copy it !"
Actually, it looks like the reverse is already starting to happen. And in the past the linux kernel guys were able to get info from solaris and solaris engineers. here Some comments are negative some are positive but Solaris is mentioned the most by far out of any of the commercial Unixes. I can't find the link right now but I remember someone saying that back in the day Sun was a lot more open with it's technology. Sun engineers would publish info about their hardware and software. Especially when someone was having some sort of trouble. Then they got a little more closed down. Probably when they were making a ton of money. Sounds like Scott McNealy recognizes that and wants Sun to go back to being more open.
"Not true. Solaris 10 is free to use for development and evaluation purposes only."
Not true according to Sun you can use Solaris for free "As software business models are evolving Sun is taking an innovative lead role in making the Solaris
10 OS freely available for commercial use - and at zero cost." Though this does not extend to previous versions of Solaris like Solaris 9. Those you can only use for testing and development. RedHat doesn't even let you do that with RHEL. They only give you a 30 day trial license.
Just to emphasize... According to Eric Boutilier in his blog
"under
the new Solaris/Opensolaris model, in order for a Sun developer to put
code into regular Solaris (the Solaris that Sun ships), he/she will
have to put it into Opensolaris first."
The OpenSolaris license is the CDDL. It is not a viral license like the GPL. It was derived from the Mozilla Public License.
OpenSolaris is based off of the Solaris Next source tree which is the working codebase after (and built on code from) Solaris 10. I've run PostgreSQL 7.3, 7.4 and 8.0 on Solaris. http://www.sunfreeware.com/ has Subversion binaries. As for Trac it should compile fine. Solaris has a lot of development behind it and a lot of resources from Sun. OpenSolaris is still in its early stages though. Solaris 10 (the commercial one) might be a good fit for your hosting/running apps instead of FreeBSD. Solaris 10 is free to use but not open source. For distributing OpenSolaris might be a good choice but it was just released and not quite all the code is out there.
The CDDL is a per file license so unless you're hacking the actual OpenSolaris code it should serve the needs you have for using the BSD's. Some different benchmarks (like the mysql os benchmark) showed Solaris doint better than FreeBSD. Different independant benchmarks (think zdnet had some and different ISV's) show that the new Solaris can even hold it's own against Linux.
Though you'd probably want to consult a lawyer or at least check out the cddl faq and not just take my opinion.
I don't think that Jörg is part of xcdroast. He wrote and maintains cdtools. xcdroast is just a gui for cdrecord. cdtools is released under the GPL. Why don't you find some open standards minded people yourself and fork it to fix it. From what I've read on the lkml it doesn't seem to have anything to do with open standards anyway and you can get around it by running it as root.
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I don't mean this to diminish individual contributions but to point that there is more benefit to you than just what you might get in the future. Let me give you an example but keep in mind I'm not a lawyer and I have no connection to sun, this is just my understanding.
Let's say you have a great idea for a small business appliance. You want to build it on a unix type OS and want to use an open source one so you don't have to pay licensing fees. You select OpenSolaris as your OS and you build your software stack on top of that. You use DTrace to tune your application for the best results. In doing so you discover some ways to speed up a few system calls and make changes to some CDDL'd code. You also add some of your own libraries and modules. The only thing you are required to give back are the modifications to the CDDL'd files. Anything else you built on top of that you can license any way you want. Now you start selling this appliance and do pretty well and don't have to worry about giving the technology you're earning money from to anyone else. If someone else later looks at your CDDL'd contributions and finds a way to improve them, you can benefit from that as well.
My understanding of the GPL is that if your software stack tightly integrates with the GPL'd code it is considered a derivative work and needs to be licensed under a GPL compatible license. If you link to CDDL'd code you don't have to worry about that just like if you link to LGPL'd code you don't either. Some of the GNU System libraries are licensed under the LGPL, some under the GPL with exceptions for linking and some under just the plain GPL.
That's what I think Sun is trying to do with OpenSolaris. This may not be your type of thing. Maybe you just like to hack at OS code for fun in your spare time and the notion that someone else has joint ownership doesn't sit well with you. That's understandable.
Again, my main point isn't that copyright assingment/joing copyrights is a great thing but rather that Sun isn't the only one doing this. FSF, Mozilla, Novell are ones I can think of off the top of my head. From the perspective of these organizations, it makes sense.
Have you tried Ethol LPD? I've been very happy using it in trays and a roller transport processor. It's very cheap too in powder form.
I've probably made thousands of black and white prints and I have never printed on kodak black and white paper. Although I do like their color papers when I print color.
I shoot digital as well as traditional film and I do my own printing for color and black and white as well as color and I also send stuff out to digital printers as well. Traditional film printing, especially from larger negatives can be a lot nicer than digital. Especially when it comes to black and white. A nice hand printed black and white print on fiber paper has a certain depth and richness that you can't achive on dye based papers.
There's no need to start making your own emulsions. There are still plenty of other options.
That may be true of the drivers but not some of the main files. It looks like the GPL v3 may not be compatible with v2 because it places further restrictions. Maybe I'm wrong about this and if so, prove to me otherwise.
Looks like your problem is with assigning copyright (in the case of FSF) or letting your copyright be co-owned (in the case of Sun). That's fine, I'm not trying to argue why you should do that but rather give my opinion on why those groups would want that.
These are oviously straw man arguments but... FSF and RMS, at least to me, seem more about ethics and morality which are more subjective than freedom. Who is to say that GPLv4 won't have to some clause that requires you to take in a homeless person if you use the code commercially? It's not likely but we just don't know what the future holds. Who will run FSF after RMS passes. Same goes for Sun too. In the end it's about trust.
The safety net is that even if they decide to switch licenses or whatever, the code that has previously been released under CDDL or GPLv2 will always be around and can always be that way. So even if Linus or Sun do this, then all the other developers can continue to use the code that was licensed the old way. They just can't use the new stuff licensed with the new license only. If most of the developers don't want to switch the new stuff probably won't matter. The converse is true too. You as a developer can't decide to take all your marbles and go home just because you own the copyright, even if exclusivly. Whatever you release is out there forever. You can't take it back.
No, what I'm saying is that if Linux goes to GPL v3 and GPL v2 is not compatable Linus will have to hunt down the other contributors whose files do not specify "any later version" in their license. Linus isn't the only contributor to the kernel and not all the code is licensed in a way that it can be redistributed under GPL v3. More likely, something in the GPL v3 will appeal to someone like RedHat and they would want to switch. Though things may not be bad if that happens, there is that potential and that is why the FSF and Sun try to make provisions in that regard.
It's good for Linus to not agree to license his code under a license that doesn't exist yet but it's not good if you're a commercial company that might need to relicense their OS at a later time. If sun wanted to relicense OpenSolaris under the GPL 5 years from now, the contributor agreement gives them that power. THey can't relicense your code and keep it. Meaning if you release something to them under the CDDL and down the road they decide they want to keep their new stuff private, the CDDL'd code is still out there, free and clear under the license. This is the same for other open source licenses.
To try and put it another way, lets say I'm writing a book and I use a open source type license on it. I do it in a wiki style online after I write the first 10 chapters. I allow people to work off a copy of my work. They can write their own book off my base but I require them to give me back the changes to my chapters. They can add their own chapters and keep them to themselves if they want. If I like what they send me back I can include it in my book or not. Since I asked for co copyright of the work they contributed back into my chapters I can choose to later decide to relicense it with a closed license, write the last chapter and start publishing it. That last chapter isn't available for others to copy, nor are the changes that I made on the closed version, but the previously open work is still available for others. They can choose to write their own last chapter(s) (not based off my last chapter) and publish it themselves. That's the bad side of the coin and it's not all THAT bad. The other is I may decide I want to give it a freer license later, or even make it public domain. Since I co own the copyright I can do that without asking others. Some people may not like that either. The point is that the FSF and Sun both see the need for this. If anyone is going to find it bad that Sun is wants it, they should find fault with the FSF for wanting the same thing as well.
From what I've read so far I don't think v3 will get much traction anyway. The provision that closes the ASP loophole will probably cause a lot of problems for people. For companies like Google and IWon that patch their own kernels and don't always send the changes back (since tey don't technically distribute linux) there might be some resistance to GPL v3. They may not want to share their code with their competitors. For people that create income producing websites based off of GPL technology they may choose to avoid GPL v3 because they don't want to dillute their revenue.
Amazon.com is calling this a "Thank You" to it's customers. The title of the press release is "Amazon.com to Thank Customers with 10th Anniversary Event Featuring Bob Dylan, Norah Jones, and Bill Maher"
They're kind of creating an anniversary special like you would see for some TV shows. But if someone like David Letterman creates an anniversary special, he's going above and beyond to deliver a better product (TV show) to his consumers (viewers). They are doing a higher budget, longer running version of what the viewer is already 'buying'. These types of shows are a bit self indulgent but it's ok because it's a special enhancement of the product. They are also not pitched as a Thank You but rather a Celebration. The hosts humbly thank the viewers and others involved at some point.
Amazon.com is doing the exact opposite. Their product isn't this type of entertainment. If they wanted to thank consumers they could have decided to give something back to consumers based on what they go to amazon.com for. They could have also done something to reward some of the people that actively volunteer their reviews. Those reviews add value to their site. Some other people had good suggestions such as free shipping for the anniversary.
What this looks like to me is an webcast informercial and a reward to it's employees. That's fine, but don't bill it as a "Thank You" to customers.
I think it's great that Amazon wants to reward it's employees but it seems like they are trying to combine an employee event with a marketting effort and in the end will probably not be succesful with either. Do something great for your employees, there's no problem with that, they work hard. Do something good for your customers, that's good too, they are the most important part of your business. If Amazon decided to buy all their employees a Hummer, that's fine by me (I'm not a shareholder) but don't submit a press release saying you're doing it as a thank you for customers because it makes the employees happier, safer and more confident which makes the services they offer to consumers better.
Some people say "well it's the thought that counts". I Don't think people understand what this means. Based on the reaction from a lot of people here, it seems amazon.com didn't put enough thought into this. They thought about doing something for their consumers, but the thought of doing something for someone else isn't what is meant. "Well I did it for you" just sounds self aggrandizing to me. Let me try and put it into a context more on our level (I know I'm not the CEO of some multi billion dollar corp and chances are you aren't either). Lets say you want to buy a book as a gift for a friend that's getting into pottery. You can go in and just pick up the best selling pottery book or you can try and find out more details about what types of pottery your friend is interested in, compare that to other things you know about them including if they like to read long technical type stuff or more relaxed short examples with pictures, know what level they're at and spend time looking for the book that you think would fit them best. In the latter scenario there was a lot more thought put into it. This is what "it's the thought that counts" means. If you do all that but you fail to hit your mark, your effort is still appreciated. If you nail it you really show the person that you've spent the time to understand them instead of just knowing a few obvious facts. Some of my favorite gifts people have given me have been among the most inexpensive that I have reaceived because they have done this while I've had some hefty gift cards expire because they were at places I didn't want anything from.
It's not how much time, effort or money you put into acquiring something for someone. It's how you show someone you care enough about them to know who they are. Obviously there are different levels of expectation. If your new neig
I don't know.... If I was Miranda I might be happy if someone that extended my program by adding adware to it forgot to credit me. :)
I'll pass on that but I did a search of Norah Jones on images.google.com. Feel free to take photos at the concert in case there are any wardrobe malfunctions.
Hmm.. that reminds me. I think the last book I bought from amazon was on concert photography and that was years ago before I moved. I started becoming skeptical of women that are taller than me and didn't want them to have my new address.
That's one thing I hate, corps rewarding their employees and making it seem like they're doing it for the consumer. Why don't they post pictures of the company picnic too.
A lot of people don't know the difference between what looks good and what looks crummy.
I was thinking the same thing. Go find some capital... I'm in :)
That's my point. The person licensing the code has to include that statement for future versions to apply. The person may choose not to in which case future versions don't apply.
Looks like there's also a bunch of files that don't include that clause. Including files that Linus holds the copyright to. I don't think he put that statment in the main COPYING file for nothing. Some specifically state version "2 only" or version 1. This one was cute.
Also from here Now I'm not trying to say Linux is bad for not having this provision. I mean who's to say what GPL3 will look like, or the post-RMS GPLs. My point is that not all of the linux kernel can be used with future licenses. For Sun, a commercial and public company, it needs a little more assurance and specifies co-ownership if it needs to do anything in the future. They aren't stealing anything from you.I think you hit the nail on the head.
So if the file doesn't say "Version 2 of the GPL or any later version" then that clause does not apply.
If you look at the linux kernel readme it says "It is distributed under the GNU General Public License - see the 19 accompanying COPYING file for more details. "
Also note that in the COPYING file it specifically states
And there were only a couple files I found that explicityly stated it.Next time, know what you're talking to before you call bullshit. This is from the 2.6.11 kernel. I didn't look at 2.6.12
Looks like it started on day one
No you don't but the FSF recommends that you assign your copyright to them for GPL'd code. Sun is asking for joing ownership. You don't give up your copyright completely. When GPL v3 comes out, if Linus wants to upgrade to it he'll have to track down all the copyright holders to get their permission to relicense it. Didn't something like this already happen?
Just make it easy :)
for us to read and do not
try and write haikus.
This is a good writeup of Solaris 10 Security. They pulled some things in from Trusted Solaris such as process rights management.
BSDs more likely than Linux because of licensing restrictions. Although a good number of drivers for the linux kernel are written as modules and don't have to have to be GPL'd. In fact there are a number of drivers that are released under a BSD license as well as proprietary, binary-only drivers. Also more hardware venders might support the Solaris x86 platform. nVidia released Solaris 10 x86/x64 drivers.
" Yes, Linux is such a "mess" that Sun have been _forced_ to copy it !" Actually, it looks like the reverse is already starting to happen. And in the past the linux kernel guys were able to get info from solaris and solaris engineers. here Some comments are negative some are positive but Solaris is mentioned the most by far out of any of the commercial Unixes. I can't find the link right now but I remember someone saying that back in the day Sun was a lot more open with it's technology. Sun engineers would publish info about their hardware and software. Especially when someone was having some sort of trouble. Then they got a little more closed down. Probably when they were making a ton of money. Sounds like Scott McNealy recognizes that and wants Sun to go back to being more open.
Not true according to Sun you can use Solaris for free "As software business models are evolving Sun is taking an innovative lead role in making the Solaris 10 OS freely available for commercial use - and at zero cost." Though this does not extend to previous versions of Solaris like Solaris 9. Those you can only use for testing and development. RedHat doesn't even let you do that with RHEL. They only give you a 30 day trial license.
Just to emphasize... According to Eric Boutilier in his blog "under the new Solaris/Opensolaris model, in order for a Sun developer to put code into regular Solaris (the Solaris that Sun ships), he/she will have to put it into Opensolaris first."
OpenSolaris is based off of the Solaris Next source tree which is the working codebase after (and built on code from) Solaris 10. I've run PostgreSQL 7.3, 7.4 and 8.0 on Solaris. http://www.sunfreeware.com/ has Subversion binaries. As for Trac it should compile fine. Solaris has a lot of development behind it and a lot of resources from Sun. OpenSolaris is still in its early stages though. Solaris 10 (the commercial one) might be a good fit for your hosting/running apps instead of FreeBSD. Solaris 10 is free to use but not open source. For distributing OpenSolaris might be a good choice but it was just released and not quite all the code is out there.
The CDDL is a per file license so unless you're hacking the actual OpenSolaris code it should serve the needs you have for using the BSD's. Some different benchmarks (like the mysql os benchmark) showed Solaris doint better than FreeBSD. Different independant benchmarks (think zdnet had some and different ISV's) show that the new Solaris can even hold it's own against Linux.
Though you'd probably want to consult a lawyer or at least check out the cddl faq and not just take my opinion.
That's one of the benefits of open source. :)