I think it is some elements in the FSF which are confused. For example, over and over for the past twenty years they have said that the restrictions of the GPL only kicked in upon distribution. Yet they considered closing the so-called "webapp loophole" in GPLv3, which would have been a condition placed upon use of the software. I suspect they would have included this condition if they didn't get so much push back from the community.
They're "core" principles have remained the same, but their interpretations of them have changed and expanded. They most definitely do NOT have a strict constructionist view of their four freedoms, but require essay after essay to explain what they really mean.
If you go read the effing article, and the list thread, you'll see that the license is the least of their problems.
But when you do finally get down the priority list to the license, there's a reason for it. One goal of the free BSDs, particularly OpenBSD, is that the base/core system can be distributed in its entirety under an unrestricted license.
This is a language, so keep it as such. I realize it's hard to market a language without a rich set of standardized libraries, but the UI should be an exception. This is an area where the technology is slowly but constantly changing. In addition, GUIs tend to have somewhat "religious" supporters. Also, as Bruce mentioned, all of the toolkits have their advantages and disadvantages. One "disadvantage" they all share is a changing API. Nothing stays the same forever. Tying your language standard to a third party API is problematic.
One language tried to do this (Java), but it's original GUI was universally reviled, and it's current "official" GUI (Swing) is competing with an extremely popular third party solution (SWT), and another third party solution (Jambi) is starting to gain enthusiastic users.
the BSD licence explicitly permits redistribution of the unaltered work under a different licence
No it does not. Have you actually READ the BSD license? You are permitted to distribute, modify and use the software, provided that you follow the conditions listed. You are not given permission to change the license of the copyrighted work.
Copyright (c) <YEAR>, <OWNER>
All rights reserved.
Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions are met:
* Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer.
* 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.
* Neither the name of the nor the names of its contributors may be used to endorse or promote products derived from this software without specific prior written permission.
THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED BY THE COPYRIGHT HOLDERS AND CONTRIBUTORS "AS IS" AND ANY EXPRESS 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 COPYRIGHT OWNER OR 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.
You must be using a different internet than I am, because what I see is a much longer definition that a mere four words. It must be that new fangled Web 2.0 everyone keeps talking about. Here is what I get from www.m-w.com (highlights are mine, and are what I think are the most applicable to the subject at hand):
substantive Main Entry: 2substantive
Pronunciation: 's&b-st&n-tiv; 2c and 3 also s&b-'stan-tiv
Function: adjective
Etymology: Middle English, from Anglo-French sustentif
1 : being a totally independent entity 2 a : real rather than apparent : FIRM <need substantive evidence to prove her guilt>; also : PERMANENT, ENDURING b : belonging to the substance of a thing : ESSENTIAL c : expressing existence <the substantive verb is the verb to be> d : requiring or involving no mordant <a substantive dyeing process> 3 a : having the nature or function of a grammatical substantive <a substantive phrase> b : relating to or having the character of a noun or pronominal term in logic 4 : considerable in amount or numbers : SUBSTANTIAL <made substantive progress> 5 : creating and defining rights and duties <substantive law> -- compare PROCEDURAL 6 : having substance : involving matters of major or practical importance to all concerned <substantive discussions among world leaders> - substantively adverb - substantiveness noun
I find these definitions, among others, in my dictionary. If one similar is not in your dictionary, I suggest getting a new one, preferably not from GNU.
Having substance and prompting thought; "a meaty discussion"
...still it seems to me that the right place for an author to make his wishes known is in the license.
Funny that. The original author DID make his wishes known in the license! Nowhere in the ISC license is anyone given the permission to remove the copyright notice and relicense.
This is the moral equivalent of pissing is someone's pool after they gave you permission to use it. Then people like you come along and fault the pool owner for not explicitly posting rules against urination.
The reason people don't use public domain, is that it is an onerous task to do so. It takes a lawyer and legal filings to do so. Which is why people who would other PD their code use BSD, MIT or other unrestricted licenses instead....and as a bonus, you get to add a warranty waiver. You need a license to say "you can't remove this disclaimer from the license".
How many successful microkernel based systems are there? One. Only QNX has managed to be successful with a true microkernel architecture.
Now that the source code is open, it would be nice to find out how they got out a robust microkernel years ago while GNU is still struggling with HURD a decade after Stallman belittled Torvalds by saying the kernel was the easiest part of an OS to write.
Except for the devlopers. Taking freedom from one group and giving to an other is always dangerious.
Actually, it's not even that. The confusion stems from Stallman's misuse and subtle redefinition of the word "free". A better word to use instead is "unencumbered". Software that is (relatively) unencumbered by legal or license restrictions.
The GPLv3 is the most encumbered of all Open Source licenses. Deliberately. Stallman believes in encumbered software, he just differs from proprietary companies on whom the encumberances should be placed and what form they should take. He and his advocates do want software to be controlled, they just want it to be controlled in a different manner. Calling this control "freedom" is incorrect.
Do what you enjoy for a living. You might have a take a few crap jobs on the way there, but no one is ever happy doing a job they hate just because it pays well. If you enjoy programming, then go into programming. But be realistic as well. The days of one career per lifetime are gone. Don't expect to be a C++/Java/Python developer in 2060.
Ditto. I am a FreeBSD users. There are no drivers for newer ATI cards on FreeBSD, because ATI refuses to open source their drivers. I have been hearing rumours of open source drivers for a year now, but nothing. At LWCE the AMD guys said we would see some imminently, but nothing.
I am building a new system in the next month or two, and if ATI still hasn't come out with open source drivers, I'm going with Intel instead.
It's like taking the free apples from the apple tree, making a bunch of apple pies, and specifically not inviting the owner of the apple tree to the feast.
Just because you don't have the legal obligation under pain of lawsuit not to contribute back does not mean that it's okay to snub the original author. When I share I am not demanding that you share back. It doesn't matter if it's code, time or sandwiches, I am not imposing any obligation on you. But that does not absolve you of the morality of sharing. You should be sharing back simply because you should be sharing.
Jesus said to render unto Caesar what is Caesar's, and render unto God what is God's. But what belongs to God? Everything! There ain't much room left for rendering unto Caesar.
That's nice, but it doesn't really have anything to do with this situation. Code doesn't grow on trees, and especially not magical, self-replenishing trees.
Actually, it has everything to do with the situation. Software is like that apple tree. No matter how many times you copy software, it remains undamaged. So there is no reason to "protect" it with restrictive licenses.
Slashdot Mirror
You are just confused...
I think it is some elements in the FSF which are confused. For example, over and over for the past twenty years they have said that the restrictions of the GPL only kicked in upon distribution. Yet they considered closing the so-called "webapp loophole" in GPLv3, which would have been a condition placed upon use of the software. I suspect they would have included this condition if they didn't get so much push back from the community.
They're "core" principles have remained the same, but their interpretations of them have changed and expanded. They most definitely do NOT have a strict constructionist view of their four freedoms, but require essay after essay to explain what they really mean.
Considering how GCC is doing nothing to prevent bitrot in many architectures, you're probably going to need to use an *old* version of GCC.
If you go read the effing article, and the list thread, you'll see that the license is the least of their problems.
But when you do finally get down the priority list to the license, there's a reason for it. One goal of the free BSDs, particularly OpenBSD, is that the base/core system can be distributed in its entirety under an unrestricted license.
Reason 1) Avoid a monoculture
Reason 2) Competition
Reason 3) Choice
Reason 4) Tweak Stallman's nose
Actually, that's not the BSD license. It's the ISC license, which is now used by OpenBSD for all new code. It's even freer than the BSD license.
http://www.opensource.org/licenses/bsd-license.php
Regarding the GUI: don't.
This is a language, so keep it as such. I realize it's hard to market a language without a rich set of standardized libraries, but the UI should be an exception. This is an area where the technology is slowly but constantly changing. In addition, GUIs tend to have somewhat "religious" supporters. Also, as Bruce mentioned, all of the toolkits have their advantages and disadvantages. One "disadvantage" they all share is a changing API. Nothing stays the same forever. Tying your language standard to a third party API is problematic.
One language tried to do this (Java), but it's original GUI was universally reviled, and it's current "official" GUI (Swing) is competing with an extremely popular third party solution (SWT), and another third party solution (Jambi) is starting to gain enthusiastic users.
So in my opinion, leave the UI unstandardized.
No it does not. Have you actually READ the BSD license? You are permitted to distribute, modify and use the software, provided that you follow the conditions listed. You are not given permission to change the license of the copyrighted work.
...still it seems to me that the right place for an author to make his wishes known is in the license.
Funny that. The original author DID make his wishes known in the license! Nowhere in the ISC license is anyone given the permission to remove the copyright notice and relicense.
This is the moral equivalent of pissing is someone's pool after they gave you permission to use it. Then people like you come along and fault the pool owner for not explicitly posting rules against urination.
The reason people don't use public domain, is that it is an onerous task to do so. It takes a lawyer and legal filings to do so. Which is why people who would other PD their code use BSD, MIT or other unrestricted licenses instead. ...and as a bonus, you get to add a warranty waiver. You need a license to say "you can't remove this disclaimer from the license".
How many successful microkernel based systems are there? One. Only QNX has managed to be successful with a true microkernel architecture.
Now that the source code is open, it would be nice to find out how they got out a robust microkernel years ago while GNU is still struggling with HURD a decade after Stallman belittled Torvalds by saying the kernel was the easiest part of an OS to write.
Except for the devlopers. Taking freedom from one group and giving to an other is always dangerious.
Actually, it's not even that. The confusion stems from Stallman's misuse and subtle redefinition of the word "free". A better word to use instead is "unencumbered". Software that is (relatively) unencumbered by legal or license restrictions.
The GPLv3 is the most encumbered of all Open Source licenses. Deliberately. Stallman believes in encumbered software, he just differs from proprietary companies on whom the encumberances should be placed and what form they should take. He and his advocates do want software to be controlled, they just want it to be controlled in a different manner. Calling this control "freedom" is incorrect.
As a FreeBSD user, I have to second the motion of "troll".
The fact that my on-topic post regarding AMD drivers got modded down as offtopic doesn't bode well for Slashdot either.
Do what you enjoy for a living. You might have a take a few crap jobs on the way there, but no one is ever happy doing a job they hate just because it pays well. If you enjoy programming, then go into programming. But be realistic as well. The days of one career per lifetime are gone. Don't expect to be a C++/Java/Python developer in 2060.
This does not bode well for our chances to get either Open Source drivers or complete specs for ATI chipsets. Sigh.
I wonder how long until the nutbag conspiracists start claiming this as a dry run? Oh wait, it's already happening...
Ditto. I am a FreeBSD users. There are no drivers for newer ATI cards on FreeBSD, because ATI refuses to open source their drivers. I have been hearing rumours of open source drivers for a year now, but nothing. At LWCE the AMD guys said we would see some imminently, but nothing.
I am building a new system in the next month or two, and if ATI still hasn't come out with open source drivers, I'm going with Intel instead.
It is not sharing if you are obligated to share. Enforced sharing is not sharing anymore than welfare is charity.
It is entirely possible to encourage people to share without holding a lawsuit-laden license to their head.
It's like taking the free apples from the apple tree, making a bunch of apple pies, and specifically not inviting the owner of the apple tree to the feast.
Legal != moral
Just because you don't have the legal obligation under pain of lawsuit not to contribute back does not mean that it's okay to snub the original author. When I share I am not demanding that you share back. It doesn't matter if it's code, time or sandwiches, I am not imposing any obligation on you. But that does not absolve you of the morality of sharing. You should be sharing back simply because you should be sharing.
Jesus said to render unto Caesar what is Caesar's, and render unto God what is God's. But what belongs to God? Everything! There ain't much room left for rendering unto Caesar.
That's nice, but it doesn't really have anything to do with this situation. Code doesn't grow on trees, and especially not magical, self-replenishing trees.
Actually, it has everything to do with the situation. Software is like that apple tree. No matter how many times you copy software, it remains undamaged. So there is no reason to "protect" it with restrictive licenses.