Submitted by Apple has bought the CUPS code base, and has hired it’s lead developer. “CUPS was written by Michael R Sweet, an owner of Easy Software Products. In February of 2007 Apple Inc. hired Michael and acquired ownership the CUPS source code. While Michael is primarily working on non-CUPS projects, he will continue to develop and support CUPS, which is still being released under the existing GPL2/LGPL2 licensing terms.”
Apple Buys CUPS
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Eugenia Loli
Ex-programmer, ex-editor in chief at OSNews.com, now a visual artist/filmmaker.
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time for a fork?
Give it a rest, how is this different from other large corporations paying for Kernel developers to work on Linux, and people to work on all manner of open source. Google hire many people who work on Firefox full time – does that make it less Free than before?
Really, open source zealots need to open some windows and breath some fresh air because as soon as they hear a corporation supporting open source software, they close their minds straight away.
First off zealots is an offensive term.
Second many prefer the term “free software zealot”
Third Companies With Linux *contribute* to a larger codebase they do not have overall control of the *copyright*. In fact it mirror the FSF work only that someone with a political agenda owning the code we have a *competing* OS owning the copyright.
Give it a rest, how is this different from other large corporations paying for Kernel developers to work on Linux, and people to work on all manner of open source.
It’s different in that Apple now owns CUPS. This is a fundamental difference from companies simply contributing to open source project they don’t own.
I thought that was pretty obvious.
Anyway, I don’t think there’s any reason to be alarmed about this. As long as Apple continues to distribute CUPS under the GPL, as they seem to intend to do, this is even a very good development.
P.S.: There really is no need for namecalling.
Agreed. And particularly about the name calling. I’m critical of people who are truly *reactive* to news like this. But there are legitimate reasons for concern over this unexpected (to me anyway) news.
It seems to me that sometimes we focus too much upon open source vs closed source, which is important, and too little upon the matter of centralized vs distributed copyright, which is also important.
you mean like OpenOffice?
Actually, Apple *isn’t* contributing under the GPL. See here: http://www.cups.org/articles.php?L179+I0+TFAQ+M10+P1+Q
Not that I ever wanted to be in a position to defend Apple, but that sounds in line with the LGPL, so what am I missing?
Actually, any changes to the CUPS souces by Apple, will be covered by the GPL, unless Apple change the core copyright. The excerpt that you quoted, deals with addons and linked programs, not the core CUPS system.
If Apple continue to release it under the GPL, and Apple contribute something of their own expertise, kudos to Apple.
If Apple decide to make it proprietary, as they are entitled to do since they purchased the copyright, then no doubt CUPS would fork and of the current CUPS developers some would, I suppose, go to work for Apple and some would continue on with the fork.
I think Apple would perhaps best be served by keeping it GPL and keeping all of the developers onside. A fork really isn’t in anyone’s best interest.
This decision is purely up to Apple, however.
Google didn’t buy the FireFox Source base, which is very uncommon if you just want to support a project.
I find it very uncanny to see CUPS in the hand of one of the biggest patent trolls in the industry which has a portfolio filled to the brim with patents that are trivial, based on public work or even based on other peoples work.
Really, it wouldn’t be much worse if it was in the hands of Microsoft now.
Why? “software and license remain the same” (quote from the website).
Except the license didn’t remain the same*, this page was changed:
http://www.cups.org/articles.php?L179+I0+TFAQ+M10+P1+Q
I’m concerned, yet interested in what Apple is going to do with CUPS…
*A minor change, but important
Edited 2007-07-12 23:18
Today? More than 5 years ago: http://lists.debian.org/debian-legal/2002/05/msg00033.html and http://www.osnews.com/permalink.php?news_id=18251&comment_id=255038
Edited 2007-07-12 23:17
Five years ago Apple didn’t own the copyright.
On one hand, this could accelerate development and increase the quality of CUPS.
On the other hand, this could mean that future versions might not be released under GPL/LGPL…Right now it looks as if they will, but there are no guarantees it will stay that way.
I’m a bit ambivalent about this. What does everyone else think?
Edited 2007-07-12 19:35
I don’t mind it being in Apple’s hands as long as it stays in GPL. I might have some issues if they rename it iCups. Oops I hope I don’t get sued for putting the letter I before a product name without Apple’s permission. 😉
Edited 2007-07-12 19:39
It’s ok, I’ve had iCups before, they’re easy enough to get rid of. Just drink some water, or breathe into a paper bag.
😉
But then again one could fork the current released version and keep developing that as GPL. That would be a sad scenario though, hope Apple does good to the project.
Apple initiated a bunch of OSS projects (Darwin Streaming Server, WebKit, Bonjour/Rendezouz, iCal Server,…).
Why should they end GPLed CUPS?
WebKit was not initiated by Apple, it was KHTML + some (admittedly major) changes. In the case of bonjour and ical… those are specifications, not products. Apple also produced the OpenStep specs, but they didn’t provide any code.
As to why CUPS will be different: Apple shows all signs of wanting CUPS for itself. It will never contribute its patches back to the GPL’d version; those will remain internal. Plus, all contributers of GPL’d patches to CUPS will be requried to sign over the copyright–in effect they will be giving Apple the source code to use to its (proprietary) advantage with no guarantee that it will benefit the community.
For a start, you don’t even know how to *spell* contributor, so I don’t see why it would affect you.
Secondly, you’re wrong, wrong, wrong about iCal and ZeroConf. In both of those cases Apple released code.
iCal may be a specification, but Apple also released source sometime last year for “Darwin Calendar Server” which is what I believe the original poster referred to. In the case of ZeroConf, Apple released code for MDNSResponder, which is essentially all that is required to begin advertising services.
If you’re wondering, both projects are now covered by the Apache 2.0 License, so unless you object to the majority of the world’s websites (this one included) which are served by Apache and free OS’s which include Apache, you probably have no reason to be concerned.
If any license change occurs, my guess is it will be to move it to the same license as the majority of Apple’s other open source projects, namely the Apache 2.0 License.
The only reason I can imagine that Apple would want to own the copyrights to allow them to do things which the GPL would prohibit them from doing, like integrating CUPS more deeply into the OS. The real problem with that is that by enabling themselves to do so they gain a competitive advantage without having the bad PR of changing the license.
If that were to happen, and I were a contributor to CUPS, I would be watching very closely to make sure that my code is not being used as leverage against competition, and would be ready to pull the plug on their copyright to my code come release-day.
There is no need to overreact though, Apple have learned through bitter experience that geeks are less tolerant of being shafted than their traditional (fan) base.
Missed this story yesterday, I, of course, am worried. We all know how helpful Apple was with giving back khtml code back to KDE…
Dave
@ Melkor
Not helpful you say?
“Over time, Apple spend significant resources to retool their relationship with KHTML and the open-source community in general by making the Webkit project an open-source one. It was complete with an anonymous CVS repository, a full history of changes from Apple’s very first involvement in the project, a comprehensive web site with Bugzilla bug tracking, blog, mailing lists, IRC channel, and information for developers if they would like to help the project in any capacity.”
I would say they have been pretty helpful.
For anyone interested, that quote is from this Ars article:
http://tinyurl.com/2ffdqb
I find that story encouraging, as it was the webkit debacle, in part, that had me concerned about the future of CUPS.
So what does that mean? Since it is GPL, I am free to use the code and enhance, distribute, fork, etc. I understand buying the Logo or the Trademark (i.e., we be JBoss, we be Redhat, etc), but how exactly did they “buy” the code base? Fill me in, please.
It means they now own the copyright to the code, and could relicense it if they wanted to.
Agreed, which would affect future code. The current code _released_ under the gpl cannot be un-released. Thus, I would agree that it would be a good time for someone to step in and at least get a very good understanding of the code. In the event the code was re-licensed, it would be important for someone to be able to step-in, fork the code, and keep things running.
I agree. It’s only in the past couple of years that I’ve noticed a huge forward leap in printing support with CUPS. It would be a shame for that tide to stop now. So far, Apple has been kind to the F/OSS community, but what happens if they decide they don’t want GNU/Linux and non-Apple BSDs to be as competitive in the printing world? All they have to do is relicense, and unless someone is brave enough to fork the last free release, that stops any future CUPS development on open platforms.
It means they now own the copyright to the code, and could relicense it if they wanted to.
As far as I can see, they may only do so if the new, relicensed version of CUPS would not be a derivative work of the old version, or if the old version was released under GPL + some kind of “Apple OS-Developed Software exception”. Unfortunately, the latter seems to be the case…
“””
As far as I can see, they may only do so if the new, relicensed version of CUPS would not be a derivative work of the old version, or if the old version was released under GPL + some kind of “Apple OS-Developed Software exception”.
“””
If they own the copyright, they can do whatever they want with new releases, regardless of any of the details of the current license.
Edited 2007-07-12 21:43
If they own the copyright, they can do whatever they want with new releases, regardless of any of the details of the current license.
To me it’s not perfectly clear that as the copyright holder it’s OK to essentially violent the license my code is released under by closing the source of a newer version if it is a derivative work of an older GPL-licensed version.
Could you perhaps point me to any references that explicitly state this doesn’t actually violate the terms of the GPL?
Cheers
Edited 2007-07-13 11:41
The code that is released under GPL once will always be available. But the copyright owner can change the license, so that future versions don’t have to be under the GPL. Derivate work or not isn’t relevant. If you own all of the code (e.g. by having all external contributors assign the copyright to you which was done in this case) you can do whatever you want with it. The original authors of any contributions made have no say. That you have released one or several earlier versions under GPL doesn’t matter.
(You can read up on copyright on Wikipedia.)
The Apple OS exception was added *five years ago*.
They own the copyright to all the code because the original author of the code always required copyright assignment for integration of contributions.
Is that even possible, I mean CUPS must have tons of other developer code in it, you can’t just ignore them? So shouldn’t this mean that Apple must redo all GPL2 code?
Apple can do whatever they want with the code if the other developers have given up their copyright and assigned it to them. So yes, they can just ignore them, and no, they don’t have to redo any GPL2 code. (Which is why giving up your copyright stinks most of the time IMHO.)
Yes there will investment of time and money to advance CUPS and if a future version is not provided as a GPL/LGPL release then there will be a de facto fork.
Frankly I don’t see that happening; Apple like appearing benevolent to the open source community and have little to lose in funding things that irritate Microsoft.
A
Yes…an interesting question, since open source CODE isn’t really “owned” by anyone….I don’t understand this either…but they did buy the “company” that was developing the code….
My feelings: No alarm…it seems as if everything will be OK, however Apple will do what it will to protect its own interests. The parts of the code that are developed specifically for OS-X are “exempt” from the GPL, according to the FAQ’s..which would theoretically only affect OS-X code (which is closed now anyway)…and the rest of CUPS would be the same as before. If they hold to this, fine.
If they don’t…there is no choice but to fork and break away from Apple for Linux, BSD, and the others….
It’s nice that the developer has a salary though…and I’m thinking that this will be a pattern, where well established and useful open source projects will be taking “under wing” of a larger entity…it may even strengthen the movement in the long run. False turns like the Novell/MS deal could be negatives though.
I’m sitting in the bleachers watching and also wondering what all of this means….
@Bobmeister since open source CODE isn’t really “owned” by anyone.
…but apparently its owned by the copyright owners of the code, and thats what Apple bought.
If what you said was true they would have just *contributed* to the project.
Not neccesarily, as just a contributer, Apple do not get to decide what goes into the main trunk, no more than I can decide what gets checked into Firefox trunk. It is the main developer’s choice what gets checked in. Perhaps Apple want control over what goes into trunk so that they can either accelerate development and support for OS X, or guide the project in a particular direction (Like some sensible usability wouldn’t go a miss)
@Kroc
Why the hatred? why the words of anger. The emotive language.
Name calling is so tiresome, please help me understand so I can help you with your rage.
I’m here to for you.
Because the immediate attitude “fork it” without any deeper understanding of what Apple have specifically bought, and what they will do, is more obnoxious than even me. Apple already have and contribute to several large open source projects. Is nothing good enough for you people??
@Kroc “you people”
I’m shocked and surprised by your language.
Which large software projects has Apple contributed to as opposed to *leeched off*. I’m sure their must be some, and even Microsoft is getting hip with its open source(sic) licenses, but I cannot think of *anything* I use, and I suspect nothing copyleft. I can remember when FSF *boycotted* apple though.
All of these softwares are open source and available for you to use as you please: Webkit. Bonjour/Rendevous. Darwin. OpenDirectory.
More at http://developer.apple.com/opensource/index.html
I’m glad you took time to respond.
webkit is a branch of KHTML, as opposed to Apple *contributing* to KHTML.
Bonjour/Open Directory is Apples own code.
Darin actually includes nothing interesting like API for Carbon and Cocoa APIs or the Quartz Compositor and Aqua user interface, its own drivers are binary, yet is from FreeBSD
Apple is leeching of open source developers again these services have equivalents in the GNU world, Apple *contributed* to none of them.
Apple contributed to Webkit/KHTML.
Darin actually includes nothing interesting like API for Carbon and Cocoa APIs or the Quartz Compositor and Aqua user interface, its own drivers are binary, yet is from FreeBSD
Darwin is not FreeBSD, and *plenty* of Apple-developed drivers are open as well. Just go and check the sources instead of just relaying words you heard elsewhere; your well-informed source unfortunately happened to be a troll.
Still: come on people! Have you *never* heard of NDAs?!?! You talk as if Apple naturally HAD to open up everything they licensed from someone else, from trivial but patented technology, to core drivers!
Sheesh.
“Darwin is not FreeBSD, and *plenty* of Apple-developed drivers are open as well.”
Sorry I was under the impression that.
Quote
“It supports the POSIX API by way of its FreeBSD lineage and can run a large number of programs written for various other Unix-like systems.”
Source
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Darwin_(operating_system)
I’m sorry I didn’t realize their Airport drivers were now open.
Wow, wikipedia, the undisputed source for accurate information.
By the way, they got things completely backwards. Apple could reuse part of the FreeBSD, NetBSD and OpenBSD userland because Darwin already supported the POSIX API through its (original) BSD 4.4-Lite heritage. The fact that not even today FreeBSD is feature-complete on PowerPCs is telling, don’t you think?
And BTW, Apple has hired a decent share of FreeBSD developers, Jordan Hubbard included. And if you check the FreeBSD commit trees sometime, you might become aware of very interesting stuff.
Not to mention how Apple *never* refrained from crediting FreeBSD.
http://developer.apple.com/technotes/tn2002/tn2071.html
By the way, if you’re really curious about the history of Mac OS X, Amit Singh actually knows what he talks about: http://www.kernelthread.com/mac/osx/history.html
I’m sorry I didn’t realise Apple owns Atheros, Broadcom and others.
Edit: … they got things …
Edited 2007-07-12 22:38
“I’m sorry I didn’t realize Apple owns Atheros, Broadcom and others.”
And yet Linux has open source drivers for those.http://www.linuxwireless.org/en/users/Drivers and those drives came about becuase of *contributions* by companies.
Ironically the wikipedia entry agrees with you. I’m sure than freebsd would benefit more from having a *shared* tree, rather than a separate development, rather than a thank you.
Edited 2007-07-12 23:03
Oh, dear… If only you dug a little deeper.
From the page you just linked, click the “bcm43xx (Broadcom chips)” link. Go to the bottom of the page. Open the “driver homepage” link, under “External links”
You’ll arrive here: http://bcm43xx.berlios.de/
Read the very first sentence, which I quote here: “Broadcom never released details about these chips. So this driver is based upon reverse engineered specifications.”
And I assure you, this situations saddens me to the extreme. For instance, I’d love to use FreeBSD as the primary OS on my laptop, but unfortunately Intel is slacking on releasing specs for their 3945ABG cards.
Oh, dear… If only you dug a little deeper.
From the page you just linked, click the “bcm43xx (Broadcom chips)” link. Go to the bottom of the page. Open the “driver homepage” link, under “External links”
.
I was referring to Atheros from *your* list of ccompanies http://zd1211.wiki.sourceforge.net/VendorDriver.
But lets face it a competing kernel manages Open source drivers where Apple fail to deliver…and they can pick and choose their hardware.
It saddens me more that you make claims of support for open-source and yet buy hardware, from companies that don’t support it. I bought my wireless cards from ZyDAS becuase of their support for open-source. Clearly you or Apple do not think that way. Oddly *intel* *contributed* the ieee80211 wireless stack.
Intel have been a *major* *contributer* to open source and I have benefited from their work personally, but you can see over their behavior over OLPC there are no *good* companies.
Edited 2007-07-12 23:30
Except that you failed to notice WHEN ZyDAS began releasing those sources: 2004/2005 timeframe
http://dsd.object4.net/zd1211-vendor/ChangeLog.txt
By then Apple had already stopped using Atheros chips.
But enough cat and mouse, ok? We already made our points.
Now you’re saying Apple failed to release OPEN SOURCE drivers when they were previously closed and had their internal Apple development covered by NDA?! And you’re comparing them to either reverse-engineered drivers or drivers that ended up being contributed at a much later timeframe than what was relevant to Apple?
As mentioned before, ZyDAS support for open source came at a much later date. And the 3945ABG card on my laptop is built in, not add-on. And I bought this laptop because I could afford its price; it had nothing to do with the luxury of only choosing select, FreeBSD-supported hardware.
Again: enough cat and mouse, we both made our points. There was no wrongdoing in Apple’s actions in this regard.
Edit: he edited, I edited, else it would lose context and stop making sense
Edited 2007-07-12 23:42
“Again: enough cat and mouse, we both made our points. There was no wrongdoing in Apple’s actions in this regard.”
I don’t think we are playing cat and mouse. Your claiming Apple is an Open-source company. I didn’t. In fact open-source(sic) is something that although getting increasing interest from Companies. They have to be dragged kicking and screaming to the table…kicked by Microsoft BTW. Sun over Java is fantastic example of this. None of these companies do it for love but necessity. The *only* example, but I’m sure I can think of that was done out of Love was ID. Even Linus is in it for himself.
What Apple does is wartered down post iPod as I suspect they are more interested being Content provider than a Hardware company, but they *could* have open-sourced BSD wireless drivers, they *chose* not to, they even have the power and influence to get companies to open-source their drivers. Apple put the machines together nobody else. Wireless chips are a *cheap* part of a computer, and there are many choices. The funny thing is its in *their* benefit to closed source drivers.
I personally don’t think Apple is doing anything wrong, but to argue love and kisses with open source when I see little to nothing to support this argument. I actually went to http://www.macosforge.org/ thats shameful support.
BTW if you could not find a FreeBSD-supported laptop in *your* price range with a compatible wireless card. Then either the kernel, the development model, the license, or the community is simply not up to scratch. I suspect its none of these things.
W T F ? !
http://www.osnews.com/permalink.php?news_id=18251&comment_id=255018
If anything, I explicitly stated Apple is a business and their relation to open-source projects is governed by what makes business sense to them.
The fact that they actually happen to either contribute stuff back or just go on and open significant portions code they own is a very welcome twist of their business logic, IMHO.
Great, so seemingly we’re on the same page here, except that you believe I’m not.
Being a business as Apple is, why you wonder so? Content is where the money is; hardware is increasingly becoming commoditised. Ask IBM why they sold their home PC division to Lenovo; and while you’re at it, ask HP and Dell why they ventured into the home entertainment business with their TVs.
If anything, Apple’s shareholders should be glad the company they invested their money in is not a one trick pony.
How?
Oh-kay. Right. Sure. Twisting corporate allies arms is an excellent tactic when you’re a fraction of the size of your direct competitors. Or used to be.
The wireless chip could cost a dime, this is not the issue here; it’s the associated IP that happens to be an entirely different matter – mind the binary blobs used by almost every vendor. And the fact that back when Apple made the licensing agreements they had to play by the same rules everybody else was bound by and do the development under NDA.
Sometimes I feel I’m one of the few people who don’t believe Apple has magical powers and the tiles that built 1 Infinite Loop are made with pixie dust. Yet people call me a zealot. Go figure.
I only mentioned Mac OS Forge for the sake of reference; I couldn’t agree more that the content of the site itself stinks. Even the OpenSolaris website is more effervescent and appropriate (and IMHO the OpenSolaris website sucks to an incredible degree).
Which brings me to another point: to build a vibrant community of open source developers, there must be interest from the community itself. OpenDarwin (the website, that happened to be supported by ISC as well) was shut down for this very reason.
You can’t really expect a flourishing community to exist when the mongers spread the word that Apple is doing it just to steal somebody else’s work, wrap it up and name it after a cat.
I’ll pretend I missed the provocation and simply state that both OpenBSD and NetBSD have the right drivers, and the FreeBSD one is under development. I have plenty of patience to wait until this driver is ready. In the meantime, here’s Ubuntu, loaded with the proprietary driver.
@meianoite Come on your killing me.
You comment was a response about GCC being an open-source project. My point is they would replace it in a heartbeat…as would BSD, for the more attractive *lisence*, your arguing they are doing it because its *good technology*. I simply *cannot* argue with that. Oddly the reference I pulled out about licenses shows the possibility of some merging between GCC.
My comments are strictly about Apple not being an open-source partner, and yes I made up the term. The fact that you refer to business decisions not moral, or doing was right. I’m increasingly seen as business being used as excuse for *immorality*
Your arguing that in a market that has competing products, with companies that have *willingly* open-sourced *their* IP apple could not have chosen a wireless product they could show the source to. That is just nonsense. Your in the land of pixie dust. If you *had* have argued that Apple chose the best technology to go in their product, and respect the wireless companies IP, but I can’t believe the differences are that great. The bottom line is Apple is *not* contributing back those drivers, on the large list of things it doesn’t and there is no excuse for them not to.
The site actually shows that Apple give lipsync to open source as opposed to real support, as for Opensolaris. Suns interest is Solaris not open source. I suspect if Solaris make the decision to go GPL3. I suspect things will change rapidly. Oddly the site I would pick as a good reference to open-source would be Novell/Mono which is lovely.
About OpenDarwin “On July 25, 2006, the OpenDarwin team announced that the project was shutting down, as they felt OpenDarwin had “become a mere hosting facility for Mac OS X related projects,” the actual shutdown notice has been taken down, but it pretty much says it all really.
There is no provocation, if you find it so its becuase its simple true. I find it funny that Vista users with their “Its the drivers” excuses and Linux users with their “the companies won’t share their specifications” admittedly an open-source driver will always trump that of a proprietary one for support. BSD actually looks like a none starter. I use an open source wireless stick that I chose from a company that supported open-source, Apple could have done the same, as could you.
Are you doing this on purpose? You’re completely mixing things up. Apple employs Chris Lattner, but doesn’t own LLVM. Apple single-handedly built the ARM backend, released it under a BSD license (if you want to nitpick that it’s not verbatim BSD, be my guest; but you’re going to look like the fool here). Now, of all companies, Nokia has started taking this code to use it as they see fit, and it’s even contributing some stuff back, too!! Just check the CVS logs of LLVM.
(And notice, if you read my comment history, you’ll see that I began advocating LLVM a long time before Apple entered the game. If anything, I’m on LLVM’s side, not Apple’s)
I fail to see any oddity here. This is by design.
Ahem. Okay. So Apple patches to the myriads of projects they incorporate in Mac OS X are fictitious. And the software Apple itself created and gave away with a permissive license, ANY permissive license, should not be taken into consideration, ever, ever. Because Apple has become a powerful vendor by leveraging open source technology, so it must be evil.
Now that’s something I can’t argue with, but in this case it’s because there’s ZERO reason within such utterings.
I’m trying to make sense out of this. I guess you’re saying that because Apple is making business decisions, they are immoral. And because BSD-like licenses (MIT, BSD proper, or some minor derivative, or any non-copyleft OSI-approved license) are designed to allow for this, there’s filthy immorality going on, because even when Apple contributes things back, somehow Apple isn’t contributing anything back; they’re like a blackhole emitting useless X-rays, but you have no idea what crossed the horizon of events. Uh-huh. And because you’ve never seen a single FreeBSD developer complaining about Apple — quite the opposite, actually –, somehow Apple managed to gag them.
I already told you about the time frame when ZyDAS open-sourced their drivers and how that could not affect the agreements Apple had with Atheros before. Even after Atheros began changing their attitude. And by then Apple had halted producing Airport products that had Atheros/ZyDAS chips, and went someone else.
Why? The only obligation Apple ever had here is to support their own products, which they do via binary blobs and whatnot, not to play good-boy PR games and force some vendor to open up anything.
Interestingly, Apple’s binary blobs work just as well on non-Apple branded systems running OpenDarwin. How is that different than Ubuntu providing proprietary binary blobs? You’re not calling Ubuntu evil, are you?
No, you’re calling Apple evil, because somehow it’s a publicly traded business, not some open source paladin with perfect teeth and a shining smile, riding a pure-breed white horse while holding the magical Justice sword.
LOL!! ;D
Which I did.
This is the second instance where I leave you to read between the lines and you accuse me of telling half truths.
Take the trouble to do some research yourself, please? I’m not writing an encyclopaedia here, this is just OSNews.
I still fail to see their obligation to.
You meant lip service, I believe.
I myself already said so. You’re not going to use my own words against me, sorry.
By the way, have you ever checked http://www.hackint0sh.org/ and http://www.insanelymac.com/ ? Guess how the people that hang in there managed to build XNU kernels that enable running Mac OS X on non Apple-branded PCs.
If anything, releasing those sources hurt Apple. Yet they kept releasing…
It sure is. And you just can’t have missed the part where I said Mac OS Forge stinks as a community site.
Uh… Yes? It’s become a miscellaneous OS X project repository – which is a task for some BerliOS/sf/nongnu/Tigris kind of website – instead of helping foster an OpenDarwin community. So it failed to foster OpenDarwin development. Where’s the contradiction?
You wish.
ZERO need to bring up Vista here.
Nonsense.
I’ve lost count of how many stuff gone unmaintained on the Linux kernel itself, no less!
There’s no magic in opening stuff up, there must be continued support! And it’s not Apple’s job as a hardware integrator (VAR) to do this, has never been, never will be: this is the OEM’s job!
Do I sense a GPL fanboi here? I hope you’re not. Else I’m just wasting my time.
Just like they could simply give up this stupid computers gig and become a pharmaceutical company. Or open apple pie restaurants.
Why do you refuse to understand Apple is doing what makes business sense to them? Why are you not complaining about Toshiba, Gateway, Dell/Alienware, Sony, Acer, Lenovo? They’re not exclusively integrating Linux-supported hardware on their complete product lines. What they do, when they do, however, is to offer a few Linux-compatible products, more often than not by the means of proprietary binary blobs, and charge a premium for such Linux-compatible offerings.
Yet, you seem to think only Apple is evil.
And FWIW: I live in a country where the minimum wage is equivalent to US$170, monthly, NOT US$6 hourly. You have absolutely no clue how much I worked and how much money I had to save and for how long to buy this laptop.
As I already said, it was not a matter of having the luxury of choice of supported hardware. I never talked about aftermarket, add-on cards, yet you keep bringing this up. Mind donating some to a 3rd world citizen like me?
I wasn’t all that familer with what Apple had taken from open-source or what it it given back, becuase I see precious little, after closer examination. Its actually worse than I thought.
Lets nitpick…because. Its easier to nitpick. Its not a BSD license and thats the end-of it. The creators of the project thought that the BSD license did not fulfill their needs. Does it interest Apple…absolutely because they are not interested in sharing, that does not mean some current maintainers do not get money for services out of the deal. In fact thats part of the pattern, of which CUPS is one project in.
There open source strategy is simple two-tier. Proprietary closed versions by Apple of Open-source source projects being better, Simply by taking and not giving back. Thats not exactly sharing your IP. FreeBSD is an excellent example of this.
What open-source work they do is pitiful, with only on a select few projects, which you exaggerate out of all proportion…and then go on to contradict yourself that they are a proprietary company so don’t have to share, or the license allows it etc etc. Pick a door
The funny thing about your post is you quote other closed source companies. The major difference is *you* are not claiming they are Open-source advocates, and does not excuse Apples behavior.
Code may be unmaintained in the kernel, although nothing I use, so I suspect your exaggerating a touch. The difference is it is available. You can even *pay* for the driver to be maintained fixed. You can’t with a binary blobs that Apple loves.
Seriously I love the fact that Linux code for wireless drivers from companies and Apple don’t.
Again I love the fact that you cannot use hardware thats available to apple, but not to the project that it liberally gets code from. This is just what I expect. It highlights a flaw in BSD, which relies on people *contributing* code.
I find it especially fun that *you* bought incompatible hardware for an OS *you* promote, and ask for a handout to correct your problems.
Edited 2007-07-13 19:54
I simply won’t repeat every point I already made and you pretend you didn’t understand while throwing red herrings all along the way. But I can’t leave this one out:
GET A CLUE, DUDE. I do live in a 3rd world country and I really can count the sweat of saving that money in litres, but that last sentence was s a r c a s m!
I’m done with you. Have a nice day.
Edit: Breathe. Inspire. Expire. Slowly. Breathe. Count to 10.
Edited 2007-07-13 20:03
off-topic
@meianoite lol sorry about the editing I do that all the time. Once for spell checking, and often a second time to verify my points. I’m actually struggling as this site has been updated with about three threads I am interested in. Its the second time in two days, because I’m heading more off topic. I have wanted to send a private message. In any point scoring game about apple you will *always* make stronger comments, but having looked through the references, and comments. The thing I am most shocked by is how much Apple have taken.
The only reference to Webkit is not it being ported but re-synchronized http://dot.kde.org/1152645965/ on QT4 this work is *NOT* being done by Apple. but your initial statement was false.
I’ve ignored your comments about NDA’s which I shouldn’t have done. Apple is a hardware company and a good one, but they have shown little sign in showing *real* support to *any* open source drivers that a company interested in furthering open source; controlling their own hardware could give, other than what is necessary.
I’m actually fascinated by the acknowledgment you link to about FreeBSD simply becuase they don’t offer *real* support to it, and its not a real competitor.
And finally this http://lists.cs.uiuc.edu/pipermail/llvmdev/2007-January/007813.html what are you on about. this shown nothing and I mean nothing about your post , my post or the reply to it. Is this code under a BSD license as you stated or not!
The think that I’m actually fascinated with is you are making post *more* knowable than mine, but when I check they tell half a story of a half truth. You respond to my posts as though I’m accusing Apple of some wrong doing in fact everything I see points to BSD being a poor license not for political reasons but Linus’ Tit for Tat, when its certainly not the case. I’m saying they are a proprietary company that takes from open source, and everything I see supports that statement.
Edited 2007-07-13 01:06
Log into OSNews V4 and you will
So what? The BSD license is designed to allow this. Which is great, BTW: Sun only exists because once there was a time SunOS was 100% BSD-based. Then Sun grew bigger and became able to license SysV.
I did not say or otherwise implied it was Apple doing this work. Check my post again.
I did not say Apple is interested in furthering Open Source. Google is, Sun is, Apple is not. Because Apple’s business is to sell the software-plus-hardware package, or “the whole experience” in market speak, or “the whole widget” in Jobs’ speak. Google’s business is to sell advertisement space, and recently also media content. Sun’s business is to sell throughput-related services.
Keep this in mind every time you read some news regarding these companies.
You’re expecting flashy announcements where they seldom exist in the BSD world, and less so when it’s not indirectly related to OpenBSD, more often than not Theo being harsh.
I’ve already told you to grep around CVS logs for further info.
http://llvm.org/viewvc/llvm-project/llvm/trunk/lib/Target/ARM/
If you have any specific complaints, share, and I’ll address them. I’m not trying to lecture you, only to show you that the facts are not as shallow as some people seem to imply. Google is a great tool.
The BSD license is designed as such. Remember how it was created: in the academic world. People choose to release code under the BSD license because they don’t care about “tit for tat”. They care about giving their art to the world and making quality code completely available for anyone else to use it.
We’re back on the same page!
Here, quoting myself:
“http://www.osnews.com/permalink.php?news_id=18251&comment_id=255018
If anything, I explicitly stated Apple is a business and their relation to open-source projects is governed by what makes business sense to them.
The fact that they actually happen to either contribute stuff back or just go on and open significant portions code they own is a very welcome twist of their business logic, IMHO.”
😉
Edit: I hate OSNews’ URL mangling with a passion
Edited 2007-07-13 01:42
OSNews V4 finally turns this site into what perhaps it always was a smackdown site. I actually can’t stanf the avatar stuff. It actually makes this personal, and I don’t like that. I would rather not recognize the people I post to.
The reason I wanted PM is becuase of this “So what? The BSD license is designed to allow this. Which is great” I don’t want to talk about BSD here, becuase then I would truly deserve the title troll. Its not only off-topic and emotive. *You* have mentioned BSD lots of times in this thread, and I have seen nothing to show that Apple support this license in fact we do see a few different licenses from license none of them BSD.
Ignoring the Moral argument, or that BSD *relies* on sharing, and is what the license is about. *My* problem and it is *my* problem is I’m lost. Comparatively in the OS world there is precious little in the open-source world that is under BSD and I can see why. Copyleft forces morally bankrupt companies like apple to share their code…like I have seen with Apples dealing with GCC. BSD doesn’t so gets little to nothing. The only positive think I have ever seen about the license is the way it can be used to get a *standard* like TCP adopted, and thats the only example I can think of as it being used this way. Although through *your* posts being used as a CV/Service over code you maintain. I now understand why *BSD has such a limited feature set.
The term BSD is “great” resource for morally bankrupt companies to scavenge from. But *BSD as a product that stands up in its own right suddenly seems ridiculous to the extreme. The difference between similar *morally bankrupt* companies contributing to the linux, and even Apple over GCC…I’m lost i’m truly lost. I’m curbing my own emotive language, and losing my point.
Dont push the point “Anyway, now that Webkit is being ported to Qt4, this discussion is kind of mute.” thats what you said, you outright lied. I was not good enough to call you on it then, but I’m better now. I understand the arguments. Apple scavenged code from khtml, in a form that could not allow mutual collaboration, you actually state that that it was the incompatible toolkit that made this happen. Ignoring the simple fact that code *does not work like that* certainly not object-orientated code. It could have been rewritten to support two toolkits, in fact thats what KDE developers are doing, and the copyleft license means they can”. In fact this reference says it all. “It is dependent on many factors … our ability to come to a suitable working arrangement with the other WebKit contributors.”
The bottom line for *me*. That Stallman has looked over the top “calling” proprietary code evil. Having seen the abuses of open-source from *your* references. I understand his point more. The one-way code grab says it all, regardless of how you point out token/copyleft contributions, I see all over your comments “have the right to”;”business” and “IP” says it all. In the next thread I will be able to point out your subterfuge with confidence because I am more familiar with what Apple has *not done* for open source, there morally bankrupt agenda.
I actually understand now why Apple bought out cups, and its the same reasoning the use BSD and are choosing llvm over contributing to GCC, and its not about control. Its about a simple take not give back attitude that Linus chose GPL for the kernel to defend. That actually leaves the original project a poor alternative to Apples *now proprietary* product.
I’m starting to believe this is a *bad* business decision in the short term they get a quick code injection, but as we have seen with the OpenDarwin project not many developers want to “care about giving their art to the world and making quality code completely available for anyone else to use it”.
The thing to keep in mind about BSD is that they really don’t care about getting ripped off. They are doing it for the point of doing it, and don’t really expect compensation in any form. The open source world has a much more widely collaborative mentality, where everything comes from a different source. /the BSD side of things is a lot more centralized and controlled in development style. They don’t really care when business does a “code grab” as you put it.
While you are right about apple only doing the bare minimum with KHTML, I disagree about CUPS. If they wanted, they could have just done the same thing they did while making webkit, without the added pain of making their token efforts. Instead, the only change is that companies who want to write drivers for OSX won’t be subjected to the “play fair” aspects of the GPL. The current users will benefit by apples contributions, apple will benefit with a kickass printer framework.
OpenDarwin failed because it wasn’t that great an idea in the first place. OpenDarwin was a variant of a variant of Mach, which not many people use in the first place. The only real reason for OpenDarwin to exist would be to completely clone the closed bits of OSX, which would be a monumental task. ReactOS is a much less daunting project, and has been around since 1996, and is still nowhere NEAR done. The OpenDarwin people should have really asked “Why” before they started, they may have saved themselves alot of wasted effort.
“thing to keep in mind about BSD is that they really don’t care about getting ripped off”
I must have short memory. I seem to remember a project called compiz and beryl, and there being an awful lot of bad feeling regarding the relicensing of their code to GPL. A more permissive license than BSD,
If there was bad feelings, then it was a bad fit for them. I was talking about the purpose for the license, which was for software coming out of Berkley.
As for GPL being more permissive, you are being kind of silly. You can argue that the GPL is more fair, is better protection, etc, but it has far more restrictions on what you can do with the code then BSD.
“If there was bad feelings, then it was a bad fit for them. I was talking about the purpose for the license, which was for software coming out of Berkley.
As for GPL being more permissive, you are being kind of silly. You can argue that the GPL is more fair, is better protection, etc, but it has far more restrictions on what you can do with the code then BSD.”
I double checked my wording its right. Compiz is under X11(MIT) license a more permissive license than BSD. I said nothing of GPL, apart from the code had been relicensed as such. I’m sorry that you are confused.
You’ve been talking about how you dislike BSD for the whole time.
Name them, and care to point how they’re different, in spirit and effect, from the BSD license.
Unless you’re talking about LGPL stuff. And APSL stuff, which happens to be a strong copyleft license, which even the FSF seems to approve, despite not being GPL compatible.
WTF?
Cut the zealot speak, else I’m going to stop right here.
Apple maintains a whole GCC branch in the public.
Show me a single FreeBSD developer of any real magnitude complaining about that nothingness. Which isn’t real, BTW.
Designed. As. Such.
Strangely enough, guess what license OpenSSL/OpenSSH is under. Or even CVS, since we’re talking about it now. Or even Xorg (yeah, go on, argue that it’s MIT and it’s more permissive, argue that there’s a world of difference).
Damn, that’s limiting.
I’m really going the extra mile not to utter curse words here.
Refer to the ridiculous Yahoo! infrastructure. The appalling Netcraft infrastructure. Refer to the ridiculous software I just happened to mention.
No comments.
http://dot.kde.org/1152645965/
Yeah, I’m a big fat liar. Oops.
Oh, the outrage. NO, DUDE. I said that Apple reorganised the code so it made better sense. *AND* I said that plenty of Apple work related to Cocoa/ObjC underpinnings.
You’re the one purposefully misquoting me.
Good Lord. I’m going to rip apart my CS diploma. It’s worthless.
Yeah, Apple could even port it to Motif, just for the kicks, because then we could run Webkit on Tru64 and OpenVMS. Yet Apple didn’t. Bastards!
So what’s your beef?????
Ooooh… Feel the smell of gun grease. Because it surely has nothing to do with logistics.
Another convert is born!! 6 billion to go.
Come on, Cyclops: what abuse? Not holding your hand while you cross the street and not doing your homework for you?
Oh no, not the holier than thou argument, not again!!
As if they haven’t contributed plenty to both projects, financially and code-wise.
Yeah, Apple *so* didn’t pay for those rights. We all know every developer out there live out of donations, just like Stallman.
Why look at the OpenDarwin experiment when the other BSDs are out there? Why not look at the immense success cases of companies that built their businesses out of BSD products?
How come those BSD hippies aren’t starving to death?
Why, oh why?
And regarding your ludicrous retort: I wonder why the number of artists, of any craft, in the population at large, is not even close to 5%.
Edit: forgot to close a quotation, everything went italics.
Edited 2007-07-13 19:35
I think we are starting to expose you true colors with the name fanboi and zealot only one sort of person resorts to such language, and your lies are getting increasingly transparent.
I’m glad you fully understood the term “morally bankrupt”. I thought it was quite suite as you use “buisness” to excuse “morally bankrupt” decision making.
In fact the only thing that reams to restrain them if the FSF and GPL with GCC something they are clearly not happy about. I find in interesting you point out things that they are obliged to do under that license as something *special* other companies just do this as a matter of course.
I’m glad apple reorganized the code so it made sense. I cannot imagine why any khtml would be up in arms, about improving the code. Unless your just making this up, but closing your eyes, to the hold thing any using emotive language towards me will not change the fact.
I love this “success cases of companies that built their businesses out of BSD products” when I am Apple.
Well, what can I do. Now I must go against myself and reply to this, after saying I would stop. Come on, use this against me.
Look, I write code for a living. I’m 3 months away from holding a degree in Computer Science. I should be able to feel the developer’s pain, first hand, when there’s pain to be felt.
But consider this: I’m contributing key code to a very nice project that’s BSD licensed (and yes, it has been criticised for not picking the GPL. Over and over.).
I can only hope my work will be taken and spread as far as humanly possible.
Get it?
Now I’m really done with you. Bye.
Edit: missed “taken”.
Edited 2007-07-13 20:37
If you think for a second, that because you contribute to a BSD project, or that the *project* has criticized for not choosing GPL. Gives you the right to insult me.
It doesn’t. I know why terms like “zealot” and “fanboi” are used and so do you, and if you don’t you should perhaps have a little think.
Isn’t that just a bit trivial and nitpicky? They took open source code, made changes, and released it again with improvements. Webkit was KHTML, but now it’s Webkit and it’s open source, and browsers like Shiira and Swift benefit from that code. Its still open source, they aren’t responsible for retrofitting it to KDE’s projects too, are they? Seriously, all fanboyism aside, isn’t this the same goodwill?
I’m reminded of a line from A Few Good Men: “I have neither the time nor the inclination to explain myself to a man who rises and sleeps under the blanket of the very freedom I provide, then questions the manner in which I provide it!”
Your computer may have benefitted from the open code that Apple wrote. It could, but to suggest they have an obligation to make their changes work in other software too is stretching it. In general, I think the distinction between contributing open code vs. contributing open code to a project is a trivial one though.
I can’t say anything but well said so many people fail to make the distinction between open code vs. contributing open code to a project. If people feel that strongly the code is out there why don’t they contribute it to a project.
So many people want to impose their beliefs on an entire community and say this is the way you should do this but the truth is that, that does not work for everyone. One persons model is different from another.
Apple has contributed and they are advancing both Linux and Unix if by nothing else, they promote the Unix under pinnings that allows users to be familar with the term. Have we also forgotten that Leopard is now branded Open Brand Unix.
It amazes me what gets voted down here. Please someone tell me what was offensive in my comments that deserverd a negative vote. I guess the rules mean nothing!
GCC.
Big enough for you?
“GCC.
Big enough for you?”
Size doesn’t matter, its contributing to *other* developers code not vice-versa.
Apple *had* to use GCC, Apple is moving towards LLVM, but you still have to use GCC as a front end…but they are solving the GCC problem http://llvm.org/devmtg/2007-05/index.html
If your trying to make out Apple is anything but self serving, your crackers.
Edited 2007-07-12 22:13
Correct me if I’m wrong, but are you really implying that by releasing humongous portions of code written by Apple, Inc. developers themselves, BSD-licensed, is self-serving? And that because they chose to reinvent better wheels rather than attempting to reuse something that already existed bur didn’t really fit their needs, even if they also release the source code for such projects of theirs, they should be accused of not contributing?
Here, dude: http://www.macosforge.org/
I hope you’re not insulted by this huge pile of non-contributed crap.
You are shocked when someone writes “you people”? Wow, you skin must be very thin….
wow, that post scares me.
I’m here to help you! *pats back*
😛
Apple is not “just a contributor,” they own the copyright to _all_ of the code. This was only possible/feasible because Mr. Sweet insisted that all contributors give the copyright for all of their contributions to his company, Easy Software Solutions. Therefore, Apple was easily able to acquire the rights to all of the code. This would be either difficult or impossible with most FOSS projects, since individual contributors usually own the copyright to the code they contributed. If you own 100% of the code, you can relicense it any way you want. If not, you need the unanimous consent of all copyright holders.
Apple is looking for acceleration of innovation in open standards and of course greater influence.
Edited 2007-07-12 19:49
iPrint!
No seriously, why did they buy that? For their server line? In that specific case, I doubt Apple will merge changes if they intend to use it commercially. Of course, I think that CUPS itself will remain free (GPL’ed).
Novell already owns iPrint… In fact Novell and Motorola were using the i prefix before apple made a pig’s ear out of it…
Apple already owned a license for CUPS to not be bound to the GPL for Mac OS X. Thus since CUPS is part of OSX, closed source CUPS drivers are allowed on Apple systems (incl. plain, OSS Darwin). The “old” dual licensing model didn’t hurt Apple at all.
Maybe Apple wasn’t pleased with the development speed of CUPS. So they hired that guy and while they where at it, bought all source rights. The money was peanuts for Apple anyway.
Now that’s refreshing: actual reasoning instead of flinging crap at everyone’s second favourite sandbag (the undisputed first being Microsoft).
Perfect. Kudos!
It seems to reason that some will worry about what Apple with do with the future of CUPS. Are there other open source alternatives to CUPS? If so, are they better or worse? What I am getting at is this, assuming there is no comparable alternative to CUPS, would people who are against the GPL see some benefit to having the current GPL’d code always available to the public? I don’t mean to start another war about which license is the best.
“Are there other open source alternatives to CUPS?”
We wouldn’t need an alternative, the current code, as it has been amply pointed out is already, GPL. Rather we would just need to fork it in order to make changes. (Although if it doesn’t have the automatic license upgrade clause then this may block the ability to make it GPL3 in case someone wants it to be GPL3)
“Are there other open source alternatives to CUPS?”
Just to mention two, there’s apsfilter and PostScript (explaination of choice follows).
“If so, are they better or worse?”
It depends on your printer and what you’re going to do with it. I have used laser printers only, all of them were supported (HP Laserjet IIP, 4, 4M, 5, 4000 duplex, Lexmark Optra S1650) by apsfilter. The LJ4000 has PS support, so it does not need any driver because all UNIX applications usually generate PS output for printing which can be “put into the printer” without any problems.
For multi function devices (that include a inkjet pee printer and a scanner) or photo printers (such as built by Canon or Kodak) apsfilter won’t be suitable, I fear. Furthermore, these devices usually don’t conform to existing standards which makes them requiring a special driver that is not available in UNIX land.
Apsfilter does not have an integration into KDE (because it does not need one), but it can be used with KDE, too, but without KDE as well. To have support for dotmatrix printers (except simple text output) apsfilter needs special compile options. Additionally, apsfilter can use gimp-print drivers brought along by the Gimp.
“What I am getting at is this, assuming there is no comparable alternative to CUPS, would people who are against the GPL see some benefit to having the current GPL’d code always available to the public?”
As it has been explained before, Apple just bought the right to get their own license of CUPS, so they do not need to use it under the terms of the GPL. The “GPL branch” of CUPS will continue developing anyway, and maybe because of Apple’s engagement there will be better printer drivers again in the future. The CUPS code will stay available for the public, only Apple’s changes surely won’t. We’ll see…
“I don’t mean to start another war about which license is the best.”
This is a good idea, because “best” always depends on the license user’s intention. 🙂
I wonder if they’ll relicense CUPS to GPLv3? It would be better for Apple since if Sun or Microsoft or an embedded device wanted to Tivoise CUPS, they would have to pay Aooke for a proprietary license. Right now they could take CUPS and Tivoise it, since it’s under only (L)GPLv2.
(Before anyone says anything about patents, only the contributor’s patents are licensed for GPLv3 use and GPLv2 has an implicit patent license already)
“””
I wonder if they’ll relicense CUPS to GPLv3?
“””
I wonder if we will ever see another news story on OSNews that does not have a subthread asking how it relates to GPLv3.
Edited 2007-07-12 20:06
“I wonder if we will ever see another news story on OSNews that does not have a subthread asking how it relates to GPLv3.”
Personally I find it kind of strange that the anti-fsf that Linus sparked over GPL3, and many Microsoft supporters sympathized(sic) over. Suddenly everyone is expecting GPL3 to save their four freedoms.
Whats funnier they expect the FSF to fork, and maintain the cups, after all the “they don’t write code for the kernel comments”, personally I’ll be happy when “Gnash” is good enough, although seriously the FSF needs more than coders it needs advertisers to come up eith better names for their products, although I actually like GNU becuase it sounds like new.
This is a good example of why I would NEVER contribute code to a project that requires copyright assignment. It’s like working for free if they decide to close it up in the future. (Yeah, yeah, Apple haven’t said that they will do something like that (although the likelihood of that occurring just increased IMHO) but this allows them to do what ever they want with the code (not releasing their own changes etc.)
Granted, there are valid reasons for copyright assignment but it sort of disturbs the whole quid pro quo thing that comes with the GPL that Linus likes to talk so much about.
Edited 2007-07-12 19:56
So you would never contribute to:
OpenSolaris
The Apache Project
MySQL
Any Free Software Foundation Projects
etc?
I don’t think you realise that in this day of lawsuits that copyright assignment is the only defense a project has against the evils of this world.
As I said, there are valid reasons for copyright assignment. Anyways…
OpenSolaris is under CDDL (which according to the FSF isn’t a strong copyleft license, whatever that means exactly… not 100% sure) and the Apache project is under the Apache license (which isn’t a copyleft license either). Nothing wrong with that, but they have already sort of missed out on the quid pro quo philosophy. I might consider contributing smaller patches to projects like these but nothing major. But in that case, it’s dubious whether I have the right to assert any copyright at all anyway.
I wouldn’t contribute to MySQL, no.
As for FSF projects. When it comes to not closing up the code or doing something else that goes against the spirit of GPL, I think the FSF can be trusted… don’t you think?
The beauty of the GPL is that there is an implicit trust which is important for companies etc. It’s one of the reasons I think Linux etc have bean so successful with large corporations (and I think Linus agrees
.
Edited 2007-07-13 02:02
Thanks…I of course, stand corrected on that nuance.
Apple is unleashing the Armageddon. The full assault on corporate and domestic desktops that Apple has been cooking for the last 5 years has finally reached critical mass.
Just wait until CEOs start demanding iPhone support. The MacBooks are *full* of corporate momentum.
By using CUPS Apple gained a boatload of high quality printer driver support. Now it seems that Apple is ready to take it in their own hands. The Apple mindshare is sky high nowadays, all it takes is broader hardware support to roll the big snowball down the hill. This is what owning the CUPS code bring: the driver (!) seat with regards to broader printer support.
This is just beautiful. Really. The MacBooks and the iPhone to gain corporate mindshare; the iPod halo effect all over again.
What a strategy!
Edit: broader.
Edited 2007-07-12 20:08
Yeah, I’m sure that will happen Real Soon Now(tm).
For people on both sides, cool down.
1. Apple isn’t going to hamper CUPS development or its GPL status. There’s no reason for a fork and there’s every reason to expect this to make CUPS better.
2. Apple didn’t buy nothing. You CAN own open-source code. That ownership gets you something. Specifically, you can make GPL EXEMPTIONS. As they mention on the CUPS site (http://www.cups.org/articles.php?L179+I0+T+M10+P1+Q) this means that if you’re developing a printer driver for an Apple OS, you’re allowed to use CUPS without complying with the GPL. That’s attractive to people like HP or Epson and will get Apple more printer drivers.
So, the Linux (and other free software communities) get CUPS development from Apple. Apple gets more printer drivers from companies who would love to use a non-GPL CUPS. It’s really a great situation all-around.
Apple now owns the copyright to the code. The GPL is irrevocable so your rights are protected (and it’s in Apple’s interest to continue with the GPL to gain some free development that way) and Apple gets easier printer drivers.
Not quite, if it means that Apple will get printers which Linux *won’t* get because printer manufacturers will only release it for the non-GPL version…I certainly wouldn’t call that a great situation all-around!
I agree. However, the provision allowing for this seems to have been in the CUPS license for five years now:
http://lists.debian.org/debian-legal/2002/05/msg00033.html
Wow.
At least that was public and in the license.
But the purchase of the open source world’s premiere print subsystem by Apple went unmentioned for 5 months.
I can’t help but wonder what other surprises they might be holding back, thinking that the community might not be ready to accept them yet.
I’m a bit torn between being cautiously optimistic, and downright suspicious at this point.
What you forget here, is that Linux wouldn’t be getting those drivers anyway. But if Apple can get them, as they wouldn’t have before, that will inspire them to make more improvements to CUPS, which WILL be released for the use of Linux.
You don’t find that to be positive?
If everyone was treated equal, Linux would be getting those drivers too. Now, however, the sole copyright owner gets special treatment. I don’t find that to be positive. And I gather that the external contributions (i.e. not from Apple) could in theory eclipse the internal ones (if the project was managed properly). But now, all contributors aren’t treated equal. If I where a large corporation that wanted to make major contributions to CUPS I would think twice because I would have to give it all up to Apple.
By providing closed drivers to OSX for a piece of hardware the chances of an open driver for that hardware being developed go down. The “Surface area” of affected users (users who have the printer but no driver) is suddenly much smaller–because, obviously, OSX users are more likely to attach printers than Linux users, given the server/desktop percentages of each)–so the incentive for independant development of an open driver is greatly reduced.
This is teh “Should Linux allow binary drivers?” debate all over again. Binary drivers might get you hardware support in the short term, but in the long run it’s better to go without them to encourage development of open drivers–even with poor initial quality.
Would Open Office have as large a development effort behind it if Microsoft Office were available for Linux? No, because there would be much less demand.
Surely if you bought a printer, and it had a closed-source driver for MacOSX, and MacOSX was using CUPs, then that same driver could be used on Linux.
It would be even more attractive for printer manufacturers if they could cover the MacOSX and the Linux market at the same time.
After all, what does it matter to a printer manufacturer what OS users are running?
What two sides!? This is a happenstance.
Why is this not going to hamper CUPS development? Is there going to be a license change? Can this code compatible with GPL3. Why should they make it better for GNU…its not in their interest.
If you can have *exceptions* to GPL(you don’t you can dual license the *your* code) in cups its a disadvantage to GNU not an advantage. Closed source drivers on GNU are worse than there Windows equivalent.
Are your freedoms protected with dual license code?
Edited 2007-07-12 20:32
“It’s really a great situation all-around.”
I’m not convinced. Mainly because of Apple’s record on open systems and customer choice. Which has been a consistent theme for over 20 years, and which is now showing up in the iPhone negotiations in the UK. The basic approach is always control and restriction. What the Guardian reports on this last is:
“Apple is understood to be demanding that its European mobile phone partners hand over a significant proportion of revenues generated by the iPhone and restrict the content that users can access. The portion of network revenues demanded by Apple is believed to have been behind Vodafone’s decision not to sign up as the exclusive partner for the iPhone in the UK.”
You have it also in iTunes/iPod (and in the linking of the iPhone to iTunes) and in the basic attitude to the OS and to hardware. Not just the ability to run the OS on the hardware of your choice – but the ability to upgrade the hardware.
Apple’s approach is always about linking sales and controlling, to compel you to buy more of the package from them as opposed to mixing and matching. Now, this may or may not have integration benefits. What I know is, I don’t want them at the price asked.
So my reaction would be immediate: fork it, and fork it now. If Apple’s heart were in the right place, it would have contributed and would have continued to place its contributions in the public domain. If the CUPS guys hearts had been in the right place, they would never have insisted on copyright assignment. But as it is, fork it now.
Couldn’t have said it better myself.
Apple and freedom do not mix.
Apple is no friend of opensource, but it’s a big user of free technologies. Period.
DOUBLE nonsense. Go check what Apple does for LLVM, will you?
LLVM is crucial technology, Apple employed Chris Lattner, and guess what, it released the ARM LLVM backend in a BSD license. Not APSL, not CDDL, but BSD. But I’m sure some people would still insist it’s not good enough and it should be released in the public domain instead.
There’s been a word coined to refer to this attitude: trolling.
Same thing when people complained Apple made it impossible to merge their Webkit work into the KHTML mainline. Well, guess what, a much needed code reorganisation and plenty of work trying to untie KHTML and Qt can’t be easily merged back, by definition. I saw less than a handful of actual KHTML developers complaining, but the peanut gallery was in uproar!
This holier than thou bs is really, really getting me on my nerves. 100% of businesses exist to make money, and as such they will do what makes sense to them.
And in Apple’s case so far there’s been absolutely no freeloading, and no hidden agenda is to be found as soon as you keep in mind they are a business; get over it.
“LLVM is crucial technology, Apple employed Chris Lattner, and guess what, it released the ARM LLVM backend in a BSD license. Not APSL, not CDDL, but BSD”
I can’t find the reference but I’m pretty certain LLVM is under a LLVM license and this post http://gcc.gnu.org/ml/gcc/2005-11/msg00888.html is pretty much what I would expect to be happening. It describes the license as BSD-like so I’m assuming that the license in question is LLVM license. http://llvm.org/releases/1.3/LICENSE.TXT
I personally didn’t call them for branching Webkits code, although I’m happy you acknowledge khtml developers weren’t happy, but to argue that its not an argument for apple *contributing* to anothers project.
Edited 2007-07-12 23:26
http://lists.cs.uiuc.edu/pipermail/llvmdev/2007-January/007813.html
A couple devs expressed some outrage, but later it became evident that it made absolutely no sense for Apple not to reorganise the code and not to write their code targeting Cocoa/ObjC, not Qt.
Anyway, now that Webkit is being ported to Qt4, this discussion is kind of mute.
s/mute/moot/
You’re welcome.
The LLVM license is te 3-clause BSD license with a different copyright holder (compared to BSD Unix) as only difference.
Don’t you just love how paranoid some people in the FSF are? It seems most times, a company has to go bankrupt before these people realize that it was helping them all along. It’s just ridiculous.
I still remember how Linspire was viewed as the devil because it didn’t conform to every single demand of the FS movement because they had some proprietary code too. However, it contributed a lot of code, marketing and money to over two dozen FS projects. Here is a list of some of their contributions: http://info.lindows.com/opensource/ SUN also has been crucified countless times and they are probably the biggest corporate contributor to FS. They have invested billions into FS. This includes, OpenSolaris, Java, OpenOffice, GNOME and dozens of other projects I can’t remember off the top of my head. Yet they probably got more bad PR overall. Apple too is definitely no foe of open source. They need open source in order to be more standardized and to cut costs. They’ve also contributed heavily to FreeBSD, GCC, KHTML, and even released Darwin as OSS. http://developer.apple.com/opensource/index.html But no, Apple is no friend of FS either. They didn’t go bankrupt, so it’s not clear if they aren’t planning some SUPER EVIL conspiracy against FS. It seems to me that a lot of people in the FSF movement need to look before shooting because if this continues, the FSF movement really won’t have any friends. A company seems to do better in terms of PR by not contributing anything to the FS movement because helping will get you shot. It’s pathetic.
“””
Don’t you just love how paranoid some people in the FSF are?
“””
Not really. The paranoia concerns me.
“””
I still remember how Linspire was viewed as the devil because it didn’t conform to every single demand of the FS movement because they had some proprietary code too.
“””
I was giving them the benefit of the doubt until they began to actively collude with Microsoft to legitimize the idea of paying patent royalties to MS for using *other* operating systems.
You picked a really bad example, there. The FSF paranoics were right on that one.
Oh. And “every single demand”? Straw man technique, that. Very unbecomming.
Edited 2007-07-12 22:56
The licence for CUPS now is identical to what it’s been for the past 5 years – including the exemptions for Apple software. If you’re really paranoid mirror the repository and fork when the licence changes.
Here’s a thread on the Debian mailing list when the Apple exemptions were put in the licence: http://lists.debian.org/debian-legal/2002/05/msg00033.html
For those who missed it:
The copyright on CUPS was already owned by a company, and that company opted to release CUPS under the GPL.
Apple bought that company.
Apple now owns the copyrights to CUPS, and will continue to use the GPL for future releases. By nature of the GPL, even if they didn’t use the GPL for future releases, existing releases (which are widely used) still will be, and Apple (or anybody else) is unable to change that.
To answer the question of the delay between February and Now: I’m speculating, but I’d imagine sorting out all of the finer legal points of the purchase had something to do with it.
There is precisely nothing to worry or complain about with this announcement: Apple is paying for the continued development of one of the better pieces of open source software. There actually isn’t a better way to “give back to the community”.
“””
There is precisely nothing to worry or complain about with this announcement
“””
Comforting words. In an odd sort of way, they remind me of these words spoken by Patrick Allen:
“If any member of the family should die whilst in the shelter from contamination,
Put them outside, but remember to tag them first for identification purposes.
Mine is the last voice that you will ever hear, do not be alarmed.”
There is precisely nothing to worry or complain about with this announcement
Or, in other words, “Nothing to see here, move along!” Call me paranoid, but I’m just a bit wary of this deal. Time will tell, I guess.
Developer Kenny Carruthers had a wonderful time at Apple.
http://www.bebits.com/app/75
http://www.osnews.com/comment.php?news_id=5154
Apple’s had a very close relationship with Easy SW for a long time (and has been paying them to do CUPS-related work).
The ‘Apple operating system license exception’ has been part of the CUPS license since 2002, for example.
http://lists.debian.org/debian-legal/2002/05/msg00041.html
Spit my coffee out of my mouth after reading this title earlier today. Kind of a scary thing right now not knowing what apple will do with it. Like someone else said above though, could also be a great thing. Long as apple keeps the gpl license like mentioned and the lead developer gets paid I’m happy for him and the community.
Hopefully this will result in a redisign of the CUPS website as well as http://localhost:631/
CUPS is nice software, but honestly…. both sites look like poo (literaly).
Apple has so many great designers. There has to be someone within Apple who creates a nicer website for CUPS.
Run for the hills! Apple bought CUPS! We’re dooooomed, we’re allllll gonna die!
Come on, everything is not some plot. Apple already contributes to a number of opensource projects and everyone does not have to operate or do things exactly thye same meaning your interpretation of the GPL to have the same common goal. Owning something does not mean that you are out to destroy it. People do’nt buy art to destroy it, My theory is that they purchased it because they had some unique feature that they likely wanted to integrate with Leopard or the iphone and saw that it may be easire if they owned the rights and employed the lead CUPS programmer. I am sure the purchased it to have the ability to integrate certain features in their os without some huge community drawback because now the own it. People may sy well they paid for it, and lets keep in mind it was for sell obviously, Apple did not use Microsoft tactics to squeeze anyone out of anyt
I’m tired of words like “plot” or “conspiracy” etc etc. I Admit it does make the whole thing more exciting. Apple having examined there contributions, only contribute forced by a copyleft license, or work around the license by making it incompatible, or focus on alternative solutions, or buy out the copyright.
It is *not* an open source company, they are simply incapable of filling large gaps in a complete OS, without mining open-source, but they do not work collaboratively with those projects to a common end.
The fact that you talk about “Unique” feature says it all. The simple fact is if its Unique its not shared its propriatery.
They bought out the software company, to obtain copyright to the code, thats standard practice for almost *everything* that we see in Vista today.
I agree with you the bought it meaning it had to be for sale. Microsoft could have bouhgt it, hell Pepsi could have the fact remains that Apple is not an open source company and the do contribute regardless of whether you may feel their contributions are in good faith. The fact is that they meet the requirements and that is all that is asked by the license. Maybe the FSF should have purchased it and there would be no discussion untill then there really should be no issue apple has not said we are changing anything.
Everyone is so conspiracy sensitive
“Apple is not an open source company and the do contribute regardless of whether you may feel their contributions are in good faith.”
Apple do not make *any* contributions in good faith. In fact as we delve deeper. We are yet to see anything that does not point to *using* but not contributing to. The Exception if GCC owned in the same way by the FSF, and they have to be we see that they are trying to move to a more BSD licensed product so they can code mine again, and they do that because their simply is not an alternative on the scale or quality of GCC. They have no choice.
“FSF should have purchased it” do you even know who the FSF foundation is? I won’t warrant that with a reply.
The conspiracy argument does not work here. Conspiracies imply more than one group is involved…they conspire. This is Apple a single company they act like they have always acted. In what they believe to be their own best interest. They are not even doing it in secret they *publicly* bought out an open source software product. They use masses of Open source code, and contribute little back. They don’t do anything secretly.
Now that I have a chance to respond. Yes I know who the FSF is and while you felt compelled to reply to my comments you have not addressed that the rights were “FOR SALE”.
The big issue here is again if it is that big of a deal and if so many people feel that strongly about it then someone should have forked up the cash to purchase before Apple and ensure that the GPL license remained uncompromised.
The fact is this is not the first project to have this happen and it by far will not be the last that is the nature of this licensing structure. Apple capitalized on what was obviously for sale.
I know the licenses that I contribute code to and I am aware that this may potentially happen. You may never expect it to happen but you should be aware that it can happen. Again let’s not talk about what they don’t contribute address the fact that they were able to buy what many feel should not have been for sale even though the license it is under explicitly allows this type of thing to occur.
I will take the conspiracy clarification and say thanks I know the definition however I used it out of context so I stand corrected, (Nice Catch)
I can disagree amicably and take some of your comments into consideration however “Apple do not make *any* contributions in good faith” comment that is an opinion not a fact and also *using* but not contributing is allowed by the license. I think that the backlash here of Apple’s purchase is really an disappointment and acknowledgment of a flawed license.
And thats the trend we see here. I find very little posts that are a backlash against apples decision. I simply calling you a liar. I think some people are overprotective. I see concern, and speculation and little else.
The FSF is not a mega-corperation with deep pockets, you were actually being facetious. I do in part agree with you, but seeing the same people looking for help from the same people who you see time and time being abused, and it being condoned on here, to protect their freedoms.
There is a flaw in the license we can all see unusual apple clause. The reality is if there is an issue its whether you can trust the people you hand you *copyright* over to, but to be fair I see no reports of anyone condemning this sale that contributed, although I wouldn’t be surprised if there was some.
I find it unsurprising that the only project I see being actively contributed to by Apple to any degree is that owned by the FSF…which is of no surprise, they cannot easily be bought. Even with a little consultancy from the maintainers.
Stop trolling.
“I find it unsurprising that the only project I see being actively contributed to by Apple to any degree is that owned by the FSF”
If that’s the only project you see, you need to wear glasses.
“If that’s the only project you see, you need to wear glasses.”
Then simply point them out. I’m perfectly willing to be corrected.
No, you are not willing to be corrected.
People already posted that Apple contributes to LLVM (not a FSF project).
And the reply has been the same, LLVM is a replacement for GCC which allows Apple to inject proprietary code into or replace GCC completely, as the license is more in line with what Apple want which is take and not give back.
…but then I’ve to the very tiny list that has been posted.
Edited 2007-07-13 22:20
LLVM is a replacement for GCC? LOL! LLVM works with GCC. It does not replace GCC. TenDRA ( http://www.tendra.org/ ) is a GCC replacement, but LLVM is not.
Why should I post a longer list? You are so ignorant, you’ll dismiss the list anyway like you do with Apple’s LLVM-involvement.
If you had just a little clue, you would know that Apple didn’t even need GCC, because they already own proprietary compilers. NeXT used an in-house developed Objective-C compiler, but after buying NeXT Apple chose to use GCC.
Maybe I should give you a quote from the Samba website: “SGI, Sun and Apple all have people assigned to Samba on permanent staff.”
In the past Apple also contributed to Mozilla.
These are just two additional examples. If you are really interested in a longer list, do your own research.
LLVM uses GCC as a frontend…and Apple is getting a new frontend.
I know what “do your own research mean” it means there is nothing else, but *I* did not know about Mozilla and Samba but it does not surprise me, although I fully expect to see the same pattern. Although I’m pretty certain that support for Mozilla was a long time ago for obvious reasons.
Again not really a lot is it. In fact its interesting to see what parts of the OS Apple cannot create in house.
I
> I fully expect to see the same pattern
As I said: You dismiss Apple’s involvement like you did with LLVM.
> In fact its interesting to see what parts of the OS Apple cannot create in house.
Apple is a multi-billion dollar company. They can hire whoever they want to develop software. And they do. It not that Apple just take OSS code and port it to Mac OS. They employ developers to do more than just porting work.
Printing, file sharing, compilers, ect. are not areas where Apple wants to do business. Thus it doesn’t hurt them to contribute to open source software.
Apple developers work on way more complex software like the Final Cut Studio package, Aperture, and so on.
Oh, to debunk your nonsense claims about GCC and LLVM even further: http://gcc.gnu.org/ml/gcc/2005-11/msg00888.html
Quote: “I (Chris Lattner, Apple employee) personally believe that the LLVM community would agree to assign the copyright of LLVM itself to the FSF”
See, Apple even supports the idea of turning LLVM into a FSF project under the GCC umbrella.