"Sun today announced that Java Platform, Standard Edition 5 is now available for redistribution by GNU/Linux and OpenSolaris operating system distributors under the new Operating System Distributor's License for Java (also known as the 'Distro License for Java' or DLJ). Developed in consultation with, and for use by, the various GNU/Linux communities, the new license allows distributors to ship Sun's Java SE 5.0 Java Development Kit and Java Runtime Environment as installable packages for their operating systems." At the same time, Sun also promised to open-source Java.
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Member since:2006-04-21
I think the correct thing to say is that the GPL is *one* of many open source licenses that can *encourage* a centralized project. However, I'm not aware of any that would actually *prevent* forking.
I didn't say it would prevent forking, any more than DRM will prevent illegal copying. What I did say is that it is the best way to prevent copying, just as making code closed-source is the best way to prevent your algorithms being copied by someone else. But it's still not impossible.
In fact, I don't see how the GPL prevents forking at all. It seems to encourage it, just look at the hundreds of Linux distributions that exist. Not only are they different in what they package, many of them have different patches applied, etc. They may have the same sources for code, but that doesn't mean anything.
I already addressed this in my post. Distros are *collections* of OSS, and as such they can differ in their choice of what goes into the collection. Yes, I know many distros do submit patches to GPL'ed programs and such (Gentoo and SuSE being two of them which I use), but since they must be open-sourced, they can't be "taken away" from the community in the way that, say, you can take FreeBSD, make changes to support your proprietary architecture, and keep the changes to yourself, such that (say) only your GUI can run on top of your architecture. Anyone who does so is in violation of the GPL.
Member since:2005-07-06
I didn't say it would prevent forking, any more than DRM will prevent illegal copying.
Actually, you did:
Secondly, what is clear is that choosing the GPL is the best way to prevent forks.
At the very least you implied that it would "prevent forks."
I already addressed this in my post. Distros are *collections* of OSS, and as such they can differ in their choice of what goes into the collection. Yes, I know many distros do submit patches to GPL'ed programs and such (Gentoo and SuSE being two of them which I use), but since they must be open-sourced, they can't be "taken away" from the community in the way that, say, you can take FreeBSD, make changes to support your proprietary architecture, and keep the changes to yourself, such that (say) only your GUI can run on top of your architecture. Anyone who does so is in violation of the GPL.
So then, wouldn't *any* open source license with roughly the same terms as the GPL be just as good at "preventing forking" as you said earlier? Why the GPL? What makes it better than other OSI approved licenses with similar terms?
"At the end of a week in which Electronic Arts confirmed it wasn't developing a thing for the Wii U, one of the software engineers in EA Sports' Canada studio, in a series of since-deleted tweets, disparaged the console as 'crap' and suggested Nintendo should give up on hardware altogether. 'The Wii U is crap. Less powerful than an Xbox 360. Poor online/store. Weird tablet', tweeted Bob Summerwill, listed as a senior software engineer at EA Canada, in a reply to a tweet posting a link about EA's no-Wii U news. 'Nintendo are walking dead at this point'." The Wii U is turning into the 21st century's Virtual Boy.
"In NixOS, the entire operating system - the kernel, applications, system packages, configuration files, and so on - is built by the Nix package manager from a description in a purely functional build language. The fact that it's purely functional essentially means that building a new configuration cannot overwrite previous configurations. Most of the other features follow from this." Interesting approach. A Linux distribution, sure, but with some very refreshing ideas about system configuration.
Appfour added, among other features, C/C++ support to its new version of AIDE. From Android-IDE, "Now you can write parts of your app or your whole app in C/C++ on your device. AIDE supports the Standard Android NDK toolchain (GCC 4.6 + Bionic, STL, ...). No changes are necessary if you want to build an app developed on a PC with Eclipse. C/C++ development is fully integrated: Build errors appear in the error list and files can easily be navigated to with Go to file. The editor supports C/C++ syntax highlighting."
Ars nails it: "The answer is that Google did announce what amounts to a fairly substantial Android update yesterday. They simply did it without adding to the update fragmentation problems that continue to plague the platform. By focusing on these changes and not the apparently-waiting-in-the-wings update to the core software, Google is showing us one of the ways in which it's trying to fix the update problem."
"It is good for programmers to understand what goes on inside a processor. The CPU is at the heart of our career. What goes on inside the CPU? How long does it take for one instruction to run? What does it mean when a new CPU has a 12-stage pipeline, or 18-stage pipeline, or even a 'deep' 31-stage pipeline? Programs generally treat the CPU as a black box. Instructions go into the box in order, instructions come out of the box in order, and some processing magic happens inside. As a programmer, it is useful to learn what happens inside the box. This is especially true if you will be working on tasks like program optimization. If you don't know what is going on inside the CPU, how can you optimize for it? This article is about what goes on inside the x86 processor's deep pipeline."
"It was the only moment I heard regret slip into Otellini's voice during the several hours of conversations I had with him. 'The lesson I took away from that was, while we like to speak with data around here, so many times in my career I've ended up making decisions with my gut, and I should have followed my gut,' he said. 'My gut told me to say yes.'" The world would've been a much different place - Apple would have been less dependant on Samsung for its chips, which probably would've meant less money for Samsung to develop its Galaxy business.Glass is getting some love at Google I/O as well. New applications have been released - Facebook, Twitter, Evernote, Elle, Tumblr, and CNN. Perhaps more interesting: the newly announced Google Glass Developer Kit will allow offline applications and direct hardware access - great for hacking and expanding Glass' potential. This kit will really allow hackers to put Glass through its paces."But Beck and Merrill decided that simply banning toxic players wasn't an acceptable solution for their game. Riot Games began experimenting with more constructive modes of player management through a formal player behavior initiative that actually conducts controlled experiments on its player base to see what helps reduce bad behavior. The results of that initiative have been shared at a lecture at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and on panels at the Penny Arcade Expo East and the Game Developers Conference." Absolutely fascinating stuff. I'm a League of Legends player, and to be honest, the community isn't nearly as bad as some make it out to be. I'm happy Riot games has the guts to employ science to address the issue.
"Android and iOS, the number one and number two ranked smartphone operating systems worldwide, combined for 92.3% of all smartphone shipments during the first quarter of 2013 as Windows Phone crept past BlackBerry for 3rd place. According to the International Data Corporation Worldwide Quarterly Mobile Phone Tracker, Android smartphone vendors and Apple shipped a total of 199.5 million units worldwide during 1Q13, up 59.1% from the 125.4 million units shipped during 1Q12." Windows Phone doubles from a few to twice few, iOS loser market share as its growth is slower than that of the overall market. BlackBerry continues slide into irrelevance."According to the latest research from our Wireless Smartphone Strategies service, global Android smartphone profits reached US$5 billion in total during the first quarter of 2013. Samsung dominated and captured an impressive 95 percent share of all Android smartphone profits." Wow.
Member since:
2005-07-06
Secondly, what is clear is that choosing the GPL is the best way to prevent forks. Yes, there are plenty Linux distros, but they all take the Linux kernel from the same codebase, GNU binutils from the same codebase, and so on.
That isn't necessarily true. In fact, I don't see how the GPL prevents forking at all. It seems to encourage it, just look at the hundreds of Linux distributions that exist. Not only are they different in what they package, many of them have different patches applied, etc. They may have the same sources for code, but that doesn't mean anything.
In fact, I'm not sure how the GPL ensures that people will obtain it from the same source, when obviously, the different kernel patches they use often don't come from the same source.
I think the correct thing to say is that the GPL is *one* of many open source licenses that can *encourage* a centralized project. However, I'm not aware of any that would actually *prevent* forking.