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i was hoping that solaris would go under the GPL2 so that linux and solaris could both be improved and abosrbed, i hope we dont have a foss war, between the old world of linux and the new world of solaris

You mean so that Linux distributions can plunder every good thing about Solaris and kill the existing Solaris community?

As an OpenSolaris contributor, I would stop contributing if they chose the GPLv2. The CDDL was a *main* reason why I joined the OpenSolaris project.

At least Open Source zealots won't be able to complaint about it being "fake" open source anymore, even though it never was.

Edited 2007-01-17 00:45

You mean so that Linux distributions can plunder every good thing about Solaris and kill the existing Solaris community?

Yet you don't mind Apple and BSD "plundering" the good things from Solaris? How is it any different?

As an OpenSolaris contributor, I would stop contributing if they chose the GPLv2. The CDDL was a *main* reason why I joined the OpenSolaris project.

Correct me if I'm wrong here, but the way I read this is "I would stop contributing if those Linux bastards could use my stuff". Such an attitude goes completely against the sprit of the open source/free software movement and is, frankly, rather childish.

If you like OpenSolaris best and want to contribute to it, then that's great. But choosing to do so specifically so that another open source project can't use your code just doesn't seem right to me.

actually while i myself like gpl3, in the spirit of stopping misuse, i too might have preferred solaris as gpl2, so solaris could major-rip linux's drivers.

i think in the long run, ripping between solaris/linux would do most for solaris.

What's so bad about sharing code between Solaris and Linux? Wouldn't that make both systems better?

Sun has positioned OpenSolaris (under the GPLv3) so that it can plunder everything from the GNU/Linux userland (which mostly retains the "or later version" provision), yet the Linux kernel (which doesn't) can't plunder anything from OpenSolaris. Neither can OpenSolaris plunder from the Linux kernel, which contains lots of driver support unavailable under OpenSolaris, which doesn't seem like the best way to serve its userbase.

As a contributor to an open source project, I find it odd that you are opposed to sharing your code with other open source projects. That's why some people are sour on OpenSolaris and its licensing decisions. It wants to be an open source project, but it wants to make sure that its code doesn't benefit other open source projects. Some find this arrangement selfish (keep your hands off our code) and arrogant (we don't need your crappy code anyway).

Fine, set up your little wall and keep your precious community separate from the rest of the open source community. We've gotten this far by sharing. I'm confident that if we continue to share and share alike, the Linux community will continue to out-pace the growth of OpenSolaris.

Sweet system you've got over there, though, very impressed. You know, it might just be good enough so that you don't have to worry about your community disappearing overnight...

As an OpenSolaris contributor, I would stop contributing if they chose the GPLv2. The CDDL was a *main* reason why I joined the OpenSolaris project.

It's a particularly rare breed of open source developer that doesn't want his code to be open source.

Yes, it's purposely recursive, just to confuse the likes of binarycrusader.

i was hoping that solaris would go under the GPL2 so that linux and solaris could both be improved and abosrbed, i hope we dont have a foss war, between the old world of linux and the new world of solaris


Actually, this isn't a bad thing for either community. Sun's adoption of GPL v3 will finally give the FSF community an alternative kernel to wrap their flag around, and end some of the ridiculous infighting that has been going on in the linux community.

It will inject some new energy into the opensolaris and FSF communities without drawing resources away from continued development and advancement of the linux kernel. Hell, maybe HP and IBM will feel the need to contribute some more code from their proprietary vaults.

The GNU projects, various desktops etc. will work with work fine with either, regardless of licensing.

People will have their choice of free platforms to match their philosophies and principles, real or imagined, without sacrificing the software that they are able to run.

I do believe that any time additional choices are added to OSS, everyone benefits overall whether directly or indirectly.

SUN said that they prefered to license solaris under the GPL2.

No, that was Java. Remains to be seen if they'll relicense under v3 when it's published.

In fact, Sun has always hinted that opensolaris would consider v3 licensing. This story is based on unnamed sources, so carries as much credibility as anyone's opinion in this forum, but I see no reason to doubt it. While I applaud their endorsement of OSS, I'm not sure this is as big a strategic endorsement as it will be made out to be. Fact is Sun will retain and require copyright assignment for all contributions made, and it will remain CDDL/GPL licensed.

There's little risk to Sun in such a move since they will be free in the future to do whatever they want with the code, and are likely gambling that the community on it's own (including other well-heeled tech companies) would not be able to fork opensolaris sufficiently to pose a risk to Sun losing control.

Not to be overly cynical, but I see this as being more of a marketing move than a paradigm shift in open source strategy. There's no doubt the incompatibility with linux is intentional, and I don't blame them, unless they changed their rights management model to one where the developers retain ownership of the code as with the current linux model, they wouldn't be able to utilize linux code anyways. Sun is a big iron company competing with HP and IBM, linux's two biggest development backers, it would be a mistake to assume this is purely a warmhearted community group hug on their part.

But as I said, I don't care about philosophies and dogma, so I still applaud the move and think that the OSS community as a whole will be stronger for it.

Exactly what could solaris improve from linux?