Linked by Eugenia Loli-Queru on Thu 12th Jul 2007 19:23 UTC, submitted by wibbit
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."
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Member since:2005-11-10
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??
Member since:2005-07-06
Member since:2007-05-22
Not neccesarily, as just a contributer, Apple do not get to decide what goes into the main trunk
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.
Member since:
2005-11-10
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)