Open Source Archive

The GNU General Public License (version 2) is one of the most widely used open source licenses in the world. The GNU GPLv2 is commonly used in Linux distributions and open source applications. Yet, despite being widely used for decades, the GPLv2 has not been tested much in the legal system. Most GPL violations do not result in a trial and so the power of the license has remained largely untested. That is about to change. As OpenSource.com posted,

It is expected the court cases will help define what qualifies as a derivative work and how the GPL affects software patents along with other details of how the license is interpreted.

A bit late, but there you have it. Does anyone here actually use Hurd?

"The Samba Team and seven kernel hackers have come together with Software Freedom Conservancy to help efforts to ensure compliance with the GPL by those who implement Linux and other GPL software. Richard Hillesley talked to Bradley Kuhn of Software Freedom Conservancy, Jeremy Allison of Samba, and Matthew Garrett, who works in his spare time with the GPL Compliance Project for Linux Developers."

John Sullivan, executive director of the Free Software Foundation: "Were it grounded in reality, Oracle's claim that copyright law gives them proprietary control over any software that uses a particular functional API would be terrible for free software and programmers everywhere. It is an unethical and greedy interpretation created with the express purpose of subjugating as many computer users as possible, and is particularly bad in this context because it comes at a time when the sun has barely set on the free software community's celebration of Java as a language newly suitable for use in the free world. Fortunately, the claim is not yet reality, and we hope Judge Alsup will keep it that way." Couldn't agree more.

It's been a while since we caught up with Stallman. But a couple months ago we took a look around at what's happening with law, politics and technology and realized that he maybe perhaps his extremism and paranoia were warranted all along. So when we were contacted by an Iranian Linux publication and asked if we would like to publish an English translation of a recent interview they had done with Stallman, I thought that it was a particularly rich opportunity.

The Dutch LinuxMagazine translated an interview (direct PDF link) from their magazine with Gianugo Rabellino, Senior Director Open Source Communities at Microsoft into English. Many of your readers are probably wondering, is Microsoft really involved in open source these days, or is there more to it? Fabrice Mous started his conversation with Mr. Rabellino to get to know him better, but also to ask him some pressing questions about Microsoft's policies towards open source and open standards. It turned out to be an interesting, but certainly quite critical conversation, that will probably lead to some discussion.

We would very much like to hear your opinion on the open source policy of Microsoft.

"The Free Software Foundation released a statement open for public signing, titled 'Stand up for your freedom to install free software'. The statement is a response to Microsoft's announcement that if computer makers wish to distribute machines with the Windows 8 compatibility logo, they must implement a system called 'Secure Boot'. The FSF statement warns against the danger that, if done wrong, this system would have to be called Restricted Boot, because it could make computers incapable of running anything but Windows." Signed.

Rapid7 created a $100,000 investment fund to support up to seven promising open source projects in the security industry. The "Magnificent7" projects will be identified and supported through the remainder of 2011 and into 2012. Any security-related open source project - with a preference for BSD-compatible licensing - is applicable and encouraged to submit a "Magnificent7" application.

"Much has been said about open source projects - and open source platforms are now powering an ever-increasing share of the mobile market. But what is 'open' and how can you measure openness? As part of our new research report, VisionMobile Research Partner Liz Laffan introduces the Open Governance Index - a new approach to measuring the 'openness' of software projects, from Android to WebKit."

In a recent article Thom contributed his opinion to the discussion about the openness of Android that started when Google choose to withhold the source code for honeycomb, here are my 2 cents. In the article the obligations GPL puts on Google are made very clear. This makes it clear that Android is indeed an open-source project. However being open-source and being open aren't always the same thing.

The GNU Project has announced a new project called GNU Free Call, an open source Skype alternative that will offer anonymous VoIP and will use the GNU SIP Witch server as the back end. GNU SIP Witch requires a minimum of system resources so it can be used on cell phones too so it seems the goal is to provide a cross-platform application, the immediate target most probably being Android.

"Now that Linux is the most popular free Unix-like operating system, it shouldn't be a surprise that some projects have begun treating non-Linux operating systems as second-class citizens. This isn't out of contempt for the BSDs or OpenSolaris, it's just a matter of limited manpower: if almost all the users of the application have a Linux operating system and if all the core developers are using Linux themselves, it's difficult to keep supporting other operating systems. But sometimes the choice to leave out support for other operating systems is explicitly made, e.g. when the developers want to implement some innovative features that require functionality that is (at least for now) only available in the Linux kernel."

"Manu Sporny, founder and CEO of Digital Bazaar, has decided to use GitHub to store a project of a nature. Rather than a piece of software, he is listing his own genetic data as an open source project. He has released all his rights to the data and made around 1 million of his genetic markers public domain."

"A recent survey by Gartner found that more than half of organizations surveyed have adopted open source software (OSS) solutions as part of their IT strategy. Nearly one-third of respondents cited benefits of flexibility, increased innovation, shorter development times and faster procurement processes as reasons for adopting OSS solutions. However, the survey revealed that only one-third of responding organizations had a formal OSS policy in place."