Re: Bug#651624: is zfs incompatible with the GNU Project ?
On Wed, Feb 08, 2012 at 09:09:24PM +0100, Paolo Delbene wrote:
> Paolo Delbene
> <id3rfix@gmail.com> 07 febbraio 2012 02:47
> A: debian-bsd <debian-bsd@lists.debian.org>
>
> Hi,
>
> For that i know the GNU Project is based on the GNU General Public
> License (i suppose you are using GPLv3
> http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-3.0.txt for the kernel KFreeBSD) and
> is easy to undestand why:
>
> FreeBSD license (#FreeBSD)
>
> This is the original BSD license with the advertising clause and
> another clause removed. (It is also sometimes called the “2-clause BSD
> license”.) It is a simple, permissive non-copyleft free software
> license, compatible with the GNU GPL.
>
> If you want a simple, permissive non-copyleft free software license,
> the FreeBSD license is a reasonable choice. However, please don't call
> it a “BSD” or “BSD-style” license, because that is likely to cause
> confusion which could lead to use of the flawed original BSD license.
FreeBSD license _is_ a BSD license. It's just there are three kinds
of BSD license, and some of FreeBSD code is four-clause.
> Other Free Software Licenses compatible with the GNU General Public License
> http://www.gnu.org/licenses/license-list.html#SoftwareLicenses
>
> To the same time the license which supports the ZFS is in contrast
> with the GNU General Public License:
>
> Common Development and Distribution License (CDDL), version 1.0 (#CDDL)
>
> This is a free software license. It has a copyleft with a scope that's
> similar to the one in the Mozilla Public License, which makes it
> incompatible with the GNU GPL. This means a module covered by the GPL
> and a module covered by the CDDL cannot legally be linked together. We
> urge you not to use the CDDL for this reason.
Yes, it's a known problem with GPL, which seems to have been deliberately
made incompatible with licenses that are not subset of it. Still, it's
not a problem, since there is hardly any useful code licensed under GPL
in the FreeBSD kernel. There were three sound card drivers, but they
were cleaned from GPL in 10-CURRENT.
> Also unfortunate in the CDDL is its use of the term “intellectual property”.
>
> Sincerely i don't understand because you adopted ZFS until AdvFS
> (Advanced File System, designed by Digital Equipment Corporation for
> their Digital UNIX (now Tru64 UNIX) operating system.
Simply because ZFS works.
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AdvFS
>
> AdvFS, also known as Tru64 UNIX Advanced File System, is a file system
> developed in the late 1980s to mid 1990s [1] by Digital Equipment
> Corporation for their OSF/1 version of the Unix operating system
> (later Digital UNIX/Tru64 UNIX). In June 2008, it was released as open
> source under the GNU GPL license[2].
>
> You can find too anything i wrote in past on:
> http://www.gnuvox.info/2009/04/debian-implementa-kernel-freebsd
>
> something was not proper correct, but other thing yes :-)
>
> about AdvFS this is one good alternative to ZFS or is possible to use
> LVM Logical Volume Manager
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logical_Volume_Manager_(Linux)
>
> so why don't use one of these 2 ones ?
For AdvFS to be useful, it would have to be ported to FreeBSD first.
Also, this would make FreeBSD the sole consumer of this code (ZFS
is being used in other systems, e.g. Illumos). This would also mean
adding GPL-ed code to FreeBSD, which is not really desired.
Also, AdvFS and LVM are nowhere of being functionally equivalent to ZFS.
--
If you cut off my head, what would I say? Me and my head, or me and my body?
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