Re: BTRFS and debian
On Sat, Jul 14, 2018 at 01:19:39PM +0300, Reco wrote:
> Hi.
>
> On Sat, Jul 14, 2018 at 07:50:03PM +1000, Zenaan Harkness wrote:
> > Can someone explain if there's an -actual- non-free dependency that
> > these packages have, or if it is just the somewhat-incompatibility
> > between ZFS CDDL and Linux GPL?
>
> Unless they manage to pull in some Oracle code (zfs encryption and
> dtrace probes come to mind), ZFS on Linux is a free (as in freedom)
> software.
> But, since Sun Microsystems deliberately designed CDDL to be
> incompatible with GPL2 (happened in 2004 IIRC), you can not ship ZFS
> binary modules with the Linux kernel, for instance ([1]).
> What you can do is to ship source code, and 'ask' the user to build such
> modules for themselves (hence the need of dkms or module-assistant).
>
> [1] https://github.com/zfsonlinux/zfs/wiki/FAQ
Yes, zfs-dkms and zfs-initramfs is a little more work that plain
apt install.
This gives some of the details:
https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=861263
which explains thusly:
“> Forgive my ignorance, but why will it not happen?
The legal status of ZFSonLinux was discussed by the FTP team and
DPL over a long period, with input from legal counsel, resulting in
a decision to put it in the 'contrib' section. That decision is
unlikely to be revisited soon.
”
and further from
https://blog.halon.org.uk/2016/01/on-zfs-in-debian/#comment-13678
:
Martin (February 28, 2017 at 6:14 pm):
> I understand the decision to distribute ZFS as source
> only, but could you elaborate on why the package is
> going into contrib rather than main?
Neil McGovern (February 28, 2017 at 6:26 pm):
> Sure – it’s about the promise that Debian makes to
> the end user. Basically, by it being in main you’re
> legally able to redistribute the end product (along with
> source). With a CDDL module and a GPL2+ kernel,
> that becomes – at best – unclear.
So, packages are even provided such as zfs-initramfs and zfs-dkms to
make the process largely painless, for which we be grateful.
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