FreeBSD Continues Work On Ridding Its Base Of GPL-Licensed Software

[uxmkt]

You can't really blame companies for “stealing” code (absorbing and not source-releasing modifications) from authors who have explicitly put a “steal me” (permissive-license) sticker on it.

[qarium]

> Ridding Its Base Of GPL-Licensed Software
> moving from Subversion to Git
LOL

yes you are right... these BSD people are a real mystery they hate GPL software and they like closed-source software very much so Subversion is closed source and Git is GPL open source....

what a big joke.,.. i think it is not about GPLv2 what they really hate is GPLv3 and Git is like the linux kernel onlx GPLv2

[jabl]

yes you are right... these BSD people are a real mystery they hate GPL software and they like closed-source software very much so Subversion is closed source and Git is GPL open source....

Last I checked, subversion is open source and released under the permissive Apache 2.0 license.

what a big joke.,.. i think it is not about GPLv2 what they really hate is GPLv3 and Git is like the linux kernel onlx GPLv2

Yes, they seem to hate GPLv3. Also, I'm not sure git is part of the base system or if it's in ports. Ports are a lot less restricted, they contain a lot of GPLv3 code as well (like the GNU toolchain).

[skeevy420]

I've had pfSense freeze on a reboot, when upgrading to an official, newer patch level of the same version, when installed on an approved/recommended hardware. It wasn't really any fancy setup, just regular home firewall running some vpns as well.

Things can break badly with FreeBSD too ...

I was just poking fun at all the out of tree modules that break on Linux from time to time.

[cesarcafe]

I would love to see a Linux distribution in which every component (but the kernel) had a permissive license. Yes, I know BSDs already provide that, but I'd really love to see a MIT-Linux (the kernel, obviously, would have to be GPL, unless you replace it with a kernel from another UNIX, but then it wouldn't be Linux). (Edit: with Alpine Linux, which is musl-based, you almost have what I'm asking for if you replace GCC by LLVM, but I'd love to see a new distro with this goal in mind).

[jabl]

I would love to see a Linux distribution in which every component (but the kernel) had a permissive license.

Probably not what you're looking for, but, Android.

[qarium]

Last I checked, subversion is open source and released under the permissive Apache 2.0 license.

yes right thank you... i am stuck in the past with my brain did not catch this.

Yes, they seem to hate GPLv3. Also, I'm not sure git is part of the base system or if it's in ports. Ports are a lot less restricted, they contain a lot of GPLv3 code as well (like the GNU toolchain).

i think they only inveted software patents because GPLv2 was to succesfull
they invented software patents to cheat on GPLv2's spirit.
then GPLv3 was developed but they found a way to cheat it again the google web server cheat...
because of this the AGPL was developed to fix this hole to.

i think RMS and the FSF should turn AGPL into GPLv4 to make sure no one ever cheat on FLOSS software again.

[mdedetrich]

And BSD contains no patent license, which can and will bite you in the ass harder than a group that has historically been interested in compliance.

Use Apache 2 which contains a patent clause then. Most companies I work for that do open source work use Apache2 and also funnily enough every company I have worked for has avoided GPL (2 or higher) like the plague for their open source work, from what I gathered its a massive PITA for lawyers especially defining what "linking" means (among other things).

[k1e0x]

lol, can't wait to see FreeBSD getting rid of all their graphics drivers, because those are actually Linux drivers

Base OS vs ports. Their is tons of GPL code in ports and they have no desire to remove any of it. They want to make a pure permissive base OS.

FreeBSD is used in -A LOT- of large expensive commercial applications. Where as for the home/desktop user you don't see very much of it, in corporate world the typical company probably pays more money to FreeBSD companies than to Linux companies. You can see there in the same quarterly report that NetApp merged in their changes to FreeBSD. Even though they didn't have to and there is no law, they did. Permissive open source works.

/sarcasm But nobody uses NetApp.. lets get steam running and good grapiks.. storage is so 1999.

What is the largest enterprise Linux storage provider anyhow? Is there one?

[jabl]

i think they only inveted software patents because GPLv2 was to succesfull
they invented software patents to cheat on GPLv2's spirit.

No, software patents were not invented due to GPLv2.

then GPLv3 was developed but they found a way to cheat it again the google web server cheat...
because of this the AGPL was developed to fix this hole to.

Google and other web giants were already giants when GPLv3 arrived on the scene, heck "webapps" have been a majorly big thing since the mid 90'ies. So no, the "service provider loophole" wasn't some new unknown issue that crept up on the FSF after GPLv3 was released. In fact there was already an AGPLv2 long before *GPLv3.

i think RMS and the FSF should turn AGPL into GPLv4 to make sure no one ever cheat on FLOSS software again.

IIRC MongoDB switched from AGPL to their own SSPL because in their opinion AGPL didn't go far enough in protecting them against cloud service providers.

But yes, given SaaS etc, in some sense AGPL is more in the spirit of protecting the four freedoms than plain GPL. However, I wonder whether the FSF has the political capital to spend on a more rigorous GPLv4 considering already GPLv3 caused a massive schism in the community. Heck, even some GNU projects have refused to update to v3 due to fear of losing users (glibc is still LGPLv2.1).