Re: [9fans] The new ridiculous license

Re: [9fans] The new ridiculous license

[Theo de Raadt]

It's too difficult for me to explain in full details how much of this
license is not acceptable to us.  But it clearly is not acceptable to
us.

We have an entire operating system (minus a touch of GPL and LGPL here
and there, one sendmail license, and a few smatterings of Artistic)
that has NO CONTRACTS -- every license is simply "copyright law term
dismissal + warranty disclaimer".  That is free; these licenses make
no new requirements of anyone; they do not require or re-state
anything that is already the way it is.  The BSD licenses we have
simply take rights granted by copyright law to the author, and they
serve to allow the author to give up all of those rights (except the
copyright law right to be known as the author).  These licenses ask
for nothing in return; they do not even restate anything that another
law might make a problem -- because there is no need to state it!

We can't accept this license as it is. I note your meeting notes said
that a goal had been to allow OpenBSD to use parts from this (in
particular we were interested in the c compiler).  I think someone did
not listen to us, or understand what a BSD-licensed operating system
has as a goal -- as this is, the plan9 components are now no more free
for us to use than they were weeks ago.

sure; you have a new license.  That will be good for some people.  Too
bad it does not go far enough for the needs of a BSD licensed system.
It's just incompatible.  It would be the most onerous license in our
tree (well there is the GPL, but year by year we remove and replace
more and more GPL software in our tree... we had hoped to replace the
c compiler in the long term with a free one...)

Re: [9fans] The new ridiculous license

[Dan Cross]

> We can't accept this license as it is. I note your meeting notes said
> that a goal had been to allow OpenBSD to use parts from this (in
> particular we were interested in the c compiler).  I think someone did
> not listen to us, or understand what a BSD-licensed operating system
> has as a goal -- as this is, the plan9 components are now no more free
> for us to use than they were weeks ago.

I don't think it has ever been a goal of anyone working on Plan 9 to
allow or disallow you or anyone else from using the Plan 9 code.  If
you don't want to use it because you don't like the license, fine.
Otherwise, what's your point by sending this garbage to 9fans?  If
you've got a problem with Bell Labs, take it up with them.  Don't spam
the rest of us with your misunderstandings of the community's goals.

	- Dan C.

Re: [9fans] The new ridiculous license

[boyd, rounin]

From: "Dan Cross" <cross@math.psu.edu>
> If you don't want to use it because you don't like the license, fine.
> Otherwise, what's your point by sending this garbage to 9fans?

right

Re: [9fans] The new ridiculous license

[ozan s yigit]

Dan Cross:

> Otherwise, what's your point by sending this garbage to 9fans?  If
> you've got a problem with Bell Labs, take it up with them.  Don't spam
> the rest of us with your misunderstandings of the community's goals.

theo's message is on this list because people who can be instrumental
in crafting a new license happen to read this list. would you rather
hold the discussion on slashdot? :-]

oz
---
there is a fault in reality. do not adjust your minds. -- salman rushdie
Followup-To:
Distribution:
Organization: University of Bath Computing Services, UK
Keywords:
Cc:


--
Dennis Davis, BUCS, University of Bath, Bath, BA2 7AY, UK
D.H.Davis@bath.ac.uk

Re: [9fans] The new ridiculous license

[Dan Cross]

> theo's message is on this list because people who can be instrumental
> in crafting a new license happen to read this list.

Then I propose the creation of another list for license issues.
Perhaps, ``plan9-license-flames'' would be a good name.

> would you rather hold the discussion on slashdot? :-]

Well, yes, since I don't read slashdot, and therefore wouldn't be
distracted by it.  :-)

I'd just rather not be a party to the discussion at all.  The current
license is sufficiently liberal for my tastes, the OSI-approved license
seems fine for most other people, and it's a subject that's been beaten
to death, time and again.  Theo just seems upset because he believes he
can't use the compilers in his ersatz version of BSD Unix.  Frankly, I
don't care.

	- Dan C.

Re: [9fans] The new ridiculous license

[Wesley Parish]

Theo de Raadt wrote:

> It's too difficult for me to explain in full details how much of this
> license is not acceptable to us.  But it clearly is not acceptable to
> us.
>
> We have an entire operating system (minus a touch of GPL and LGPL here
> and there, one sendmail license, and a few smatterings of Artistic)
> that has NO CONTRACTS -- every license is simply "copyright law term
> dismissal + warranty disclaimer".  That is free; these licenses make
> no new requirements of anyone; they do not require or re-state
> anything that is already the way it is.  The BSD licenses we have
> simply take rights granted by copyright law to the author, and they
> serve to allow the author to give up all of those rights (except the
> copyright law right to be known as the author).  These licenses ask
> for nothing in return; they do not even restate anything that another
> law might make a problem -- because there is no need to state it!
>
> We can't accept this license as it is. I note your meeting notes said
> that a goal had been to allow OpenBSD to use parts from this (in
> particular we were interested in the c compiler).  I think someone did
> not listen to us, or understand what a BSD-licensed operating system
> has as a goal -- as this is, the plan9 components are now no more free
> for us to use than they were weeks ago.
>
> sure; you have a new license.  That will be good for some people.  Too
> bad it does not go far enough for the needs of a BSD licensed system.
> It's just incompatible.  It would be the most onerous license in our
> tree (well there is the GPL, but year by year we remove and replace
> more and more GPL software in our tree... we had hoped to replace the
> c compiler in the long term with a free one...)

If gcc a.k.a. the c compiler's a problem, why not take this one and run with
it:
http://www.tendra.org/

"In case you are already wondering, TenDRA is a BSD-licensed C compiler,
with C++ STL support forthcoming. The original Crown copyright from DERA is
still present and the further expansion of TenDRA is BSDL'd."

It's reportedly a very high quality one.

Wesley Parish

--
First the wife, tone of awe.  So much a condition.  Kent in the labs, fast
forward.  "So how was the worthlessful businessman?"  But they hadn't
stopped meat for year ago, that arose hotel facade slowly moved apper.
- Don't let emacs meta-x dissociatedpress write your speeches!

Re: [9fans] The new ridiculous license

[D. Brownlee]

Wesley Parish wrote:

> If gcc a.k.a. the c compiler's a problem, why not take this one and run with
> it:
> http://www.tendra.org/
>
> "In case you are already wondering, TenDRA is a BSD-licensed C compiler,
> with C++ STL support forthcoming. The original Crown copyright from DERA is
> still present and the further expansion of TenDRA is BSDL'd."
>
> It's reportedly a very high quality one.
>
> Wesley Parish
>

Also, ACK is available with a BSD-style license.
Don't know -- haven't followed compilers lately -- but
it's generated code used to be respectable. It is also
fairly easy to get a compiler up for a new archictecture.
It was recently at:

	http://www.cs.vu.nl/vakgroepen/cs/ack.html

but just noticed that that link is now 404.

Re: [9fans] The new OK license

[D. Brownlee]

D. Brownlee wrote:

> Also, ACK is available with a BSD-style license.
> Don't know -- haven't followed compilers lately -- but
> it's generated code used to be respectable. It is also
> fairly easy to get a compiler up for a new archictecture.
> It was recently at:
>
>     http://www.cs.vu.nl/vakgroepen/cs/ack.html
>
> but just noticed that that link is now 404.
>
>
These work:

ftp://ftp.cs.vu.nl/pub/ceriel/ack/Ack-5.5.tar.gz
ftp://ftp.cs.vu.nl/pub/ceriel/ack/doc.tar.gz

Re: [9fans] The new OK license

[Wesley Parish]

D. Brownlee wrote:

> D. Brownlee wrote:
>
>> Also, ACK is available with a BSD-style license.
>> Don't know -- haven't followed compilers lately -- but
>> it's generated code used to be respectable. It is also
>> fairly easy to get a compiler up for a new archictecture.
>> It was recently at:
>>
>>     http://www.cs.vu.nl/vakgroepen/cs/ack.html
>>
>> but just noticed that that link is now 404.
>>
>>
> These work:
>
> ftp://ftp.cs.vu.nl/pub/ceriel/ack/Ack-5.5.tar.gz
> ftp://ftp.cs.vu.nl/pub/ceriel/ack/doc.tar.gz

Thanks!

Now I've just got to try it out on my several OSes - not excluding either
Plan9 _or_ OpenBSD - TenDRA compiles on Linux, I do know that, I just
haven't tried compiling the kernel with it, but it'll happen ... ;)

Wesley Parish
--
First the wife, tone of awe.  So much a condition.  Kent in the labs, fast
forward.  "So how was the worthlessful businessman?"  But they hadn't
stopped meat for year ago, that arose hotel facade slowly moved apper.
- Don't let emacs meta-x dissociatedpress write your speeches!

Re: [9fans] The new OK license

[D. Brownlee]

Wesley Parish wrote:

> Now I've just got to try it out on my several OSes - not excluding either
> Plan9 _or_ OpenBSD - TenDRA compiles on Linux, I do know that, I just
> haven't tried compiling the kernel with it, but it'll happen ... ;)
>
> Wesley Parish

The Linux kernel may be a problem.
There is alot of "inline" code in '.h' files,
assembly code at that. Those guys learned 'C'
with GCC.