Re: [TUHS] 386BSD released

[Warner Losh <imp@bsdimp.com>]

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On Wed, Jul 14, 2021 at 8:10 AM Larry McVoy <lm@mcvoy.com> wrote:

> On Wed, Jul 14, 2021 at 09:07:19AM +0000, Lars Brinkhoff wrote:
> > Michael Kj??rling wrote:
> > > And all this, of course, ignoring the other issue of what might be
> > > considered a "start to the open source operating system movement",
> > > given that even development of GNU was well underway by the time the
> > > Linux kernel got started (having been worked on since early 1984)
> >
> > GNU planned to adopt TRIX which was developed at MIT in the mid 1980s.
> > I don't know its exact distribution terms, but Wipikedia says "open
> > source" so it was possibly in that general vicinity.
> >
> > Arguably ancient PDP-10 operating systems like ITS, WAITS, TENEX were
> > somewhat "open" and "free", but it's not a clear cut case.
>
> X10 and X11 predate all of this and at least X11 is open source.
>

The X10R3 license sure looks like a standard MIT license. The other license
statements that were included also read very much like open source, or
at least a strong intention of being open source, absent any drafting flaws.

Copyright 1985 by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Permission to use, copy, modify, and distribute this
software and its documentation for any purpose and without
fee is hereby granted, provided that the above copyright
notice appear in all copies and that both that copyright
notice and this permission notice appear in supporting
documentation, and that the name of M.I.T. not be used in
advertising or publicity pertaining to distribution of the
software without specific, written prior permission.
M.I.T. makes no representations about the suitability of
this software for any purpose.  It is provided "as is"
without express or implied warranty.

This software is not subject to any license of the American
Telephone and Telegraph Company or of the Regents of the
University of California.

Although uwm did have the somewhat longer:

/************************************************************************
 *                                                                      *
 *                      Copyright (c) 1986 by                           *
 *              Digital Equipment Corporation, Maynard, MA              *
 *                       All Rights Reserved.                           *
 *                                                                      *
 *      Permission to use, copy, modify, and distribute this software   *
 *      and its documentation is hereby granted only to licensees of    *
 *      The Regents of the University of California pursuant to their   *
 *      license agreement for the Berkeley Software Distribution        *
 *      provided that the following appears on all copies.              *
 *                                                                      *
 *            "LICENSED FROM DIGITAL EQUIPMENT CORPORATION              *
 *                      COPYRIGHT (C) 1986                              *
 *                 DIGITAL EQUIPMENT CORPORATION                        *
 *                         MAYNARD, MA                                  *
 *                     ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.                             *
 *                                                                      *
 *      THE INFORMATION IN THIS SOFTWARE IS SUBJECT TO CHANGE WITHOUT   *
 *      NOTICE AND SHOULD NOT BE CONSTRUED AS A COMMITMENT BY DIGITAL   *
 *      EQUIPMENT CORPORATION.  DIGITAL MAKES NO REPRESENTATIONS        *
 *      ABOUT SUITABILITY OF THIS SOFTWARE FOR ANY PURPOSE. IT IS       *
 *      SUPPLIED "AS IS" WITHOUT EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTY.           *
 *                                                                      *
 *      IF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA OR ITS LICENSEES MODIFY         *
 *      THE SOFTWARE IN A MANNER CREATING DERIVATIVE COPYRIGHT          *
 *      RIGHTS APPROPRIATE COPYRIGHT LEGENDS MAY BE PLACED ON THE       *
 *      DERIVATIVE WORK IN ADDITION TO THAT SET FORTH ABOVE."           *
 *                                                                      *
 ************************************************************************/

This is the earliest copy of X10 I could find, pegging the date at around
1985, which
predates Linux by half a dozen years.

Warner

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