Date: 14 Dec 2001 23:29:16 -0800 From: swear@blarg.net (Gary W. Swearingen) To: Greg Lehey <grog@FreeBSD.org> Cc: Brett Glass <brett@lariat.org>, chat@FreeBSD.org Subject: Re: IBM's intentions with JFS (was: IBM suing (was: RMS Suing was [SUGGESTION] - JFS for FreeBSD)) Message-ID: <0ln10l7xgz.10l@localhost.localdomain> In-Reply-To: <20011215113836.O85108@monorchid.lemis.com> References: <3C1875D6.5DE4F996@mindspring.com> <1id71idej9.71i@localhost.localdomain> <3C1875D6.5DE4F996@mindspring.com> <20011213051012.Y56723-100000@turtle.looksharp.net> <3C186381.6AB07090@yahoo.com> <3C1875D6.5DE4F996@mindspring.com> <3C186381.6AB07090@yahoo.com> <20011214122837.O3448@monorchid.lemis.com> <3C19807D.C441F084@mindspring.com> <4.3.2.7.2.20011214175450.02da2a90@localhost> <20011215113836.O85108@monorchid.lemis.com>
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Greg Lehey <grog@FreeBSD.org> writes:
> On Friday, 14 December 2001 at 17:58:44 -0700, Brett Glass wrote:
> > At 05:02 PM 12/14/2001, Greg Lehey wrote:
> >
> >> Correct. But there's this funny agreement that loading modules falls
> >> under the LGPL, not the GPL.
> >
> > Linux is licensed under a variant of the GPL that allows the linking
> > of modules and libraries that are not GPLed. This does not apply at
> > all to this case, in which the module WOULD be GPLed.
I've seen it both ways from people who should know, but I just looked
at the COPYING file in the top of a Linux 2.2.18 source tree and it is a
vanilla GPL with this at the top (separated by a "Linus Torvalds" above
a dashed line):
NOTE! This copyright does *not* cover user programs that use kernel
services by normal system calls - this is merely considered normal use
of the kernel, and does *not* fall under the heading of "derived work".
Also note that the GPL below is copyrighted by the Free Software
Foundation, but the instance of code that it refers to (the Linux
kernel) is copyrighted by me and others who actually wrote it.
I guess he must consider kernel module loading just another case of
kernel system calls. Makes good sense to me, but I think some people
aren't so agreeable, especially when the modules are shipped with the
kernel and are loaded during boot. (The kernel hackers don't really
qualify as "agreeable" either, since they make frivolous changes to the
kernel API so as to frequently break modules seemingly to "encourage"
closed-source module makers to hand the source over for maintenance.)
One could easily make the case that "COPYING" forms the language of the
license contract and not just the FSF stuff and the combination defines
a possibly non-standard (or at least a more precise) definition of
"derived work". I suspect the Linux people prefer to see it as pure GPL
with just some added "education", out of the legal arena.
> It's a similar situation. Whom should I ask for confirmation?
It seems the similarity depends on how people (and courts) view the
definition of "derivative". Loading a kernel module on a long-running
kernel wouldn't seem to make the kernel a derivative of the module.
How about during boot? How about if the kernel and module are
distributed on a CD ROM? How about in a filesystem in flash RAM? How
about in ROM? That seems essentially like a statically linked program.
I wouldn't count on getting a confirmation; just opinions.
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