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Softpanorama
(slightly skeptical)
Open Source Software Educational Society |
May the
source be with you,
but remember the KISS principle ;-)
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OSS in Developing Countries Bulletin, 2005
[Apr 06, 2005]
Comparing
Open Source Licenses GPL vs. BSDL
[Apr 06, 2005]
Schwartz swipes at the GPL Builder AU Program At Work "Imagine a
developing nation that elects to use free software in the construction of its
intellectual property and then finds that it has a rather predatory obligation
to give back all the intellectual property to the wealthiest nation in the world
that happens to be the author of the GPL," Schwartz said.
Schwartz singled out the GPL provision that
says source code may be mixed with other code only if the resultant code also
is governed by the GPL. That provision is intended to create a body of
software that must remain liberated from proprietary constraints. But Schwartz
said that some people he's spoken to dislike it because it precludes them from
using open source software as a foundation for proprietary projects.
"Economies and nations need intellectual
property (IP) to pull themselves up by their own bootstraps. I've talked to
developing nations, representatives from academia and manufacturing companies
that had begun to incorporate GPL software into their products, then... found
they had an obligation to deliver their IP back into the world," Schwartz
said.
The GPL purports to have freedom at its core,
but it imposes on its users "a rather predatory obligation to disgorge all
their IP back to the wealthiest nation in the world", the United States, where
the GPL originated, Schwartz said. "If you look at the difference between the
licence we elected to use and GPL, there are no obligations to economies or
universities or manufacturers that take the source code and embed it in [their
own] code."
[Apr 06, 2005]
Sun slams predatory GPL - Computeract!ve
In his most elaborate response yet to the
criticism Schwartz said the GPL is unfair and "predatory". The GPL requires
developers to publish all the code that they mix in with the original GPL
code, where the CDDL allows them to guard their work if they want to.
"Imagine a developing nation that elects to use
free software in the construction of its intellectual property and then finds
that is has a rather predatory obligation to give back all the intellectual
property to the wealthiest nation in the world that happens to be the author
of the GPL," Schwartz noted.
The GPL is wrongly used as a way force
developers to share their work because the creators have a hidden agenda of
forcing a social model on the world, the Sun executive claimed.
He described the authors of the GPL as
"individuals and companies that want to use intellectual property models to
define social models and economic models rather than intellectual property
models."
The controversy over the GLP has led to the
Open Source Initiative (OSI)to reform the system for using open source
code under licence. The latest version of the license, version 2, was released
in 1991.
Linux Pipeline Sun's Schwartz
Equates GPL With 'Colonialism'
Schwartz in particular targeted the General
Public License, used by many open-source initiatives, in a talk before 700
attendees of the Open Source Business Conference in San Francisco on Tuesday.
Under the GPL, developers are required to publish or "give back" their work to
the general community. Such licensing practices work to the advantage of the
United States, which already enjoys a technology lead over many parts of the
world, Schwartz said.
"I do not believe in intellectual-property
colonialism," he declared.
Sun took a sounder approach in using the
Mozilla Public License as the model for its Sun Community Development and
Distribution License, Schwartz said. The CDDL was created for OpenSolaris, the
open-source version of Sun's Unix operating system. Sun will make Solaris 10
available as open-source code sometime in the second quarter. The CDDL allows
proprietary products to be built on top of open-source code and allows a Third
World developer to produce a product for sale in the United States and
elsewhere.
Schwartz said he has talked to representatives
from academic institutions and developing countries that want the opportunity
to sell software they produce with open-source code. The GPL inflicts "a
rather predatory obligation to disgorge their IP [intellectual property] back
to the wealthiest nation in the world," the United States, he noted. Instead
of meeting such a requirement, poorer societies need the right to use
open-source code to "bootstrap" their own economic development, he said.
But not everyone agrees. On Wednesday at the
same conference, a supporter of Third World development, Lawrence Lessig, law
professor at Stanford University and founder of the school's Center for the
Internet and Society, expressed doubt that the GPL was a future source of
technological imperialism.
Lessig said he has discussed the issue with
Brazilians, and they were less concerned with the terms of open-source
licenses than with not having access to the technology at all. Members of the
Brazilian government told him Microsoft representatives have warned them that
open-source software costs more in total cost of ownership than Windows, he
said. The Brazilians told him, "We'd rather invest in a free-software
infrastructure. It buys commitment to Brazilian society, building up computing
expertise, as opposed to sending our capital abroad," Lessig said.
Schwartz swipes at the GPL - ZDNet UK News Schwartz correctly
noted that due to its anarchistic nature The GPL imposes a
'predatory obligation to disgorge IP back to the wealthiest nation in the world'
Schwartz singled out the GPL
provision that says source code may be mixed with other code only if the
resultant code also is governed by the GPL. That provision is intended to
create a body of software that must remain liberated from proprietary
constraints. But Schwartz said that some people he's spoken to dislike it
because it precludes them from using open source software as a foundation for
proprietary projects.
"Economies and nations need
intellectual property (IP) to pull themselves up by their own bootstraps. I've
talked to developing nations, representatives from academia and manufacturing
companies that had begun to incorporate GPL software into their products,
then... found they had an obligation to deliver their IP back into the world,"
Schwartz said.
The GPL purports to have
freedom at its core, but it imposes on its users "a rather predatory
obligation to disgorge all their IP back to the wealthiest nation in the
world", the United States, where the GPL originated, Schwartz said. "If you
look at the difference between the licence we elected to use and GPL, there
are no obligations to economies or universities or manufacturers that take the
source code and embed it in [their own] code."
[Jul 2005]
Top Tech News - Software - Sun's Jonathan Schwartz Slams Open-Source Licensing
Model Schwartz said the GPL "exports a form of IP colonialism to
nations seeking to create their own means of production" and demand that they
return their source code back to developed countries.
The GPL governs a significant number of projects in the open-source software
community. But its use is tantamount to economic imperialism, Schwartz believes.
In his speech, Schwartz said that the GPL expressly limits choice by
disallowing the inclusion of non-GPL code into GPL projects. He added that it
"exports a form of IP colonialism to nations seeking to create their own means
of production."
Those who use the GPL as a foundation for proprietary software dislike having
to give their intellectual property "back into the world," Schwartz said.
Unfolding Roadmap
As an alternative to the GPL, Schwartz praised the company's Community
Development and Distribution License (CDDL), a variant of the Mozilla Public
License.
Sun has already started using this license strategy with the release of
Solaris source code.
In addition to his GPL comments, Schwartz also addressed criticism
surrounding Sun's decision not to release
Java as open-source
software. The refusal to go with a proprietary scheme is to prevent Java from
forking, he noted.
License Department
Schwartz's comments illustrate the increasing complexity of licensing,
especially in the open-source realm, said
Yankee Group analyst Dana
Gardner.
"Not long ago, there were only a couple of open-source licenses," he said.
"Now, you've got many, and there are many more being created."
The result is that some companies will develop their own, as Sun has done, or
tweak existing licenses to suit their needs. Gardner praised Sun's willingness
to address the issue directly. But even with this kind of clarity, companies
should be ready for more confusion, rather than less.
"We're beginning to enter
Schwartz
Attacks GPL; Sun's Mention of "Stewardship" Has People Thinking of Java
At the inaugural Open Source Business Conference, which opened today in
San Francisco, Jonathan Schwartz has been giving a keynote. We bring here an
early on-the-spot report, written by former JDJ editor-in-chief and
LinuxWorld Magazine founding editor, Alan Williamson.
... ... ..
On the subject of Java, Schwartz also addressed
criticism of the alleged hypocrisy of Sun's message for not having released
Java under GPL.
He answered this criticism by asserting that the licensing of Java was not the
issue: Sun wants to keep Java from forking into different incompatible
versions, thus depriving the many companies that rely on Java as a standard of
their business opportunity.
Schwartz continued to discuss GPL,
issuing a cautionary warning regarding the use of this particular license
noting that Sun "believes in IP" but not in "IP colonialism." He talked about
how licenses imply an obligation and one must be very careful to read the
small print.
Finally Schwartz tailed off, talking
about how a product should be adopted because it's
better and not because it's free.
Sun Believes In IP But Not In IP Colonialism, Says Schwartz at Open Source
Conference @ JDJ
Schwartz Attacks
GPL; Sun's Mention of "Stewardship" Has People Thinking of Java
At the inaugural Open Source Business Conference, which opened today in
San Francisco, Jonathan Schwartz has been giving a keynote. We bring here an
early on-the-spot report, written by former JDJ editor-in-chief and
LinuxWorld Magazine founding editor, Alan Williamson.
Jonathan Schwartz, President and COO of Sun
Microsystems, today opened up the spring Open Source Business Conference (OSBC)
in San Francisco. The OSBC is aimed at the business side of the open source
ecosystem, with delegates ranging from a wide range of areas. It is fair to
characterize this community as comprising "influencers" or decision makers,
and it was to this audience profile that Schwartz pitched his keynote.
Schwartz opened up his discussion on
standards by noting historical success stories, examples of where
standards worked. For example the canal system in Victorian England with
their standard widths and lock sizes, through to the railroad system in the
US with its standard guage. By standardizing on a platform, more
opportunity was created.
In the first of many swipes at Microsoft (who
incidentally are co-sponsors of OSBC and will be speaking later on in the
day), Schwartz highlighted a story of Thomas Edison who initially attempted
to get his DC standard for electricity adopted instead of AC. He achieved
this by illustrating how unsafe AC was by "frying dogs and farm animals"
in the hope of promoting how safe DC was in comparison. Not much seems to
have changed in this modern economy!
Open Source, as far Schwartz is
concerned, is about lowering the barrier to entry and creating opportunity.
Just as telcos are giving away their mobile phones, Schwartz sees a day
where automobile manufacturers may give away cars to consumers to garner a
whole new suite of chargeable services. Again, hammering home the point that
free doesn't necessarily equate to "no revenue" but instead means "more
opportunity to create revenue."
Hot on the heels of the Sun's announcement of
OpenSolaris,
Schwartz made countless references to this as being "single largest
contribution to the open source world" any company had ever made. He
continued to address the concerns he had heard in the marketplace that Sun
was attempting to "steal away" customers from Linux, saying that on the
contrary Sun believes there is more than just one community, that many
communities exist and more are being generated; that a rising tide
floats all boats.
By contrast it was interesting to hear
Schwartz portray Sun as the all-embracing company. Contrary to many
historical keynotes when Sun and JBoss were locked in battle, Schwartz made
a number of references to JBoss as a shining example of open source in
action, both in terms of its business model and how it has utilized the open
standardization that Java has created.
On the subject of Java, Schwartz also
addressed criticism of the alleged hypocrisy of Sun's message for not having
released Java under GPL.
He answered this criticism by asserting that the licensing of Java was not
the issue: Sun wants to keep Java from forking into different incompatible
versions, thus depriving the many companies that rely on Java as a standard
of their business opportunity.
Schwartz continued to discuss GPL,
issuing a cautionary warning regarding the use of this particular license
noting that Sun "believes in IP" but not in "IP colonialism." He talked
about how licenses imply an obligation and one must be very careful to read
the small print.
Finally Schwartz tailed off, talking
about how a product should be adopted because
it's better and not because it's free.
Free Software Magazine - When free meets proprietaryThree free applications on proprietary systems, three proprietary
applications on free systems. Published on paper in: April, 2005 (will be free on the
15th of May, 2005 )
By Daniel O. Escasa
In a dream world, all software would be free. However, we spend enough time
with our eyes open to realize that some situations call for proprietary
software, either as a desktop or as a server application, on a free system. On
the other hand, those stuck with a proprietary operating system can still
enjoy free software applications. This article will list a few situations
where free software and proprietary software can mix, and give three examples
of each.
Why free and proprietary can mix
Examine this scenario: your company is moving your servers over to a free
system. The trouble is, you have an Oracle database that’s been running for x
years and it’s tweaked so perfectly you can’t afford the time and effort to
scrub it and migrate to a free relational database management system (RDBMS).
Rest easy: Oracle is available on free systems, albeit certified only on
certain distributions.
Another scenario: your company policy is free systems on desktops, with a
few selected exceptions. You’re one of the poor sods who pass the Free-OS
exemption test because of some esoteric application not available on free
systems. However, your company can’t afford a license for MS Office, and you
do need a Microsoft file-compatible word processor, presentation-authoring
tool, or spreadsheet. OpenOffice.org to the rescue.
Situations such as those above are not limited to corporate desktops. Your
home PC might have an important proprietary application that doesn’t have any
free counterpart. You can’t resort to dual-boot because that just takes too
much time. So, you can run an emulator on a free system to run that
proprietary application. In an extreme case – e.g., your software won’t run in
an emulator – you might be forced into Windows but choose to run mostly free
applications.
You’re one of the poor sods who pass the Free-OS exemption
test because of some esoteric application not available on free systems.
OpenOffice.org to the rescue
For this article's purposes, treatment of proprietary systems will be
limited to Windows 9x/ME/NT/2K because they’re the dominant platforms. Other
proprietary systems are OS/2, BeOS, and MacOS X, and most free software
applications for Windows are available for them as well. I will define free
systems as GNU/Linux and the BSDs and I will refer to them as “Freenix” for
convenience.
Free software on proprietary systems
The OpenOffice.org suite and the Firefox Web browser are the most prominent
free software applications on proprietary systems. In addition, server
applications such as Apache, MySQL, and PostgreSQL are also available for
Windows.
OpenOffice.org began life as
StarOffice, an office suite by a German company named Star Division.
StarOffice was available for Windows, OS/2 (up to version 5.2), and Unix. Sun
Microsystems bought StarOffice in August 1999 and subsequently opened up the
source code to the community. The result was OpenOffice.org, now at version
1.1.4 for all available platforms – which include Windows, OS/2 (for a fee),
and Freenix. OpenOffice.org includes a full-featured word processor,
presentation-authoring tool, spreadsheet, and drawing tool. It is nearly 100%
file-compatible with MS Office.
-
-
OpenOffice.org Writer
As an aside, StarOffice, now at version 7, is still available for Windows,
GNU/Linux, and Solaris, for a suggested retail price of US$79.95. However,
academic use is free except for shipping and handling. In addition, Sun also
offers site licenses. Lastly, there’s an electronic download available for
US$59.95. StarOffice has all the components of OpenOffice.org, and adds a
simple database manager. The Sun FAQ claims that SO and OpenOffice.org share
the same code.
The Mozilla suite includes a Web browser, chat client,
newsgroup reader, POP/IMAP client, HTML composer, and the Jabberzilla
multi-protocol IM client
Firefox is a child of the
Mozilla
project which also produced its bigger brother the Mozilla suite. The latter
includes a Web browser, chat client, newsgroup reader, POP/IMAP client, HTML
composer, and the Jabberzilla multi-protocol instant messaging (IM) client.
Firefox is a stand-alone browser, now at version 1.0, available for the same
platforms as Mozilla and OpenOffice.org. Like the advertising-sponsored Opera
and the Mozilla browser, Firefox employs tabbed browsing. This means that you
can browse several pages in different panes within the same window, and switch
from one pane to another by clicking on the tabs at the top of the panes.
-
-
Firefox in full-screen mode. Note the tabs at the top of the viewing
area
The most exciting feature for me is the use of the XML User-interface
Language (XUL, pronounced zool to rhyme with ‘cool’) to create extensions,
which as the name implies, extend the features of Firefox. The one I find most
useful is WebmailCompose, which converts a mailto: link to a link to my
selected Webmail account’s compose window. In other words, when I click on a
mailto: link, a new tab opens up where I can compose a mail message from gmail.
Also, here’s an
interesting sample XUL application that should give you some idea of XUL’s
capabilities. A real-world application is the Wizz RSS News Reader, which uses
the sidebar as the control panel. I personally find XUL interesting because it
looks to be one of the building blocks in creating a class of applications
known as Rich Internet Applications (RIAs), which use the browser as a
universal front end.
The Web server we know as Apache, officially the Apache HTTP server, is the
most famous output of the
Apache Software
Foundation. Apache serves approximately 67% of the world’s websites. It is
now at version 2, available both for Windows and free systems. A 2.1 version
is, as of this writing, in beta.
Free desktop software on Windows can make sense, depending on the
situation. However, I personally question the usefulness of running free
server software on Windows. They run more efficiently on free systems, which
in turn can run on older – and therefore, cheaper – hardware. I would only run
a free server on Windows for experimention and education not for production.
Proprietary software on free systems
Vendors of proprietary software have made their products available on free
systems for one reason or another.
Oracle,
for instance, saw GNU/Linux as an opportunity to expand their market. Some
applications –
Opera and
VMWare, to name two – were available on
free systems from the start, and it was natural for the latter.
Oracle created a stir in the industry when they announced the availability,
sometime in 1998, of their database products on GNU/Linux. According to the
Oracle-on-Linux FAQ, the following are the certified and supported
distributions:
-
Red Hat Enterprise Linux AS and ES
-
SUSE LINUX Enterprise Server
-
Asianux 1.0, which includes Red Flag DC 4.1 Asianux Inside and Miracle
Linux 3.0 Asianux Inside
-
UnitedLinux 1.0
This is not to say that Oracle won’t run on other GNU/Linux distributions,
or on the BSDs, just that Oracle can’t certify and support all of those
systems.
The FAQ adds that “All key Oracle products including Oracle Database 10g
with Real Application Clusters, Oracle Application Server 10g, Oracle
Collaboration Suite, Oracle Developer Suite 10g, and Oracle E-Business Suite
are available for Linux.” Those of you who run Oracle know the details of
those products better than I do. Oracle distributes these in no-fee 650MByte .gz
(gzip’ed) files. Those of you without the bandwidth can order a CD from Oracle
for a minimal handling fee. Pricing takes effect only when you deploy a
database, and starts at about US$49 per user, and moves into per-CPU rates
depending on the application.
Oracle has the reputation for being the choice for enterprise-class
databases. However, free RDBMSes are encroaching on this space. The two most
popular ones are MySQL and PostgreSQL, both of which were mentioned earlier.
As an aside, MySQL also has a paid-support license option which – need I
remind you? – does not detract from its being free software.
VMWare is a software implementation of a virtual machine – i.e., it enables
applications from other operating systems to run on the target machine. Thus,
in MS Windows, VMWare will open up GNU/Linux as a task on your Windows
desktop; on the other hand, VMWare will open up Windows as a task on your
Freenix X desktop. And, once you have Windows-on-X, you can run most Windows
applications. However, graphic-intensive games, such as Duke Nukem or Far Cry,
will run far too slowly – if at all – to be playable. Feedback from users
indicates that Microsoft Office will run under VMWare, albeit at a slight
speed penalty.
Once you have Windows-on-X, you can run most Windows
applications. However, graphic-intensive games will run far too slowly – if at
all – to be playable
VMWare is available as a no-fee download in .tar.gz (tar’ed, then gzip’ed)
format. You are free to try it out for 30 days, after which the program dies
unless you purchase a license: the workstation edition is US$189 for
electronic delivery, US$199 for packaged. Network licenses are also available,
starting at US$1,694 for two CPUs.
-
VMWare’s web site
If the licensing fees are too steep for you, there are several free
software options –
wine(Wine is Not an
Emulator) and
bochs. The setup for
these may not be as smooth as VMWare’s though. I, for one, never got my wine
working on my FreeBSD box, although I admit that maybe I didn’t try hard
enough, since it wasn’t a priority. On the other hand, it is free software.
Opera is a no-fee download, and you can continue using it for as long as
you want, although you’ll have to put up with ads that take up the top portion
of the task window. US$39 gets rid of those ads. Opera claims to be the
“safest and fastest full-featured Web browser on the market.” People who have
tried both Firefox and Opera confirm that Opera is faster. However, the
consensus was that Firefox adhered more closely to W3C standards than Opera.
Besides, Firefox is free software, whereas Opera’s source isn’t even available
to begin with.
Other proprietary software available on Freenix are Sun’s StarOffice, Sun’s
Java, and IBM’s Websphere. Take note that, while Sun does make the source to
Java available, you aren’t free to modify it. As to IBM’s Websphere, it’s a
no-fee download like Oracle, and then you pay for deployment.
-
Opera’s web site
Conclusion
So, if you’re stuck in a proprietary system, don’t despair: you’re still
invited to the free software party because there are ports of free software.
Conversely, if you’re already enjoying free software bliss at the operating
system level, don’t knock proprietary software.
[May 5, 2005]
Why
the third world won’t save open source Between the Lines ZDNet.com
The primary barrier to Linux growth is the
cost of moving from a Windows ecosystem to a Linux ecosystem. Developing
nations, however, have less existing IT infrastructure. Much as African
nations are bypassing wired telecommunications and moving straight to
wireless, why can’t developing nations bypass the Windows standard and
grow a Linux ecosystem?
First, don’t underestimate the
installed IT base present in developing nations. Nations such as
Brazil aren’t Zaire. Per capita GDP in Brazil is six times that of China,
and over half of the Czech Republic. The IT base in most nations isn’t
exactly a tabula rasa, and any large organization will have already built
up credible amounts of IT infrastructure.
Second, consider why English is the de
facto language of business. Given the need to communicate in business
situations, people naturally gravitate towards one language, and for
historical reasons, that language is English. It doesn’t matter whether an
economy newly integrated into the global marketplace has less of a track
record of using English. They will use English in business situations,
because that’s what the wider business world is using.
The same principle applies in computer
technology. Asians outnumber Westerners by a factor of 4 to 1.
Still, the West will remain a critical market for the forseeable future,
and having systems that integrate seamlessly with, and can consume
products created by, Western corporations will continue to be important.
That means Asian IT infrastructure is likely to mirror Western IT
infrastructure.
Some think that third world nations’
enthusiasm for open source, driven in part by a desire to replace IT
imports with domestic product (a form of IT industrial policy), will
change the equation and pull the Western world into open source nirvana.
Unfortunately, such industrial policies don’t have a great track record of
success.
Dana Blankenhorn wondered aloud in a
recent blog
post whether Brazil’s commitment to open source might "jump-start
profitable businesses." He also noted, interestingly enough, the
disastrous consequences of Brazil’s last industrial scheme:
In the 1980s the country instituted a
market reserve policy aimed at limiting PC imports. This proved
disastrous. The country missed 15 years of progress.
The goal, of course, was to replace PC
imports with domestically created product. Unfortunately, hiding domestic
companies from foreign competition merely makes weak domestic companies
that can’t survive without government preferences. I don’t see why
replacing the last system of preferences with a new system of preferences
will fare any better
The open source community
can’t look to the developing world as the tugboat that drags the developed
world into the Linux port. They will need
to figure out a way to convince the developed world to adopt Linux. In my
entirely fallible opinion, the only way to do that is to lower the cost of
shifting to Linux, and that’s going to depend on
making it easy for Windows
developers to move into open source. If the open source community
doesn’t want to do that, then Windows developers aren’t going to move, and
that means the people who use their products will stay put, too.
Copyright © 1996-2008 by Dr. Nikolai Bezroukov.
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