FE package kernel module guidelines and openafs

[Greg DeKoenigsberg]

Here I refer to the Red Hat Patent Promise.  The licenses that we 
enumerate here are the licenses that Red Hat counsel considers to be 
"friendly".  

http://www.redhat.com/legal/patent_policy.html

Approved License means any of the following licenses: GNU General Public 
License v2.0; IBM Public License v1.0; Common Public License v0.5; Q 
Public License v1.0; Open Software License v1.1; and any open source 
license granted by Red Hat. Red Hat may add to this list in its sole 
discretion by publication on this page.

The IBM Public License is specifically included here.  I believe that any
license under which we *encourage community development under our own
patents* can certainly be included in Fedora Extras.

--g

_____________________  ____________________________________________
  Greg DeKoenigsberg ] [ the future masters of technology will have
 Community Relations ] [ to be lighthearted and intelligent.  the
             Red Hat ] [ machine easily masters the grim and the 
                     ] [ dumb.  --mcluhan

On Thu, 24 Feb 2005, Matthew Miller wrote:

> There'd been some discussion earlier about getting my OpenAFS packages for
> Fedora into Extras. (They're at <http://www.mattdm.org/misc/openafs/>.)
> 
> The new package guidelines state: 
> 
>   Also, keep in mind that kernel modules without source code, or licensed
>   with anything other than GPL or LGPL licenses do not belong in Fedora Core
>   or Fedora Extras.
> 
> OpenAFS is open source, using an OSI-approved license -- the IBM Public
> License -- which is not GPL compatible.
> 
> Does this mean that getting OpenAFS into Extras isn't something worth even
> bothering with?
> 
> 
>   But I do not want to force it on people that arguably are _not_ doing
>   derived work (it would be rather preposterous to call the Andrew
>   FileSystem a "derived work" of linux, for example, so I think it's
>   perfectly ok to have a AFS module, for example).
> 
>    -- Linus Torvalds
>    <http://groups-beta.google.com/group/gnu.misc.discuss/msg/d5af1cc0012c3bec>
> 
> And that was before the module was actually open source. Now, it sure would
> have been nice if IBM would have chosen to make the code GPL'd. But it
> isn't, yet it is open source code which many people around the world rely
> on. 
> 
> I know there are all sorts of legal and religious issues here; mainly I want
> to know: is working with Fedora Extras on this worth my time, or a waste of
> it?
> 
> 
> -- 
> Matthew Miller           mattdm at mattdm.org        <http://www.mattdm.org/>
> Boston University Linux      ------>                <http://linux.bu.edu/>
> 
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