ZFS on Ubuntu Violates GPLv2 According to SFC
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Canonical has been talking up the inclusion of OpenZFS in its upcoming Ubuntu 16.04 release. But, of course, other Linux distros have avoided this package in the past on legal licensing grounds. The SFC, the organization that controls the GPL, says that the inclusion of the ZFS filesystem, licensed under Oracle's CDDL, is a violation of the GPL. This should have been expected as the CDDL has kept ZFS and OpenZFS out of Linux distribution already for more than a decade. The move by Ubuntu was a bit surprising given this decade old, dead horse licensing issue.
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I was wondering why no one was talking about the elephant in the room.
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@scottalanmiller said:
I was wondering why no one was talking about the elephant in the room.
They're all riding on top of it and don't see it. It's a big elephant, apparently.
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This seems like a massive oversight. It can't possibly be intentional, correct?
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It probably wont matter anyway. It will be so slow that no one will be able to use it
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@wirestyle22 said:
This seems like a massive oversight. It can't possibly be intentional, correct?
Well, the move is intentional, no question there. Canonical has said that they are aware. Canonical claims that they are not in violation and that the licenses are compatible. SFC claims, and has for over a decade, that the two are incompatible.
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@scottalanmiller said:
@wirestyle22 said:
This seems like a massive oversight. It can't possibly be intentional, correct?
Well, the move is intentional, no question there. Canonical has said that they are aware. Canonical claims that they are not in violation and that the licenses are compatible. SFC claims, and has for over a decade, that the two are incompatible.
Do you think this inclusion is worth a legal battle should one ensue?
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@wirestyle22 said:
Do you think this inclusion is worth a legal battle should one ensue?
Hard to say, it's a marketing ploy. How much it convinces people based on the Cult of ZFS thing, is unknown. ZFS has a quite religious following, no real technical reason to exist on Linux, so Canonical's play here is to attract that crowd. Whether it is worth it or not, hard to say.
