Xen becomes a Linux Foundation project

[Posted April 15, 2013 by corbet]

The Linux Foundation has announced that the Xen project has come under the Foundation's "collaborative project" umbrella. "The Xen Project is an open source virtualization platform licensed under the GPLv2 with a similar governance structure to the Linux kernel. Designed from the start for cloud computing, the project has more than a decade of development and is being used by more than 10 million users. As the project experiences contributions from an increasingly diverse group of companies, it is looking to The Linux Foundation to be a neutral forum for providing guidance and facilitating a collaborative network."

Every project should find an appropriate non-profit home for it

Posted Apr 15, 2013 20:49 UTC (Mon) by bkuhn (subscriber, #58642) [Link] (4 responses)

The Xen Project inquired with Software Freedom Conservancy about possibly joining Conservancy, and in our discussions, it became clear that the best home for Xen would be a 501(c)(6) non-profit trade association (like Linux Foundation) rather than a 501(c)(3) non-profit charity (like Conservancy). Conservancy is delighted to see the news today that Xen found a new home at Linux Foundation and we wish the project well!

Conservancy's goal, in part, is to find the best possible non-profit home for every Free Software project. Sometimes the right home is a trade association, and Conservancy is happy that it was able to give advice to the Xen project about what home was best for it.

Every project should find an appropriate non-profit home for it

Posted Apr 15, 2013 22:59 UTC (Mon) by rahulsundaram (subscriber, #21946) [Link] (3 responses)

Do you have any public references on what type of things you consider in making such recommendations? That would be useful to know. If I have a project, I would rather read such recommendations upfront and apply to foundations which would fit me.

Every project should find an appropriate non-profit home for it

Posted Apr 16, 2013 18:33 UTC (Tue) by bkuhn (subscriber, #58642) [Link] (2 responses)

rahulsundaram wrote:

Do you have any public references on what type of things you consider in making such recommendations?

Actually, my colleague Tony Sebro (Conservancy's general counsel) is giving a talk that covers some of this tomorrow at the Linux Foundation Collaboration Summit. His slides are available and I'm going to try to record the talk.

Every project should find an appropriate non-profit home for it

Posted Apr 16, 2013 23:52 UTC (Tue) by josh (subscriber, #17465) [Link] (1 responses)

Interesting presentation, but it doesn't seem to address the original question that started this comment thread: what might motivate a project to choose a 501(c)(6) rather than a 501(c)(3) or vice versa?

Every project should find an appropriate non-profit home for it

Posted Apr 17, 2013 17:14 UTC (Wed) by bkuhn (subscriber, #58642) [Link]

josh asked:

what might motivate a project to choose a 501(c)(6) rather than a 501(c)(3) or vice versa?

I am worried I don't understand your question, because I think I can state the answer in one line: A project should chose a 501(c)(6) if the project seeks to be primarily controlled by a group of for-profit companies and develop the software toward their shared business interest. By contrast, a project should chose a 501(c)(3) if the project seems to be governed by a community whose primary interest is the public good, and wishes the software to be developed to benefit everyone in the entire public equally.

Since that answer is so simply stated, that's why I worry I am missing something here.

Xen becomes a Linux Foundation project

Posted Apr 15, 2013 22:36 UTC (Mon) by SEJeff (guest, #51588) [Link] (4 responses)

This seems kind of ironic. The upstream Linux "direction" appears to be quite polarized towards KVM, but in typical OSS fashion, more is better. May the best hypervisor win!

Xen becomes a Linux Foundation project

Posted Apr 16, 2013 0:12 UTC (Tue) by flewellyn (subscriber, #5047) [Link]

Or, alternatively, may they specialize towards particular niches and avoid direct competition. I've noticed that FOSS tends to evolve somewhat (though not entirely) like organisms. Direct competition tends not to last long, and similar projects tend to evolve towards niches that they fit best, avoiding directly competing with each other.

Of course, the analogy breaks down when you realize that software projects, unlike evolution, are directed by conscious design. Still, I've noticed a similar pattern.

Xen becomes a Linux Foundation project

Posted Apr 16, 2013 0:47 UTC (Tue) by aliguori (subscriber, #30636) [Link] (2 responses)

I think you'd be surprised how closely the KVM and Xen communities work together. There is a very large chunk of shared code (QEMU) and both projects now use qemu.git as their upstreams.

A lot of the kernel infrastructure is shared (paravirt_ops, pvclock, etc.). They're also fun guys to drink with at conferences :-)

I'm very happy they've found a home at Linux Foundation. Linux Foundation has been nothing but generous to KVM over the years and I hope the Xen folks have the same experience.

Xen becomes a Linux Foundation project

Posted Apr 16, 2013 11:41 UTC (Tue) by nicku (guest, #777) [Link]

They're also fun guys to drink with at conferences :-)

Please let me be there!

Xen becomes a Linux Foundation project

Posted Apr 16, 2013 13:22 UTC (Tue) by SEJeff (guest, #51588) [Link]

Glad to know that upstream kvm and xen are working together for the betterment of both projects. Thanks for cluing me in Anthony. Open source ftw!

Just an Observation

Posted Apr 20, 2013 14:53 UTC (Sat) by XERC (guest, #14626) [Link]

It would be nice, if the NetBeans became some Linux Foundation or Apache or similar project.

The problem with the NetBeans is that it deteriorates significantly under the Oracle stewardship.