Microsoft's position isn't anti-open-source, it's against their competitors (esp. GPL)
Microsoft's position isn't anti-open-source, it's against their competitors (esp. GPL)
Posted Aug 13, 2007 20:18 UTC (Mon) by epa (subscriber, #39769)In reply to: Microsoft's position isn't anti-open-source, it's against their competitors (esp. GPL) by dwheeler
Parent article: Two Microsoft licenses submitted for OSI approval
Yes Windows includes the TCP/IP stack taken from BSD, but it is rather a stretch to call it open source code. Microsoft doesn't include the source code and doesn't provide any way for you to change the code and run your own changed version, let alone share it with others. An unchangeable binary blob doesn't really fit the open source definition, whatever the evolutionary origin of the code.
OTOH, as you say, Microsoft has made true open source software. On the other hand, they have taken deliberate measures to hamper open source, such as claiming to document information about Windows network protocols (to satisfy European Union antitrust regulators) while putting it behind a licence agreement that specifically excluded GPLed implementations.
Posted Aug 14, 2007 0:51 UTC (Tue)
by brouhaha (subscriber, #1698)
[Link] (2 responses)
Free Software, on the other hand, is based on licenses that require the preservation of freedom, and don't allow third parties to turn it proprietary.
Posted Aug 14, 2007 2:23 UTC (Tue)
by josh (subscriber, #17465)
[Link]
Both copyleft licenses (such as the GPL) and non-copyleft licenses (such as the BSD licenses) qualify as both Open Source and Free Software.
Posted Aug 14, 2007 2:28 UTC (Tue)
by stevenj (guest, #421)
[Link]
Um, no. This is the different between a copyleft license (e.g. the GPL) and a non-copyleft permissive license (e.g. the X11 license). Software under both types of license are considered free software and open source by the Free Software Foundation and the Open Source Initiative, respectively.
Posted Aug 15, 2007 14:15 UTC (Wed)
by gdt (subscriber, #6284)
[Link] (5 responses)
Yes Windows includes the TCP/IP stack taken from BSD... For the record, Microsoft say that this has not been true since 1994. By my count Microsoft claim to have completely re-written the TCP/IP implementation in its Windows operating systems three times since the original third-party but BSD-derived implementations in WfW and NT 3.1: NT 3.5 (NT4, 95, 98, Me), 2000 (Xp, 2003), Vista. "Completely" might be overstating things, since 2000 had some bugs in its design choices which were shared by earlier BSDs. The implementation in Vista appears to be very different to previous implementations (and much better too).
Posted Aug 16, 2007 9:03 UTC (Thu)
by tialaramex (subscriber, #21167)
[Link] (4 responses)
* NO Windows doesn't include a BSD-derived TCP/IP stack and NO they didn't just snip the copyright messages off. NO the BONE TCP/IP stack that was never officially shipped yet somehow seems to be on a lot of BeOS systems isn't BSD-derived either, and NO that wouldn't make it legal to copy it anyway.
* NO the X window system doesn't send everything via TCP/IP networking when you run software locally. NO other systems don't, on the whole, build the GUI into the OS kernel, and NO X wouldn't go "a lot faster" if you ripped the support for network transparency out.
* NO Bill Gates never said that about 640K of memory. NO it's not in "some book" you read unless it's a misquote in that book too. NO it isn't clever to just make up quotes in order to poke fun at someone you don't like.
* NO Linux did not start out as a "server OS" unless suddenly student university digs are server rooms and reading Usenet is a server activity. NO it wasn't "designed for" servers either, except in the sense that your servers happen to be i386 hardware, much like my desktop.
I'm sure there are dozens more, at least...
Posted Aug 16, 2007 17:20 UTC (Thu)
by dwheeler (guest, #1216)
[Link] (1 responses)
Well, that depends on the definition of "stack". There's BSD-derived code in Windows for implementing TCP/IP. A trivial hunt on Windows XP with "strings" showed that \WINDOWS\System32\nslookup.exe includes "Berkeley" (I'm sure there's more, but I only need one example for the point).
And this is OKAY; the Berkeley licenses explicitly PERMIT reuse.
Posted Aug 29, 2007 19:34 UTC (Wed)
by tialaramex (subscriber, #21167)
[Link]
Note that I didn't write "network stack" or "operating system stack" which might arguably include such independent programs, but only the TCP/IP stack. Maybe that's nitpicking.
Posted Aug 16, 2007 19:19 UTC (Thu)
by bronson (subscriber, #4806)
[Link] (1 responses)
Cite your source? The BeOS networking stack most certainly WAS derived from BSD. I have the evidence sitting on an old dual 603e BeBox in my garage.
Posted Aug 29, 2007 19:48 UTC (Wed)
by tialaramex (subscriber, #21167)
[Link]
Howard Berkey, who actually worked on the project, said several times that the BONE stack was not BSD-derived. If he lied then Be's successors in interest stand to be sued for copyright infringement for stripping the BSD copyright notices. The authors would certainly be interested in your evidence, if in fact it exists.
As to the net_server stack, I don't think anyone ever cared how Be Inc developed that, whatever they did was mind-blowingly stupid, its performance is wretched compared even to other userspace TCP/IP offerings.
Microsoft's position isn't anti-open-source, it's against their competitors (esp. GPL)
Yes Windows includes the TCP/IP stack taken from BSD, but it is rather a stretch to call it open source code.
Au contraire, that's a perfect example of the difference between "Open Source" and "Free Software". Open Source allows users to do almost anything they like with it, other than removing copyright notices. That includes turning it proprietary. Thus Microsoft's use of BSD code is fully within the Open Source paradigm. The original BSD code is still Open Source, but Microsoft's derived code is not.
Those terms do not mean what you think they mean.Microsoft's position isn't anti-open-source, it's against their competitors (esp. GPL)
Totally untrue
Open Source allows users to do almost anything they like with it, other than removing copyright notices. [...] Free Software, on the other hand, is based on licenses that require the preservation of freedom, and don't allow third parties to turn it proprietary.
Microsoft's position isn't anti-open-source, it's against their competitors (esp. GPL)
Yeah, this particular mis-information really needs to go away. Someone ought to compile a generic list of IT forum myths so that every time a newbie says "I heard..." or "Isn't it true..." they can get a one day time out and a pointer to the list of myths. Not so much here on LWN but in general technology forums where the same myths come up over and over.Microsoft's position isn't anti-open-source, it's against their competitors (esp. GPL)
"NO Windows doesn't include a BSD-derived TCP/IP stack and NO they didn't just snip the copyright messages off."
Anti-Myths: Actually, Windows DOES use some BSD code
The only BSD-derived code is in assorted utilities and examples like this. Most of them are obsolete (nslookup is considered broken by design, FTP is hopelessly insecure, as is telnet) and are included because they're small and Microsoft has learned that removing even the most insignificant feature from their products causes people to accuse them of "downgrading".Anti-Myths: Actually, Windows DOES use some BSD code
> NO the BONE TCP/IP stack that was never officially shipped yet somehow seems to be on a lot of BeOS systems isn't BSD-derived eitherMicrosoft's position isn't anti-open-source, it's against their competitors (esp. GPL)
Given that you don't even seem to understand that Be Inc. had two different TCP/IP stacks, I doubt that you have any interesting "evidence".Microsoft's position isn't anti-open-source, it's against their competitors (esp. GPL)