Symbian releases microkernel

Posted Oct 24, 2009 18:16 UTC (Sat) by rahvin (guest, #16953)
In reply to: Symbian releases microkernel by quotemstr
Parent article: Symbian releases microkernel

My comment was probably over the line but I don't like Symbian. They trolled against Linux and the GPL for half a dozen years. When Linux finally started to hurt them they sell out to Nokia and then they "embraced" open source while continuing to troll the GPL and Linux. Symbian has never been a friend of the OSS community. Nokia buying them might eventually neutralize them but they have a long way to go to earn my trust that they aren't a danger to the community. I would question any donation of code from them as a possible subversive attempt to sink copyrighted code into the kernel.

Symbian releases microkernel

Posted Oct 25, 2009 7:10 UTC (Sun) by imcdnzl (guest, #28899) [Link] (8 responses)

Remember that the code is now looked after by Symbian Foundation, not Symbian and that this is a completely different company. We (Symbian Foundation) were donated the code by Nokia, Sony Ericsson and NTT DoCoMo.

We are a not for profit, under a limited by guarantee structure (i.e. no shareholders).

Nokia themselves seem to have "got" open source, having donated us the code and also opened up Qt far more (which incidentally allows us to put Qt on the phone which is currently in beta)

Symbian releases microkernel

Posted Oct 25, 2009 7:44 UTC (Sun) by mjg59 (subscriber, #23239) [Link] (7 responses)

In the absence of any profit-related motives, what was the reasoning behind choosing a license that makes it effectively impossible to use any of the Symbian kernel code in any existing open-source kernel projects?

Symbian releases microkernel

Posted Oct 25, 2009 9:13 UTC (Sun) by deucalion (guest, #12904) [Link] (6 responses)

It is more business friendly. (See also: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eclipse_Public_License#Other... )

Even though the Symbian Foundation is a non-profit, in order to sustain long term existance a good combination of a opensource community and business partners (foundation members) is needed.

A good working example for this is the Eclipse Foundation, working with a similar "business model" (for the lack of a better word - eventhough it's non-profit and meant for better collaboration and development):
- allow independent as well as
- funded development while allowing both
- businesses to use the source in their products incorporating their own intellectual property as well as
- independent parties to use their source.

Symbian releases microkernel

Posted Oct 25, 2009 14:24 UTC (Sun) by rahulsundaram (subscriber, #21946) [Link] (3 responses)

"Business friendly" and being friendly to proprietary licensing is not the same thing. Permissive licenses enable certain business models but hinders certain other business models such as dual licensing. Whether dual licensing is a good model is a separate debate but I just wanted to note that since I see that confusion quite often.

Symbian releases microkernel

Posted Oct 25, 2009 14:37 UTC (Sun) by deucalion (guest, #12904) [Link] (2 responses)

I use proprietary licensing as a connotation of business friendly in this context because it is the most common way to make money through software. I'm however aware of the fact that it doesn't necessarily mean the same thing.

But... admittedly, deciding which business and legal model makes most sense is a different discussion.

Symbian releases microkernel

Posted Oct 26, 2009 20:23 UTC (Mon) by martinfick (subscriber, #4455) [Link] (1 responses)

No, the most common way to make money through software is to use the software to run a business, regardless of which license it is under.

Your statement was likely intended to be: "I use proprietary licensing as a connotation of business friendly in this context because it is the most common way to make money BY SELLING software LICENSES." But, by wording it that way, it makes it somewhat obvious that it is somewhat of a circular reason. If I completely miss-interpreted what you meant, please do clarify.

Symbian releases microkernel

Posted Oct 26, 2009 20:46 UTC (Mon) by deucalion (guest, #12904) [Link]

Please excuse my ambiguous wording - your interpretation is spot on.
Thanks!

Symbian releases microkernel

Posted Oct 25, 2009 17:28 UTC (Sun) by pboddie (guest, #50784) [Link] (1 responses)

- allow independent as well as
- funded development while allowing both
- businesses to use the source in their products incorporating their own intellectual property as well as
- independent parties to use their source.

Even if you'd written that as a normal sentence, rather than as a "business-friendly" set of bullet-points, you could still plug the GPL into those criteria and get the green light. What you really mean, of course, is that the EPL allows people to redistribute the code without revealing their own sources and - an area dear to Symbian's heart, I'm sure - without agreeing to not sue various people over patents.

Symbian releases microkernel

Posted Oct 29, 2009 19:26 UTC (Thu) by lysse (guest, #3190) [Link]

Do you mean Nokia's heart?