Stallman on GCC, LLVM, and copyleft
Stallman on GCC, LLVM, and copyleft
Posted Jan 29, 2014 9:33 UTC (Wed) by khim (subscriber, #9252)In reply to: Stallman on GCC, LLVM, and copyleft by Del-
Parent article: Stallman on GCC, LLVM, and copyleft
Rob, you mentioned Apple going away from GPL over version 3. From what I have seen this not correct.Just what are your talking about? Apple was not happy with GPLv2 but accepted it and compiled with it. Kicking and screaming but complied. GPLv3, on the other hand was banned outright (that's why Apple used GCC 4.2 for years till LLVM was more-or-less ready, that's why it still uses bash 3.x, etc).
Posted Jan 29, 2014 12:06 UTC (Wed)
by Del- (guest, #72641)
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This is where we see the historic events differently I believe. I don't think Apple ever accepted GPLv2, or any other copy-left license. I believe it was only a matter of time before they moved over to alternatives. Moreover, I believe they would get rid of bash, WebCore and JavaScriptCore in a heartbeat if something like LLVM surfaced for it, or if the license creates an inconvenience of any sort. I have provided examples supporting that view, but you are of course free to reach another conclusion.
In any case, why does Apple's opinions weigh in on what restrictions we should put on licenses? When it became clear that Apple refuse GPL altogether from their app store, I took it as a clear sign. A signal that Apple no longer needs us, and now wants to get rid of us. If any , this has just reinforced my belief in the importance of copy-left. Remember Cicero and his "cui bono". These things matter, at least to me.
Posted Jan 30, 2014 0:04 UTC (Thu)
by landley (guest, #6789)
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Apple built MacOS X with gcc, and shipped gcc as the system's compiler, for most of a decade, through gcc version 4.2.1. Version 4.2.2 was the first one containing GPLv3 code, and Apple did not ship that version (or later versions) but instead remained on gcc 4.2 for the next 5 years, while sponsoring development of a replacement until said replacement could take over:
http://caiustheory.com/install-gcc-421-apple-build-56663-...
But feel free to see these historic events differently.
Rob
Posted Jan 30, 2014 0:23 UTC (Thu)
by nix (subscriber, #2304)
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Posted Jan 30, 2014 11:11 UTC (Thu)
by Del- (guest, #72641)
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I have tried to dig into the events surrounding GCC and LLVM to understand what went on, and the most I have found is Chris Lattner's posts on the GCC mailing list. Chris is still active on said mailing list, so he may or may not be able to confirm or correct my perception.
First up two mails proposing LLVM as an optimizer for GCC:
In any case, it is very easy to agree that Apple strongly dislikes the GPLv3 on general grounds. Both the patent part (they don't seem very fond of any license providing any sort of patent protection, copy-left or not) and the anti-Tivotization part.
Still, following the webkit story evolving from 2001, ending up with only minimal parts having the original LGPL license, the rest having a BSD license. Moreover, the BSD parts opened up a full four years later. To me at least, it seems quite clear that Apple did not like copy-left long before GPLv3 came about (and quite frankly I cannot see how anybody reach another conclusion). This also leads me to the conclusion that they may very well have made their own compiler out of LLVM regardless of GPLv3. The fact that they stopped contributing after GCC 4.2 seems clearly related to v3, but they may very well have stopped at 4.5 or something if v3 never came about. Actually, with the kind of resources that came into Apple's hands during the last decade, my only surprise was that they continued contributing under copy-left as long as they did.
I understand that there is a lot of emotions around this issue, so it quickly becomes personal, at least for some. For me it is actually a reality I need to figure out. Licensing matters if you want successful projects, where I believe Linus made the prime example of (yes I know some argue that copy-left had little to do with it, but I have now idea how one can reach such a conclusion).
I feel that I have come more or less to the bottom of the patent clause in GPLv3, and it really puts a rather strange light on many of the discussions. I think it is very helpful to think through the "cui bono" on that.
On the tivotization clause, the most interesting information I have found is actually from Upstart's mailing list. Upstart was licensed to GPLv3 in June 2009, and it made a lot of stuff crawl out of the wood work. Here is a reference: https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/upstart-devel/2009-June...
Stallman on GCC, LLVM, and copyleft
Stallman on GCC, LLVM, and copyleft
> I don't think Apple ever accepted GPLv2, or any other copy-left license.
Stallman on GCC, LLVM, and copyleft
Stallman on GCC, LLVM, and copyleft
http://gcc.gnu.org/ml/gcc/2005-11/msg00888.html
http://gcc.gnu.org/ml/gcc/2005-11/msg01112.html
To me it seemed the sentiment was rather positive in all camps. However, the copyright transfer seems to never happen, and this is the latest I found on that issue:
http://gcc.gnu.org/ml/gcc/2006-03/msg00706.html
This was now four months later. It may of course be that the early work on GPLv3 had something to do with it, but if so, I saw no hint of it. It seems to me that the process never came past the copyright transfer agreements.
it does give support to those who see GPLv3 anti-Tivo clause as a problematic point for embedded vendors. Note for instance that Cisco seems to be OK with GPLv3 as long as it is not in the more critical parts of the OS (with critical I assume boot-loader, init-system and kernel counts). You will find a number of the sponsors of linux foundation on the concerned parties, so I assume linux was under as least as much pressure to not go with GPLv3.