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El Reg reports:
Linux kernel developer Christoph Hellwig has sued VMware in Hamburg, Germany, over alleged violations of the GNU General Public License.
Hellwig's suit, which is backed by New York advocacy group the Software Freedom Conservancy, alleges that VMware's proprietary ESXi hypervisor products use portions of the code that Hellwig wrote for the Linux kernel, in violation of the terms of version 2 of the GPL.
"In addition to other ways VMware has not complied with the requirements of the GPL," the Conservancy wrote in a blog post on Wednesday, "Conservancy and Hellwig specifically assert that VMware has combined copyrighted Linux code, licensed under GPLv2, with their own proprietary code called 'vmkernel' and distributed the entire combined work without providing nor offering complete, corresponding source code for that combined work under terms of the GPLv2."
This isn't the first time Hellwig has made such claims. He first accused VMware of violating the GPL in 2006 via the Linux Kernel Mailing List, even threatening to sue. It now seems that the proverbial other shoe has finally dropped.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by LoRdTAW on Friday March 06 2015, @02:39PM
It's a mixed bag. If I wrote code that I wanted to give away, I would want everyone to benefit from it indefinitely. That is why the GPL is appealing. I can write code and be assured that no one can run with it and never contribute back. Of course many BSD based derivatives contribute back but there is no guarantee. It's based on an honour system that can be terminated at any time. At least the GPL keeps beneficiaries in check and ensures they give back.
(Score: 4, Informative) by Arik on Friday March 06 2015, @04:59PM
Anyone that does not object to E^3 treatment of Free Software should prefer the BSD license, anyone that does not wish to see that happen should prefer the GPL.
If laughter is the best medicine, who are the best doctors?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday March 06 2015, @11:46PM
I oversee the team in my company that pulls in all open source software for internal use. We're a large company, one of the largest on wall street, and employ a staggering number of programmers.
GPL is an irritating library for us. We do not decide to give code back to software because it is GPL, instead we just don't allow people to use GPL'd works in ways that would, even potentially, obligate us to give code to a third party.
I'm not saying businesses don't exist that exploit the GPL for EEE, but the practical view of the matter should always keep in mind that some companies will not participate as heavily in GPL'd software communities because of copyleft. We've given a large amount of code back and most of it to Apache/BSD style projects.
(Score: 3, Informative) by Arik on Saturday March 07 2015, @12:47AM
Good, then it's working as it should. If you are not willing to assume the obligations, you should not use the code, and you are not the intended recipient of the code. The intended recipient is that startup that is about to eat your lunch by offering your customers a better deal. And the sooner they do that the better.
If laughter is the best medicine, who are the best doctors?
(Score: 4, Funny) by isostatic on Friday March 06 2015, @07:16PM
That is why the GPL is appealing. I can write code and be assured that no one can run with it and never contribute back
No you can't. I take GPL code all the time, modify it, and never contribute back. I have no need to, unless I distribute the modifications. If I do that, then I have to distribute the changes to the code too, and people laugh at how bad my programming is, and I get upset. So I don't distribute the modifications.
(Score: 2) by TheRaven on Monday March 09 2015, @09:11AM
sudo mod me up