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VMware Sued for Ripping Off Linux Kernel Source Code

posted by n1 on Friday March 06 2015, @10:19AM   Printer-friendly
from the lawyers-already-won dept.

"gewg_" writes:

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.

 
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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday March 06 2015, @11:46PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday March 06 2015, @11:46PM (#154002)

    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

    by Arik (4543) on Saturday March 07 2015, @12:47AM (#154014) Journal
    "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."

    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?