Sun's Schwartz hints at GPLv3 for Solaris

Posted on 30 Jan 2006 at 17:46

The first draft of version 3 of the General Public License caused controversy last week when criticisms emerged on the Linux kernel mailing list from none other than Linus Torvalds.

But it appears version 3 has found some new friends, even if its old mates are now looking askance at it. Sun Microsystem's president Jonathan Schwartz wrote in his blog that he would consider 'the possibility of releasing Solaris (and potentially the entire Solaris Enterprise System), under dual open source licenses' - one of which would be GPLv3.

Sun created its own open source licence, the CDDL (Common Development and Distribution Licence), for its open-source version of its flagship platform Solaris. It specifically chose not to release it under the commonly used GPLv2 and says the CDDL is not compatible with the GPL - so code licensed under one cannot be used with code licensed under the other.

Schwartz says Sun is interested in the GPLv3 for a number of reasons: partly through developer and customer demand, and given the long and successful history of the GPL, there are large numbers of both who have already made their licence choice.

He also says Solaris technology will help drive forward GPL projects looking to achieve the same goals. 'Why recreate the wheel with technologies like dTrace and ZFS - or GRUB and Xen?' he asks.

Schwartz also suggest that the GPL might be the licence of choice for its Niagara hardware platform architecture.

It should be remembered that Schwartz is suggesting a dual licensing strategy, rather than doing away with the CDDL altogether.

First, Solaris is a platform containing intellectual property licensed from Unix company SCO, which has already said it wouldn't support a wholesale dumping of Unix IP into the GNU/Linux system.

Second, the CDDL facilitates the inclusion of proprietary IP code, which might be attractive - even necessary - for some customers.

But by the same token, this could hobble whatever Sun releases of Solaris under GPLv3. Torvalds has already said he expected the open-source CDDL version of Solaris to be 'crippled'. A GPL version is likely to be even less intact.

And again, knowing the heavily reported criticisms of the GPLv3 by Torvalds, it could simply be opportunistic gamemanship on Schwartz's part.

Author: Matt Whipp