Never Annoy The Linux Kernel Developers

If you want a sure way to create some problems for yourself then go ahead and annoy some Linux kernel developers and see what they're going to do in response like what happened with Tuxedo computers.

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#Linux #LinuxKernel #OpenSource #FOSS #LinuxDesktop

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[djsmeguk]

There's a high probability that a manager thought they could just keep punting on this until they'd got all the code merged.

[jenbanim]

CS students really need to have at least one lecture where the professor stands up and screams at the top of their lungs "SOFTWARE LICENSING IS IMPORTANT AND YOU NEED TO UNDERSTAND WHAT YOU'RE DOING. IT DOESN'T MATTER IF YOU'RE NOT A LAWYER BECAUSE IF YOU SCREW UP YOU WILL NEED ONE"

[_BLANK_BLANK]

>make laptops meant to be used with Linux

>Make it more difficult to use with linux than a normal store bought laptop.

Nice.

[CloudCuckooKing]

I will comment once, to be a ridiculous grammar pedant - "purposely, allegedly" in that context the comma is meant to divide the statements into "They did this purposely" and "allegedly to 'keep control the upstream pacing'", not connect them into "allegedly-purposely".

[Littlefighter]

TUXEDO is a relatively small company, relying on passionate developers.
(I applied there, so I know roughly how it looks there, they have a really cozy kitchen with lots of Tux merch and even hold public events in their HQ).
They most likely don't have any lawyers for stuff, that isn't a pressing issue.
(I haven't seen such a department in their HQ at least, doesn't mean they can't be contracted externally).
You can expect, that management decided, that modules should be GPLv3 in line with the GNU FOSS philosophy and company image,
and didn't know it's incompatible with GPLv2 in the kernel. Also the developer really didn't know, there's any incompatibility between the licenses, as the identifiers were called only "GPL" and not "GPL v2",
which already makes it indistinguishable from GPLv1.
(And to be fair it's more important, that the kernel is GPLv2 ONLY, as it would have been compatible with GPLv3 otherwise.)

All in all, it's just "legal incompetence" from a relatively small company with good intentions.
You really need to think of TUXEDO as a "indie dev" with great upwards momentum and less of an established player.
(That's also why no CLA was in place, which even caused this delay)
Either way, everything's resolved now, so we can all sleep well.

[SurfingProphet]

I admire the fact that you managed to make this entire video without mentioning Nick from The Linux Experiment

[Mekuso]

As someone daily driving a Tuxedo, I can totally get behind this being 100% non-malicious. They seem to take a "move fast and break things" approach to everything, and it *usually* works out 😅

[SIackware]

ok then, I'll go build my own kernel with blackjack and hookers

[xmvziron]

14:58 Come on, that's like the first thing you learn as a kernel dev. MODULE_LICENSE is the one thing you cannot leave out from a kernel module. MODULE_AUTHOR and MODULE_DESCRIPTION are not required.

[stayblueee]

This was definitely a case of them just making a really dumb mistake, but them reverting the commit that fixed the problem definitely wasn't a good look. I doubt that a company who distributes computers that have Linux would want to have any problems with upstream. I think the response from upstream is totally reasonable, but for the sake of the customer's involved, I hope this is resolved.

[fluffy_fluffinity]

I kinda feel bad for Werner. Yes, they dug themselves into this hole, but I also see all of this as a series of human errors. Licensing the code under GPLv3+ should have never happened but afterwards, if you don't fully understand the legal consequences, it's easy to loose sight of this problem. Even after getting informed about this problem, as seen in this story, it can go under the radar again, if you don't understand these consequences. Should he have known about this stuff in the first place? Yes, especially as an author of kernel modules. But now he learned it the hard way. As long as Tuxedo doesn't do this mistake again, I think we can count this outcome as a win

[RogueRen]

I highly doubt Tuxedo wants to piss off the upstream of the OS they built their entire business off of lol. This has to be just being painfully unaware.

[ahettinger]

WELLL... even if Linus wanted to re-license to GPLv3, he has to get everyone to sign off on the re-licensing, or replace any contributions that say no. For all practical purposes Linus can't even if he wanted to.

[ovrskr]

the crazy part is GPLv3 only exists because of some obscure Tivo hardware that briefly existed 20 years ago. One company broke the open source world xD

[ZeroUm_]

If I had a penny for each time an open source related project had problems with licenses, I'd be richer than Elon.

[act..]

Sometimes, the best thing someone can say is, "Have your lawyer contact our lawyer and let them straighten this mess out. Here is the contact info."

[gerarderloper]

Meanwhile big corporations just laugh as they steal all the free code from open-source regardless, licenses be damned... :/

[gljames]

I personally like MPL the best. It's able to be used in anything as long as you mention you are using it and only requires you to redistribute if you are adding anything directly to it.

That way you aren't blocking it from being used alongside any other code, you get credit, and you prevent the embrace, extend, extinguish risks that permissive licenses have like that prevent software like BSD from benefitting from common development from Apple or Game Consoles.

[Afsafs]

Whenever the LKML gets brought up, I know to start popping the popcorn.

[Stroopwafe]

Never attribute to malice, what can be explained by incompetence. So definitely incompetence to me