News: 0001648873

  ARM Give a man a fire and he's warm for a day, but set fire to him and he's warm for the rest of his life (Terry Pratchett, Jingo)

FreeBSD's Kernel Still Has A Bit Of GPL Code While Its Base User-Space Is GPL-Free

([BSD] 6 Hours Ago FreeBSD + GPL)


A few weeks ago there was excitement in the FreeBSD camp with [1]FreeBSD 16 set to retire the last of its GPL code from the base system . While the retiring of the dialog code proclaimed that it was the last remaining piece of GPL software in the base system for FreeBSD, it turns out now that there is some GPL code within the FreeBSD kernel.

The FreeBSD Wiki page was recently [2]updated from its "Mission accomplished!" announcement to now clarify that the FreeBSD userland is free from any GPL code in its base system.

The issue at hand is that there still is some GPL code within the FreeBSD kernel and thus its entire base is not free of GPL code, just the userland base portion. There is some GPL code in the FreeBSD kernel such as [3]this header file copied over from the Linux kernel for Qualcomm SoCs. There is also [4]other Device Tree bits that are GPLv2 only. Most other [5]GPL-2.0 hits are at least code that's dual licensed for both BSD or GPL.

Hopefully in time they can work with the original developers to get the code dual licensed or other avenues for making the FreeBSD kernel properly GPL-free.



[1] https://www.phoronix.com/news/FreeBSD-16-Goes-GPL-Free

[2] https://wiki.freebsd.org/action/info/GPLinBase?action=diff&rev2=340&rev1=339

[3] https://github.com/freebsd/freebsd-src/blob/main/sys/dts/include/dt-bindings/soc/qcom%2Ctcsr.h

[4] https://github.com/freebsd/freebsd-src/blob/b72f9bfc4513e3e286fb3fc2d07ebdd94ed7ac57/sys/contrib/device-tree/src/arc/axs103.dts#L1

[5] https://github.com/search?q=repo%3Afreebsd%2Ffreebsd-src%20GPL-2.0&type=code


The justifications for drug testing are part of the presently fashionable
debate concerning restoring America's "competitiveness." Drugs, it has been
revealed, are responsible for rampant absenteeism, reduced output, and poor
quality work. But is drug testing in fact rationally related to the
resurrection of competitiveness? Will charging the atmosphere of the
workplace with the fear of excretory betrayal honestly spur productivity?
Much noise has been made about rehabilitating the worker using drugs, but
to date the vast majority of programs end with the simple firing or the not
hiring of the abuser. This practice may exacerbate, not alleviate, the
nation's productivity problem. If economic rehabilitation is the ultimate
goal of drug testing, then criteria abandoning the rehabilitation of the
drug-using worker is the purest of hypocrisy and the worst of rationalization.
-- The concluding paragraph of "Constitutional Law: The
Fourth Amendment and Drug Testing in the Workplace,"
Tim Moore, Harvard Journal of Law & Public Policy, vol.
10, No. 3 (Summer 1987), pp. 762-768.