Re: [HACKERS] MySQL Gemini code
> "Michael" == Michael Widenius <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: Michael> Please note that we NEVER have asked NuSphere to sign Michael> over copyright of Gemini to us. We do it only for the Michael> core server, and this is actually not an uncommon thing Michael> among open source companies. For example QT (Trolltech) Michael> and Ximian (a lot of gnome applications) does the same Michael> thing. Assigning over the code is also something that Michael> FSF requires for all code contributions. If you Michael> criticize us at MySQL AB, you should also criticize the Michael> above. And Redhat (who are obviously pro Open Source) does this with Cygwin, Sincerely, Adrian Phillips -- Your mouse has moved. Windows NT must be restarted for the change to take effect. Reboot now? [OK] ---(end of broadcast)--- TIP 4: Don't 'kill -9' the postmaster
Re: [HACKERS] MySQL Gemini code
Hi! > "Jan" == Jan Wieck <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: Jan> Moin Monty, Jan> dear fence-guests, Thanks. >> Please note that we NEVER have asked NuSphere to sign over copyright >> of Gemini to us. We do it only for the core server, and this is >> actually not an uncommon thing among open source companies. For >> example QT (Trolltech) and Ximian (a lot of gnome applications) does >> the same thing. Assigning over the code is also something that FSF >> requires for all code contributions. If you criticize us at MySQL AB, >> you should also criticize the above. Jan> I should not criticize the others and Trond already explained Jan> why (thank you). Jan> All I was doing was summing up some of the latest press Jan> releases from NuSphere and MySQL AB. You as CTO and your own Jan> CEO have explained detailed enough why the assignment of Jan> copyright for all core system related code is so important Jan> for your company because of your business modell. As the Jan> original banker I am, and as the 13+ year IT consultant I am, Jan> I don't have the slightest problem with that and understand Jan> it completely. It's not my business at all anyway, so it Jan> doesn't matter if I personally think it's good or not. Jan> But NuSphere said, that the problem with contributing the Jan> Gemini code was because of the copyright questions. Looking Jan> at the code now and realizing that it's part of the Progress Jan> storage system fits perfectly. NuSphere might have had Jan> permission from Progress to release it under the GPL, but not Jan> to assign the copyright to MySQL AB. The copyright of parts Jan> of the Gemini code is still property of Progress (Britt Jan> please come down from the fence and correct me if I'm wrong Jan> here). We have never asked for the copyright to Gemini; We don't need the copyright to do an embedded version of MySQL, as MySQL works perfectly without Gemini; We have an agreement with Innobase Oy and an understanding with Sleepycat so we can provide ACID transactions even without Gemini, if any of our commercial customers would require this. (Sorry for the 'business talk', but I just wanted to fill in the background) In my opinion the whole thing with the copyright is a public stunt of NuSphere to explain why they are now doing a fork. I don't have any problems with a fork as long as they don't call it MySQL and don't do it on a site called mysql.org. >> I had actually hoped to get support from you guy's at PostgreSQL >> regarding this. You may have similar experience or at least >> understand our position. The RedHat database may be a good thing for >> PostgreSQL, but I am not sure if it's a good thing for RedHat or for >> the main developers to PostgreSQL. Anyway, I think that we open source >> developers should stick together. We may have our own disagreements, >> but at least we are working for the same common goal (open source >> domination). Jan> The RedHAT database IS PostgreSQL. And I don't see it Jan> becoming something different. All I've seen up to now is that Jan> RedHAT will be a contributing member of the PostgreSQL open Jan> source community in the same way, PostgreSQL Inc. and Great Jan> Bridge LLC are. That they use BIG RED letters while GB uses Jan> BIG BLUE ones and PgSQL Inc. a bavarian mix for the Jan> marketing, yeah - that's marketing - these folks like logos Jan> and colors. The real difference will mature somehow in the Jan> service portfolios over time. And since there are many Jan> different customers with a broad variety of demands, we'll Jan> all find more food than we can eat. No need to fight against Jan> each other. Sound's good. I really hope it will be that way in the long run! On the other hand, in the beginning our deal with NuSphere also appeared to be good:( Jan> The major advantage in the PostgreSQL case is, that we don't Jan> need no dispute about licensing, because whoever thinks he Jan> can make a deal out of keeping something proprietary is Jan> allowed to. People contributing under the BSD license are Jan> just self-confident enough to know that this will become a Jan> niche solution or die anyway. Yes, in your case the BSD license is a good license. For us at MySQL AB, that have paid staff doing all most all development work on the server, the GPL license is a better license as this allows to put all software we develop under open source and still make a living. (I am not trying to start a flame war here; I am just saying that both licenses have their use and both benefit open source, but in different ways) Jan> And there we are at the point about "support regarding THIS". Jan> If you're asking for support for the MySQL project, well, I Jan> created two proc
Re: [HACKERS] MySQL Gemini code
Hi! > "Nathan" == Nathan Myers <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: Nathan> On Wed, Jul 18, 2001 at 08:35:58AM -0400, Jan Wieck wrote: >> And this press release >> >> http://www.nusphere.com/releases/071601.htm >> >> also explains why they had to do it this way. Nathan> They were always free to fork, but doing it the way they did -- Nathan> violating MySQL AB's license -- they shot the dog. Yes, we wouldn't have minded a fork as long as they would have done it under their own name. Now they are causing a lot of confusion and giving both MySQL and open source a bad name :( Of course, PostgreSQL will benefit from this, but I would rather have seen that we would compete with technology instead of with bad PR :( Nathan> The lesson? Ask somebody competent, first, before you bet your Nathan> company playing license games. The problem is that this doesn't always help. For example if the other part is not playing by the rules, but counts on the fact that because he has more money he will win by the end even if he breaks all the rules going there. Regards, Monty ---(end of broadcast)--- TIP 4: Don't 'kill -9' the postmaster
Re: [HACKERS] MySQL Gemini code
> This is slightly different - FSF wants it so it will have a legal > position to defend its programs: There is at least one documented case where the FSF has used that right to sell a non-open license for GCC to Motorola. - Sascha Experience IRCG http://schumann.cx/http://schumann.cx/ircg ---(end of broadcast)--- TIP 3: if posting/reading through Usenet, please send an appropriate subscribe-nomail command to [EMAIL PROTECTED] so that your message can get through to the mailing list cleanly
Re: [HACKERS] MySQL Gemini code
On Wed, Jul 18, 2001 at 06:37:48PM -0400, Trond Eivind Glomsr?d wrote: > Michael Widenius <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: > > Assigning over the code is also something that FSF requires for all > > code contributions. If you criticize us at MySQL AB, you should > > also criticize the above. > > This is slightly different - FSF wants it so it will have a legal > position to defend its programs: ... > MySQL and TrollTech requires copyright assignment in order to sell > non-open licenses. Some people will have a problem with this, while > not having a problem with the FSF copyright assignment. Nobody who works on MySQL is unaware of MySQL AB's business model. Anybody who contributes to the core server has to expect that MySQL AB will need to relicense anything accepted into the core; that's their right as originators. Everybody who contributes has a choice to make: fork, or sign over. (With the GPL, forking remains possible; Apple and Sun "community" licenses don't allow it.) Anybody who contributes to PG has to make the same choice: fork, or put your code under the PG license. The latter choice is equivalent to "signing over" to all proprietary vendors, who are then free to take your code proprietary. Some of us like that. > > I had actually hoped to get support from you guys at PostgreSQL > > regarding this. You may have similar experience or at least > > understand our position. The RedHat database may be a good thing > > for PostgreSQL, but I am not sure if it's a good thing for RedHat > > or for the main developers to PostgreSQL. > > This isn't even a remotely similar situation: ... It's similar enough. One difference is that PG users are less afraid to fork. Another is that without the GPL, we have elected not to (and indeed cannot) stop any company from doing with PG what NuSphere is doing with MySQL. This is why characterizing the various licenses as more or less "business-friendly" is misleading (i.e. dishonest) -- it evades the question, "friendly to whom?". Businesses sometimes compete... Nathan Myers [EMAIL PROTECTED] ---(end of broadcast)--- TIP 6: Have you searched our list archives? http://www.postgresql.org/search.mpl
Re: [HACKERS] MySQL Gemini code
Michael Widenius wrote: > > Hi! Moin Monty, dear fence-guests, > Please note that we NEVER have asked NuSphere to sign over copyright > of Gemini to us. We do it only for the core server, and this is > actually not an uncommon thing among open source companies. For > example QT (Trolltech) and Ximian (a lot of gnome applications) does > the same thing. Assigning over the code is also something that FSF > requires for all code contributions. If you criticize us at MySQL AB, > you should also criticize the above. I should not criticize the others and Trond already explained why (thank you). All I was doing was summing up some of the latest press releases from NuSphere and MySQL AB. You as CTO and your own CEO have explained detailed enough why the assignment of copyright for all core system related code is so important for your company because of your business modell. As the original banker I am, and as the 13+ year IT consultant I am, I don't have the slightest problem with that and understand it completely. It's not my business at all anyway, so it doesn't matter if I personally think it's good or not. But NuSphere said, that the problem with contributing the Gemini code was because of the copyright questions. Looking at the code now and realizing that it's part of the Progress storage system fits perfectly. NuSphere might have had permission from Progress to release it under the GPL, but not to assign the copyright to MySQL AB. The copyright of parts of the Gemini code is still property of Progress (Britt please come down from the fence and correct me if I'm wrong here). > I had actually hoped to get support from you guy's at PostgreSQL > regarding this. You may have similar experience or at least > understand our position. The RedHat database may be a good thing for > PostgreSQL, but I am not sure if it's a good thing for RedHat or for > the main developers to PostgreSQL. Anyway, I think that we open source > developers should stick together. We may have our own disagreements, > but at least we are working for the same common goal (open source > domination). The RedHAT database IS PostgreSQL. And I don't see it becoming something different. All I've seen up to now is that RedHAT will be a contributing member of the PostgreSQL open source community in the same way, PostgreSQL Inc. and Great Bridge LLC are. That they use BIG RED letters while GB uses BIG BLUE ones and PgSQL Inc. a bavarian mix for the marketing, yeah - that's marketing - these folks like logos and colors. The real difference will mature somehow in the service portfolios over time. And since there are many different customers with a broad variety of demands, we'll all find more food than we can eat. No need to fight against each other. The major advantage in the PostgreSQL case is, that we don't need no dispute about licensing, because whoever thinks he can make a deal out of keeping something proprietary is allowed to. People contributing under the BSD license are just self-confident enough to know that this will become a niche solution or die anyway. And there we are at the point about "support regarding THIS". If you're asking for support for the MySQL project, well, I created two procedural languages in PostgreSQL so far and know enough about the query rewriting techniques used by Stonebraker and his team to implement views in PostgreSQL. As the open source developer I am, I might possibly find one or the other spare hour to create something similar. The reason I did it for PostgreSQL was because a couple of years ago Bruce Momjian asked me to fix the rule system. Noone ever asked me to do anything for MySQL. But if you're asking for direct support for your company, sorry, but I'm a Great Bridge employee and that's clearly against my interests. > Jan> But maybe Mr. Mickos told the truth, that there never have > Jan> been substantial contributions from the outside and nearly > Jan> all the code has been written by "Monty" himself (with little > Jan> "donations" from David). In that case, NuSphere's launch of > Jan> mysql.org was long overdue. > > Why do you think that? > > MySQL AB is a totally open source company. Everything we develop and > sell we also put on open source. I think we have are doing and have > always done the right thing for the open source community. That is what your CEO said on NewsForge, SlashDot and whereever. I am committed to free source. Thus I think that the best thing for open source is a free community, which and who's product is not controlled by any commercial entity. > I don't think it's really fair to
Re: [HACKERS] MySQL Gemini code
Michael Widenius <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: > Please note that we NEVER have asked NuSphere to sign over copyright > of Gemini to us. We do it only for the core server, and this is > actually not an uncommon thing among open source companies. For > example QT (Trolltech) and Ximian (a lot of gnome applications) Ximian isn't doing a lot of gnome applications, just a few ("Evolution" springs to mind, and their installer). Signing over copyright to Ximian wouldn't make much sense - GNOME isn't a Ximian project, so they can't dual license it anyway. > Assigning over the code is also something that FSF requires for all > code contributions. If you criticize us at MySQL AB, you should > also criticize the above. This is slightly different - FSF wants it so it will have a legal position to defend its programs: http://www.fsf.org/prep/maintain_6.html If you maintain an FSF-copyrighted package, then you should follow certain legal procedures when incorporating changes written by other people. This ensures that the FSF has the legal right to distribute the package, and the right to defend its free status in court if necessary. Before incorporating significant changes, make sure that the person who wrote the changes has signed copyright papers and that the Free Software Foundation has received and signed them. We may also need a disclaimer from the person's employer. MySQL and TrollTech requires copyright assignment in order to sell non-open licenses. Some people will have a problem with this, while not having a problem with the FSF copyright assignment. > I had actually hoped to get support from you guy's at PostgreSQL > regarding this. You may have similar experience or at least > understand our position. The RedHat database may be a good thing for > PostgreSQL, but I am not sure if it's a good thing for RedHat or for > the main developers to PostgreSQL. This isn't even a remotely similar situation: * For MySQL, the scenario is that a company made available an open version of its product while continuing to sell it under other licenses. * For PostgreSQL, it has been a long living project which spawned companies which then hired some of the core developers. We're not reselling someone elses product with minor enhancements (companies have been known to be doing that to products we create), we're selling support and working on additions to an open project. That may make it harder for the companies now employing the core developers (or may help, as PostgreSQL gets more much deserved publicity and technical credit), but doesn't violate the project's licenses and a company's trademark the way NuSphere did with MySQL. > Anyway, I think that we open source developers should stick > together. We may have our own disagreements, but at least we are > working for the same common goal (open source domination). > > If you ever need any support from us regarding the RedHat database,, > please contact me personally about this. Red Hat is firmly committed to open source, and is definitely a big open source developer. -- Trond Eivind Glomsrød Red Hat, Inc. ---(end of broadcast)--- TIP 4: Don't 'kill -9' the postmaster
Re: [HACKERS] MySQL Gemini code
On Wed, Jul 18, 2001 at 08:35:58AM -0400, Jan Wieck wrote: > And this press release > > http://www.nusphere.com/releases/071601.htm > > also explains why they had to do it this way. They were always free to fork, but doing it the way they did -- violating MySQL AB's license -- they shot the dog. The lesson? Ask somebody competent, first, before you bet your company playing license games. Nathan Myers [EMAIL PROTECTED] ---(end of broadcast)--- TIP 1: subscribe and unsubscribe commands go to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: [HACKERS] MySQL Gemini code
Hi! As I do have some insight in these matters, I thought I would comment on this thing > "Jan" == Jan Wieck <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: Jan> Bruce Momjian wrote: >> As some of you know, Nusphere is trying to sell MySQL with an additional >> transaction-based table manager called Gemini. They enabled download of >> the source code yesterday at: >> >> http://mysql.org/download3.php?file_id=1118 >> >> Looking through the 122k lines of C code in the Gemini directory, it is >> pretty clear from a 'grep -i progress' that the Gemini code is actually >> the database storage code for the Progress database. Progress is the >> parent company of Nusphere. Jan> And this press release Jan> http://www.nusphere.com/releases/071601.htm Jan> also explains why they had to do it this way. They disagreed Jan> with the policy that every code added to the core system must Jan> be owned by MySQL AB, so that these guys can sell it for Jan> money in their commercial licenses. Please note that we NEVER have asked NuSphere to sign over copyright of Gemini to us. We do it only for the core server, and this is actually not an uncommon thing among open source companies. For example QT (Trolltech) and Ximian (a lot of gnome applications) does the same thing. Assigning over the code is also something that FSF requires for all code contributions. If you criticize us at MySQL AB, you should also criticize the above. We did never have any problems to include any of GEMINI code into MySQL. We had tried to get them to submit Gemini into MySQL since March, but they didn't want to do that. It was not until we sued NuSphere for, among other things, breaking the GPL that they did finally release Gemini under GPL. We wouldn't mind if they did this 'community thing' with a site named something like NUSPHERE.ORG, but by doing this with MYSQL.ORG and violating our trademark is not something that we can just look upon without reacting. That NuSphere also have had very little regard for the GPL copyright, keeps copyrighted material on their web site and uses mysql.org to push out their own commercial (not free) MySQL distribution tells a lot of their intentions. I had actually hoped to get support from you guy's at PostgreSQL regarding this. You may have similar experience or at least understand our position. The RedHat database may be a good thing for PostgreSQL, but I am not sure if it's a good thing for RedHat or for the main developers to PostgreSQL. Anyway, I think that we open source developers should stick together. We may have our own disagreements, but at least we are working for the same common goal (open source domination). If you ever need any support from us regarding the RedHat database,, please contact me personally about this. I really liked all the PostgreSQL developers I met last year at OSDN; I found it great to be able to exchange ideas, suggest features and talk openly about our products without any restrictions. I hope to be able to do it again this year! Those that has seen my postings knows that I don't publicly criticize PostgreSQL; I do also recommend PostgreSQL for projects where I think it's better suitable than MySQL. I have at many times defended PostgreSQL when I heard people criticize it without a good reason. I am not afraid of pointing out weaknesses in a product if I am sure that I have discovered one, but I try to do that in a professional manner. I don't think you will find that NuSphere is going to be as fair if they get more control over MySQL through mysql.org. Jan> IMHO, the MySQL community gives a few people far too much Jan> credit anyway. The MySQL AB folks degrade contributions from Jan> their community to "personal donations" to "Monty", which he Jan> has to "scrutinize" and often rewrite so that they can stand Jan> their (MySQL AB's) standards. Give me a break, but does the Jan> entire MySQL community only consist of 16 year old junior Jan> pacman players, or are there some "real programmers (tm)" Jan> too? I only rewrite things that are going to be in the MySQL server, not in the clients. As MySQL needs to work in 24/7 systems, we have to be very carefully of what we put into the server. With a background of 20 years of programming, it's also not that hard to rewrite code to make it better so why not do it? Because I know the whole MySQL core code intimately, its much easier for me to remove duplicated functions, optimize things and generalize code to make things works better than the original author had thought of. I am sure that it's the same thing with those of you that has worked a lot of time on the PostgreSQL code... You must also understand that we have a totally different development structure here at MySQL AB than you have. We are 30 people of which 14 are full time developers. 99.99 % of the code in the core MySQL server is written by us or by people that we have paid for the
Re: [HACKERS] MySQL Gemini code
On Wed, Jul 18, 2001 at 11:45:54AM -0400, Bruce Momjian wrote: > > And this press release > > > > http://www.nusphere.com/releases/071601.htm > ... > On a more significant note, I hear the word "fork" clearly suggested > in that text. It is almost like MySQL AB GPL'ed the MySQL code and > now they may not be able to keep control of it. Anybody is free to fork MySQL or PostgreSQL alike. The only difference is that all published MySQL forks must remain public, where PostgreSQL forks need not. MySQL AB is demonstrating their legal right to keep as much control as they chose, and NuSphere will lose if it goes to court. The interesting event here is that since NuSphere violated the license terms, they no longer have any rights to use or distribute the MySQL AB code, and won't until they get forgiveness from MySQL AB. MySQL AB would be within their rights to demand that the copyright to Gemini be signed over, before offering forgiveness. If Red Hat forks PostgreSQL, nobody will have any grounds for complaint. (It's been forked lots of times already, less visibly.) Nathan Myers [EMAIL PROTECTED] ---(end of broadcast)--- TIP 6: Have you searched our list archives? http://www.postgresql.org/search.mpl
Re: [HACKERS] MySQL Gemini code
And the story goes on... http://www.newsforge.com/comments.pl?sid=01/07/18/0226219&commentsort=0&mode=flat&threshold=0&pid=0 Jan -- #==# # It's easier to get forgiveness for being wrong than for being right. # # Let's break this rule - forgive me. # #== [EMAIL PROTECTED] # _ Do You Yahoo!? Get your free @yahoo.com address at http://mail.yahoo.com ---(end of broadcast)--- TIP 5: Have you checked our extensive FAQ? http://www.postgresql.org/users-lounge/docs/faq.html
Re: [HACKERS] MySQL Gemini code
> And this press release > > http://www.nusphere.com/releases/071601.htm > > also explains why they had to do it this way. They disagreed > with the policy that every code added to the core system must > be owned by MySQL AB, so that these guys can sell it for > money in their commercial licenses. This is interesting. They mention PostgreSQL twice as an example to emulate for MySQL. They feel the pressure of companies involved with PostgreSQL and see the benefit of a community around the database. On a more significant note, I hear the word "fork" clearly suggested in that text. It is almost like MySQL AB GPL'ed the MySQL code and now they may not be able to keep control of it. -- Bruce Momjian| http://candle.pha.pa.us [EMAIL PROTECTED] | (610) 853-3000 + If your life is a hard drive, | 830 Blythe Avenue + Christ can be your backup.| Drexel Hill, Pennsylvania 19026 ---(end of broadcast)--- TIP 4: Don't 'kill -9' the postmaster
Re: [HACKERS] MySQL Gemini code
Bruce Momjian wrote: > As some of you know, Nusphere is trying to sell MySQL with an additional > transaction-based table manager called Gemini. They enabled download of > the source code yesterday at: > >http://mysql.org/download3.php?file_id=1118 > > Looking through the 122k lines of C code in the Gemini directory, it is > pretty clear from a 'grep -i progress' that the Gemini code is actually > the database storage code for the Progress database. Progress is the > parent company of Nusphere. And this press release http://www.nusphere.com/releases/071601.htm also explains why they had to do it this way. They disagreed with the policy that every code added to the core system must be owned by MySQL AB, so that these guys can sell it for money in their commercial licenses. IMHO, the MySQL community gives a few people far too much credit anyway. The MySQL AB folks degrade contributions from their community to "personal donations" to "Monty", which he has to "scrutinize" and often rewrite so that they can stand their (MySQL AB's) standards. Give me a break, but does the entire MySQL community only consist of 16 year old junior pacman players, or are there some "real programmers (tm)" too? But maybe Mr. Mickos told the truth, that there never have been substantial contributions from the outside and nearly all the code has been written by "Monty" himself (with little "donations" from David). In that case, NuSphere's launch of mysql.org was long overdue. Jan -- #==# # It's easier to get forgiveness for being wrong than for being right. # # Let's break this rule - forgive me. # #== [EMAIL PROTECTED] # _ Do You Yahoo!? Get your free @yahoo.com address at http://mail.yahoo.com ---(end of broadcast)--- TIP 2: you can get off all lists at once with the unregister command (send "unregister YourEmailAddressHere" to [EMAIL PROTECTED])
[HACKERS] MySQL Gemini code
As some of you know, Nusphere is trying to sell MySQL with an additional transaction-based table manager called Gemini. They enabled download of the source code yesterday at: http://mysql.org/download3.php?file_id=1118 Looking through the 122k lines of C code in the Gemini directory, it is pretty clear from a 'grep -i progress' that the Gemini code is actually the database storage code for the Progress database. Progress is the parent company of Nusphere. -- Bruce Momjian| http://candle.pha.pa.us [EMAIL PROTECTED] | (610) 853-3000 + If your life is a hard drive, | 830 Blythe Avenue + Christ can be your backup.| Drexel Hill, Pennsylvania 19026 ---(end of broadcast)--- TIP 5: Have you checked our extensive FAQ? http://www.postgresql.org/users-lounge/docs/faq.html