On Fri, 7 Sep 2001, Richard rebel wrote:
> > FreeBSD nearly used Exim as its main MTA but couldn't because of the
> > lisence? ... or was it Red Hat? Phil?
>
> Interesting point, the licence thing. I'd like to know if anyone has the
> details.
The three main BSD projects strive to provide code in their core/base
systems that are free for any use, including making modifications for
proprietary products. The BSDs projects try to clearly separate code that
doesn't meet the goals.
FreeBSD: "The goals of the FreeBSD Project are to provide software that
may be used for any purpose and without strings attached."
NetBSD: "The NetBSD Project provides a freely available and
redistributable system that professionals, hobbyists, and researchers can
use in whatever manner they wish."
OpenBSD: "We want to make available source code that anyone can use for
ANY PURPOSE, with no restrictions."
As you can see, some popular licenses are incompatible with these noble
goals. For more info check out:
"BSD project goals ..."
http://www.bsdtoday.com/2001/June/Features495.html
"What is the BSD license?"
http://www.bsdnewsletter.com/bsd/license.html
One of the benefits of using a BSD license, is that the code and ideas
potentially get wider use (such as TCP/IP).
On Fri, 7 Sep 2001, Patrick Kirk wrote:
> I don't think a GPL product would ever be the main MTA of a BSD distro.
As was mentioned in another email, sendmail is still the default even
though its current licensing doesn't match the BSD project's desired
goals. (On that note, I have slowly been working on a very simple,
BSD-licensed, sendmail replacement [1] for sending email to a hub; it is
for workstations and servers that are not "mail" servers; it is not an
exim replacement, because it has no daemon or port listening
capabilities.)
On Fri, 7 Sep 2001, Philip Hazel wrote:
> Red Hat were unhappy with the GPL licence. They wanted a more BSD-like
> one, ISTR (but my memory may not be accurate). I wasn't interested in
> messing around with multiple licences.
Sometimes I wonder how to ask Philip to consider using a BSD license, but
I know if would be a lot of work since it may use other GPL'd code or
contributors may have supplied code in the assumption that it is to be
GPL'd.
Jeremy C. Reed
http://bsd.reedmedia.net/ -- BSD news and resources
http://www.isp-faq.com/ -- find answers to your questions
[1]
http://www.reedmedia.net/software/mailout/
