Re: [ossig] What's your take on this.

[Simos Xenitellis <simos74@xxxxxxx>]

On Sat, 2004-08-28 at 20:52, Dinesh Nair wrote:
> On 28/08/2004 14:41 Simon said the following:
> > The freedom, with regards to the GPL licence, refers to the source code 
> > of the software. When you market
> > open-source software, you need to provide somehow the source code. It 
> > does not mean that anyone can
> > ask for your binaries (compiled software, ready to be installed) or 
> > resell them. *You* can set the rules for the binaries.
> > In these cases of illegal copies we have to do with binaries, possibly 
> > copied
> 
> maybe i'm grokking what you said above wrongly, but if the binaries are 
> of GPLed software, then Redhat, or anyone else for that matter, can't 
> change the license. isn't this the very viral-nature of the GPL which 
> some say is good and some say is bad ? as such, the binaries are GPL 
> licensed and the rights inherent in the GPL have to be passed on by 
> Redhat. of course, binaries of software which is not under the GPL but 
> under some closed source license may then be liable for piracy charges 
> if they exist on the same CD.

Lineox comes to the rescue. Lineox is a company has a product based on
RHEL3 and they went into the trouble to clarify the questions we are
asking here.

According to "Switching to Lineox Enterprise Linux Update Service from
Red Hat Network"
http://www.lineox.com/rhel2lel.php, "the GPL is specifically concerned
with the source code from which the binaries are built, however Red
Hat's EULA has more specific information concerning the distribution of
the binaries."

Furthermore, the RHEL3 EULA states that "with the exception of certain
image files identified in Section 2 below, the license terms for the
components permit Customer to copy, modify, and redistribute the
component, in both source code and **binary code** forms" (emphasis
mine).

(RHEL EULA: http://www.redhat.com/licenses/rhel_rha_eula.html)

This means that Red Hat is liberal with the distribution of the binaries
of their RHEL3 distribution, however if you remove any reference to
their registered trademarks (see link above). Practically, you cannot
make exact copies of the RHEL3 CDs because you have to change the image
logo files which the CD sellers probably did not do.

Therefore, if the CD sellers did an exact copy of the RHEL3 CDs, they
contravene the three issues mentioned in Charles original e-mail.

In the references you can see three off-shoots of RHEL3 making use of
the freedom of the GPL and the generosity of Red Hat (no need to
recompile for binaries). It looks like an interesting business plan to
offer an enterprise Linux distribution while at the same time limiting
your exposure. Apart from the instructions in [1], one has to setup an
automatic update procedure and then start building credibility in
his/her Enterprise Linux business offering.

References: 
1. "Switching to Lineox Enterprise Linux Update Service from Red Hat
Network" - http://www.lineox.com/rhel2lel.php
2. "White Box Enterprise Linux" -
http://whiteboxlinux.org/
3. "Pie Box Enterprise Linux" - http://www.piebox.org/

Simos
http://simos.info/


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