This should be the sort of red flag to take note of. There’s an LLVM fork for every esoteric architecture now and this sort of thinking will lead to never being able to run your own software on your own hardware again. A reversion to the dark ages of computing.
Linux magically solves this problem how? GPL isn't magic. It doesn't compel contributing upstream. And half of modern driver stacks live in userspace anyways.
There are also so many G.P.L. violations and nothing is done about it.
I think a big issue is also that it's hard to show actual damages with this kind of copyright violation. It's obviously copyright violation but what damages are there really? Also, there are so many dubious cases where it's not clear whether it is a violation or not.
Software Freedom Conservancy have been doing GPL compliance actions for a long time, especially if you consider their staff's previous lawsuit that resulted in OpenWRT existing. Also the more recent Vizio lawsuit is kinda interesting, it aims to enable any recipient of GPLed binaries to sue for GPL compliance.
> And half of modern driver stacks live in userspace anyways
??? I haven't touched hardware whose driver lives in userspace since 2017 and it was a DMX512 controller of a shitty brand
Infineon tricore compiler from hightec. Compilers are actually, IMO, one of the things that are the most easy to have GPL because you can use it internally however you want without releasing the source outside. You could build whatever you want and you don't have to ship it on the final HW. A kernel does not afford you such a thing, you MUST ship it with your product.
Thanks for the example! Your opinion here aligns with mine: GCC's GPL status has manifestly not been an issue for vendors in the past. I think the reason for vendors selecting LLVM has much more to do with the fact that LLVM is easier to develop on than GCC.
Seriously: stop it. It's none of your business what the author's license choice is. You don't know what the author is trying to accomplish by their choice of license. It could be a mindless choice, or it could be an informed choice. Perhaps the author wants to build interest and later plans to switch licenses (it's not like others are likely to fork _and_ do an excellent job of evolving and maintaining the fork). Perhaps the author is looking to get hired. Perhaps the author believes that BSD/MIT licensing is more free than the GPL. You really don't need to be shaming the author for not making the choice you made.
