QNX has announced that they are going to open up the source code to their QNX microkernel operating system. The press release reads: “Effective immediately, QNX will make source code for its award-winning, microkernel-based OS available for free download. The first source release includes the code to the QNX Neutrino microkernel, the base C library, and a variety of board support packages for popular embedded and computing hardware.” Read on for more information, as well as an interview with Dan Dodge, CEO of QNX.Apart from opening up the source code to QNX, the company will also launch a new community portal website, ‘Foundry27‘, where QNX “customers and developers can access a wealth of resources relating to the QNX Neutrino RTOS and the QNX Momentics IDE, as well as to new community projects”. After a free registration, users can choose from three different software licenses, after which they get access to free versions of many QNX products, including the source code for many of these products. “Not only can developers view the QNX Neutrino source code, but they can improve, modify, or extend that code for their own purposes or for the community at large. They can then choose to contribute back those changes to QNX Software Systems and the QNX development community or to keep their modifications private and proprietary.”
As some of you may know, I am a huge fan of QNX and its PhotonUI, and have more than once regretted QNX apparent lack of interest in sustaining the ‘desktop version’ (so to speak) of its operating system. While this lack of interest was completely justifiable from a financial standpoint, it was a blow to an OS enthusiast like me – and on top of that, a proponent of the microkernel design.
A few weeks ago, I wrote: “It is sad that an operating system with such potential is held back by its parent company.” This may very well change due to today’s big announcement.
Interview: Dan Dodge, CEO of QNX
Last week, I was given the opportunity to interview (via email) Dan Dodge, CEO of QNX, about today’s announcement and its implications.
1. Why is QNX opening its source code?
Dan Dodge: It’s important to remember that we’re not simply publishing our source code; we’re also making our development process transparent, for everyone to see. From now on, we are going to develop our products out in the open and allow the QNX community to participate in the process.
We’ve done this for three reasons. First, to give software developers the benefits of accessible source, such as faster debugging, easier customization, and better integration of application code. Second, to give our business customers faster time to market and a greater sense of vendor independence. And third, to encourage an active community that includes not only commercial developers, but also hobbyists, technology partners, and academic researchers. In fact, we’ve launched a new community website, Foundry27, where members of the QNX community can access source repositories, share code with another, and even start new projects.
2. What portions of the QNX platform can be accessed in source form? Will it include the Photon microGUI?
Dan: The initial release includes the source code for the QNX Neutrino microkernel – the crown jewels of our OS technology. The release also provides source code for many board support packages, published under the Apache 2.0 license. Mind you, this is just Phase 1. Over the coming months, we plan to publish the source for many more modules: networking stacks, file systems, utilities, and, of course, the Photon microGUI. How about the various drivers, for instance for 3D acceleration? Yes, we also intend to publish source code for device drivers, graphics drivers included.
3. How does this differ from an open source project?
Dan: If you’re a developer, everything will look and feel like an open source project: You can access QNX source code, track our product development in real time, and, best of all, participate in the development process – whether by providing input, posting bug reports, or offering up code modifications. The big difference is in the licensing: Rather than publish our source code under a reciprocal license like the GPL, we’ve opted for a licensing model that offers flexible terms for derivative works. So if you modify QNX source code, you can either keep your modifications proprietary or donate them back to the QNX community. The choice is yours.
I invite everyone to visit our web site and download Lawrence Rosen’s paper, titled “The New QNX Hybrid Software Model“. Lawrence served as a lawyer for the Open Source Initiative, and he offers a lot of insight into how the new QNX model offers benefits of open source – but without being open source.
4. How will this initiative affect your current customers and partners?
Dan: It’s a win-win situation. Our customers develop software themselves, so they immediately grasp the advantages of accessible source code and transparent development. In fact, their response so far has been extremely positive. The same goes for our technology partners: they see this initiative as providing a simpler way to integrate their technologies with ours. And that, in turn, will provide more technology choices for our customer base.
5. How does QNX expect to be successful with this change in the business model?
Dan: Today, QNX Software’s revenue comes from a mix of products and services, including runtime royalties, development tool sales, custom engineering, and technical support. None of that will change: Anyone who uses QNX’s technology to build commercial products will still need to purchase commercial development seats and runtime redistribution licenses. The big difference is that we now expect more people to choose QNX for their commercial projects. That’s because our new model will make it far easier to access, experiment with, and distribute QNX technology. It will also encourage a larger ecosystem of complementary products.
6. What is available in the evaluation download?
Dan: Besides accessing OS source code, developers can download the full binary version of our QNX Momentics development suite, which includes tools, an Eclipse-based IDE, and the QNX Neutrino RTOS. This isn’t a crippled version of our product, but the real thing: it’s all there for you to play with. In fact, if you qualify as a partner or noncommercial user, you get a free perpetual license to use the technology. No time limits.
7. Which license(s) will be used for the open source parts?
Dan: We aren’t releasing the OS code under an open source license. Rather, we’re using a commercial-friendly licensing model that gives developers and customers the option of either keeping their source modifications or donating them back to the community.
If fact, we’re providing three licenses: one for commercial users, one for noncommercial users, and one for QNX technology partners. When you register, you identify which license is appropriate to your interests. For instance, if you’re a student, academic faculty member, or hobbyist developer, you choose the noncommercial license, which provides access to development tools and runtime components free of charge.
8. Will it be possible for 3rd parties/the community to create a ‘distribution’ of QNX specifically tailored for desktop usage?
Dan: Definitely. In fact, developers could even take the existing OS code and port it to hardware architectures that QNX doesn’t currently support. QNX will, of course, maintain its strong focus on the embedded market; it’s our bread and butter. But flexibility is a key strength of our architecture, so we’re sure that the community will take it in some interesting directions, the desktop included.
9. What do you see QNX looking like in 3 years? How about 10?
Dan: All of our competitors offer pretty much the same thing: an RTOS and, in many cases, tools. The problem is, this model hasn’t kept pace with market demands, and embedded customers now need solutions that are far more comprehensive. That’s why we’ve been transitioning to a company that also provides middleware for industry-specific requirements. Our multimedia middleware, for instance, is so comprehensive that in many cases the customer simply has to tweak the user interface and a few other parameters.
Right now, we’re the leading RTOS provider for the automotive telematics and infotainment market. But in three years, people will also see us as that market’s leading middleware provider. We will also have grown our footprint as a major middleware provider for the consumer market, particularly in multimedia. As for 10 years from now, I have no doubt that QNX technology will be in more devices than you can count. And while I won’t hazard a guess as to what those devices will be, one thing is for sure: we’ll still be having fun creating software that makes those devices as cool and reliable as they can be!
I know a lot of people will be excited about this. And I know some will bitch about it not being GPL. But the real question I have is how does everyone think this might impact embedded Linux projects like OpenMoko?
Does it include the GUI – the GUI IMHO is the *best* component of QNX. Also, another benefit, it is a microkernel.
I’d love to see it not only in PDA’s but things like routers etc.
Does it include the GUI – the GUI IMHO is the *best* component of QNX. Also, another benefit, it is a microkernel.
Erm, did you read? It’s one of the questions, actually.
It doesn’t matter if this is licensed under the GPL. The fact that this is now free software means that we have the liberty to study the logic of that code. This means that we can write our own code that implements the same logic and we can release our (hypothetical) software under any license that we have chosen.
Umm… it’s NOT free sofware. It’s NOT open source.
If anything, it’s a kind of “shared source”.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shared_source
Umm… it’s NOT free sofware. It’s NOT open source.
If anything, it’s a kind of “shared source”.
Nonsense.
They allow everyone to look at the code, download it, compile it, change it, share it with their peers or keep it to themselves, heck, they can even make a distribution and put that online – they are just not allowed to sell it.
Thom, frankly, do you think they would carefully avoid calling it “open source” or “free sofware” if it qualified as that? I won’t remind you the OSD or the FSF definition of Free Sofware. So, again, it’s NOT Free Sofware, it’s NOT Open Source (maybe the caps help to clarify?) and if you disagree, just Google it. You seem to have been deceived by their announcement, just like they planned.
Oh, and it would help you think more clearly if you avoided buying into their speaking about “selling” the sofware or “commercial deployment”. That’s very confusing and they know it. They try to blur the distinction between making a derivative under a proprietary license, and setting up a project to distribute sofware and provide support for profit, which are two VERY different things. Software is either free or proprietary. Free software can be deployed commercially (as Red Hat and other do). You can use Free Software at home and in the office, and you can set up your business around Free Sofware, without fears that anyone will charge you for making “commercial” use of said sofware.
So, again, it’s NOT Free Sofware, it’s NOT Open Source (maybe the caps help to clarify?) and if you disagree, just Google it. You seem to have been deceived by their announcement, just like they planned.
You can do whatever the hell you want with the code – you just can’t commercially exploit it.
It is not Free Software as defined by the FSF. It’s not open source software as defined by OSI. But, it it can still be called open source by another defintion – namely that of being able to do whatever the hell you want with it, except sell it.
Like I said before, OSI and FSF haven’t patented the definition of open source.
“You can do whatever the hell you want with the code – you just can’t commercially exploit it.”
What’s exactly to “commercially exploit it”? Can you set up a business with 100 workstations running QNX without their permission? I don’t think so. What sets Free Sofware apart from other licensing models is that you can effectively avoid vendor lock-in. I couldn’t find their exact licensing terms in their website, but it seem to be designed to keep vendor lock-in as a business model. Hence, it’s fundamentally different from Free Sofware as defined by FSF, which is by far the most widely accepted definition, and calling it the same is arguably misleading. “free for personal use” would be acceptable, but in any case it’s a VERY different licensing model.
You’re right. I was wrong. I was blinded by the Apache 2.0 license. I didn’t read answer 7 closely enough.
That also happened to me at first. I think it’s a rather confusing announcement
Wooah! Cool!
Does this mean QNX’s primary business/revenue stream is no longer their OS?
I considered applying for a job at QNX, but decided against it. Now they’re heading into open source territory, it’s a bit more appealing again.
Strange, there are no jobs listed on their site. This is the first time I’ve seen this in what, 10 years? Is this a bad sign for the company? I did initially wonder if open sourcing the s/w implied the company was cutting staff or going through troubled times.
I think their primary revenue has been support, not the actual sale of their software. If this is true, going open source makes perfect sense. The company benefits by having the open source community (hypothetically) contributing to the OS relatively cost-free, and the community benefits by learning their numerous engineering accomplishments in the realm of real-time computation.
A fairly major source of revenue in the embedded market for them is actually royalties. The commercial users pay a fee for each system shipped with QNX running on it.
The “open source for non commercial use” license is kind of dumb..
They _are_ QNX after all, the same way Sun is Sun.
Properly open sourcing QNX will attract a much bigger developer community. They can even use a dual-like license, and make sure that 1) If using a GPL/MPL-like approach, they only accept changes for inclusion in the main branch if ownership or special usage rights are granted 2) If using BSD/MIT, etc license, they can easily just merge the changes.
I don’t understand why does QNX fail to see this..
—
To make the point clearer, they are still the owners of the product and it’s not like anyone will take it from them if they opensource it. Same way it happens with Solaris and Sun. On the other hand, they will get a much larger community instead.
Edited 2007-09-12 12:15
It goes in both way, maybe you fail to see all the amount of money they invest in it and are unwilling to let other company making profit out of it.
Then why should the license “limitation” a problem?
> It goes in both way, maybe you fail to see all the
> amount of money they invest in it and are unwilling to > let other company making profit out of it.
No, I think it comes down to their business model.
Like Sun, IBM, etc. QNX also realized how their market (Aix,Solaris,etc) is being eaten alive by Linux and the overall opensource community projects (PHP, MySQL, etc), in the server, embedded, etc areas,
Even if their are strong in their own areas (Solaris for highend servers, QNX for mbedded/realtime/critical), it is undeniable that they still share a lot with the opensource OS arena, which is growing several times faster than them, and makes them realize they are missing a big business chance.
Even microsoft did at some point see this and attempted to compete by using their “Shared Source” licenses (failing miserably).
But it’s been proven endless times that unless the project is FULLY open, and not something that “resembles being open” or just “free”, the community will lack interest and will not pick it up. Beos and QNX itself were examples of this. They looked great, worked great, but then died and left their “community” out in the cold.
So I think it’s good to point out that either QNX really goes open, or they’ll likely not get much community adherence. To me, it’s just another in the long list of companies that don’t seem to “get it”, and repeat the same mistake over and over.
Neither Beos or QNX were open source, just free to copy. I am sure if Beos was open source, Haiku developers would have concentrated their efforts on the existing code base rather than starting from scratch.
Edited 2007-09-12 13:35
So I think it’s good to point out that either QNX really goes open, or they’ll likely not get much community adherence.
Define “open”.
If you definition of “open” is either GPL or BSD – and nothing more… Than you have a very narrow-minded view on the world… And we all know what happens to narrow-minded people.
If you definition of “open” is either GPL or BSD – and nothing more… Than you have a very narrow-minded view on the world…
I don’t think so. It often doesn’t make much sense investing code into something that is not open as in opensource or free software. An opensource license put every participant in a project on an equal footing. When that is not the case, one participant in a project (QNX in this case) can play games with whoever is dependent on QNX for making their money. In an opensource project, the contributions of participants lifts the tide for every participant, and contributors can be sure that they won’t be locked in, or disadvanted in other ways.
Of course, licenses differ in their strength to regulate participation, and arguably, the GPL is a lot better at it than the BSD license (just to name one other commonly used license). Additionally, dual licensing like MySQL does, is a kind of workaround.
And we all know what happens to narrow-minded people.
Right, like what? At any rate, many companies make misuse of the term “open” in software to suggest opensource. While this is explicitly denied in the interview (though the Apache license bit confused me for a second), it’s not suprising that people enumerate the term ‘open’ with ‘opensource’.
Edited 2007-09-12 14:01
Define “open”
I guess he means Free Software. There are many, many Free licenses apart from GPL and BSD. But QNX won’t use any of the existing ones, nor their own Free license. They’ll use a “friendly” one.
That’s ok with me, of course. And I thank them for it (even if I have never used QNX and don’t have plans to use it soon). But it’s true that with a “friendly” license they won’t get too much community contributions.
Yes, they become politicians and managers.
Beos and QNX itself were examples of this. They looked great, worked great, but then died
QNX died? news to me. and to all the companies using it too, I presume.
Every time you use a credit/debit card in that touchscreen box at Target, you’re looking at a QNX platform. That’s 10-15 seats x every Target store in North America.
Isn’t this somewhat similar to what Trolltech does?
If you simply want to play with it, use it, tweak it, spread it (say, make a distro) it’s free.
If you want to make money out of it, the company makes money too.
In both cases you get to modify it at will.
Sounds like a reasonable long term strategy for a company rather than wishy-washy GPLing (or BSDing) it.
Edited 2007-09-12 13:29
Actually not. Trolltech releases QT under two commercial licenses. One license is Proprietary Commercial, and the other license is FLOSS Commercial. Both licenses allows for commercial use.
Proprietary is not the same as commercial. Licenses which do not allow for commercial use are not open. All open licenses allow for commercial use, incl. GPL and Apache License 2.0.
Nope. Trolltech (though I don’t agree with the choice of GPL) chose a license that allows commercial development, etc. The QNX license will not allow commercial development (without a separate agreement with them).
In theory, you could perform commercial development with Qt’s open source edition.
They could have offered the same freedom to their existing commercial customers without this bizarre licensing incompatibility situation.
No, not the same way. Sun chose an open source license for their code that meets all of the commonly accepted definitions of what open source is.
QNX has chosen a license that is clearly not reflective of what most people accept as “open” and will severely restrict what their community can do with the code due to license incompatibilities.
While they are to be commended for trying, I think they’re just confusing matters. Even Microsoft has chosen better licensing terms for many of their “shared source” projects with the Ms-PL, etc.
Not just for commercial ventures, but hobbyists that want to dabble, and just perhaps wind up entering into the commercial venture realm, should their personal projects/research pan out.
Perhaps the iPhone will soon have a QNX port
This also opens up a lot of other single board computers (PCI-104 and other mutations) that aren’t especially powerful systems that are (perhaps) old PC-compatible or mostly so, as well as those that just fit the form factors, that are relatively cheap to get, and provides another option with great development tools and an OS you can easily strip down to the bare requirements.
So do we see the old story repeating? It sounds like the good ole days of QNX6.0 only better in a sense that they don’t intend to take the OS away or cripple it with time limits.
One thought flashed through my mind though: they’re late. They should’ve made that move several years ago and could have had a great thriving community by now. Back in the day enthusiasts were really excited about QNX. Now they’ll just have to spend all those marketing resources again to attract the dev crowd back. Hey, we’ve even seen QNX news sites shutting down recently…
Anyway, wishing them luck and wishing them to have a separate deskop/evangelistic department within the company. Nothing commercial or serious, mind you, just to fuel the interest.
PS Their site is broken in Safari v3. Does it work in Voyager though, heh.
PPS And bring back William Bull. Pleeeeease!
Edited 2007-09-12 12:46
QNX source code is being released with the Apache Licence 2.0, which is compatible with the GNU GPL v3.
Apache? Where did you read that? I read it as only being board support not the kernel.
Edited 2007-09-12 13:20
“QNX source code is being released with the Apache Licence 2.0, which is compatible with the GNU GPL v3.”
But only one way? Can people change the code and release it under GPL v3 only so it can’t get transfered back to QNX?
I hate GPL, even if it protects “freedom”. It’s a little evil to FORCE “freedom” on everyone =P
As in the subject! 😀
That was a pleasant surprise!
I’ve always liked QNX. I started messing with it when I moved to Japan and was looking for something to pass the time while I was not working. Back then, I think it was QNX 4 something, you could install from CD in under 5 minutes. Total network transparency. Totally cool.
I’d love to see a port of the Photon MicroUI to other nixs, man that would rock!
While the code being open will certainly be useful as a source of study, the licensing will severely restrict how people can use it.
QNX is merely continuing to muddy the waters of licensing for projects that make their code available. Microsoft at least had the decency to choose licensing terms that would be compatible with a great deal of code that is available in the open source community.
The non-commercial restriction of the code will make it difficult at best to be able to use anything but BSD, MIT, or X11 -style open source code in combination with QNX code.
While this is beneficial for QNX’s customers, I can’t help but think that their company has “missed the point.”
Nonetheless, they are to be commended for trying.
i for one think this is great
thats the one place i would like to test qnx i think, on umpc/mid devices
Pity a few years late for my original goals… *sigh* But, welcome to the party!
QNX is a very interesting operating system for a small, energy-efficient desktop system (e.g. sam440ep, efika).
A typical Linux system is already overkill for daily usage and provided a good browser (Opera sucks least imho, but a webkit port would be most promising), text editor and media player, I would ditch my current Archlinux desktop instantly.
You mean a webkit “port” like Konqueror?
Konqueror is a really nice browser – if you use KDE.
But qt-webkit is afaik not yet released, is it?
No, what I was talking about was more of a webkit-photon using native widgets and so on.
QNX’s browser, Voyager, already supports multiple rendering engines, so UI-wise, there’s little to do.
Maybe cdm will update KillerIRC
My company uses QNX commercially. As much as I think this announcement is good, it doesn’t help me at all, at least directly. Neither myself nor any of my co-workers has the ability, inclination, or business case for even LOOKING at the micro-kernel source code, much less modifying it.
But maybe someone will port OpenJDK to QNX, and that would be quite helpful to me.
-James Ingraham
Sage Automation, Inc.
it’s more useful than you think, as an asp.net web developer i also looked at the mono source. having the internal workings of your platform at your disposal can cut debugging times a lot.
My guess is that the only time you will need to look at the kernel code is when you are having problems, and boy will you be glad then.
This is great! Ever since 6.3 came out, QNX has died as a community. So many apps are so far behind (X11, Gaim, Abiword, etc) because of the restrictions place on 6.3.
I love QNX and its UI. I can’t wait for the apps to start flowing, just like in the 6.2 days.
Rock on!
Again, nothing really happened. If you download source of this “open source” kernel, and browse it – please read the headers.
You can’t call this free software, you can’t even call this open source.
It seems like they wanted to make bug fuss about that, it’s free commercial for them – I understand that – but it is nowhere close to revolution – until it’s free for commercial use and redistribution – nothing changes.
Well, the anouncement seems to be targeted more at OS enthusiasts rather that businesses, even though QSSL is all about business.
Anyway, you can’t call that “nothing” because it gives people a great code example to study and educate themselves. And if you’re running a business you shouldn’t expect to get things for free.
No it isn’t.
Yes it is. Everyone can read the source at will, it is “open” to the public.
You need to clearly differentiate between the two. That is why there are OSI open source licenses which are not considered to be free software by everyone.
Anyway QNX has made a decision which makes sense for their business. Giving away their flagship product would probably ruin them (unlike Sun which doesn’t depend on Solaris to bring in the megabucks.) Instead they have opted to just open their source so their clients can write better software because they are aware of how things work internally. Sounds like a good idea to me.
Fine – but this isn’t even under an OSI approved license, is it?
So I wouldn’t call it “Open Source”. Open Source implies more than just “I can view the code”.
No, it’s not and probably couldn’t be approved by OSI, because you cannot freely redistribute the product (you need to buy a license.)
I guess it depends on what your definition of “open” is. ([CLINTON MODE OFF])
“Again, nothing really happened. If you download source of this “open source” kernel, and browse it – please read the headers. ”
Would you please paste the license in a pastebin and provide a link? That would be very helpful.
http://rafb.net/paste/
Okay, so what exactly _are_ the licensing terms?
It’s not any of the [L]GPLv[23] licenses, it’s not MIT/X/BSD licensing, it’s more than likely not an OSI approved license – so it’s not “Open Source” at all. This is “look but don’t touch open”.
This is (maybe) good for existing customers of QNX and that’s it. I’m sure their internal processes will be more open too, and they probably did the work to vet where all their copyrighted code came from, which is healthy too.
But this is definitely not an “Open Source” move.
…how cool the floppy was that QNX used to distribute. From a single floppy, you could boot up the machine into a graphical OS with a file manager, web browser, tcp/ip, etc. I thought it was an amazing feat. I, too, hope further work goes into a desktop-focused QNX for lower-spec machines or PDA’s. It could rock!
Which lacked the driver for the Intel PRO network card in most Dells built between 199x-2002 or most of the modern softmodem cards. This was unbelievably frustrating.
Edited 2007-09-12 16:15 UTC
It’s a pity, because I was glad when I saw the title of the article. Finally a good open source RT microkernel! Well, the title is about as close to being a LIE as it can be, without quite lying.
This and other “open-sourcish” initiatives and doomed to a well-deserved failure. They completely miss the point about FOSS. Do they really think many open source developers will be interested in contributing for free to a PROPRIETARY, CLOSED-SOURCE project? Have you noticed it’s not a bit closer to being open source now than before?
“Dan: Today, QNX Software’s revenue comes from a mix of products and services, including runtime royalties, development tool sales, custom engineering, and technical support. None of that will change: Anyone who uses QNX’s technology to build commercial products will still need to purchase commercial development seats and runtime redistribution licenses. The big difference is that we now expect more people to choose QNX for their commercial projects. That’s because our new model will make it far easier to access, experiment with, and distribute QNX technology. It will also encourage a larger ecosystem of complementary products.”
So, they want to have their cake and eat it too, so to speak.
“Dan: We aren’t releasing the OS code under an open source license. Rather, we’re using a commercial-friendly licensing model that gives developers and customers the option of either keeping their source modifications or donating them back to the community. If fact, we’re providing three licenses: one for commercial users, one for noncommercial users, and one for QNX technology partners. When you register, you identify which license is appropriate to your interests. For instance, if you’re a student, academic faculty member, or hobbyist developer, you choose the noncommercial license, which provides access to development tools and runtime components free of charge.”
The title and the tone of the interview seems to suggest otherwise, misleading the reader, but in the end he admits it’s NOT open source, it just “feels exactly like” open source, and “is a better model”. Personally, as a free software enthusiast, I must say I find these words rather insulting, and a lame marketing campaign.
I’m sorry to say, I wish them a resounding failure.
The title and the tone of the interview seems to suggest otherwise, misleading the reader, but in the end he admits it’s NOT open source, it just “feels exactly like” open source, and “is a better model”. Personally, as a free software enthusiast, I must say I find these words rather insulting, and a lame marketing campaign.
I don’t see where exactly it is claimed this is “open source as defined by the OSI and/or FSF”. The article says just that – they’re opening up the source code. You can view the code, modify it for your personal use and/or contribute those changes back to the community.
Sadly, these days, it are the big organisations (FSF, OSI) who get to decide what’s open and what’s not. To me, QNX here has made a very smart move, that only benefits us enthusiasts. So, this code can’t be copied/pasted into the Linux kernel… Well, too bad, then. Doesn’t mean the code is not open.
I, for one, am extremely pleased, and wish the company all the luck in the world with their effort.
“I don’t see where exactly it is claimed this is “open source as defined by the OSI and/or FSF” ”
Nowhere in the article such a claim is made. Otherwise it would be an outright lie, not just misleading.
You are right in that, AFAIK, the term “open source” is not trademarked (and neither is “Free software” IIRC), so, technically, maybe you could even say it’s “open source, just not by the OSI definition”. But I hope you agree that would be *extremely* misleading, and as such, contrary to good journalism style.
I get rather heated when some initiatives try to sell themselves as kind of “equivalent to all practical purposes to open source, just better” to entice naive developers into contributing to a proprietary product.
Other than that, I think your coverage of the new was in good faith, just that you got carried away by your technical enthusiasm about QNX and microkernels in general, which I understand and even share, up to a point. So let’s say I hope they realise their mistake and change to a REAL open-source license.
Actually “Open Source” used to be a trademark, but its legal status at this moment is unknown (the same status as in 1999). The trademark still exists.
Besides that the term “open source” was invented specifically as a term for sources one could use, modify and distribute for commercial as well as non-commercial use.
Your attempt at redefining “open source” is – to put it mildly – quite unethical.
I think the trademark is “OSI certified”. It seems that “open source” could not be trademarked for being too descriptive.
http://slashdot.org/articles/99/06/17/0213251.shtml
Absolutely. Although I agree that the opening of the QNX source is not what you could call ‘GPL’ like, it’s still opening the source code for all to see.
So you can’t make a commercial product out of your changes without buying a license? Where is the problem in that? QNX, unlike Sun or IBM, are not a hardware company and need to make a buck some how.
As for this being opensource, of course it is. You can see the source, change it and compile your own binaries from that source. What else could possibly be ment by opensource software?
AS far as I can tell, nobody is trying to hoodwink naive developers here by calling a spade a spade. If you want free as in libre software, choose the GPL. It’s that simple.
BTW, Thom. Bad mouthing and misquoting me does not make you look any better.
EDIT: Removed subtle insult
Edited 2007-09-12 23:31 UTC
Now if someone just turned it into the next gen. amigaos/beos =P
The Hebrew year that is… (It started yesterday).
I have programming experience on Linux, FreeBSD, BeOS, Solaris, AmigaOS, VxWorks, Windows and QNX – One thing I can tell you is that QNX is a top quality OS and the opening of the source code is on par (in terms of importance to the industry) with the opening of the Solaris source code.
finally finish HURD!! 😀
Well, will it revive the NC interrest of 6.1 ? 6.2 had more hardware support, but became limited to a 30 days usage… Will http://www.qnxzone.com/ reopen ?