> On Oct 5, 2016, at 4:32 AM, Christoph Hellwig <hch@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote: > > Could someone elaborate what the OFA position is? Right now the only > thing I know is that they are a) forcing their members to Dual license > code nd have b) some sort of weird idea that they could also force this > on others in some way. Although I am sitting on the OFA board as the representative of my organization, I do not speak for the OFA. These are my observations: 1. The OFA is an organization to promote the standardization of alternative network technologies. Prior to the OFA, vendors created specialized hardware with specialized software stacks tailored to HPC. Examples include QSnet/Quadrics, GM/Myrinet MX/Myrinet, Cray Portals/SeaStar, Cray GNI/Gemini/Aries, IBM BG[LPQ], etc. The OFA evolved from the InfiniBand/Verbs trade group in order to promote additional technologies (e.g. iWarp, RoCE, PSM, etc). 2. The OFA organization, made up of various members, has rules to govern itself. Most members are also competitors. They cooperate on standards because everyone benefits by avoiding the fragmentation of the prior state of affairs (see item 1). Because they are competitors, changes are difficult and/or slow because people have to build consensus. Other members are consumers, for example the organization I represent, and we want standards and competition. The former allows us to get better products from the latter. 3. The members that contribute the most to the OFA in terms of money, staff time, and code are the vendors. They wrote much of the code that was contributed and they chose dual license, as is their right. I assume (because I do not know) that they did so to avoid writing two (or three) stacks for Linux and non-Linux environments. 4. OFA has a rule that code developed on its behalf be dual-license. They do not _force_ this on members because members decided this or they joined knowing that this was the rule. OFA cannot force anyone to join so therefore they cannot force anyone to adopt a dual-license. As mentioned in item 2, OFA members can modify their rules via an established process. If you want to change the rule, join OFA and convince the members. 5. The only one in this thread trying to force a license of others is not the OFA. > I personally think that a) is not helpful to the adoption of RDMA > technologies in Linux, and that b) is obviously a complete non-started > as confirmed multiple times, which isn't just my own opinion. If one is not a member, the OFA cannot force anything. I do not see dual-license as a hindrance to Linux kernel use or adoption. Perhaps you can help me understand better. > Based on that I really don't understand what the point of this > discussion is, unless OFA really needs help with an internal discussion > to get rid of a). If Christoph really wants me to help with a) please > do it during Plumbers as I won't be around on Saturday. -- To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-rdma" in the body of a message to majordomo@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html
