The three least developed states have the highest birthrate , not surprising . <| sep |> I was 14 and it was a family party , I was still pretty chill about it . My aunt , however , got hammered and I ended up feeding her bread while she was laying on the floor of the bathroom . <| sep |> On respecte aussi la diversit sexuelle et si un gai veut avoir le droit de frencher des gars sur la job il va autant se faire envoyer promener qu ' un htro . En quoi la religion est un privilge superlatif ? <| sep |> I didn ' t downvote either of you , but the author of the article is an opinion writer , and he ' s giving his opinion . He ' s not supposed to be objective . <| sep |> This is just bullshit . What encumbered code is he talking about ? I have no idea , but it wasn ' t just ZFS they were opening it was all of Solaris and other software , some of which they might not have been able to GPL for various reasons . There is no reason ZFS couldn ' t be licensed under GPLv 2 , and it was obviously a lot more work to invent a new license CDDL from scratch . Not so obviously . GPL is a very restrictive license and has a lot of little gotchas . That ' s one reason so many open source projects use the MIT or Apache license they ' re a lot more liberal about what you can do with the code . Oracle can support Linux by relicensing ZFS under the GPL . It ' s probably not so simple . Whether they can or cannot depends on a few small matters , such as the copyrightassignment and the merger agreement between Oracle and Sun . It would probably take a team of lawyers a few weeks to sort out the details to ensure this could be done . You have industryinsider experience , right ? You do know how expensive things get when lawyers are involved , right ? Meanwhile Canonical ' s opinionlicensingandlinux is that they don ' t need to . Conservancy disagreesandlinux , and makes the argument you did , that Sun intentionally made the CDDL to be incompatible with GPL . Their arguments are reasonable , but they are , as they state , a belief . For my part , I think Canonical is right , but the fear of a license conflict kept many wouldbe developers at bay . To that extent , the differing licensing was an issue . About why I think Canonical is right Linux loadable modules do not fall under the domain derivative work . The intent of the GPL having read Stallman ' s manifesto 20 years ago was to ensure that code , written freely , remains free . If I write 100 lines of code and publish that code under GPL , I ' m assured reciprocal freedom that someone else who modifies that code must also publish it . It was also intended to ensure moral purity Stallman , ever a moralist , wanted to ensure every piece of software he ran was at least opensource . With Linux modules , neither is the problem here . 1 GPL ' d source code is not reused nor further restricted . 2 The user is free to not use the ZFS binary it is purely optional . In broad terms , and by intent , loadable kernel modules do not need to be GPL ' d if distributed with a GPL kernel the exception is if said module forms a key part of the OS that can hardly operate without it , such as binfmtelf and loop and procfs just to be clear you can operate Linux without any of these . Conservancy ' s entire argument seems to be based on a false interpretation of covered work of the CDDL and derived of the GPL . Thus they see the Linux kernel and ZFS as one piece of software , whereas I see it as two . we conclude easily that binary distribution of ZFS plus Linux even with ZFS in a . ko file constitutes distribution of a combined work , which we name LinuxZFS . Yet the GPLv 2 seems pretty clear that this is incorrect These requirements apply to the modified work as a whole . If identifiable sections of that work are not derived from the Program , and can be reasonably considered independent and separate works in themselves , then this License , and its terms , do not apply to those sections when you distribute them as separate works . Since a ZFS module adapted to Linux can reasonably be considered independent , it doesn ' t apply . The ZFSLinux module requires Linux , but that ' s OK by the CDDL Linux does not require the ZFS module , and thus it retains its separateness . This is the same argument for any userspace program which uses a Linuxspecific implementation or system call interface it depends on Linux , but Linux doesn ' t depend on it . That program is a separate work from the standpoint of the GPL ' d software . So , as long as ZFS is distributed with Linux as a . ko file , and as long as the documentation clearly regards it as a separate work , it ' s a separate work . Therefore , if you distribute Linux ZFS it ' s OK . But when you distribute the same sections as part of a whole which is a work based on the Program , the distribution of the whole must be on the terms of this License , whose permissions for other licensees extend to the entire whole , and thus to each and every part regardless of who wrote it . but if you include the ZFS . ko file in a distribution merely marked as Linux , it ' s not OK .