Friday, July 14th 2023

Oracle Advocates Keeping Linux Open and Free, Calls Out IBM

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Oracle has been part of the Linux community for 25 years. Our goal has remained the same over all those years: help make Linux the best server operating system for everyone, freely available to all, with high-quality, low-cost support provided to those who need it. Our Linux engineering team makes significant contributions to the kernel, file systems, and tools. We push all that work back to mainline so that every Linux distribution can include it. We are proud those contributions are part of the reason Linux is now so very capable, benefiting not just Oracle customers, but all users.

In 2006, we launched what is now called Oracle Linux, a RHEL compatible distribution and support offering that is used widely, and powers Oracle's engineered systems and our cloud infrastructure. We chose to be RHEL compatible because we did not want to fragment the Linux community. Our effort to remain compatible has been enormously successful. In all the years since launch, we have had almost no compatibility bugs filed. Customers and ISVs can switch to Oracle Linux from RHEL without modifying their applications, and we certify Oracle software products on RHEL even though they are built and tested on Oracle Linux only, never on RHEL.
While Oracle and IBM have compatible Linux distributions, we have very different ideas about our responsibilities as open source stewards and about operating under the GPLv2. Oracle has always made Oracle Linux binaries and source freely available to all. We do not have subscription agreements that interfere with a subscriber's rights to redistribute Oracle Linux. On the other hand, IBM subscription agreements specify that you're in breach if you use those subscription services to exercise your GPLv2 rights. And now, as of June 21, IBM no longer publicly releases RHEL source code.

Why did IBM make this change? Well, if you read IBM's blog attempting to explain its rationale, it boils down to this: "At Red Hat, thousands of people spend their time writing code to enable new features, fixing bugs, integrating different packages and then supporting that work for a long time … We have to pay the people to do that work."

Interesting. IBM doesn't want to continue publicly releasing RHEL source code because it has to pay its engineers? That seems odd, given that Red Hat as a successful independent open source company chose to publicly release RHEL source and pay its engineers for many years before IBM acquired Red Hat in 2019 for $34 billion.
The blog goes on to mention CentOS. It is no surprise CentOS was top of mind for the author attempting to justify withholding RHEL source. CentOS had been a very popular free RHEL compatible distribution. In December 2020, IBM effectively killed it as a free alternative to RHEL. Two new alternatives to RHEL have sprung up in CentOS's place: AlmaLinux and Rocky Linux. Now, by withholding RHEL source code, IBM has directly attacked them.

And perhaps that is the real answer to the question of why: eliminate competitors. Fewer competitors means more revenue opportunity for IBM.

As for Oracle, we will continue pursuing our goal for Linux as transparently and openly as we always have while minimizing fragmentation. We will continue to develop and test our software products on Oracle Linux. Oracle Linux will continue to be RHEL compatible to the extent we can make it so. In the past, Oracle's access to published RHEL source has been important for maintaining that compatibility. From a practical standpoint, we believe Oracle Linux will remain as compatible as it has always been through release 9.2, but after that, there may be a greater chance for a compatibility issue to arise. If an incompatibility does affect a customer or ISV, Oracle will work to remediate the problem.

We want to emphasize to Linux developers, Linux customers, and Linux distributors that Oracle is committed to Linux freedom. Oracle makes the following promise: as long as Oracle distributes Linux, Oracle will make the binaries and source code for that distribution publicly and freely available. Furthermore, Oracle welcomes downstream distributions of every kind, community and commercial. We are happy to work with distributors to ease that process, work together on the content of Oracle Linux, and ensure Oracle software products are certified on your distribution.

By the way, if you are a Linux developer who disagrees with IBM's actions and you believe in Linux freedom the way we do, we are hiring.

One observation for ISVs: IBM's actions are not in your best interest. By killing CentOS as a RHEL alternative and attacking AlmaLinux and Rocky Linux, IBM is eliminating one way your customers save money and make a larger share of their wallet available to you. If you don't yet support your product on Oracle Linux, we would be happy to show you how easy that is. Give your customers more choice.

Finally, to IBM, here's a big idea for you. You say that you don't want to pay all those RHEL developers? Here's how you can save money: just pull from us. Become a downstream distributor of Oracle Linux. We will happily take on the burden.
Source: Oracle News

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66 Comments on Oracle Advocates Keeping Linux Open and Free, Calls Out IBM

#51
Imouto
bugOn the other hand, Arch has my printer, which works fine under Windows under the "paperweight" category.
Try another distro in a pen drive. Archlinux unless you are knowledgeable is a nightmare for certain things. Nowadays printers are pretty much OS / driver agnostic so I really don't know if it falls in the "corpo overlord shackle" basket.
Posted on Reply
#52
bug
ImoutoTry another distro in a pen drive. Archlinux unless you are knowledgeable is a nightmare for certain things. Nowadays printers are pretty much OS / driver agnostic so I really don't know if it falls in the "corpo overlord shackle" basket.
Neah, I've tried many distros, I'm sticking with Arch. It just seems my printer had some drivers for Fedora and Ubuntu, but, since they were not open, not much beyond that. And yes, it's an older model, but still works as it did day 1, so I'm not throwing it away. These days that printer is about the only reason I boot into Windows.
Posted on Reply
#53
wNotyarD
bugNeah, I've tried many distros, I'm sticking with Arch. It just seems my printer had some drivers for Fedora and Ubuntu, but, since they were not open, not much beyond that. And yes, it's an older model, but still works as it did day 1, so I'm not throwing it away. These days that printer is about the only reason I boot into Windows.
Printers are the devil's work, so there's that.
Posted on Reply
#54
Aleksandar_038
wNotyarDPrinters are the devil's work, so there's that.
Printer manufacturers are the biggest bunch of a**holes in the IT world. They made rocket science out of writing drivers, and planned obsolescence is their top priority.
ImoutoNo, you don't use Linux or you wouldn't be saying half of the nonsense you are saying. It's like you just woke up from being frozen 20+ years. "Trouble with WiFi / BT / random stupidity" is almost non-existent. If you had installed Linux on a machine in the last 10+ years you'd know that. It's so easy I got complete computer illiterates to install it over the phone.
Tell that to Asus Vivobook X3400PA and Bluetooth which did not work under Ubuntu whatsoever just last month. Now it is working, but it did require a bit of juggling.

I do not know why you get so defensive almost immediately...
Posted on Reply
#55
Kyan
ImoutoNo, you don't use Linux or you wouldn't be saying half of the nonsense you are saying. It's like you just woke up from being frozen 20+ years. "Trouble with WiFi / BT / random stupidity" is almost non-existent. If you had installed Linux on a machine in the last 10+ years you'd know that. It's so easy I got complete computer illiterates to install it over the phone.
I did admin studies with linux in 2018-2019 and when I tried to install debian on my laptop, I had problems with wi-fi and bluetooth which I think I overcame, so it was still existing less than 5 years ago.
Posted on Reply
#56
unwind-protect
KyanI did admin studies with linux in 2018-2019 and when I tried to install debian on my laptop, I had problems with wi-fi and bluetooth which I think I overcame, so it was still existing less than 5 years ago.
First order of business for any laptop is ripping out whichever random Wifi NVMe it came with and put an Intel one. Only costs $10-20.

This applies even if you run Windows. Bad hardware is bad hardware even if you have a driver for it.
Posted on Reply
#57
bug
unwind-protectFirst order of business for any laptop is ripping out whichever random Wifi NVMe it came with and put an Intel one. Only costs $10-20.

This applies even if you run Windows. Bad hardware is bad hardware even if you have a driver for it.
That's not the problem. The problem is Debian on a laptop. Debian is aimed at servers, its kernel and general driver support are meant to lag behind.
Posted on Reply
#58
Aleksandar_038
unwind-protectFirst order of business for any laptop is ripping out whichever random Wifi NVMe it came with and put an Intel one. Only costs $10-20.

This applies even if you run Windows. Bad hardware is bad hardware even if you have a driver for it.
Yes, I noticed that even some moderately good laptops come with junk NVMe WiFi/Bluetooth adapters that have tendency to bug out quite often, regardless of OS.
Posted on Reply
#59
Kyan
unwind-protectFirst order of business for any laptop is ripping out whichever random Wifi NVMe it came with and put an Intel one. Only costs $10-20.

This applies even if you run Windows. Bad hardware is bad hardware even if you have a driver for it.
It's probably not so good but it works and I nerver have any problem with it. It's a laptop from 2016 : i5-4460 with GTX950M.
Side story :
The 950M didn't work for obscur reason after opening it (maybe a screwdriver slip at the wrong spot ?) for multiple year, and magically with an update on W8.1 (yeah W10 wasn't able to be install also for obscur reason), the 950M re-enable itself in the device manager (it was manually disable or else windows crash just before login) and nothing crashed.
So yeah, Wi-Fi was really not my problem with it.
PS : It's on W10 now on a ssd, it works a lot better than when i was actually using it :rolleyes: Playing on intel hd wasn't the gaming experience i was hoping for during internship.
Posted on Reply
#60
lexluthermiester
Aleksandar_038Maybe for you. For me too, unlocked Android, freed from the Google services, is a very powerful tool... Not to mention that my battery life is FANTASTIC.
True. Google's services running in the background can eat up battery life in certain situations.
Aleksandar_038But 99,5% users do not want that - they want simple access to social networks, good photos and a few utility apps to work without a hitch.
Yeah, that's fair. We all have to remember that, as a general rule, we TPU surfers are PowerUsers compared to the general public...
Aleksandar_038Yes, it sounds simple. But install it on ten PCs / laptops, then count how many times you need to tinker with Bluetooth / Audio / WiFi...
I do it frequently, rarely have issues..
Aleksandar_038Then explain to the average Joe how to run his favorite games...
Let's faces reality, Linux is still not a "Gamers" platform. And I make that clear to anyone who looks at it.
Aleksandar_038They are not in the business of education
Moose muffins!!! They absolutely are. That myth is something sinister indeed. Those companies desperately need to pull their heads from their collective rectums, slow down the development trains(yes, plural!) and go back to methodically showing what is on offer, TEACH people how to use it all and stay with what WORKS for a decade or more. This ideal is also part of the message Oracle is trying to send, but they're being a bit subtle about it.
ImoutoExcuse me but WTF. Linux is ten thousand times easier to use than Windows.
No it's not. You can not make a blanket statement like THAT and expect people to take you seriously. Some versions of Linux are VERY easy to use, true, but not all and not even most. Windows is very similar. Some versions of Windows are a fricken pain in the "mikta" to setup and configure. Sorry, but what you said is just silly!
Posted on Reply
#61
Aleksandar_038
lexluthermiesterLet's faces reality, Linux is still not a "Gamers" platform. And I make that clear to anyone who looks at it.
Yes, it is not, but Proton has everything it needs to change that. However, if we need SteamOS for Gaming and some other Distro for work - it won't work at consumer level :)
lexluthermiesterMoose muffins!!! They absolutely are. That myth is something sinister indeed. Those companies desperately need to pull their heads from their collective rectums, slow down the development trains(yes, plural!) and go back to methodically showing what is on offer, TEACH people how to use it all and stay with what WORKS for a decade or more. This ideal is also part of the message Oracle is trying to send, but they're being a bit subtle about it.
I like muffins a lot :) As for business, they should care about education, but they are not (most of the time, with few bright exceptions). Slow down development trains? They are on constant lookout for how to speed them up :) Just look at the state of AAA gaming development... But I agree that it should be completely different.
Posted on Reply
#62
bug
lexluthermiesterMoose muffins!!! They absolutely are. That myth is something sinister indeed. Those companies desperately need to pull their heads from their collective rectums, slow down the development trains(yes, plural!) and go back to methodically showing what is on offer, TEACH people how to use it all and stay with what WORKS for a decade or more. This ideal is also part of the message Oracle is trying to send, but they're being a bit subtle about it.
I don't see that happening anytime soon. The current trend is a perpetual search for "the next billion users". The more clueless they are, the more you can fleece them, so keeping them uninformed is actually a bonus.
Posted on Reply
#63
Wirko
Aleksandar_038Yes, it is not, but Proton has everything it needs to change that. However, if we need SteamOS for Gaming and some other Distro for work - it won't work at consumer level :)
This sounds like a perfect case for dual booting - you screw up the gaming installation because you have to do/want to do some experimenting with driver versions, and the other installation remains intact.
Posted on Reply
#64
Aleksandar_038
WirkoThis sounds like a perfect case for dual booting - you screw up the gaming installation because you have to do/want to do some experimenting with driver versions, and the other installation remains intact.
I am talking about an average user who freaks out when somebody unpins icon from taskbar :) For them, dual booting is not an option.
For me - I have two PCs, one with Windows and Ubuntu, other with Mint and SteamOS - and I make more fuckups than anything else, but never mind, I am learning every day :) Only problem is that I have less and less time for such endeavors :(
Posted on Reply
#65
bug
Aleksandar_038I am talking about an average user who freaks out when somebody unpins icon from taskbar :) For them, dual booting is not an option.
For me - I have two PCs, one with Windows and Ubuntu, other with Mint and SteamOS - and I make more fuckups than anything else, but never mind, I am learning every day :) Only problem is that I have less and less time for such endeavors :(
Tbh, once I learned to mount /home on its own partition, my Linux woes were over. Recently, I even made the mistake to reboot the computer while it was installing a kernel update. Booted off a USB stick, chrooted, ran mkinitcpio and was back in business.
I don't expect most people would be able to do this, what I'm saying is Linux is a pretty resilient beast at this point.
Posted on Reply
#66
lexluthermiester
Aleksandar_038Proton has everything it needs to change that.
Credit where it's due, Proton has made some great strides forward. Still has a long way to go though.
bugTbh, once I learned to mount /home on its own partition, my Linux woes were over. Recently, I even made the mistake to reboot the computer while it was installing a kernel update. Booted off a USB stick, chrooted, ran mkinitcpio and was back in business.
Impressive!
bugI don't expect most people would be able to do this
True!
bugwhat I'm saying is Linux is a pretty resilient beast at this point.
VERY true!
bugThe current trend is a perpetual search for "the next billion users".
Which is very sad..
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