no longer open-source

[VonderVuflya]

Apparently Linux unfortunately can no longer be open-sourced 😢

https://opensource.org/osd

[KernelPRBot]

Hi @VonderVuflya!

Thanks for your contribution to the Linux kernel!

Linux kernel development happens on mailing lists, rather than on GitHub - this GitHub repository is a read-only mirror that isn't used for accepting contributions. So that your change can become part of Linux, please email it to us as a patch.

Sending patches isn't quite as simple as sending a pull request, but fortunately it is a well documented process.

Here's what to do:

• Format your contribution according to kernel requirements
• Decide who to send your contribution to
• Set up your system to send your contribution as an email
• Send your contribution and wait for feedback

How do I format my contribution?

The Linux kernel community is notoriously picky about how contributions are formatted and sent. Fortunately, they have documented their expectations.

Firstly, all contributions need to be formatted as patches. A patch is a plain text document showing the change you want to make to the code, and documenting why it is a good idea.

You can create patches with git format-patch.

Secondly, patches need 'commit messages', which is the human-friendly documentation explaining what the change is and why it's necessary.

Thirdly, changes have some technical requirements. There is a Linux kernel coding style, and there are licensing requirements you need to comply with.

Both of these are documented in the Submitting Patches documentation that is part of the kernel.

Note that you will almost certainly have to modify your existing git commits to satisfy these requirements. Don't worry: there are many guides on the internet for doing this.

Where do I send my contribution?

The Linux kernel is composed of a number of subsystems. These subsystems are maintained by different people, and have different mailing lists where they discuss proposed changes.

If you don't already know what subsystem your change belongs to, the get_maintainer.pl script in the kernel source can help you.

get_maintainer.pl will take the patch or patches you created in the previous step, and tell you who is responsible for them, and what mailing lists are used. You can also take a look at the MAINTAINERS file by hand.

Make sure that your list of recipients includes a mailing list. If you can't find a more specific mailing list, then LKML - the Linux Kernel Mailing List - is the place to send your patches.

It's not usually necessary to subscribe to the mailing list before you send the patches, but if you're interested in kernel development, subscribing to a subsystem mailing list is a good idea. (At this point, you probably don't need to subscribe to LKML - it is a very high traffic list with about a thousand messages per day, which is often not useful for beginners.)

How do I send my contribution?

Use git send-email, which will ensure that your patches are formatted in the standard manner. In order to use git send-email, you'll need to configure git to use your SMTP email server.

For more information about using git send-email, look at the Git documentation or type git help send-email. There are a number of useful guides and tutorials about git send-email that can be found on the internet.

How do I get help if I'm stuck?

Firstly, don't get discouraged! There are an enormous number of resources on the internet, and many kernel developers who would like to see you succeed.

Many issues - especially about how to use certain tools - can be resolved by using your favourite internet search engine.

If you can't find an answer, there are a few places you can turn:

• Kernel Newbies - this website contains a lot of useful resources for new kernel developers.
• The kernel documentation - see also the Documentation directory in the kernel tree.

If you get really, really stuck, you could try the owners of this bot, @daxtens and @ajdlinux. Please be aware that we do have full-time jobs, so we are almost certainly the slowest way to get answers!

I sent my patch - now what?

You wait.

You can check that your email has been received by checking the mailing list archives for the mailing list you sent your patch to. Messages may not be received instantly, so be patient. Kernel developers are generally very busy people, so it may take a few weeks before your patch is looked at.

Then, you keep waiting. Three things may happen:

• You might get a response to your email. Often these will be comments, which may require you to make changes to your patch, or explain why your way is the best way. You should respond to these comments, and you may need to submit another revision of your patch to address the issues raised.
• Your patch might be merged into the subsystem tree. Code that becomes part of Linux isn't merged into the main repository straight away - it first goes into the subsystem tree, which is managed by the subsystem maintainer. It is then batched up with a number of other changes sent to Linus for inclusion. (This process is described in some detail in the kernel development process guide).
• Your patch might be ignored completely. This happens sometimes - don't take it personally. Here's what to do:
  • Wait a bit more - patches often take several weeks to get a response; more if they were sent at a busy time.
  • Kernel developers often silently ignore patches that break the rules. Check for obvious violations of the Submitting Patches guidelines, the style guidelines, and any other documentation you can find about your subsystem. Check that you're sending your patch to the right place.
  • Try again later. When you resend it, don't add angry commentary, as that will get your patch ignored. It might also get you silently blacklisted.

Further information

• Working with the kernel development community - the official documentation for new kernel contributors

Happy hacking!

This message was posted by a bot - if you have any questions or suggestions, please talk to my owners, @ajdlinux and @daxtens, or raise an issue at https://github.com/ajdlinux/KernelPRBot.

[Ritanlisa]

yeah, that's how fucking politics affect human brains

[nicolello-dev]

To be fair, it is the license that should not discriminate. So it is technically still open source

[HopaBDD]

To be fair, it is the license that should not discriminate. So it is technically still open source

Wrong. Open source is not just about reading and using code without restrictions. It is much more than that.

[Jorgen10]

Wrong. Open source is not just about reading and using code without restrictions. It is much more than that.

If you read the introduction, you would know that it says:

The distribution terms of open source software must comply with the following criteria

In other words? It is specifically for distribution.

[mikkorantalainen]

To be fair, it is the license that should not discriminate. So it is technically still open source

Wrong. Open source is not just about reading and using code without restrictions. It is much more than that.

Check the initial screenshot. It specifically talks about license and Linux is still GPL v2 which doesn't discriminate any group or persons.

There's no promise of any kind of accept new contributions into the official source code from any given person but the license allows anybody to freely use and improve the Linux kernel as they wish. The decision to accept any new contribution into the official Linux kernel is solely decided by Linus Torvalds, the owner of this repository.

It's just you that wants to convert this into purely political issue. Do you really think that Linux kernel should accept contributions from anybody? Do you really think that anybody should be accepted as maintainer for this project?

Being a maintainer is 99% about being trusted and people with Russian nationality cannot be trusted because their country has passed laws that allow them to be forced to silently accept code if Russian government says so.

If you want to maintain an alternative fork that accepts contributions from people that Linus doesn't trust, feel free to press the Fork button and maintain that fork yourself. Hopefully you do good enough work to attract lots of people. However, considering that Linus' fork is still considered the official one even after Redhat, Ubuntu and SUSE have been maintaining their respective forks for decades, I would say changes are slim to none that any given individual could do better work. But you definitely have freedom to try!

[anonyco]

I’d consider the FSF to be a much more authoritative source on open source software, and they define “free software means users have the four essential freedoms:”

0. to run the program
1. to study and change the program in source code form,
2. to redistribute exact copies, and
3. to distribute modified versions.

Apply a little critical thinking comparing the FSF and the OSI and it becomes clear which one sucks the dicks of corporate sponsors and which one is genuinely altruistic. I trust the FSF to be my source of truth and relish getting high off my ass on the euphoric idealism of snorting FSF cocaine

Linux is more open source than most projects thanks to its awesome copyleft GPLv2 license, guaranteeing the freedom of the code to every recipient all the way down the line.

OK, first, let’s review the top messages of the mail list:

Remove some entries due to various compliance requirements. They can come
back in the future if sufficient documentation is provided.

Signed-off-by: Greg Kroah-Hartman

Two good analogies to Linus Torvalds removing Russian maintainers are businesses choosing customers and first amendment rights. Nobody has any right to be a customer of any business and businesses are free to deny services to anyone they choose. Similarly, you can say whatever you want but nobody is free from the consequences; cancel culture is legal and the government can closely monitor people they’re concerned about.

Similarly, Open Source doesn’t mean it’s available to everyone and certainly doesn’t mean anyone is allowed to be a contributor. Per the FSF principles, the GPL only obligates you to provide source code to those who you distribute your software to. Publishing your source code online is a good kind gesture, but not required. Likewise, an open source project can reject any maintainers they want. Look up “open source, not open contribution” to find projects following the strictest sense of this model.

Being a maintainer is 99% about being trusted and people with Russian nationality cannot be trusted because their country has passed laws that allow them to be forced to silently accept code if Russian government says so.

@mikkorantalainen above in this GitHub thread

A lot of countries impose censorship like this, especially China but even the United States. Read up on Snowden. It’s not too far fetched for the NSA to seize a kernel dev’s laptop and hold the person prisoner while they submit a malicious kernel patch. I wouldn’t be surprised if France did it either

OK, bring out your pitchforks and downvote my unpopular remarks, but at least consider this: it doesn’t matter who has access to the Linux kernel and who submits what because there’s too many eyeballs on the code. Chances are that a secret disguised malicious code would turn up pretty quickly in a random kernel dump and be investigated further by whoever is debugging the kernel. It’d be found out and removed, end of story.

Ok, lots of Russian trolls out and about.

It's entirely clear why the change was done, it's not getting
reverted, and using multiple random anonymous accounts to try to
"grass root" it by Russian troll factories isn't going to change
anything.

And FYI for the actual innocent bystanders who aren't troll farm accounts - the "various compliance requirements" are not just a US thing.

If you haven't heard of Russian sanctions yet, you should try to read the news some day. And by "news", I don't mean Russian state-sponsored spam.

As to sending me a revert patch - please use whatever mush you call brains. I'm Finnish. Did you think I'd be supporting Russian aggression? Apparently it's not just lack of real news, it's lack of history knowledge too.

                   Linus

SO, what’s the deal with Torvalds kicking out the Russian kernel devs? It’s because of United States sanctions on Russia and because Torvalds (very smartly) doesn’t want to drag the Linux kernel into a shootout with dumb orange oafish American politicians who don’t understand anything about software. Consider all the companies contributing to the Linux kernel located in the United States such as RedHat and Google. Hate these companies all you want but the Linux kernel wouldn’t be where it is without them.

Linus Torvalds is nothing if not completely self-directed and resistant to authority. He doesn’t care about these companies or anyone else and doesn’t pander to their interests. The interest is mutual here.

No, but I'm not a lawyer, so I'm not going to go into the details that I - and other maintainers - were told by lawyers.

I'm also not going to start discussing legal issues with random internet people who I seriously suspect are paid actors and/or have been riled up by them.

                   Linus

What if the United States passes more sanctions to try to control the Linux Kernel further? I guarantee Linus Torvalds wasn’t too happy about having to remove the Russian maintainers and he won’t allow himself to be bullied much further by pigheaded politicians. Such sanctions have and will harm tech companies just as much as the Linux kernel, and the likely result would be the exodus of open source software and big name tech companies from the United States.

When everything blows over—regardless of whether the outcome is lifting sanctions or escalating them—I’m sure Linus Torvalds will reinstate the Russian maintainers and their rightful plaques in CREDITS and MAINTAINERS

/rant please don’t hate me. Love everyone!

[AkemiKami201]

its because of the fucking politics