
Toybox, a Busybox alternative with a BSD license - networked
http://www.landley.net/toybox/
======
cliffbean
I am sympathetic to people who prefer BSD-style licenses for many reasons,
including simplicity, GPLv3 overreach avoidance, and even just declining to
give attention to a certain obnoxious man (regardless of what you think of the
politics).

However, the individualist in me really likes being able to install my own
software on my own hardware. The GPL license, specifically in the areas of a
system needed to boot and minimally run, has successfully helped me do this
several times in the past, by pushing vendors to deliver source for something
that they probably wouldn't have otherwise. It doesn't always work, and it
isn't perfect, but it has worked in some cases where seemingly nothing else
would have.

As long as this continues to be the case, I won't celebrate the replacement of
busybox for licensing purposes.

~~~
adestefan
It's pretty strange that the talking notes linked below say that one of the
biggest threats to computing is locked down embedded devices. The author's fix
is to then implement a replacement that would allow vendors to completely lock
down embedded devices.

~~~
eksith
Huh? The author's fix is to help develop embedded systems by freely
distributing an unencumbered tool set with:

    
    
      1) A smaller attack surface
      2) Correctness as a focus with regard to code
      3) Conciseness as a focus with regard to tools
      4) Improved speed
      5) Clear documentation (In TODO)
    

[http://www.landley.net/toybox/status.html](http://www.landley.net/toybox/status.html)

[http://www.landley.net/toybox/design.html](http://www.landley.net/toybox/design.html)

~~~
cliffbean
Those are nice things, but they're also orthogonal to the license choice,
which happens to be the detail which made the headline here.

~~~
oakwhiz
They're not totally unrelated to the license - all the good code is GPL, and
hardware manufacturers sometimes would rather create an insecure software
solution than use GPL code. If somewhat good BSD code is available,
manufacturers will use it instead, and it will reduce the attack surface of
many embedded systems.

~~~
synchronise
'all the good code is GPL' is a pretty unrealistic claim to make.

~~~
oakwhiz
I agree with this.

------
RexRollman
Maybe I missed it, but why recreate Busybox? It it just about the license?

Nevermind, found it here:
[http://landley.net/talks/celf-2013.txt](http://landley.net/talks/celf-2013.txt)

~~~
eksith
That's a whole heap of _very_ controversial topics.

I'm very curious how it will turn out as I favor BSD/ISC over GPL for the same
basic reason as well :

    
    
      In the absence of universal receiver, go to universal donor (BSD/PD)

~~~
spacelizard
That analogy is a bit flawed. People who can't legally combine the GPL with
other projects had to make the conscious decision of choosing an incompatible
license. If you acknowledge the idea that there are no non-universal
recipients or donors in software, then it makes more sense to use copyleft.

~~~
eksith
I'm not too sure what you're trying to say here. "If you acknowledge the idea
that there are no non-universal recipients or donors in software..." ?

My perspective is that of a donor; not a receiver. I want to ensure that what
I create has as few hindrances as possible in terms of adoptability and the
last thing I need is the license (which has no bearing whatsoever on the
actual functionality of the work to begin with) to get in the way. And I've
seen it get in the way of plenty of other past projects.

~~~
spacelizard
If you release your software under copyleft, and someone else can't use that
in another project because they chose an incompatible license, the "hindrance"
is entirely their fault, not yours.

Now if someone takes your permissively licensed code and makes it proprietary,
THAT is a real hindrance to users of that software, and while it may not be
your fault directly, you had the power to stop it because you are the
copyright holder and could have copylefted it. So permissively licensed
software actually has _more_ potential than copyrighted software in allowing a
license to "get in the way."

~~~
eksith
I want to give people _choice_ to contribute back.

'Do as you please and leave the copyright' vs. 'Do as you please, leave
copyright, distribution requires sources etc...' Which is more permissive?
"Permissive" in your sense of the word is entirely a misnomer since it's
effectively a permission whitelist not a blacklist.

This is getting to be entirely repetitious since I've had this discussion many
times before. I'll let an old post explain why I can never in good conscience
put GPL on anything I do : [http://eksith.wordpress.com/2008/11/24/gpl-vs-
bsd](http://eksith.wordpress.com/2008/11/24/gpl-vs-bsd)

~~~
Nursie
One persons restriction on what developers can do is another persons "Never
able to access the source to devices I own"

I'm sure you have your reasons for disliking the GPL. Many of us love it for
those very same reasons, and for the freedom it grants to everyone, not just
the immediate recipient.

~~~
foobarbazqux
The GPL and proprietary licenses are both about controlling what other people
can do, just in opposite ways. They each address the fear that other people
won't play nice. The BSD license sits in the middle and is about trusting
people to make good decisions. The trust extends so far that BSD code can be
converted to the GPL or a proprietary license.

~~~
nitrogen
GPL isn't about control in the way proprietary licenses are, since it grants
rights _beyond_ what you would get with no license at all, while proprietary
licenses _take away_ rights you would normally have under copyright.

~~~
Someone
Both the GPL and BSD licenses give _developers_ that want to build on software
others wrote rights that they do not have by default.

However, compared to BSD licenses, the GPL gives fewer rights to those 3rd
party _developers_. It also gives _users_ of the software those developers
write rights. BSD licenses, on the other hand, leave it to those developers to
decide what they want to give _their_ users.

So yes, the GPL isn't about control _in the way proprietary licenses are_ ,
but it _is_ about control.

~~~
vorbote
No. The GPL is about the _users_. It empowers those who use the software to
have access to the source and in case they are so inclined (say, the
_developers_ are a bunch of tools that don't listen to the needs of the
_users_ ), to be able to run away with the code and continue with _real user
oriented development_. That is, a fork.

This _" the GPL gives developers power"_ is pure FUD that showed up in the
90's as part of the reactionary trantrums throw down by some BSD groupies and
by ESR and his gun-toting friends who wanted to sell _Free Software_ to the
corporate world, so they corrupted the term and invented _Open Source_. It
just so happens that developers _are_ users too.

So, if you want to strike it rich with open core, sure, you choose a lax
license, say MIT or Apache, or even better BSD 2-clause, and when the suckers
have implemented all the features and ironed out the bugs, you run away with
the code, sell your startup and more power to your bank account in the
Caiman's. Right?

So, no. The reason why the corporate world uses the GPL instead of the BSD
license for the _really_ important stuff is because it creates a level-playing
field. It is the same situation as the Cold War (perhaps you are too young to
remember its lessons?): "If you and I can blow each other to bits and take
everybody else with us in the process, let's stop and rather do some
conquering and plundering together, shall we?" And that's exactly why the
mobile space is a nasty, miserable world of patent lawsuits: There are no
mutual assurances of total, generalized annihilation if someone doesn't want
to play by the rules. Patents are just not it; ask the Chinese.

~~~
Someone
I agree with that first paragraph. My main disagreement is about your use of
'No'. I don't see how what you say contradicts what I said. Care to explain?

I won't comment on paragraphs 2 and 3, because they, to me, look more like
opinions than factual discussion.

The last paragraph, similarly, IMO is not built on facts. "The corporate world
uses the GPL" certainly isn't uniformly true. To mention one example: from
what I can see, a C compiler is part of the " _really_ important stuff" and
clang is more popular than gcc for new developments.

------
james2vegas
Funny how this project with the BSD license is so anti-BSD (yeah, BSD users
are 'busybox-envious', amongst other things). Fails to notice the presence of
a large number of BSD-licensed userland tools, in the BSDs, while denigrating
as many similar projects as possible (linking to inaccurate, flame-bait anti-
Perl articles as a bonus).

------
mschuster91
If I may ask,why all the effort of reinventing the wheel as there already
exists the gnu userland/coreutils and busybox? Just because of the license?!

~~~
tjaerv
Yes, because of licensing. See his recent presentation at
[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SGmtP5Lg_t0](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SGmtP5Lg_t0)

------
hoverbear
I got to know Landley fairly well on IRC over a course of a few months, he was
a really clever fellow. At the time Toybox was just in it's infancy, glad to
see it maturing.

------
jimktrains2
There use to be a little DOS GUI program called ToyBox. My dad installed it to
allow easier access to stuff installed on our computer for my siblings and I.

------
jjindev
I only watched a bit, but isn't the idea that "phones become disruptive"
contrary to other expectation, of ubiquitous computing? Needing "your device"
to be self supporting seems to hearken back to rare computing.

(I think I'd like to see better communication between devices, with the
expectation that a real Linux development machine will be trivially cheap from
here on out.)

------
ausjke
worked with Robert closely in the past, who is a real geek and a kind and nice
person to work with, I'm so happy to see this coming along.

