You're probably wasting your breath, the GPLv3 crowd I think is stuck in their utopian fallacy where everyone just shares software code for free & you never have to pay for anything ever again. OpenSource has been a huge success in large part because of the willingness of corporations to contribute to it, now with GPLv3 it will go the way of the hobbiest again & we'll go back to the old days or proprietary solutions that don't work together well. Congrats, you just gave Microsoft their comeback, they're already locked into the proprietary game.
Hate to drag you back into the real world, but IBM, Netgear, CISCO, Google, Symantec and other are regular contributors to GPLv3 Samba, and have products based on it, or using it. It's a shame Apple doesn't feel confident enough to do the same (especially since they employ a Samba Team member with direct commit access to our repository) but that's their call.
If they want to move away from GPL software, that is their right and we have no grounds for complaint.
Yet many do anyway.
Quote:
I think they're wasting resources, as we (the Samba Team) will maintain a SMB/CIFS/SMB2/AD server for them if they want, but if they find our license unacceptable then they need to do what's right for their users.
If wasting resources was a concern then Samba staying at GPL v2 or later would have been a better choice. GPL v3's patent provisions are more business hostile as are the DRM provision, hence the avoidance by many companies.
You pushed this as a screw move to Novell over the Microsoft deal for ideological reasons as opposed to practical ones.
This is one major reason that Linus > Freetards.
Amusingly, GPL usage as a percentage of OSS projects has been on a steady decline since GPL v3. 70% in 2008, 65% in 2009 and 61% in 2010.
Not to get too deep into NDA territory but if the current dev seed of Lion already has these changes (and I can verify in the AM) then it seriously explains the speed difference. It is noticeably faster. I have a 20TB Xsan system and 10.6 never worked quite right when trying to connect but Lion is super fast. The files are displayed quickly and Finder behaves as I would expect. I attributed it to changes in Finder but it could be more than that.
Not to get too deep into NDA territory but if the current dev seed of Lion already has these changes (and I can verify in the AM) then it seriously explains the speed difference. It is noticeably faster. I have a 20TB Xsan system and 10.6 never worked quite right when trying to connect but Lion is super fast. The files are displayed quickly and Finder behaves as I would expect. I attributed it to changes in Finder but it could be more than that.
For all those Corporations contributing to Samba 4 you'd think it wouldn't take 7 to 8 years to reach that milestone. Or am I only assuming Samba 4 is being aided by IBM, Cisco, Google, etc., as Jeremy is implying?
At any rate, I agree that Apple moving in the direction they are makes a helluva a lot more sense than expending resources on a third party solution that is taking eternity to get to their latest milestone. Not to beat a dead horse but Samba4 is nearing their 15th alpha release.
Apple can afford to pay Microsoft what is necessary in licensing and focus on other areas of research and development.
Despite its age, some networks still use NT Domain Controller configurations because of its relative simplicity compared to Microsoft's more modern Active Directory. Apple is now said to be recommending Active Directory to users who are still dependent upon the older NT Domain Controller network directory services.
Anyone still running a network on the NT 4 PDC/BDC model should be fired. It may be "simpler", but it's so horribly limited and flawed that it's nearly unusable. Any IT worker that argues for a NT domain should be fired on the spot for not keeping up with the last decade of IT change. Most Windows admins are working on their Windows 2008 R2 migrations. If you're not even up to Windows 2000 technology it's time to get out of the game.
For all those Corporations contributing to Samba 4 you'd think it wouldn't take 7 to 8 years to reach that milestone. Or am I only assuming Samba 4 is being aided by IBM, Cisco, Google, etc., as Jeremy is implying?
At any rate, I agree that Apple moving in the direction they are makes a helluva a lot more sense than expending resources on a third party solution that is taking eternity to get to their latest milestone. Not to beat a dead horse but Samba4 is nearing their 15th alpha release.
Apple can afford to pay Microsoft what is necessary in licensing and focus on other areas of research and development.
Well, replicating an AD controller is quite hard :-). You may remember a lawsuit in the EU over access to the documentation to allow third parties to do just that..
I don't know, but doubt that the new Apple code includes AD functionality. If it does, well done to them. If not, well, when Samba4 comes out it will still work on OSX so you win both ways.
> "I believe, and someone correct me if I'm wrong"
Ok - you're wrong :-).
> "but the primary idealogical difference comes down to "source code must be available" covers
> in derived works. In GPLv2, you can use a source work, if you modify it then you have to
> provide source for those modifications, but if your code just works with it then you don't have
> to open-source your own code. Under GPLv3 you can't use an open-source component without > being entirely open-source yourself."
No, that's not true. You can easily use a GPLv3 component without being entirely open source. Google uses Samba, IBM uses Samba, EMC uses Samba, most of the small NAS boxes you can buy use Samba, all under GPLv3.
Jeremy.
Many many NAS, router, and other embedded devices distribute the source. That's the difference. Aside from Darwin, Apple won't go FOSS.
Honestly, ridding OS X of Samba is a welcome change. Samba 3 has been out forever, and still has many of the bugs that have been around since the 1.x days. Performane is horrible (compared to Windows and Solaris) - on just about any platform / hardware. One of the best things Sun has ever done was move to an in-kernel CIFS server. The performance difference is night and day.
One more thing...
People keep referring to Samba and the CIFS client as one in the same. mount_cifs is actually derived from FreeBSD source - not Samba. So mounting remote filesystems has nothing to do with this - it only has to do with SMB SHARING.
If wasting resources was a concern then Samba staying at GPL v2 or later would have been a better choice. GPL v3's patent provisions are more business hostile as are the DRM provision, hence the avoidance by many companies.
You pushed this as a screw move to Novell over the Microsoft deal for ideological reasons as opposed to practical ones.
This is one major reason that Linus > Freetards.
Amusingly, GPL usage as a percentage of OSS projects has been on a steady decline since GPL v3. 70% in 2008, 65% in 2009 and 61% in 2010.
So on the plus side there are more permissive licensed open source alternatives to GPL encumbered ones. Yay for LLVM and Clang!
With any luck Apple will open source their SMB solution under a permissive license as well.
I'm talking about Apple wasting resources here, not the Samba Team. We're going to be doing what we do anyway.
I support GPLv3 not as a "screw Novell" move (if you actually read the GPLv3 you'll find that the Novell Microsoft agreement is explicitly allowed, not prohibited), but because I believe it's a better license for Free Software in a dangerous software patent environment.
Using insults like "Freetards" doesn't improve your argument, it weakens it I'm afraid.
I hope that Apple do release their code under a permissive license, it would be good to compare and learn from it, and if it's GPLv3 compatible (as most permissive licenses are) maybe we can incorporate parts of it into Samba. I am encouraged by Apple's recent decision to release their DCE/RPC stack under a permissive license, which I thoroughly praised.
This isn't all of the pieces, but Apple posted this project on Mac OS Forge at the end of February: http://www.dcerpc.org/
I really like how Apple is unafraid of replacing entire portions of their software stack for implementations they control. It'll be interesting to see if they open source their CIFS client as well.
Many many NAS, router, and other embedded devices distribute the source. That's the difference. Aside from Darwin, Apple won't go FOSS.
Honestly, ridding OS X of Samba is a welcome change. Samba 3 has been out forever, and still has many of the bugs that have been around since the 1.x days. Performane is horrible (compared to Windows and Solaris) - on just about any platform / hardware. One of the best things Sun has ever done was move to an in-kernel CIFS server. The performance difference is night and day.
One more thing...
People keep referring to Samba and the CIFS client as one in the same. mount_cifs is actually derived from FreeBSD source - not Samba. So mounting remote filesystems has nothing to do with this - it only has to do with SMB SHARING.
I'm amused by the comment:
"One of the best things Sun has ever done was move to an in-kernel CIFS server. The performance difference is night and day."
Have you ever actually *tested* the performance ? I'm guessing not. There is a reason IBM's benchmark-winning SONAS product uses Samba you know :-).
This isn't all of the pieces, but Apple posted this project on Mac OS Forge at the end of February: http://www.dcerpc.org/
I really like how Apple is unafraid of replacing entire portions of their software stack for implementations they control. It'll be interesting to see if they open source their CIFS client as well.
Apple already do open source their CIFS client. It's part of their Darwin releases I believe.
I'm talking about Apple wasting resources here, not the Samba Team. We're going to be doing what we do anyway.
Of course we're not talking about your not wasting Samba team resources. Just everyone else's.
Quote:
I support GPLv3 not as a "screw Novell" move (if you actually read the GPLv3 you'll find that the Novell Microsoft agreement is explicitly allowed, not prohibited), but because I believe it's a better license for Free Software in a dangerous software patent environment.
And of course the it never occurred to you that forcing MS to pseudo distribute GPL v3 code that they wouldn't be able to adhere to their end of the agreement (coupon).
Quote:
Using insults like "Freetards" doesn't improve your argument, it weakens it I'm afraid.
When the shoe fits.
Quote:
I hope that Apple do release their code under a permissive license, it would be good to compare and learn from it, and if it's GPLv3 compatible (as most permissive licenses are) maybe we can incorporate parts of it into Samba.
Yes, one way sharing is always good for GPL projects and you would approve.
Nice of you guys to tell BSD devs about MS-DOS seekdir/telldir bug workaround when you guys found the bug. Oh, wait. You didn't. Not your job I suppose and I dunno if they count as upstream, downstream or just not all that important regardless.
Your accusing others of wasting time because you guys opted for GPL is an amusing pattern. I remember you kvetching about userland API access in Solaris and Sun wasting their time (which of course would have been far better spent supporting you) reinventing the wheel with native cifs support in their kernel. I recall you being such a whiny little brat that Alan had to bitchslap you for being such a drama queen on his blog.
Why do folks "reinvent the wheel"? Because the wheel you provide comes with shackles...so much for being "free".
I don't understand what the all the hissy fit is over gpl3.
Though the samba guy says otherwise, I understood the main reason behind gpl3 was to prevent certain companies aka Novell from doing patent idemification only for themselves, and not for everyone.
Course Linus doesn't care whether or not DRM is used or other commercial uses. His choice as well.
Quote:
but the primary idealogical difference comes down to "source code must be available" covers
> in derived works. In GPLv2, you can use a source work, if you modify it then you have to
> provide source for those modifications, but if your code just works with it then you don't have
> to open-source your own code. Under GPLv3 you can't use an open-source component without > being entirely open-source yourself."
Patent indemnification is a big area of differentiation between 2 and 3. I'm not a lawyer, or even a patent lawyer so if you need legal advice should should find some (really). But if you want to get *really* depressed then go to groklaw and read up on the SCO saga that's still going on (amazingly). Then check out yesterday's lawsuits from Microsoft against Android.
I don't have a good answer but even a dumbass like me can see there's a huge battle going on and that means that there's big bucks involved
Am I right in remembering that Apple has had a fair number of serious problems with it's own AFP? So now they are creating their own method to interface with Windows networks? This doesn't sound like it will have a happy ending.
Am I right in remembering that Apple has had a fair number of serious problems with it's own AFP? So now they are creating their own method to interface with Windows networks? This doesn't sound like it will have a happy ending.
Microsoft keeps changing their side of SMB. Samba then updates itself. Then apple doesn't update its version until much later. Or so anandtech said.
SMB pretty much sucks anyhow. ~25% of throughput is lost to overhead. NFS doesn't have the easy browsing capability though.
Comments
You're probably wasting your breath, the GPLv3 crowd I think is stuck in their utopian fallacy where everyone just shares software code for free & you never have to pay for anything ever again. OpenSource has been a huge success in large part because of the willingness of corporations to contribute to it, now with GPLv3 it will go the way of the hobbiest again & we'll go back to the old days or proprietary solutions that don't work together well. Congrats, you just gave Microsoft their comeback, they're already locked into the proprietary game.
Hate to drag you back into the real world, but IBM, Netgear, CISCO, Google, Symantec and other are regular contributors to GPLv3 Samba, and have products based on it, or using it. It's a shame Apple doesn't feel confident enough to do the same (especially since they employ a Samba Team member with direct commit access to our repository) but that's their call.
Cheers,
Jeremy.
Things are really looking down for OS X these days.
If they want to move away from GPL software, that is their right and we have no grounds for complaint.
Yet many do anyway.
I think they're wasting resources, as we (the Samba Team) will maintain a SMB/CIFS/SMB2/AD server for them if they want, but if they find our license unacceptable then they need to do what's right for their users.
If wasting resources was a concern then Samba staying at GPL v2 or later would have been a better choice. GPL v3's patent provisions are more business hostile as are the DRM provision, hence the avoidance by many companies.
You pushed this as a screw move to Novell over the Microsoft deal for ideological reasons as opposed to practical ones.
This is one major reason that Linus > Freetards.
Amusingly, GPL usage as a percentage of OSS projects has been on a steady decline since GPL v3. 70% in 2008, 65% in 2009 and 61% in 2010.
http://www.blackducksoftware.com/new...ses/2009-06-30
http://www.blackducksoftware.com/oss/licenses
So on the plus side there are more permissive licensed open source alternatives to GPL encumbered ones. Yay for LLVM and Clang!
With any luck Apple will open source their SMB solution under a permissive license as well.
Not to get too deep into NDA territory but if the current dev seed of Lion already has these changes (and I can verify in the AM) then it seriously explains the speed difference. It is noticeably faster. I have a 20TB Xsan system and 10.6 never worked quite right when trying to connect but Lion is super fast. The files are displayed quickly and Finder behaves as I would expect. I attributed it to changes in Finder but it could be more than that.
For all those Corporations contributing to Samba 4 you'd think it wouldn't take 7 to 8 years to reach that milestone. Or am I only assuming Samba 4 is being aided by IBM, Cisco, Google, etc., as Jeremy is implying?
At any rate, I agree that Apple moving in the direction they are makes a helluva a lot more sense than expending resources on a third party solution that is taking eternity to get to their latest milestone. Not to beat a dead horse but Samba4 is nearing their 15th alpha release.
Apple can afford to pay Microsoft what is necessary in licensing and focus on other areas of research and development.
Despite its age, some networks still use NT Domain Controller configurations because of its relative simplicity compared to Microsoft's more modern Active Directory. Apple is now said to be recommending Active Directory to users who are still dependent upon the older NT Domain Controller network directory services.
Anyone still running a network on the NT 4 PDC/BDC model should be fired. It may be "simpler", but it's so horribly limited and flawed that it's nearly unusable. Any IT worker that argues for a NT domain should be fired on the spot for not keeping up with the last decade of IT change. Most Windows admins are working on their Windows 2008 R2 migrations. If you're not even up to Windows 2000 technology it's time to get out of the game.
For all those Corporations contributing to Samba 4 you'd think it wouldn't take 7 to 8 years to reach that milestone. Or am I only assuming Samba 4 is being aided by IBM, Cisco, Google, etc., as Jeremy is implying?
At any rate, I agree that Apple moving in the direction they are makes a helluva a lot more sense than expending resources on a third party solution that is taking eternity to get to their latest milestone. Not to beat a dead horse but Samba4 is nearing their 15th alpha release.
Apple can afford to pay Microsoft what is necessary in licensing and focus on other areas of research and development.
Well, replicating an AD controller is quite hard :-). You may remember a lawsuit in the EU over access to the documentation to allow third parties to do just that..
I don't know, but doubt that the new Apple code includes AD functionality. If it does, well done to them. If not, well, when Samba4 comes out it will still work on OSX so you win both ways.
Jeremy.
mbarriault wrote:
> "I believe, and someone correct me if I'm wrong"
Ok - you're wrong :-).
> "but the primary idealogical difference comes down to "source code must be available" covers
> in derived works. In GPLv2, you can use a source work, if you modify it then you have to
> provide source for those modifications, but if your code just works with it then you don't have
> to open-source your own code. Under GPLv3 you can't use an open-source component without > being entirely open-source yourself."
No, that's not true. You can easily use a GPLv3 component without being entirely open source. Google uses Samba, IBM uses Samba, EMC uses Samba, most of the small NAS boxes you can buy use Samba, all under GPLv3.
Jeremy.
Many many NAS, router, and other embedded devices distribute the source. That's the difference. Aside from Darwin, Apple won't go FOSS.
Honestly, ridding OS X of Samba is a welcome change. Samba 3 has been out forever, and still has many of the bugs that have been around since the 1.x days. Performane is horrible (compared to Windows and Solaris) - on just about any platform / hardware. One of the best things Sun has ever done was move to an in-kernel CIFS server. The performance difference is night and day.
One more thing...
People keep referring to Samba and the CIFS client as one in the same. mount_cifs is actually derived from FreeBSD source - not Samba. So mounting remote filesystems has nothing to do with this - it only has to do with SMB SHARING.
Yet many do anyway.
If wasting resources was a concern then Samba staying at GPL v2 or later would have been a better choice. GPL v3's patent provisions are more business hostile as are the DRM provision, hence the avoidance by many companies.
You pushed this as a screw move to Novell over the Microsoft deal for ideological reasons as opposed to practical ones.
This is one major reason that Linus > Freetards.
Amusingly, GPL usage as a percentage of OSS projects has been on a steady decline since GPL v3. 70% in 2008, 65% in 2009 and 61% in 2010.
http://www.blackducksoftware.com/new...ses/2009-06-30
http://www.blackducksoftware.com/oss/licenses
So on the plus side there are more permissive licensed open source alternatives to GPL encumbered ones. Yay for LLVM and Clang!
With any luck Apple will open source their SMB solution under a permissive license as well.
I'm talking about Apple wasting resources here, not the Samba Team. We're going to be doing what we do anyway.
I support GPLv3 not as a "screw Novell" move (if you actually read the GPLv3 you'll find that the Novell Microsoft agreement is explicitly allowed, not prohibited), but because I believe it's a better license for Free Software in a dangerous software patent environment.
Using insults like "Freetards" doesn't improve your argument, it weakens it I'm afraid.
I hope that Apple do release their code under a permissive license, it would be good to compare and learn from it, and if it's GPLv3 compatible (as most permissive licenses are) maybe we can incorporate parts of it into Samba. I am encouraged by Apple's recent decision to release their DCE/RPC stack under a permissive license, which I thoroughly praised.
Jeremy.
I really like how Apple is unafraid of replacing entire portions of their software stack for implementations they control. It'll be interesting to see if they open source their CIFS client as well.
1. Apple has seemed less than committed to professional users lately. Is this another sign?
2. Apple discontinued it's pro Mac server...is this related?
3. One can only wonder how committed Apple is to mixed networks. They seem increasingly proprietary.
4. Could Apple just be playing hardball/chicken with the Samba people?
I will be needed to invest in a robust mixed network in the next year. I wonder how this will impact us little guys who aren't network gurus.
Many many NAS, router, and other embedded devices distribute the source. That's the difference. Aside from Darwin, Apple won't go FOSS.
Honestly, ridding OS X of Samba is a welcome change. Samba 3 has been out forever, and still has many of the bugs that have been around since the 1.x days. Performane is horrible (compared to Windows and Solaris) - on just about any platform / hardware. One of the best things Sun has ever done was move to an in-kernel CIFS server. The performance difference is night and day.
One more thing...
People keep referring to Samba and the CIFS client as one in the same. mount_cifs is actually derived from FreeBSD source - not Samba. So mounting remote filesystems has nothing to do with this - it only has to do with SMB SHARING.
I'm amused by the comment:
"One of the best things Sun has ever done was move to an in-kernel CIFS server. The performance difference is night and day."
Have you ever actually *tested* the performance ? I'm guessing not. There is a reason IBM's benchmark-winning SONAS product uses Samba you know :-).
Jeremy.
This isn't all of the pieces, but Apple posted this project on Mac OS Forge at the end of February: http://www.dcerpc.org/
I really like how Apple is unafraid of replacing entire portions of their software stack for implementations they control. It'll be interesting to see if they open source their CIFS client as well.
Apple already do open source their CIFS client. It's part of their Darwin releases I believe.
Jeremy.
I'm talking about Apple wasting resources here, not the Samba Team. We're going to be doing what we do anyway.
Of course we're not talking about your not wasting Samba team resources. Just everyone else's.
I support GPLv3 not as a "screw Novell" move (if you actually read the GPLv3 you'll find that the Novell Microsoft agreement is explicitly allowed, not prohibited), but because I believe it's a better license for Free Software in a dangerous software patent environment.
And of course the it never occurred to you that forcing MS to pseudo distribute GPL v3 code that they wouldn't be able to adhere to their end of the agreement (coupon).
Using insults like "Freetards" doesn't improve your argument, it weakens it I'm afraid.
When the shoe fits.
I hope that Apple do release their code under a permissive license, it would be good to compare and learn from it, and if it's GPLv3 compatible (as most permissive licenses are) maybe we can incorporate parts of it into Samba.
Yes, one way sharing is always good for GPL projects and you would approve.
Nice of you guys to tell BSD devs about MS-DOS seekdir/telldir bug workaround when you guys found the bug. Oh, wait. You didn't. Not your job I suppose and I dunno if they count as upstream, downstream or just not all that important regardless.
Your accusing others of wasting time because you guys opted for GPL is an amusing pattern. I remember you kvetching about userland API access in Solaris and Sun wasting their time (which of course would have been far better spent supporting you) reinventing the wheel with native cifs support in their kernel. I recall you being such a whiny little brat that Alan had to bitchslap you for being such a drama queen on his blog.
Why do folks "reinvent the wheel"? Because the wheel you provide comes with shackles...so much for being "free".
What alternative could Apple use? I mean Samba took YEARS to be developed into current state.
I mean Apple cant just invent something out of nothing.........
Though the samba guy says otherwise, I understood the main reason behind gpl3 was to prevent certain companies aka Novell from doing patent idemification only for themselves, and not for everyone.
Course Linus doesn't care whether or not DRM is used or other commercial uses. His choice as well.
but the primary idealogical difference comes down to "source code must be available" covers
> in derived works. In GPLv2, you can use a source work, if you modify it then you have to
> provide source for those modifications, but if your code just works with it then you don't have
> to open-source your own code. Under GPLv3 you can't use an open-source component without > being entirely open-source yourself."
That's like been the case since day 1???
There is a reason IBM's benchmark-winning SONAS product uses Samba you know :-).
Jeremy.
You mean where they blew the doors off the SPECsfs benchmark...for NFS speeds? Where's the benchmarks for CIFS?
http://www.spec.org/sfs2008/results/sfs2008.html
If you have the benches to show that Samba is faster than Solaris CFIS feel free to post them.
I don't have a good answer but even a dumbass like me can see there's a huge battle going on and that means that there's big bucks involved
Am I right in remembering that Apple has had a fair number of serious problems with it's own AFP? So now they are creating their own method to interface with Windows networks? This doesn't sound like it will have a happy ending.
Microsoft keeps changing their side of SMB. Samba then updates itself. Then apple doesn't update its version until much later. Or so anandtech said.
SMB pretty much sucks anyhow. ~25% of throughput is lost to overhead. NFS doesn't have the easy browsing capability though.