Red Hat Enterprise Linux has decided to no longer make its source code publicly available. That’s right…RHEL will become closed source. What does this mean? Should you care?

  • @[email protected]
    link
    fedilink
    English
    121 year ago

    This is dishonest framing. From what I understand, Red Hat’s patches haven’t become proprietary, they’rejust not publically available to non-subscribers. Of course, subscribers could share the code with others — as it is libre. That is not what “closed source” means, not at all!

    • @Reliant1087
      link
      English
      31 year ago

      I agree the title is misleading but the statement put out by Alma/Rocky says that according to the current TOS it would not be possible for them to redistribute binaries obtained from the customer portal.

  • @iamsgod
    cake
    link
    English
    61 year ago

    i mean, it’s gpl right? which mean someone can make a fork of it

  • jerry
    link
    English
    51 year ago

    That’s not what happened. All gpl code is open or illegal, and they’re not that dumb.

  • @MrGeekman
    link
    English
    41 year ago

    This is one of those things where you really gotta do some research instead of just going by the deliberately misleading headline.

    Red Hat subscribers can access and even share the code.

  • Breno Martins
    cake
    link
    English
    31 year ago

    That’s why I hate companies and big techs

  • @toasteecup
    link
    English
    11 year ago

    Now I’m glad they passed on my application. Get fucked redhat

  • _spiffy
    link
    English
    -11 year ago

    deleted by creator

  • @moon_crush
    link
    English
    -21 year ago

    Nope. This is a terrible hot take that misses the fundamental spirit behind the GPL.

    It helps to consider “the software” as a single snapshot in time, with the GPL’s intention that the consumer may make their own fixes, rebuild, and redistribute. Check.

    Remember: “Free as in freedom, not free as in beer.” Selling open source software has always been explicitly allowed, as long as you make the source available to those who receive it. Check.

    What the GPL does NOT provide is guaranteed access to maintenance and future versions of said software. Again, it applies to a snapshot, as delivered.

    In a nutshell, the customer receives open source everything they FOR A PARTICULAR VERSION.

    I see no problem — either in spirit or letter — in Redhat’s approach here.