Open-source leaders comment BK dispute: Father of Linux should be calm

Andrew Tridgell kept silence on the criticism of Linus Torvalds while seeking expert legal advice. At this time, another open-source community leader, Bruce Perens, was unable to withstand the attack. He publicly defended the work of The Tridgell reverse engineering Bitkeeper (BK) protocol.

Earlier, Torvalds criticized Tridgell's behavior and posted two harsh comments on the Internet. In the second petition, Torvalds even used the word "vicious destructive behavior.
Perens says it's time Torvalds to calm down. He said: "Sometimes Linus Torvalds can really be an idiot. This time he is on the unwise side ." Perens also pointed out that BK is not suitable for GPL projects, but it has been sold to many kernel developers. Many people refuse to use it because the author Larry McVoy Stops providing free clients. Therefore, the accusation against Tridgell is completely unfair.

Perens met McVoy7 years old and grew up on Long Island, New York. Perens said: "Larry could have left elegantly. But I don't think he is at fault. If it wasn't for some reason, he would have shut up for a long time ."

The following is an interview with Perens by The Register:

　　Q:Why does Trovalds think that Microsoft's reverse engineering protocol is correct, but there is a problem with BitKeeper?
　　A:Let's see what Tridge has done. Tridge is famous for Samba. He reverse engineered Microsoft's line communication protocol to make it compatible with Linux, Unix, or Mac. This technology is very popular and used in commercial products of Hp, IBM, and apple. At that time, no one had any opinion on Tridge. His practice does not violate the copyright, because his product does not involve the software itself, but only draws on the communication method of the software.

After obtaining commercial success, Tridge started another project, that is, Samba compatible with Bitmover. Like his previous project, he does not apply the source code of BitKeeper. The strange thing is that this time many people started to look for him for trouble. In my opinion, accusations against Tridge are completely hypocritical. Sometimes Linus Torvalds can be really an idiot, and this time he is standing on an unwise side.

　　Q:What are protected by property rights in BitKeeper? Larry thinks metadata is part of Bitkeeper software. Is this correct? If this is correct, what does Larry's Bitkeeper property rights include?
　　A:These allegations are exactly the same as many people have accused GPL. As a software copyright vendor, Larry can only protect his code, not his data files, such as metadata.

　　Q:Well, that's why Larry is like rowing without a paddle. Then what happened?
　　A:Then Larry created some nonexistent conspiracy. I think it's time for Larry to shut up and hope he doesn't do anything stupid, such as bringing legal proceedings. This will not be any good for him, but will only ruin his business.

In Perens's view, people should blame the use of non-open-source tools (such as Bitkeeper) in GPL projects. Because the use of completely free tools is always the principle of open-source software developers.

Linus has been very talented in solving technical disputes. Before that, he successfully resolved many disputes. However, this time he lost the correct balance. Perens said: "Linus Torvalds is not a diplomat, but he is very disciplined. Of course, this time he was dizzy and did not consider others' feelings. It's time for him to calm down ."