Gateways (was Re: Fix for wrong OOM killer trigger?)

Jamie Lokier
2003-09-20T19:56:32Z

Larry McVoy wrote:
> Nonsense. This isn't closed source issue at all because the issue is the
> CVS gateway. You don't need source to write that gateway and you could
> have (and recall that Linus said you should have) written the gateway
> yourself, hosted it yourself, and maintained it yourself.

I was prepared to write such a gatway.

We discussed it, and found that the combination of BitKeeper license
and BitMover's control over the kernel repository prevents it. This
was the subject of a heated debate.

I believe that debate was the reason BitMover wrote and now host the
BK->CVS gateway, which other gateways are built upon.

It's a brilliant solution, and thank you, I am glad of your work,
but let's not pretend that a 3rd party is in a position to offer such
a gateway.

(You need either the BK protocol, the right to run BK, or a copy of
the BK repository files to extract data from, and none of these are
available to a 3rd party who wants to write and support a BK->whatever
gateway for the kernel tree. I asked; all 3 were refused).

-- Jamie