The news that made my day yesterday was that Sun is releasing Java (my favorite programming language) under the GPL. This holds for the (Open) JDK and the mobile Java platform, but also for their Glassfish enterprise application server (which was already available under the CDDL open source license). More information on Sun open sourcing Java in this FAQ and all over the web.
There are even speculations that OpenSolaris might follow the same license change from CDDL to GPL. This would also be awesome. Think of a GNU/Solaris enterprise operating system and the possible cross-pollination between Solaris and Linux.
GNU/Solaris has been there for a year already: http://gnusolaris.org/
The fact that Nexenta has already been existing for one year is surely encouraging. However, one of the things that has prevented it from becoming the next Debian is that the kernel was not under the GPL. I also think that the driver problem would be much easier to solve by making Solaris GPL and porting Linux drivers, rather than having to write new clean room implementations for each of them.
Sure, for many purposes CDDL is as good as any other open source license. Still, CDDL being GPL incompatible is not without it’s problems.
Resistance is futile
Well… GPLv3 might be the turning point. GPLv3 is almost the same as CDDL and I have this feeling that a GPLv3 OpenSolaris looks much more likely than a GPLv3 Linux !
Duke’s mask doesn’t seem shaped quite right.