[geeks] Browser licensing?

[Shannon Hendrix]

On Sep 3, 2008, at 18:11 , Alois Hammer wrote:

> Because answers about Chrome (Chromium?) licensing seem to be in short
> supply today, I've done a smidge of detective work-- and I'm more
> confused than I started.
>
> Chrom[ium] is based on WebKit.  WebKit is licensed under BSD.  The  
> only
> two *components* of WebKit are licensed under LGPL.  This doesn't  
> sound
> like dual-licensing.  This sounds more like "legally impossible."  Or
> maybe "purposefully confusing."

What is confusing about it?

> But, anyhow, Google's modified WebKit (and the "V8" JIT engine?) are
> licensed under BSD.  Except that they're not.  Wikipedia claims BSD,  
> but
> http://code.google.com/p/chromium/ says "Code License: Multiple
> Licenses."  What's that mean?

A lot of code is under multiple licenses, so I don't see anything  
exceptional or confusing here.

> Ignoring the impossible performance claims,[1]

How did you determine that?

How do you know it will load "an entire JVSM" each time?

Have you tried it yet?

Even if it does, what stops it from using already compiled code on  
subsequent loads, easily reaching their performance claims?

> the 0.2xx version
> numbering (which, from reviews, I'm taking at face value), the
> catfighting on full-disclosure, and OSNews pointing out that this  
> looks
> very suspiciously like IE8b2 but not as good-- this is not an  
> auspicious
> start.

In other words, you've determined it sucks by reading a bunch of  
second guessing, a lot of which comes from people who've not even  
looked at it.

:)

It might suck mightily, but no one has enough information right now to  
determine that.


-- 
Shannon Hendrix
shannon at widomaker.com