Interview with Bob Gobeille, HP Fossology
SCALE: Ilan Rabinovitch: SCALE Chair
HP: Bob Gobeille, Hewlett Packard Open Source & Linux Organization FOSSology lead developer
SCALE: HP participates in a number of community run Linux and open source conferences such as SCALE, Ohio Linux Fest, Linu.conf.au, etc. How do these community events fit into HP’s strategy when compared to more commercial Linux / open-source conferences?
HP: We feel that events like SCALE are an excellent way to demonstrate how important the community is to us. It’s also a way to show how HP participates in the evolution of open source. We haven’t forgotten that if it wasn’t for “community”, Linux and open-source would not be what it is today. On a personal level, events like SCALE are also an opportunity to meet others involved in FOSS. This personal touch, is not something that shows up in a balance sheet but it is priceless, and something I hope all the conference attendees take advantage of.
SCALE: What can SCALE attendees expect to see at the HP booth this year?
HP: Our booth may not be what you expect from a company as large as HP. Rather than invest in fancy displays and advertisements, we are going to display our most valued assets, our people. We will put some interesting HP’ers in the booth and hope people will come by and chat. Bryan Gartner, an HP engineer and original architect of linuxCOE (http://linuxcoe.sourceforge.net/) will be demonstrating that project. It’s an easy way for people to try out linux or install it and keep it up to date. HP has used it internally to install many different Linux distros on thousands of machines. Bdale Garbee, HP Linux/Open source chief technologist and uber-geek, will be in the booth after his talk (Peace, Love and Rockets) on Saturday. His daughter Elizabeth will also be there. Elizabeth (a high school junior) will also be giving a talk on Saturday (animation with open source tools).
Adaora Onyia and Susan Bowen are HP program managers active in LinuxChix. They will try to spend some time in the booth talking about communication and women in open source. I’ll be in the booth on Sunday and happy to talk about and demo FOSSology and FOSSBazaar and HP’s involvement in open source governance. We will also have some give-aways, like a very chic FOSSology/FOSSbazaar t-shirt. Well, maybe “chic” is not the word most people would use, but I like them. Of course, I hope people will also come by the booth (or catch us walking about) and talk about whatever interests them.
SCALE: HP recently released 2 projects, FOSSBazar and FOSSology, which have been generating a lot of discussion in the Open Source community. Can you tell us a little about these projects and their goals?
HP: These are really cool projects. FOSSBazaar is an on-line community for FOSS (Free and Open Source Software) governance. It’s mostly for businesses to discuss and share best practices around understanding open source, benefits, risks, policies, guidelines, strategies and other governance areas. But even if you are new to FOSS governance, you can still go to the site and learn about it, there is lots of information there. You can find this sort of information scattered all over the internet, but FOSSBazaar makes it easy to find. A key thing about FOSSBazaar is that it uses experts to try and explain difficult issues. The experts come from partners like The Linux Foundation, HP, Novell, OpenLogic, Olliance Group, SourceForge, DLA Piper, Google, and Coverity. These experts are what really makes FOSSBazaar a valuable resource.
FOSSology (fossology.org) is a valuable tool in FOSS governance. Simply put, FOSSology is the study of FOSS. What can we learn by studying FOSS? Today, we can learn what licenses are in open source software. Open source software licensing is a rather nightmarish subject because there are so many different licenses. You can easily find simple open source projects that have hundreds of references to licenses and dozens of different types of licenses. A distro typically has hundreds of thousands of license references to hundreds of licenses.
We also have FOSSology analysis agents that mine other types of metadata from documents and multimedia files, but the license analysis is what is getting so many people (developers, corporations, lawyers) excited. For demos, watch the videos on fossology.org.
One thing you won’t see on the web site is an actually running instance of FOSSology. That’s because we are moving it to the Linux Foundation. So stay tuned. You can also join the FOSSology mailing list and tell us what you think we should analyze for next.
SCALE: What was your role in the development of these programs?
HP: I’m the FOSSology lead developer. The idea for FOSSBazaar came from Ragavan Srinivasan while he was with HP. He is now the open source evangelist at VMWare.
SCALE: What prompted HP to release FOSSology as open source software?
HP: Originally, HP wanted to sell the technology behind FOSSology. The decision to open source it was made because we realized that FOSSology clearly addresses problems in the FOSS community and could be a much stronger tool if developed in the community. It’s just too important to remain sequestered inside of one company.
SCALE: FOSSology is currently released under the GPLv2. Was there a particular reason HP selected GPLv2 rather than GPLv3? Were other non-GNU licenses considered?
HP: GPLv3 is a fabulous license for many software developers but has potential risk for companies like HP with large software patent portfolios. Readers can look up more about the GPLv3 in the “License compliance” section on FOSSBazaar. We really didn’t look beyond the GPL because it works and allows the community the freedom they need.
SCALE: What other organizations are currently involved in FOSSBazaar? - Does HP plan to offer services around FOSSology similar to Black Duck Software’s compliance and audit services?
HP: The Linux Foundation, Novell, OpenLogic, the Olliance Group, SourceForge, DLA Piper, Google and Coverity are all initial FOSSBazaar sponsors. I expect this list to grow as others see the value in becoming a FOSSBazaar expert and supporting an initiative that is long overdue.
HP does offer services around FOSS Governance and FOSSology. So there is a bit of overlap with Black Duck Software. But FOSSology is also quite a bit different. The last I looked at Black Duck, they were reporting the stated license for any software whereas FOSSology actually analyzes every file to thoroughly check for licenses and license references. However, this is the only (major) feature in FOSSology today. Black Ducks’ software also finds reused code and helps you set up a governance process for your organization. I’m not a spokesman for Black Duck, but I think it is fair to say that they are very focused on solving business problems, and FOSSology is an analytical tool.
SCALE: Is there anything we have not asked, which you would like our attendees to be aware of?
HP: I just hope everyone enjoys SCALE and the great opportunity to meet so many interesting and knowledgeable people. Don’t be shy, and I’ll see you there! Thanks Ilan!