Re: hsdis (OpenJDK) GPL question regarding binutils

["Chris Newland" <cnewland at chrisnewland dot com>]

Hi Matt,

Neither OpenJDK nor Oracle JDK distributions include the hsdis binary. The
OpenJDK source contains the hsdis wrapper that statically links binutils
but this is not part of the main build process and must be built
explicitly by end users to create the hsdis binary.

The hsdis binary is dynamically loaded only if the end user supplies the
+PrintAssembly switch to the JVM.

I've just discovered the LGPL-licensed Free Code Manipulation Library
http://fcml-lib.com/index.html which looks like it might solve this
problem. It's standalone and doesn't link binutils.

I think the GPLv2+Classpath Exception JVM can dynamically link this LGPL
library without license issues.

Regards,

Chris

On Fri, May 29, 2015 12:32, Matt Rice wrote:
> I'm not sure how the linking between hotspot and hdis happens,
> but hotspot appears GPLv2 only, so that may only push the problem to
> needing to re-license the hostpot jvm as well
>
> On Thu, May 28, 2015 at 8:37 AM, Chris Newland
> <cnewland@chrisnewland.com> wrote:
>
>> Update:
>>
>>
>> Feedback on another list indicates this is a GPLv2 (hsdis) / GPLv3
>> (binutils) incompatibility.
>>
>>
>> A request has been made to Oracle/OpenJDK to re-license the 2 files
>> which form the very simple shim between HotSpot and binutils to be GPLv2
>> or later.
>>
>> If that is not successful then I will look at replicating their
>> functionality with clean sources that are GPLv3.
>>
>> Thanks,
>>
>>
>> Chris
>> @chriswhocodes
>>
>>
>> On Wed, May 27, 2015 18:04, Chris Newland wrote:
>>
>>> Hi,
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> I'm the author of JITWatch[1], a BSD-licensed open-source project for
>>>  inspecting the Java HotSpot VM's JIT compiler output.
>>>
>>> JITWatch can use the hsdis (HotSpot Disassembler) tool from the
>>> OpenJDK
>>> project (GPLv2 + classpath exception -
>>> http://openjdk.java.net/legal/gplv2+ce.html) which is built by
>>> linking against binutils.
>>>
>>> I'd like to be able to host hsdis binaries for JITWatch users but
>>> found these build instructions that suggest a license issue with doing
>>> so:
>>> http://dropzone.nfshost.com/hsdis.htm
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> I then found this post suggesting GPLv3 binutils is available:
>>> https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-maintainers/2007-August/msg0026
>>> 4.ht
>>> ml
>>>
>>> Could any licensing experts shed some light on whether there is a
>>> compliant way to distribute hsdis binaries that statically link
>>> binutils?
>>>
>>> Many thanks,
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Chris
>>> @chriswhocodes
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> [1] https://github.com/AdoptOpenJDK/jitwatch
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>
>>
>