[LeoSolaris]

ZFS is stable and solid. It's hold up is licensing. ZFS isn't licensed in a way that can be included in the Linux kernel distribution.

Plus, my understanding is that Linus Torvalds has a dislike of ZFS because it came from Sun Microsystems.

[xcdzvyn]

What problem did Linus have with Sun? Oracle I understand, but Sun? Was it something to do with UNIX?

[stametseater]

I haven't heard of him objecting to the Sun origins of ZFS, but he has warned people away from ZFS on the grounds of Oracle's litigious reputation:

> And honestly, there is no way I can merge any of the ZFS efforts until I get an official letter from Oracle that is signed by their main legal counsel or preferably by Larry Ellison himself that says that yes, it's ok to do so and treat the end result as GPL'd.

> Other people think it can be ok to merge ZFS code into the kernel and that the module interface makes it ok, and that's their decision. But considering Oracle's litigious nature, and the questions over licensing, there's no way I can feel safe in ever doing so.

> And I'm not at all interested in some "ZFS shim layer" thing either that some people seem to think would isolate the two projects. That adds no value to our side, and given Oracle's interface copyright suits (see Java), I don't think it's any real licensing win either.

> Don't use ZFS. It's that simple. It was always more of a buzzword than anything else, I feel, and the licensing issues just make it a non-starter for me.

[ianai]

Could GPL be amended to be compatible with ZFS? Something along the lines of a legal shim. (Clearly Linus already said no to this in extension.)

[stametseater]

In principle I guess, but not in practice. Linux is distributed under the GPLv2 without the "or later" clause, so you couldn't simply convince the FSF to release a GPLv4 that allowed this. Nor do contributors sign away their rights. To re-license the kernel you'd have to get the consent of all the contributors, or replace the parts for which that was impossible.