Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!husc6!mailrus!ames!oliveb!sun!ingersoll!sxn
From: sxn%ingersoll@Sun.COM (Stephen X. Nahm)
Newsgroups: comp.dcom.lans
Subject: Re: NFS vs RFS
Message-ID: <47443@sun.uucp>
Date: 29 Mar 88 21:38:01 GMT
References: <22090@tis.llnl.gov>
Sender: news@sun.uucp
Reply-To: sxn@sun.UUCP (Stephen X. Nahm)
Organization: Sun Microsystems, Mountain View
Lines: 35
Summary: NFS licensing details

In article <22090@tis.llnl.gov> bae@ati.tis.llnl.gov (Hwa Jin Bae) writes:
>I am curious about the licensing policy of NFS.  SUN/RPC is in public domain;
>is NFS also in public domain?  If not, what's the cost of getting the
>source code for NFS?  I seemed to remember hearing from someone that
>NFS also is based on the same licensing policy as RPC package - free
>for anyone to use.  Does anyone know of specific details on this?

RPCSRC (or Sun RPC) is an unlicensed implementation of the RPC and
XDR library (plus other goodies).  It comes directly from SunOS code.
While it's freely redistributable, I (personally) wouldn't call it
public domain (see the DISCLAIMER in the package).

RPCSRC 3.9 has nfs_prot.x, which is an RPCGEN-ready version of the NFS
protocol.  RPCGEN, which also is included in RPCSRC, is a protocol compiler
that takes C-like protocol definition files and produces XDR encoding routines
and stubs for writing the client and server sides of the protocol.
With nfs_prot.x, the RPC library and RPCGEN you could conceivably put together
your own NFS implementation.  If anyone does this, I'd love to hear about it.

"NFS" is a trademark of Sun Microsystems.  Sun's NFS implementation is
proprietary, but the protocol is not.  The protocol is specified in RPCSRC both
in nfs_prot.x and in a document.  Sun's Portable ONC group sells a licensed
reference port (called NFSSRC) of Sun's NFS implementation.  It costs *alot* of
money, so only companies who intend to port it to their OS and resell it
usually buy NFSSRC (universities can get it cheaper).  The reference is to
Berkeley 4.3BSD.  Sun will stop selling NFSSRC when Sys V.4 is released (the
merged UNIX), since that will have ONC/NFS bundled with it.
 
You can also buy a user level NFS implementation from us (UNFS) for less money
that NFSSRC, but also *much* less performance (and it's a server only).  We
usually only push it as a "porting tool."

If you want further details, email to "nfsnet@sun.com".
Steve Nahm                              sxn@sun.COM or sun!sxn
Portable ONC/NFS