Netcat on Fedora is a different Netcat

[Giuseppe Fuggiano]

Hi list.

I recently installed Fedora and today I got a little time after work
to configure it on my laptop.  The first thing I did was configure the
network to access to the internet and to my LAN at home.  To test the
connection I used netcat to listen to a dummy port, as I usually do.
The thing I discovered is that nc on Fedora has a different manpage, a
different binary and almost different syntax.

Why?!

On every other distribution nc is the same and has the same syntax.
Why does Fedora used a different version, maybe patched or totally
different application... with the same name?

How can I be totally sure that netcat is the only command with a
different syntax?  Should I learn other syntaxes for each command,
again?  :O

I'd like to have the original software in my Linux distribution, and
as closed as possible to other distros (which probably use the
original).

Maybe this netcat is another version of the original, also shipped by
its author which I've never seen before...

Thanks for explanations.

[Jef Spaleta]

On Fri, Jan 9, 2009 at 12:27 PM, Giuseppe Fuggiano
 wrote:
> Hi list.
>
> I recently installed Fedora and today I got a little time after work
> to configure it on my laptop.  The first thing I did was configure the
> network to access to the internet and to my LAN at home.  To test the
> connection I used netcat to listen to a dummy port, as I usually do.
> The thing I discovered is that nc on Fedora has a different manpage, a
> different binary and almost different syntax.

Fedora's package uses the nc codebase from openBSD.
rpm -qi nc

We package things with the upstream project url encoded in the header
information so you know exactly where the sourcecode base is coming
from in our packages.  Do the other distributions you use do they
same? Do you know where the upstream source distribution of their
netcat package is?

Is there another actively maintained netcat upstream project codebase
that you were expecting to find?  My understanding is that that the
netcat 1.10 version that some other distros ship..is a dead upstream
project.  If I'm mistaken, please let me know where it is.

rpm -q --changelog nc
and you find this:

* Thu Mar 31 2005 Radek Vokal  1.77-1
- switching to new OpenBSD version of netcat

The switch to OpenBSD's actively maintained netcat codebase was made
in March 2005.
> Why?!
>
> On every other distribution nc is the same and has the same syntax.

Because we think its appropriate to track upstream project releases as
much as is reasonable.  Holding netcat at an old release version for
cross 'linux' distro compatibility isn't necessarily inline with that,
neither is holding onto codebases with a dead codebase for several
years when there is an alternative and active upstream to migrate to.

-jef

[Giuseppe Fuggiano]

2009/1/9 Jeff Spaleta :
> Fedora's package uses the nc codebase from openBSD.
> rpm -qi nc
>
> We package things with the upstream project url encoded in the header
> information so you know exactly where the sourcecode base is coming
> from in our packages.  Do the other distributions you use do they
> same? Do you know where the upstream source distribution of their
> netcat package is?

Yes, probably from the "old" netcat.
> Is there another actively maintained netcat upstream project codebase
> that you were expecting to find?  My understanding is that that the
> netcat 1.10 version that some other distros ship..is a dead upstream
> project.  If I'm mistaken, please let me know where it is.

I don't know exactly.  But probably the choice of take that upstream
project codebase makes some sense...
> The switch to OpenBSD's actively maintained netcat codebase was made
> in March 2005.

Does that netcat version is shipped under BSD license, or still GNU/GPL?

[Jef Spaleta]

On Fri, Jan 9, 2009 at 2:12 PM, Giuseppe Fuggiano
 wrote:
> Does that netcat version is shipped under BSD license, or still GNU/GPL?

First why do you assume it was GPL before? Can you emphatically state
that the license on the version you are expecting was in fact the GPL?
I can not find reference to the GPL in packaging of other
distributions that I have just checked. OpenSuse and Debian ship a
netcat which is effectively public domain, according to the copyright
notices I have found.

Second, since the Fedora package points you to the upstream source you
have the ability to check the license for yourself quite easily.  I
don't think its GPL by looking at the  c files in the openbsd cvs
system.   I should file a bug about that against the nc package to get
its license tag changed accordingly.

-jef

[Craig White]

On Fri, 2009-01-09 at 14:24 -0900, Jeff Spaleta wrote:
> On Fri, Jan 9, 2009 at 2:12 PM, Giuseppe Fuggiano
>  wrote:
> > Does that netcat version is shipped under BSD license, or still GNU/GPL?
>
> First why do you assume it was GPL before? Can you emphatically state
> that the license on the version you are expecting was in fact the GPL?
> I can not find reference to the GPL in packaging of other
> distributions that I have just checked. OpenSuse and Debian ship a
> netcat which is effectively public domain, according to the copyright
> notices I have found.

----
http://directory.fsf.org/project/netcat/

Craig

[Matthew Flaschen]

Craig White wrote:
> > I can not find reference to the GPL in packaging of other
> > distributions that I have just checked. OpenSuse and Debian ship a
> > netcat which is effectively public domain, according to the copyright
> > notices I have found.
>
> http://directory.fsf.org/project/netcat/

There are apparently at least 3 versions:

1. Classic Netcat (http://www.atstake.com/research/tools/) [URL no
longer works, since company has been bought by Symantec], under
non-standard permissive license
(http://changelogs.ubuntu.com/changelogs/pool/main/n/netcat/netcat_1.10-38/ne...).
2. GNU Netcat (http://netcat.sourceforge.net/), under GPL 2.
3. OpenBSD Netcat
(http://www.openbsd.org/cgi-bin/cvsweb/src/usr.bin/nc/) under 2-clause BSD.

Matt Flaschen

[Jef Spaleta]

On Fri, Jan 9, 2009 at 2:40 PM, Craig White  wrote:
> http://directory.fsf.org/project/netcat/

which distributions ship that.  OpenSuse isn't shipping that as far as
I can tell. Neither is Debian stable.  Fedora's never shipped that. It
appears to be a fork of the original codebase if I'm reading the page
sf.net project page correctly.  I don't see any evidence of activity
since 2004 in the cvs tree.

http://netcat.cvs.sourceforge.net/netcat/netcat/

are you sure its an actively maintained project? I dont see any bug
activity of merit indicating maintainer responsiveness since 2006..

-jef

[Craig White]

On Fri, 2009-01-09 at 14:58 -0900, Jeff Spaleta wrote:
> On Fri, Jan 9, 2009 at 2:40 PM, Craig White  wrote:
> > http://directory.fsf.org/project/netcat/
>
> which distributions ship that.  OpenSuse isn't shipping that as far as
> I can tell. Neither is Debian stable.  Fedora's never shipped that. It
> appears to be a fork of the original codebase if I'm reading the page
> sf.net project page correctly.  I don't see any evidence of activity
> since 2004 in the cvs tree.
>
> http://netcat.cvs.sourceforge.net/netcat/netcat/
>
> are you sure its an actively maintained project? I dont see any bug
> activity of merit indicating maintainer responsiveness since 2006..

----
I don't know squat about it - just thought I would point out that an
apparent GPL version of netcat exists.

Craig

[Giuseppe Fuggiano]

2009/1/10 Jeff Spaleta :
> On Fri, Jan 9, 2009 at 2:12 PM, Giuseppe Fuggiano
>  wrote:
> > Does that netcat version is shipped under BSD license, or still GNU/GPL?
>
> First why do you assume it was GPL before? Can you emphatically state
> that the license on the version you are expecting was in fact the GPL?
> I can not find reference to the GPL in packaging of other
> distributions that I have just checked. OpenSuse and Debian ship a
> netcat which is effectively public domain, according to the copyright
> notices I have found.
> From the sources... check the COPYING file.

http://www.mirrorservice.org/sites/download.sourceforge.net/pub/sourceforge/...

I was talking about the 0.7.1 version shipped by my previous
distribution, which in fact is not updated since 2004.
> Second, since the Fedora package points you to the upstream source you
> have the ability to check the license for yourself quite easily.  I
> don't think its GPL by looking at the  c files in the openbsd cvs
> system.   I should file a bug about that against the nc package to get
> its license tag changed accordingly.

http://www.openbsd.org/cgi-bin/cvsweb/src/usr.bin/nc/

It seems to be a BSD license.  I choosen Linux for the GPL license and
I usually avoid the non-GPL software (Free Software) when adviced of
that, of course.

So, let's install *BSD.

[Craig White]

On Sat, 2009-01-10 at 00:41 +0100, Giuseppe Fuggiano wrote:
> 2009/1/10 Jeff Spaleta :
> > On Fri, Jan 9, 2009 at 2:12 PM, Giuseppe Fuggiano
> >  wrote:
> > > Does that netcat version is shipped under BSD license, or still GNU/GPL?
> >
> > First why do you assume it was GPL before? Can you emphatically state
> > that the license on the version you are expecting was in fact the GPL?
> > I can not find reference to the GPL in packaging of other
> > distributions that I have just checked. OpenSuse and Debian ship a
> > netcat which is effectively public domain, according to the copyright
> > notices I have found.
> > From the sources... check the COPYING file.
>
> http://www.mirrorservice.org/sites/download.sourceforge.net/pub/sourceforge/...
>
> I was talking about the 0.7.1 version shipped by my previous
> distribution, which in fact is not updated since 2004.
> > Second, since the Fedora package points you to the upstream source you
> > have the ability to check the license for yourself quite easily.  I
> > don't think its GPL by looking at the  c files in the openbsd cvs
> > system.   I should file a bug about that against the nc package to get
> > its license tag changed accordingly.
>
> http://www.openbsd.org/cgi-bin/cvsweb/src/usr.bin/nc/
>
> It seems to be a BSD license.  I choosen Linux for the GPL license and
> I usually avoid the non-GPL software (Free Software) when adviced of
> that, of course.
>
> So, let's install *BSD.

----
I think just about all BSD licenses are GPL compatible with the
exception of what is referred to as the 'Original BSD License' because
of an advertising clause that was in the license.

http://www.fsf.org/licensing/licenses/

one thing is for sure though, openbsd is all about free license

Craig

[Matthew Flaschen]

Giuseppe Fuggiano wrote:
> It seems to be a BSD license.  I choosen Linux for the GPL license and
> I usually avoid the non-GPL software (Free Software) when adviced of
> that, of course.

2 clause BSD is free software, and in fact GPL-compatible.  It's not
copyleft itself, but that's no reason to reject it.

Matt Flaschen

[Phil Meyer]

Giuseppe Fuggiano wrote:
> Hi list.
>
> I recently installed Fedora and today I got a little time after work
> to configure it on my laptop.  The first thing I did was configure the
> network to access to the internet and to my LAN at home.  To test the
> connection I used netcat to listen to a dummy port, as I usually do.
> The thing I discovered is that nc on Fedora has a different manpage, a
> different binary and almost different syntax.
>
> Why?!
>
> On every other distribution nc is the same and has the same syntax.
> Why does Fedora used a different version, maybe patched or totally
> different application... with the same name?
>
> How can I be totally sure that netcat is the only command with a
> different syntax?  Should I learn other syntaxes for each command,
> again?  :O
>
> I'd like to have the original software in my Linux distribution, and
> as closed as possible to other distros (which probably use the
> original).
>
> Maybe this netcat is another version of the original, also shipped by
> its author which I've never seen before...
>
> Thanks for explanations.

Welcome to current!  Or, more current. :)

There are a LOT of major changes from

nc-1.10 (RHE4)
to
nc-1.84 (F10)

I suspect you are experiencing only version differences.

The man pages from the two versions above are VERY different, although 
common options seem to be the same.

Good luck!