Regarding " firmwares are not drivers. Firmwares are an entity of their own. Please inform yourself about firmwares and what they do and where they live and compare them to drivers. And there are many firmware hacks or open firmwares if you use a search engine of your choice. ".
Specifically, regarding "Please inform yourself about firmwares ..." I hope I am well informed - I used to write both firmware and drivers, in pre-Linux (and pre-Windows for that matter) era. You probably are missing my (implied) point, which is: 1) we have an IDE drive separated from the CPU by IDE bus. The IDE drive runs closed-source firmware, which is in terms of the controller inside the drive still software. There is no fuss about it; 2) we have a WiFi card or an audio card - both sitting on PCI bus, i.e. they are separated from the CPU by PCI bus. If the cards are running closed source software (their respective drivers) there is a fuss about it. Comparing the above two I'd say that the difference is IDE bus vs. PCI bus. So, why do we have such a discrimination here. Aren't buses and drivers created equal ? On Tue, 24 Jan 2006 02:29:08 +0100 "Hemmann, Volker Armin" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > On Tuesday 24 January 2006 02:15, Sergei Steshenko wrote: > > " > > The Linux developers DO NOT WANT to make it possible to write closed > > source drivers. Many consider it a violation of the GPL. > > " > > > > - GPL allows to run commercial closed source programs under a > > GPL'ed OS. That is, it doesn't prohibit this. > > no, but it prohibits you from incorporating gpl'ed code into closed source > programms. > > > > > SYNOPSYS and Cadence VLSI-related tools are a few examples, though, > > as far as SYNOPSYS is concerned, only 2.4.* (and NOT 2.6.*) kernels > > are supported because the former are considered to have stable API. > > the userland API is stable, please inform yourself. > > > > > Likewise, closed source drivers can be implemented as separate > > processes not linked to GPL kernel an thus not violating GPL. > > > > so why has no one done it so far? > > The userland ABI and API has been stable the last ten years. > > You can take a binary, compiled on a computer using kernel 2.0.X and run it > on > 2.6.X > > You may need some glibc-wrapper, but that is not the kernels fault. > > So if you want to implement a driver that is completly independent from the > kernel, lives in userspace, does not use GPL code in any form and is closed > source, do it. Noone will hinder you in doing that. > But if you are using GPL-code, you have to open it. > Easy, isn't it? > If you write code for Windows, you have to obey to their license too. > So where is your problem? > > I tell you: there is no problem, you only want to troll. > > > ... > > > > With all the fuss, why don't the same developers demand IDE drives > > firmware to become open ? CD/DVD ROM firmware to become open ? > > firmwares are not drivers. Firmwares are an entity of their own. Please > inform > yourself about firmwares and what they do and where they live and compare > them to drivers. And there are many firmware hacks or open firmwares if you > use a search engine of your choice. > > > > > That is, where does the developers' sense of reality begin and where > > does it end ? > > the sense of reality says them, that it is stupid to have fix internal > api&abis, because they get into the way of efficient bug fixing and > development. > > Stop trolling, start reading&thinking, > > thank you. > > > > ------------------------------------------------------- > This SF.net email is sponsored by: Splunk Inc. Do you grep through log files > for problems? Stop! Download the new AJAX search engine that makes > searching your log files as easy as surfing the web. DOWNLOAD SPLUNK! > http://sel.as-us.falkag.net/sel?cmd=lnk&kid=103432&bid=230486&dat=121642 > _______________________________________________ > Alsa-user mailing list > Alsa-user@lists.sourceforge.net > https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/alsa-user > ------------------------------------------------------- This SF.net email is sponsored by: Splunk Inc. Do you grep through log files for problems? Stop! Download the new AJAX search engine that makes searching your log files as easy as surfing the web. DOWNLOAD SPLUNK! http://sel.as-us.falkag.net/sel?cmd=lnk&kid=103432&bid=230486&dat=121642 _______________________________________________ Alsa-user mailing list Alsa-user@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/alsa-user
