* David Woodhouse <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > Who cares about whether the module is a derivative work? That's only > relevant when you distribute the module as a separate work. When you > ship a combined work including both the kernel and the module in > question, it's a _whole_ lot easier to interpret the GPL.
i fully support the notion you articulate, that whether bin-only modules are part of a derivative work of the kernel or whether they are independent works is not an automatic thing at all. The answer is: "it depends, talk to your lawyer". For example i'd say VMWare's ESX bin-only module is likely derived from the Linux kernel and should be distributed under the GPL, but that for example the ATI and nvidia drivers, although being a large PITA for all of us, are possibly independent works. but lets note that this is irrelevant to the Tivo argument. Tivo is not using bin-only modules AFAIK, all their source code is available for download. (their kernel source is totally uninteresting by the way - they have some weird crap IDE controller with hacks that will never go upstream.) Ingo - To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-kernel" in the body of a message to [EMAIL PROTECTED] More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html Please read the FAQ at http://www.tux.org/lkml/