From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Return-Path: Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org via listexpand id S932514AbVLEVTp (ORCPT ); Mon, 5 Dec 2005 16:19:45 -0500 Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org id S932512AbVLEVTp (ORCPT ); Mon, 5 Dec 2005 16:19:45 -0500 Received: from pentafluge.infradead.org ([213.146.154.40]:24522 "EHLO pentafluge.infradead.org") by vger.kernel.org with ESMTP id S932514AbVLEVTo (ORCPT ); Mon, 5 Dec 2005 16:19:44 -0500 Subject: Re: Linux in a binary world... a doomsday scenario From: David Woodhouse To: Andrew Walrond Cc: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org In-Reply-To: <200512051826.06703.andrew@walrond.org> References: <1133779953.9356.9.camel@laptopd505.fenrus.org> <200512051826.06703.andrew@walrond.org> Content-Type: text/plain Date: Mon, 05 Dec 2005 21:19:35 +0000 Message-Id: <1133817575.11280.18.camel@localhost.localdomain> Mime-Version: 1.0 X-Mailer: Evolution 2.2.3 (2.2.3-2.fc4) Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Spam-Score: 0.0 (/) X-SRS-Rewrite: SMTP reverse-path rewritten from by pentafluge.infradead.org See http://www.infradead.org/rpr.html Sender: linux-kernel-owner@vger.kernel.org X-Mailing-List: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org On Mon, 2005-12-05 at 18:26 +0000, Andrew Walrond wrote: > > On December 6th, 2005 the kernel developers en mass decide that binary > > modules are legally fine and also essential for the progress of linux, > > Has anyone (influential) actually being toying with this idea? I hope not, but > if they are, I'd like to know who to lobby... http://git.kernel.org/git/?p=linux/kernel/git/torvalds/linux-2.6.git;a=commitdiff;h=e3c3374fbf7efe9487edc53cd10436ed641983aa Remember that the only distinction between EXPORT_SYMBOL() and EXPORT_SYMBOL_GPL() is that the latter is a technological measure to prevent abuse. The use of EXPORT_SYMBOL_GPL() cannot actually impose any additional restrictions over and above what the GPL requires of EXPORT_SYMBOL() -- because any additional restrictions would themselves violate the GPL. Thus, the only point in the above-linked patch is to remove a technical measure which prevents abuse. I feel very strongly that it should be reverted. -- dwmw2