Re: brcmfmac: don't warn user if requested nvram fails

From: Arend van Spriel <arend.vanspriel@broadcom.com>
To: Hans de Goede <hdegoede@redhat.com>,
	"Luis R. Rodriguez" <mcgrof@kernel.org>
Cc: linux-wireless <linux-wireless@vger.kernel.org>,
	"Rafał Miłecki" <rafal@milecki.pl>
Subject: Re: brcmfmac: don't warn user if requested nvram fails
Date: Mon, 1 May 2017 10:57:49 +0200	[thread overview]
Message-ID: <a3730d43-1137-6cec-6ede-093ee1e3e806@broadcom.com> (raw)
In-Reply-To: <3ca61682-7267-c87b-2c3e-e4c185134cba@redhat.com>

On 4/30/2017 9:39 PM, Hans de Goede wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> On 27-04-17 02:36, Luis R. Rodriguez wrote:
>> On Tue, Apr 11, 2017 at 10:53:57AM +0200, Hans de Goede wrote:
> 
> <snip>
> 
>>>>> Right, sorry. For the pcie device I'm looking at the
>>>>> name is brcmfmac4356-pcie.txt and I would like to propose
>>>>> to first check for 
>>>>> "brcmfmac4356-<pci-subsys-vid>-<pci-subsys-pid>.txt"
>>>>>
>>>>>> So who is going to provide these nvram files. We can not
>>>>>> maintain that as there are too many variants and they are under 
>>>>>> control
>>>>>> of the OEM/ODM.
>>>>>
>>>>> Users / people like me who are interested in using certain
>>>>> devices with Linux. The idea is to at least make it possible to
>>>>> have these devices just work. E.g. I would like a user to be
>>>>> able to insert a USB-stick with a live Fedora 27 and then
>>>>> have everything just work on the GPD win.
>>>>>
>>>>> To make this happen I will submit the nvram file from the
>>>>> Windows install on the GPDwin to linux-firmware as
>>>>> "brcmfmac4356-<pci-subsys-vid>-<pci-subsys-pid>.txt"
>>>>> and yes I've checked that there are sensible values in
>>>>> the subsys ids.
>>>>
>>>> I suppose the "nvram file from the Windows install" than has a
>>>> redistributable license?
>>>
>>> IANAL but I fail to see how the contents of this file is
>>> anything but functional and as such not copyright-able.
>>
>> We take licensing serious on linux-firmware, a IANAL is no excuse for
>> being sloppy.
> 
> I don't mean to be sloppy. As I already stated I plan to make it
> clear in the commit msg that there is no license info for the nvram
> file and that in my non expert opinion that is not a problem.
> 
> If people disagree then we will likely need to ask an actual lawyer
> for advice and see from there,

I think what Luis mean to say here is that you should be sure about this 
instead of submitting the patch and see what happens. In that respect I 
will inform internally what Broadcom policy is regarding the 
distribution requirements/restriction of the nvram files.

Regards,
Arend