From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Return-Path: Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org via listexpand id S262655AbTLDGWU (ORCPT ); Thu, 4 Dec 2003 01:22:20 -0500 Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org id S262750AbTLDGWU (ORCPT ); Thu, 4 Dec 2003 01:22:20 -0500 Received: from opersys.com ([64.40.108.71]:36370 "EHLO www.opersys.com") by vger.kernel.org with ESMTP id S262655AbTLDGWT (ORCPT ); Thu, 4 Dec 2003 01:22:19 -0500 Message-ID: <3FCED34B.5050309@opersys.com> Date: Thu, 04 Dec 2003 01:25:15 -0500 From: Karim Yaghmour Reply-To: karim@opersys.com Organization: Opersys inc. User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux i686; en-US; rv:1.4) Gecko/20030624 Netscape/7.1 X-Accept-Language: en-us, en, fr, fr-be, fr-ca, fr-fr MIME-Version: 1.0 To: Linus Torvalds CC: Kendall Bennett , linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org Subject: Re: Linux GPL and binary module exception clause? References: <3FCDE5CA.2543.3E4EE6AA@localhost> In-Reply-To: Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: linux-kernel-owner@vger.kernel.org X-Mailing-List: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org Hello Linus, Linus Torvalds wrote: > Similarly, historically there was a much stronger argument for things like > AFS and some of the binary drivers (long forgotten now) for having been > developed totally independently of Linux: they literally were developed > before Linux even existed, by people who had zero knowledge of Linux. That > tends to strengthen the argument that they clearly aren't derived. > > In contrast, these days it would be hard to argue that a new driver or > filesystem was developed without any thought of Linux. I think the NVidia > people can probably reasonably honestly say that the code they ported had > _no_ Linux origin. But quite frankly, I'd be less inclined to believe that > for some other projects out there.. Since the last time this was mentioned, I have been thinking that this argument can really be read as an invitation to do just what's being described: first implement a driver/module in a non-Linux OS (this may even imply requiring that whoever works on the driver/module have NO Linux experience whatsoever; yes there will always be candidates for this) and then have this driver/module ported to Linux by Linux-aware developers. Sure, one could argue about "intent", but that's going to be really difficult, especially if the right-hand doesn't know what the left-hand is doing. IOW, can't this position be abused as much as, if not more than, publishing an "approved" set of characteristics for non-GPL modules? Just thinking aloud, Karim -- Author, Speaker, Developer, Consultant Pushing Embedded and Real-Time Linux Systems Beyond the Limits http://www.opersys.com || karim@opersys.com || 514-812-4145