Just got through to the Linux news section of the current c't magazine (delivered on Saturday 18/02). SUSE Linux 10.1 got a section about being delayed and missing its release during the CeBIT show. On the positive side Novell got a section on Xgl and Compiz (but using the old url: http://www.opensuse.org/xgl). However their was also critiscism about the fact that Compiz was written "behind closed doors", so that, for example, Gnome developers had no influence on its design. And finally (or firstly, I've actually written these in reverse order to the way they are printed :-P), the Kernel Log section mentions the removal of non-GPL USB drivers from the Linux Kernel, with AVM getting its nose in. The sub-title for the piece: "A change in the Kernel has meant the near exclusion/removal of AVM USB devices from Linux." ("Eine Änderung im Kernel hätte beinahe das Aus für die USB-Geräte von AVM unter Linux bedeutet.") "An employee of AVM critiscised [the change], saying that it is now not possible to provide proprietary USB-drivers; AVM must therefore stop support for its own USB devices." There is no mention in this article of SUSE BTW, just the Linux Kernel development and AVM, although they do mention that it is possible for USB devices to be written in "userland". -- "I got to go figure," the tenant said. "We all got to figure. There's some way to stop this. It's not like lightning or earthquakes. We've got a bad thing made by men, and by God that's something we can change." - The Grapes of Wrath, by John Steinbeck
On Tue, 2006-02-21 at 09:35 +0100, David Wright wrote: <snip>
And finally (or firstly, I've actually written these in reverse order to the way they are printed :-P), the Kernel Log section mentions the removal of non-GPL USB drivers from the Linux Kernel, with AVM getting its nose in. The sub-title for the piece: "A change in the Kernel has meant the near exclusion/removal of AVM USB devices from Linux." ("Eine Änderung im Kernel hätte beinahe das Aus für die USB-Geräte von AVM unter Linux bedeutet.")
"An employee of AVM criticized [the change], saying that it is now not possible to provide proprietary USB-drivers; AVM must therefore stop support for its own USB devices."
<rant> I just can't understand the stance of the kernel developers shutting out companies that are trying to provide drivers for their product. This is certainly more FUD fuel being provided to MS. Who are the kernel developers to tell a company to stop exactly what we need more of, -drivers- for their products. I think it may be time for the kernel developers to stop sticking their collective, holier than thou noses in the air and stop dictating what a distribution can and cannot include in their distribution, namely third party drivers. This is certainly going to drive a -LOT- of people back to MS. It is hard enough to get people to linux with the slow development of drivers, now it will be even worse. </rant> -- Ken Schneider UNIX since 1989, linux since 1994, SuSE since 1998
On Tue, Feb 21, 2006 at 07:49:21AM -0500, Kenneth Schneider wrote:
I just can't understand the stance of the kernel developers shutting out companies that are trying to provide drivers for their product. This is certainly more FUD fuel being provided to MS. Who are the kernel developers to tell a company to stop exactly what we need more of,
You just didn't get it. _They_ have written the code and thus it is part of _their_ intellectual property rights to decide about the license of their code. If you don't like the license of a software product you are free not to use it. Actually there _are_ good technical reasons against binary-only drivers. If you are not aware of them you can browse the list archives of the kernel mailing list. But even if there did not exist _any_ technical reason it is still their decission because they provide something to you for free. Either you like it or you don't like it. It is ok to state your opinion about that topic but I hope you do understand now "who the kernel developers are". Robert -- Robert Schiele Tel.: +49-621-181-2214 Dipl.-Wirtsch.informatiker mailto:rschiele@uni-mannheim.de "Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum sonatur."
On Tue, 2006-02-21 at 14:12 +0100, Robert Schiele wrote:
On Tue, Feb 21, 2006 at 07:49:21AM -0500, Kenneth Schneider wrote:
I just can't understand the stance of the kernel developers shutting out companies that are trying to provide drivers for their product. This is certainly more FUD fuel being provided to MS. Who are the kernel developers to tell a company to stop exactly what we need more of,
You just didn't get it. _They_ have written the code and thus it is part of _their_ intellectual property rights to decide about the license of their code. If you don't like the license of a software product you are free not to use it.
Actually there _are_ good technical reasons against binary-only drivers. If you are not aware of them you can browse the list archives of the kernel mailing list. But even if there did not exist _any_ technical reason it is still their decission because they provide something to you for free. Either you like it or you don't like it. It is ok to state your opinion about that topic but I hope you do understand now "who the kernel developers are".
I -do- know who they are and I -DO- appreciate the great work that they do I just cannot nor will I ever understand the justification for the kernel developers telling Novell to stop distributing the non-GPL drivers I.E. kernel-smp-nongpl-2.6.13-15.8. If the inclusion of this RPM helps Novell sell more copies of their distribution then I say let Novell do so and help further the linux cause. Next thing you know the kernel developers will tell distributions to stop including -any- non-gpl software under the guise that it -may- taint the kernel. Just plain old BULL S#)T as far as I am concerned. -- Ken Schneider UNIX since 1989, linux since 1994, SuSE since 1998
On Tuesday 21 February 2006 8:50 am, Kenneth Schneider wrote:
I -do- know who they are and I -DO- appreciate the great work that they do I just cannot nor will I ever understand the justification for the kernel developers telling Novell to stop distributing the non-GPL drivers I.E. kernel-smp-nongpl-2.6.13-15.8. If the inclusion of this RPM helps Novell sell more copies of their distribution then I say let Novell do so and help further the linux cause. Next thing you know the kernel developers will tell distributions to stop including -any- non-gpl software under the guise that it -may- taint the kernel. Just plain old BULL S#)T as far as I am concerned.
It's very frustrating for those writting the kernel, and it's increasingly frustrating for those of us who are Sys. Admins. and want to INCREASE Linux' presence not loose business. Not having good drivers HAS been a huge stumbling block for us and it hasn't gotten a lot better. I see the issue of poor hardware support as the #1 problem for Linux - not just SUSE. Fred -- Paid purchaser of ALL SuSE Linux releases since 6.x
Hi, On Sun, 26 Feb 2006, Fred A. Miller wrote:
It's very frustrating for those writting the kernel, and it's increasingly frustrating for those of us who are Sys. Admins. and want to INCREASE Linux' presence not loose business. Not having good drivers HAS been a huge stumbling block for us and it hasn't gotten a lot better. I see the issue of poor hardware support as the #1 problem for Linux - not just SUSE.
Some vendors see it just the opposite. Dell is making all the OMSA drivers open source now, and they will be integrated into the kernel. Cheers -e -- Eberhard Moenkeberg (emoenke@gwdg.de, em@kki.org)
Hi, as an independent kernel developer, I couldn't resist answering. Kenneth Schneider schrieb:
<rant> I just can't understand the stance of the kernel developers shutting out companies that are trying to provide drivers for their product. This is certainly more FUD fuel being provided to MS. Who are the kernel developers to tell a company to stop exactly what we need more of, -drivers- for their products. I think it may be time for the kernel developers to stop sticking their collective, holier than thou noses in the air and stop dictating what a distribution can and cannot include in their distribution, namely third party drivers. This is certainly going to drive a -LOT- of people back to MS. It is hard enough to get people to linux with the slow development of drivers, now it will be even worse. </rant>
And how exactly is a closed source Linux better than Windows? If anyone disagrees with the Linux kernel developers about licensing, he or she is free to rewrite the kernel from scratch or switch to any of the *BSD variants. The kernel is not a special piece of software, linking closed source code against it is as forbidden as with any other GPL project. I personally welcome any obstacle thrown in the direction of binary only drivers because this is a clear way to communicate that vendors of said binary-only drivers are not tolerated. And it will make it easier to sue these vendors in the long run. As a side note, binary only drivers are an interesting target for reverse engineering. I already did that once and the new GPL driver was faster, more stable and (most important) free. Regards, Carl-Daniel -- http://www.hailfinger.org/
On Tue, 21 Feb 2006, Carl-Daniel Hailfinger wrote:
<rant> I just can't understand the stance of the kernel developers shutting out companies that are trying to provide drivers for their product. This is certainly more FUD fuel being provided to MS. Who are the kernel developers to tell a company to stop exactly what we need more of, -drivers- for their products. I think it may be time for the kernel developers to stop sticking their collective, holier than thou noses in the air and stop dictating what a distribution can and cannot include in their distribution, namely third party drivers. This is certainly going to drive a -LOT- of people back to MS. It is hard enough to get people to linux with the slow development of drivers, now it will be even worse. </rant>
And how exactly is a closed source Linux better than Windows? If anyone disagrees with the Linux kernel developers about licensing, he or she is free to rewrite the kernel from scratch or switch to any
I do agree with a lot of what the LKD's say. The problem is the social extreemes. Free VS Commecial. It is not easy to get these extreemes to exist or co-exist in a useable situation that frees business's from the MS shackels and FUD. This one company has been on UNIX/LINUX for 20 years and now is going to MS strickly as their current investment in HW looks like it is going to become unsupported. I presonally think they will be back as I do not believe MS has a working solution for them. But many business owners do not understand the technical debate and really are less tolerant of the extreemes. All they want is for the SW/HW to work and let them do what they do best. That is their nice in the market. (How they make thier money.) They do not get into the issues and really could careless. All they want is stuff to work. They pay for what the need or preceive as what they need. Not all the ...
of the *BSD variants. The kernel is not a special piece of software, linking closed source code against it is as forbidden as with any other GPL project. I personally welcome any obstacle thrown in the direction of binary only drivers because this is a clear way to communicate that vendors of said binary-only drivers are not tolerated. And it will make it easier to sue these vendors in the long run.
agreed, but ... What about bringing Linux to replace/displace/destroy MS. Eventually I hope for a NON MS computer OS world. They are free to do the other... Well I would like to see FLOSS/Linux replace MS totally. A MS free world.
As a side note, binary only drivers are an interesting target for reverse engineering. I already did that once and the new GPL driver was faster, more stable and (most important) free.
Yes, but to create them in a Clean Room Enviroment is not easy and takes
money. Where is this going to come from. I saw where stuff had to be
removed because it did not addhere to the Clean Room test and could be
seen as violating ...
Thanks,
--
Boyd Gerber
Boyd Lynn Gerber schrieb:
On Tue, 21 Feb 2006, Carl-Daniel Hailfinger wrote:
As a side note, binary only drivers are an interesting target for reverse engineering. I already did that once and the new GPL driver was faster, more stable and (most important) free.
Yes, but to create them in a Clean Room Enviroment is not easy and takes money. Where is this going to come from. I saw where stuff had to be removed because it did not addhere to the Clean Room test and could be seen as violating ...
The reverse engineering I did back then was totally cleanroom because that was the only way to get the driver into Linus' kernel. The hard part was keeping the separation between the teams, but we managed it with zero budget. Fortunately, there are only a few classes of drivers where reverse engineering is really hard. Graphics drivers come to mind immediately. Network/ISDN/modem drivers, on the other hand, are easy if you only need basic functionality. The hard part of modems/ISDN/DSL are the DSP algorithms, but these could theoretically live in userspace in a task with realtime priority. Some people believe that even graphics drivers can have the large secret parts in userspace, exhibiting only a well-defined opensource interface from the kernel. However, it has been said that this would kill performance. Regards, Carl-Daniel -- http://www.hailfinger.org/
On Tue, 2006-02-21 at 14:21 +0100, Carl-Daniel Hailfinger wrote:
Hi,
as an independent kernel developer, I couldn't resist answering.
Kenneth Schneider schrieb:
<rant> I just can't understand the stance of the kernel developers shutting out companies that are trying to provide drivers for their product. This is certainly more FUD fuel being provided to MS. Who are the kernel developers to tell a company to stop exactly what we need more of, -drivers- for their products. I think it may be time for the kernel developers to stop sticking their collective, holier than thou noses in the air and stop dictating what a distribution can and cannot include in their distribution, namely third party drivers. This is certainly going to drive a -LOT- of people back to MS. It is hard enough to get people to linux with the slow development of drivers, now it will be even worse. </rant>
And how exactly is a closed source Linux better than Windows?
And I never said anything about "closed source linux".
If anyone disagrees with the Linux kernel developers about licensing, he or she is free to rewrite the kernel from scratch or switch to any of the *BSD variants. The kernel is not a special piece of software, linking closed source code against it is as forbidden as with any other GPL project. I personally welcome any obstacle thrown in the direction of binary only drivers because this is a clear way to communicate that vendors of said binary-only drivers are not tolerated. And it will make it easier to sue these vendors in the long run.
As a side note, binary only drivers are an interesting target for reverse engineering. I already did that once and the new GPL driver was faster, more stable and (most important) free.
Fine. Then start writing all of the rest of the drivers that are non-gpl so that current and future users don't loose functionality and can use new and better hardware when it comes out. Keep in mind that perhaps over 95% of the users of linux distributions are -NOT- programmers. Oh and I -DO- appreciate all of your hard work. Perhaps it -IS- time to start looking at BSD. -- Ken Schneider UNIX since 1989, linux since 1994, SuSE since 1998
On Tue, 21 Feb 2006, Kenneth Schneider wrote:
On Tue, 2006-02-21 at 14:21 +0100, Carl-Daniel Hailfinger wrote:
as an independent kernel developer, I couldn't resist answering.
I see the kernel much in the same light as computer BIOS. It started as a
propritary component. Then using Clean Room... We saw many other
manufactures. There is/was UNIX ... Linux. The legal entanglements need
to be avoided. We need growth in Linux. Till Linux and the world becomes
a place without monetary needs like expressed in Star Trek. We some how
have to provide for the basic needs. This is currently being done by
business. Someone currently has to pay. Novell/SUSE provided a service.
That allowed for funds to flow... I am very greatfull for all the
excellant work done by the Kernel Devs. But I am sure you all do not do
it for free. Someone is providing income/resources so this work is able
to continue. We all need to eat and have a place to live/work. Some one
has to pay for electicity/power/computers/internet/storage/access....
The Linux Kernel is much like BIOS was... Some day we will have a world
where everyone has their basic needs met and are free from the monetary
burdens we now have but till then...
We need drivers and resources to make Linux work for all.
--
Boyd Gerber
On Tuesday 21 February 2006 08:56, Kenneth Schneider wrote:
Fine. Then start writing all of the rest of the drivers that are non-gpl so that current and future users don't loose functionality and can use new and better hardware when it comes out. Keep in mind that perhaps over 95% of the users of linux distributions are -NOT- programmers. Oh and I -DO- appreciate all of your hard work. Perhaps it -IS- time to start looking at BSD.
I find it amazing how so many out there feel its the responsibility of the *kernel* developers to support so much hardware out of the box. Blame the companies, not the devs!! So the kernel developers have decided they don't want binary drivers in the kernel. Thats there decision. If you don't like it, add it in yourself. Guess what - the company is still responsible for supporting its own product! If they had any clue at all, they would work *with* the kernel developers to be sure how to properly place the binary portions in userspace. However, their complete lack of response on this list and others means they just said GFY, in no uncertain terms. These are the people you buy hardware from? These are the people you defend? Buy hardware thats not only supported, but supported properly. Most of all, get over yourself. You are a user, not a developer, and how you (among others) have just reacted shows that you clearly don't appreciate all the hard work the developers have put in. Thank you for responding Carl-Daniel, I'm happy a kernel developer saw and responded to that. Joseph M. Gaffney aka CuCullin Not a kernel developer - just appreciative.
On Tue, 2006-02-21 at 09:28 -0500, Joseph M. Gaffney wrote:
On Tuesday 21 February 2006 08:56, Kenneth Schneider wrote:
Fine. Then start writing all of the rest of the drivers that are non-gpl so that current and future users don't loose functionality and can use new and better hardware when it comes out. Keep in mind that perhaps over 95% of the users of linux distributions are -NOT- programmers. Oh and I -DO- appreciate all of your hard work. Perhaps it -IS- time to start looking at BSD.
I find it amazing how so many out there feel its the responsibility of the *kernel* developers to support so much hardware out of the box.
Blame the companies, not the devs!!
NO. Blame the devs when -they- tell the companies they cannot provide -nothing- but open source drivers. Are you saying the companies have -no- right to their IP? It is the devs that need to work with the companies to provide proper closed source drivers. And let have back the non-gpl package we have had in the past. -- Ken Schneider UNIX since 1989, linux since 1994, SuSE since 1998
On Tuesday 21 February 2006 10:05, Kenneth Schneider wrote:
On Tue, 2006-02-21 at 09:28 -0500, Joseph M. Gaffney wrote:
On Tuesday 21 February 2006 08:56, Kenneth Schneider wrote:
Fine. Then start writing all of the rest of the drivers that are non-gpl so that current and future users don't loose functionality and can use new and better hardware when it comes out. Keep in mind that perhaps over 95% of the users of linux distributions are -NOT- programmers. Oh and I -DO- appreciate all of your hard work. Perhaps it -IS- time to start looking at BSD.
I find it amazing how so many out there feel its the responsibility of the *kernel* developers to support so much hardware out of the box.
Blame the companies, not the devs!!
NO. Blame the devs when -they- tell the companies they cannot provide -nothing- but open source drivers. Are you saying the companies have -no- right to their IP? It is the devs that need to work with the companies to provide proper closed source drivers. And let have back the non-gpl package we have had in the past.
Are you saying the kernel devs have no right to *their* IP? The companies need to work with the developers, *as offered*, to provide closed source drivers if they wish. However, I still am of the fundamental belief that they sell *hardware*, not software, so proprietary drivers are unnecessary. However, as stated, help has been offered from the devs, and AVM has done nothing. So again, the *company*, not the devs, just said GFY, and then proceeded to whine. Joseph M. Gaffney aka CuCullin
Am Dienstag, 21. Februar 2006 15:28 schrieb Joseph M. Gaffney:
On Tuesday 21 February 2006 08:56, Kenneth Schneider wrote:
Fine. Then start writing all of the rest of the drivers that are non-gpl so that current and future users don't loose functionality and can use new and better hardware when it comes out. Keep in mind that perhaps over 95% of the users of linux distributions are -NOT- programmers. Oh and I -DO- appreciate all of your hard work. Perhaps it -IS- time to start looking at BSD.
I find it amazing how so many out there feel its the responsibility of the *kernel* developers to support so much hardware out of the box.
Blame the companies, not the devs!!
We do normally, but the way this was communicated makes it sound like the LKD's don't care about their user base. The information that came out was that the change is immediate and they don't care if users machines suddenly stop working. I don't know if the manufacturers were given a realistic timescale to comply, what has been publicised is that the change takes place now and the manufacturers don't have time to respond and provide a replacement to the existing non-compliant drivers. THIS IS BAD PR, whether this is what has happened or whether this went on "behind closed doors" for several months and the developers have had a chance to react before this being announced...
So the kernel developers have decided they don't want binary drivers in the kernel. Thats there decision. If you don't like it, add it in yourself. Guess what - the company is still responsible for supporting its own product!
If they had any clue at all, they would work *with* the kernel developers to be sure how to properly place the binary portions in userspace. However, their complete lack of response on this list and others means they just said GFY, in no uncertain terms.
The problem is, from what has been communicated, they aren't being given time to work with the LKD's, the world has changed overnight, without warning...
These are the people you buy hardware from? These are the people you defend?
Buy hardware thats not only supported, but supported properly. Most of all, get over yourself. You are a user, not a developer, and how you (among others) have just reacted shows that you clearly don't appreciate all the hard work the developers have put in.
Being a developer, although not a Kernel Dev, I do understand what is involved... If the information had been released in a controlled manner with a decent explanation of what is happening and reassurances average Joe that his machines aren't suddenly going to stop working, I doubt we would be having these threads... And in some areas, there aren't any OSS drivers, or they don't fulfill standard requirements (E.g. OpenGL and dual-head for video cards).
Thank you for responding Carl-Daniel, I'm happy a kernel developer saw and responded to that.
Agreed. And keep up the good work, just get somebody to handle the PR for the LKD's, please ;-) -- "I got to go figure," the tenant said. "We all got to figure. There's some way to stop this. It's not like lightning or earthquakes. We've got a bad thing made by men, and by God that's something we can change." - The Grapes of Wrath, by John Steinbeck
David Wright schrieb:
Am Dienstag, 21. Februar 2006 15:28 schrieb Joseph M. Gaffney:
Thank you for responding Carl-Daniel, I'm happy a kernel developer saw and responded to that.
Agreed. And keep up the good work, just get somebody to handle the PR for the LKD's, please ;-)
:-) That somebody will probably be me. I have prepared a short text how this affects end-users and what they can do about it. Will be uploaded to the wiki in the next few days. Regards, Carl-Daniel -- http://www.hailfinger.org/
Hello, Kenneth Schneider wrote:
Keep in mind that perhaps over 95% of the users of linux distributions are -NOT- programmers.
Including me (if we don't writing control software for measurement equipment in Pascal ;-) ). And AVM provided us with excellent support up until now, at least from the users point of view. Would be sad to loose it just because of some religious wars of kernel developers. It does not mean, that I prefer binary only drivers, but having a binary only driver is still much better, than no driver at all. Just as it's also completely nonsense to use a Radeon 9250 just because it's the best 3D video card with open source driver...
Perhaps it -IS- time to start looking at BSD.
Welcome on board :) I started to use FreeBSD before Linux even reached 1.0. It's great for old hardware, where SUSE does not even install due to not enough memory. But with more open and closed source drivers in Linux, you better stay with SUSE on recent hardware! Bye, -- CzP http://peter.czanik.hu/
Am Dienstag, 21. Februar 2006 14:21 schrieb Carl-Daniel Hailfinger:
Hi,
as an independent kernel developer, I couldn't resist answering.
Kenneth Schneider schrieb:
<rant> I just can't understand the stance of the kernel developers shutting out companies that are trying to provide drivers for their product. This is certainly more FUD fuel being provided to MS. Who are the kernel developers to tell a company to stop exactly what we need more of, -drivers- for their products. I think it may be time for the kernel developers to stop sticking their collective, holier than thou noses in the air and stop dictating what a distribution can and cannot include in their distribution, namely third party drivers. This is certainly going to drive a -LOT- of people back to MS. It is hard enough to get people to linux with the slow development of drivers, now it will be even worse. </rant>
And how exactly is a closed source Linux better than Windows?
Because it is Linux, it is more flexible and suits the way I work better. I don't care whether it is open source or not, if it does the job well I'll use it, being open source is just another plus point, that if I feel uneasy I can go and check the code, and I can recompile it if I want to... As it is, I have installed SUSE on my machines on trust since 8.0, I've never looked at the source code, because it has worked "out of the box".
If anyone disagrees with the Linux kernel developers about licensing, he or she is free to rewrite the kernel from scratch or switch to any of the *BSD variants. The kernel is not a special piece of software, linking closed source code against it is as forbidden as with any other GPL project. I personally welcome any obstacle thrown in the direction of binary only drivers because this is a clear way to communicate that vendors of said binary-only drivers are not tolerated. And it will make it easier to sue these vendors in the long run.
I agree in part with the decision, the problem is the timing. This has been announced mid-way through the Beta process for 10.1 and Novel/openSUSE have said they will react immediately and remove all closed source Kernel-drivers from the distribution, with no communication of what that means for users. For the average user this has come as a shock, and the biggest problem with the communication of this change is that they haven't said "we will work towards removing binary drivers before the next release (i.e. 10.2)," or "we will ensure our customers are unaffected as we comply with these changes," or "we are enacting the following processes to ensure there is as little disruption for the user as possible." No, instead we just have a vague statement talking about KPM modules and banning non-GPL code from the Kernel forthwith. To the end user, this sounds like a big f*** you to their loyal users who are used to putting the CD in and getting a working system out the end. If a timeframe had been made public for this change to take place (i.e. it is announced now and suppliers of binary drivers have 6 months or whatever to open their drivers or replace them with user level binaries). As it is, what has been publicised sounds like bombing Linux back to the stoneage for principles. I appreciate that having the binary drivers makes development, testing and support more problematic, and that it breaks the GPL ethos of the Kernel, but at the end of the day, the users often don't care, as long as their system boots up. Upgrading a multi-thousand pound server to a new version of Linux, only to find Linux has made a multi-thousand pound doorstop out of the hardware isn't going to do anybody any good. I think a little more care should have gone into the wording of the release, and a little thought about the consequences. The decision is very idealistic and very sound, in theory. In practice it is suicidal to just switch off these "features" without warning and without having replacements. From what I understand from reading the lists, companies like ATi and nVidia are working on complying with these changes, whilst others like AVM are getting bolshy about it. But so far we only have 3 names, what is with the rest of the industry? Who are taking on the challenge and making compliant drivers (either OSS or user level) and who are acting like spoilt brats and refusing to comply? I really think the biggest problem with this at the moment is that the PR has been handled disasterously by the Kernel developers and companies like Novell/SUSE. What has been announced sounds like pandering to ego's whilst doing nothing to reassure existing customers/users that the next upgrade isn't going to leave them with a useless pile of junk... I'm sure that isn't the intention, but with the information so far that is unfortunately how it sounds.
As a side note, binary only drivers are an interesting target for reverse engineering. I already did that once and the new GPL driver was faster, more stable and (most important) free.
This is great, and throwing out the binary drivers when they can be replaced by an OSS equivalent is a laudible goal, but throwing the binary drivers out wholesale when they can't currently be replaced isn't going to help anyone. -- "I got to go figure," the tenant said. "We all got to figure. There's some way to stop this. It's not like lightning or earthquakes. We've got a bad thing made by men, and by God that's something we can change." - The Grapes of Wrath, by John Steinbeck
Am Dienstag, 21. Februar 2006 13:49 schrieb Kenneth Schneider:
(...) This is certainly going to drive a -LOT- of people back to MS.
I don't agree. In my opinion people is *not* not switching to Linux because they *know* that this or that piece of hardware will not work, but because they are *afraid* of Linux, thinking it's too "complicated" or for "computer freaks" only. When I hear arguments against Linux I never hear facts, just rumours. This is more an image problem than a technical one. I was very much afraid of loosing the possibilities of my high priced software (photoshop etc.) and now I'm happy experiencing that OS-software is even better, easier, more comfortable. Anyway - if you ever hat to go through the hard times working with MS for years (like I unfortunately had to) and then "discover" Linux, you will *never, never* want to go back. I don't even want to come near an MS-PC anymore! With Linux the problems arrive in the beginning, until you have your machine up and running. If it runs, it's just easy life. MS is contrary: it's easy to set it up and then live starts to be a horror :-)
It is hard enough to get people to linux with the slow development of drivers, now it will be even worse.
Most of the common users like I am one (sometimes called "the idiots" here - or did I get this wrong?) don't have any idea about such technical things and don't read articles about kernels etc. because we only understand "trainstation" (I know one can't say that in english this way, anway...) I guess the following suggestion is unrealistic again (but its just an idea): Why not set up a page with some tested computer models? I don't mean single parts, chips and so on, because "we idiots" often don't even know what chip we have on our ethernet card etc., but just some lists (e.g. "1] home PC", "2] office PC", "3] gamer PC", "4] cheap laptop", "5] top laptop") with common hardware parts that are widely available, so people can go to a shop, give the list and say: put me this together and give me a box of Linux. I could even imagine that some hardware makers or sellers will exert themselves for beeing on that list. Don't you? regards Daniel -- Daniel Bauer photographer Basel Switzerland professional photography: http://www.daniel-bauer.com special interest site: http://www.bauer-nudes.com
Daniel Bauer wrote:
I don't agree. In my opinion people is *not* not switching to Linux because they *know* that this or that piece of hardware will not work,
sorry, but I have to keep a MS computer on my desk for some hardware reason. Hardware is much more various thant software and legal problem may prevent us from making drivers, easy or not :-( jdd -- http://www.dodin.net http://dodin.org/galerie_photo_web/expo/index.html http://lucien.dodin.net http://fr.susewiki.org/index.php?title=Gérer_ses_photos
On Tuesday 21 February 2006 15:20, jdd wrote:
Daniel Bauer wrote:
I don't agree. In my opinion people is *not* not switching to Linux because they *know* that this or that piece of hardware will not work,
sorry, but I have to keep a MS computer on my desk for some hardware reason. Hardware is much more various thant software and legal problem may prevent us from making drivers, easy or not :-(
And for this exact reason, I no longer have a WinXP computer. I had a dual boot system for quite a while to do a couple of things not found in linux. For Christmas, I got a new Video card Radeon X700 AGP FWIW. I tried to install it and windows says I've got new hardware. Great. I'd removed all traces of the old versions. After the install, WinXP locked up on reboot. Nothing I could do would fix it. So I did a re-install, and picked up a driver or two that might be necessary. Same thing. Locks up. Linux on the other hand worked right away. Installed the newer driver from ATI, ran their installer, and with the exception of the mouse wheel not working everything worked. Took about two minutes to make up my mind. The XP drive is gone. I found other way to do what I needed. I just hadn't looked hard enough.. Mike -- Powered by SuSE 10.0 Kernel 2.6.13 KDE 3.4 Kmail 1.8 For Mondo/Mindi backup support go to http://www.mikenjane.net/~mike 4:45pm up 1 day 21:41, 3 users, load average: 1.14, 1.22, 1.23
Mike wrote:
sorry, but I have to keep a MS computer on my desk for some hardware reason. Hardware is much more various thant software and legal problem may prevent us from making drivers, easy or not :-(
And for this exact reason, I no longer have a WinXP computer. I had a
I know that, I know Linux is oftem much better than W$, but there is hardware ill supported by Linux and that we must cope with. This was the original thread subject, IMHO. And I understand proprietary hardware owners wants to keep they secrets. but can't they use userspace drivers? jdd -- http://www.dodin.net http://dodin.org/galerie_photo_web/expo/index.html http://lucien.dodin.net http://fr.susewiki.org/index.php?title=Gérer_ses_photos
Am Dienstag, 21. Februar 2006 17:08 schrieb jdd:
Mike wrote:
sorry, but I have to keep a MS computer on my desk for some hardware reason. Hardware is much more various thant software and legal problem may prevent us from making drivers, easy or not :-(
And for this exact reason, I no longer have a WinXP computer. I had a
I know that, I know Linux is oftem much better than W$, but there is hardware ill supported by Linux and that we must cope with. This was the original thread subject, IMHO.
And I understand proprietary hardware owners wants to keep they secrets.
but can't they use userspace drivers?
Ideally yes, if they can't GPL their drivers, then move to userspace. The problem, as I've stated elsewhere is that for the average user, the communication was that we are switching off binary kernel drivers now, and those manufacturers that are willing can convert to userspace if they want, and we'll help... What would have been the proper way to phrase this is "we will switch off binary kernel drivers in n months, and we will help suppliers move their drivers to userspace if they want." As it is, what was announced made the LKD's sound like the bad guys and the manufacturers the injured party because they are expected to switch their driver model overnight... I'm sure this isn't the case, but for the average Joe that is the appearance the Kernel Developers have engendered. -- "I got to go figure," the tenant said. "We all got to figure. There's some way to stop this. It's not like lightning or earthquakes. We've got a bad thing made by men, and by God that's something we can change." - The Grapes of Wrath, by John Steinbeck
On Tue, Feb 21, 2006 at 07:49:21AM -0500, Kenneth Schneider wrote: <snip>
<rant>
Please try to keep the rants off-list. Complain on the apropriate Kernel-list. Here it will become offtopic extremeley fast, as you have seen. houghi -- Nutze die Zeit. Sie ist das Kostbarste, was wir haben, denn es ist unwiederbringliche Lebenszeit. Leben ist aber mehr als Werk und Arbeit, und das Sein wichtiger als das Tun - Johannes Müller-Elmau
On Tue, 2006-02-21 at 16:38 +0100, houghi wrote:
On Tue, Feb 21, 2006 at 07:49:21AM -0500, Kenneth Schneider wrote: <snip>
<rant>
Please try to keep the rants off-list. Complain on the apropriate Kernel-list. Here it will become offtopic extremeley fast, as you have seen.
Yes. My apologies to the list. -- Ken Schneider UNIX since 1989, linux since 1994, SuSE since 1998
Am Dienstag, 21. Februar 2006 16:38 schrieb houghi:
On Tue, Feb 21, 2006 at 07:49:21AM -0500, Kenneth Schneider wrote: <snip>
<rant>
Please try to keep the rants off-list. Complain on the apropriate Kernel-list. Here it will become offtopic extremeley fast, as you have seen.
houghi
Yikes, I hadn't expected to get this reaction! I agree with you houghi. We've been through the Kernel Driver topic *at least* twice now! I just wanted to make people aware of the articles that had been printed over Xgl, 10.1 release dates and the Kernel drivers being reported in the press this week... :-( -- "I got to go figure," the tenant said. "We all got to figure. There's some way to stop this. It's not like lightning or earthquakes. We've got a bad thing made by men, and by God that's something we can change." - The Grapes of Wrath, by John Steinbeck
On Tue, Feb 21, 2006 at 05:37:56PM +0100, David Wright wrote:
Yikes, I hadn't expected to get this reaction! I agree with you houghi. We've been through the Kernel Driver topic *at least* twice now!
Not your fault. If you see any more news directly concerning openSUSE, please let us know. houghi -- Nutze die Zeit. Sie ist das Kostbarste, was wir haben, denn es ist unwiederbringliche Lebenszeit. Leben ist aber mehr als Werk und Arbeit, und das Sein wichtiger als das Tun - Johannes Müller-Elmau
On Tue, 21 Feb 2006, David Wright wrote:
And finally (or firstly, I've actually written these in reverse order to the way they are printed :-P), the Kernel Log section mentions the removal of non-GPL USB drivers from the Linux Kernel, with AVM getting its nose in. The sub-title for the piece: "A change in the Kernel has meant the near exclusion/removal of AVM USB devices from Linux." ("Eine Änderung im Kernel hätte beinahe das Aus für die USB-Geräte von AVM unter Linux bedeutet.")
"An employee of AVM critiscised [the change], saying that it is now not possible to provide proprietary USB-drivers; AVM must therefore stop support for its own USB devices."
There is no mention in this article of SUSE BTW, just the Linux Kernel development and AVM, although they do mention that it is possible for USB devices to be written in "userland".
This is really bad. It gives too much fuel to MS to spread more fud. I
have been watching the discussion of the FACTORY list. The biggest
problem I see with Linux is drivers and getting support for them from
commecial enterprises. I am afraid that this aids manufactures of devices
to choose not to support Linux. Look at ATI and nVidia, .... We have a
hard time getting people to provide drivers for Linux as it is now. This
has aided some driver manufactorers to say why support Linux. I had this
happen this week. A client that has been on SUSE Linux since 9.0 and was
considering upgrading to SLES and newer version of Linux had the hardware
people tell him they would not be supporting Linux in the future. He
called all worked up about my convincing him to go with Linux and now he
is not going to be able to use it because of this issue. He is now
looking for a MS consultant and going to be moving from Linux. This was
really bad timing for me.
--
Boyd Gerber
On Tuesday 21 February 2006 8:01 am, Boyd Lynn Gerber wrote:
This is really bad. It gives too much fuel to MS to spread more fud. I have been watching the discussion of the FACTORY list. The biggest problem I see with Linux is drivers and getting support for them from commecial enterprises. I am afraid that this aids manufactures of devices to choose not to support Linux. Look at ATI and nVidia, .... We have a hard time getting people to provide drivers for Linux as it is now. This has aided some driver manufactorers to say why support Linux. I had this happen this week. A client that has been on SUSE Linux since 9.0 and was considering upgrading to SLES and newer version of Linux had the hardware people tell him they would not be supporting Linux in the future. He called all worked up about my convincing him to go with Linux and now he is not going to be able to use it because of this issue. He is now looking for a MS consultant and going to be moving from Linux. This was really bad timing for me.
It's bad timing for everyone, and is pure STUPIDITY!! Those knuckleheads who work on the kernel had better get a reality check and get it QUICKLY!! Fred -- Paid purchaser of ALL SuSE Linux releases since 6.x
On Sat, 25 Feb 2006 23:55:23 -0500, Fred A. Miller wrote:
It's bad timing for everyone, and is pure STUPIDITY!!
Bad timing perhaps, stupidity certainly not.
Those knuckleheads who work on the kernel had better get a reality check and get it QUICKLY!!
Insulting gets you nowhere! You're barking up the completely wrong tree and you damn well know that. Complain to the manufacturers of the hardware for not complying to the rules the kernel developers set up. Besides, distributing non GPL drivers together with the kernel could possibly get Novell/SUSE in legal trouble, which is another reason to cleanly separate those two. So cool down, stop insulting people and let's discuss in a civilized way. Philipp
Fred, sometimes you have to make a statement that will have positive effects in the long run. A speedskater that has to skate 10k won't start like a 500m skater. You can scream that he is slow and he is stupid but in the end you will see that the guy thats started like a 500m-skater died at the 6 round and the 10k-skater finished in a time that broke world records (or Olympic records) Sometimes slow things are really good things. Samsung, IBM and Others are allready preparing themselves for the new strategy of the kernel-developers. So don't complain before it all finished ;-) Azerion
Azerion wrote:
Samsung, IBM and Others are allready preparing themselves for the new strategy of the kernel-developers. So don't complain before it all finished ;-)
If what you say is that the kernel devs action minds that most important hardware vendors decided to cope with open source standards, this a very good news... but is that true? may be Linux has get so strong it can begins to rule... we'll see that soon :-) jdd -- http://www.dodin.net http://dodin.org/galerie_photo_web/expo/index.html http://lucien.dodin.net http://fr.susewiki.org/index.php?title=Gérer_ses_photos
jdd schrieb:
Azerion wrote:
Samsung, IBM and Others are allready preparing themselves for the new strategy of the kernel-developers. So don't complain before it all finished ;-)
If what you say is that the kernel devs action minds that most important hardware vendors decided to cope with open source standards, this a very good news... but is that true?
may be Linux has get so strong it can begins to rule...
With regard to the newest Intel wireless drivers, I doubt this. It is stated there (I can't judge, if it's true or not), that closed source modules are necessary to fulfill FCC rules. In a post on this list here, a Novell employee stated, that legal support for DVD playback can be achieved only by closed source drivers as the DVD commitee demands, that the driver doesn't allow any circumvention of the Macrovision mechanism. So there is the real world and the kernel world. Who do you think will change its rules to fulfill the need of the users, who just want to use their systems? Multi billion dollar business or GPL (and even worse kernel policy) zeal^wsupporters? I don't dare to bet on any side. The kernel devs have all rights to fight for their principles, they just shouldn't claim, that they are caring for the freedom of their users, when they just care about freedom of their software and with regard to stable driver APIs their freedom to change kernel interfaces with every minor version. Ciao Siegbert
On Tuesday 28 February 2006 04:03, Siegbert Baude wrote:
jdd schrieb:
Azerion wrote:
Samsung, IBM and Others are allready preparing themselves for the new strategy of the kernel-developers. So don't complain before it all finished ;-)
If what you say is that the kernel devs action minds that most important hardware vendors decided to cope with open source standards, this a very good news... but is that true?
may be Linux has get so strong it can begins to rule...
With regard to the newest Intel wireless drivers, I doubt this. It is stated there (I can't judge, if it's true or not), that closed source modules are necessary to fulfill FCC rules. In a post on this list here, a Novell employee stated, that legal support for DVD playback can be achieved only by closed source drivers as the DVD commitee demands, that the driver doesn't allow any circumvention of the Macrovision mechanism.
So there is the real world and the kernel world. Who do you think will change its rules to fulfill the need of the users, who just want to use their systems? Multi billion dollar business or GPL (and even worse kernel policy) zeal^wsupporters? I don't dare to bet on any side.
The kernel devs have all rights to fight for their principles, they just shouldn't claim, that they are caring for the freedom of their users, when they just care about freedom of their software and with regard to stable driver APIs their freedom to change kernel interfaces with every minor version.
Ciao Siegbert
Ahh... the old "well we have to, so its ok" sentiment. I hate that sentiment. I find it... well, I don't think I want to say it. At what point does the inclusion of closed source with the kernel end? At what point do we, as consumers, say no? Sorry you think differently, but they *are* caring about the freedom of the users, not only the freedom of their software. MPEG, DVD (specifically CSS encryption), DRM, etc, now has HDCP to join the group, the biggest nightmare I will ever see. None of these HDCP compliant devices out there work correctly, and even better, do not work with each other at all. If you're going to buy something HDCP, be damn sure you're getting it all from the same company at the same time... you'll run into problems, still, but less than any other way. I mention this because its the same thing. CSS encryption is weak and uneccessary. Region encoding was done only so Hollywood could control their release cycle to milk movies for all that they've got. MPEG is not the end-all be-all of video codecs, plenty of others have come up with better codecs now. For example, the BBC with DIRAC, designed for HD. Or Ogg Theora. Why do we have DVD's with encryption? Because you, Siegbert, are ok with being forced into a certain path. Me? I'm not. Let the manufacturers do their job, and support me as a customer. They can put what needs to be closed somewhere in userspace, and open the rest. Short of that, I have no interest in using them. Joseph M. Gaffney aka CuCullin
On Tue, 2006-02-28 at 09:16 -0500, Joseph M. Gaffney wrote: <snip>
Ahh... the old "well we have to, so its ok" sentiment.
I hate that sentiment. I find it... well, I don't think I want to say it.
At what point does the inclusion of closed source with the kernel end? At what point do we, as consumers, say no? Sorry you think differently, but they *are* caring about the freedom of the users, not only the freedom of their software. MPEG, DVD (specifically CSS encryption), DRM, etc, now has HDCP to join the group, the biggest nightmare I will ever see. None of these HDCP compliant devices out there work correctly, and even better, do not work with each other at all. If you're going to buy something HDCP, be damn sure you're getting it all from the same company at the same time... you'll run into problems, still, but less than any other way.
I mention this because its the same thing. CSS encryption is weak and uneccessary. Region encoding was done only so Hollywood could control their release cycle to milk movies for all that they've got. MPEG is not the end-all be-all of video codecs, plenty of others have come up with better codecs now. For example, the BBC with DIRAC, designed for HD. Or Ogg Theora.
Why do we have DVD's with encryption? Because you, Siegbert, are ok with being forced into a certain path. Me? I'm not. Let the manufacturers do their job, and support me as a customer. They can put what needs to be closed somewhere in userspace, and open the rest. Short of that, I have no interest in using them.
I want to make sure I understand the whole thing about closed source drivers. How long have the manufacturers had to comply to the -new- way of providing userspace drivers? I think all need to know the timeline involved here to properly access the impact on whether or not they upgrade their OS. I certainly do. Why should I upgrade to a newer kernel version that keeps me from using hardware that currently works? -- Ken Schneider UNIX since 1989, linux since 1994, SuSE since 1998
Hi, Maybe I am stupid, but I have tried many times now, and allways end up with: "Installation system does not match your boot medium. Sorry, this will not work." I have downloaded tha latest beta 6 boot cd from the open suse site. When booting pu and pointing out the ftp server and directory, it ends up with the error message above after some time. What am I doing wrong? Regards Fredrik
On Wed, 8 Mar 2006, Fredrik Sjöstedt wrote:
Maybe I am stupid, but I have tried many times now, and allways end up with:
"Installation system does not match your boot medium. Sorry, this will not work."
I have downloaded tha latest beta 6 boot cd from the open suse site.
When booting pu and pointing out the ftp server and directory, it ends up with the error message above after some time.
What am I doing wrong?
At the moment we have a very strict check in place to make sure the boot.iso matches the installation system. Therefore you would need to use the boot.iso that's in pub/opensuse/distribution/SL-OSS-factory/inst-source/boot -- but even this one might fail as the Factory tree changes. AFAIK Steffen will disable this check (or at least turn it into a warning-only thingy) soon. Regards Christoph
On Wed, 8 Mar 2006, Christoph Thiel wrote:
On Wed, 8 Mar 2006, Fredrik Sjöstedt wrote:
Maybe I am stupid, but I have tried many times now, and allways end up with:
"Installation system does not match your boot medium. Sorry, this will not work."
I have downloaded tha latest beta 6 boot cd from the open suse site.
Boot media up to beta6 will not work with beta7 and later. To avoid tons of bug reports I turned the warning into an error. Steffen
On Sunday 26 February 2006 1:08 pm, Azerion wrote:
Fred, sometimes you have to make a statement that will have positive effects in the long run. A speedskater that has to skate 10k won't start like a 500m skater. You can scream that he is slow and he is stupid but in the end you will see that the guy thats started like a 500m-skater died at the 6 round and the 10k-skater finished in a time that broke world records (or Olympic records)
Sometimes slow things are really good things.
Samsung, IBM and Others are allready preparing themselves for the new strategy of the kernel-developers. So don't complain before it all finished ;-)
Yes, I know. But I just lost a large bid - ALL because of poor hardware support. :( SUSE lost a nice sale. Fred -- Paid purchaser of ALL SuSE Linux releases since 6.x
Hi, On Sun, 26 Feb 2006, Fred A. Miller wrote:
On Sunday 26 February 2006 1:08 pm, Azerion wrote:
Fred, sometimes you have to make a statement that will have positive effects in the long run. A speedskater that has to skate 10k won't start like a 500m skater. You can scream that he is slow and he is stupid but in the end you will see that the guy thats started like a 500m-skater died at the 6 round and the 10k-skater finished in a time that broke world records (or Olympic records)
Sometimes slow things are really good things.
Samsung, IBM and Others are allready preparing themselves for the new strategy of the kernel-developers. So don't complain before it all finished ;-)
Yes, I know. But I just lost a large bid - ALL because of poor hardware support. :( SUSE lost a nice sale.
Please make us understand. Cheers -e -- Eberhard Moenkeberg (emoenke@gwdg.de, em@kki.org)
On Monday 27 February 2006 12:12 am, Philipp Thomas wrote:
On Sun, 26 Feb 2006 19:26:13 -0500, Fred A. Miller wrote:
But I just lost a large bid - ALL because of poor hardware support. :(
What hardware for what job? Maybe there is reason to drive/push some things, who knows :)
'Bunch of stuff, Phillip. Just one, Broadcom with their bad attitude towards Linux with their wi-fi chipsets. Yes, I know, there is a kludge, but they specified "native" linux drivers. I don't know all of the history there, but I have an idea that 1) someone tried to "get in" before me and failed, and 2) the CIO is brain dead - that is I found out yesterday that he's very pro MonkeySoft. He can stack the deck anyway he wants. :( Fred -- Paid purchaser of ALL SuSE Linux releases since 6.x
participants (19)
-
Azerion -
Boyd Lynn Gerber -
Carl-Daniel Hailfinger -
Christoph Thiel -
Daniel Bauer -
David Wright -
Eberhard Moenkeberg -
Fred A. Miller -
Fredrik Sjöstedt -
houghi -
jdd -
Joseph M. Gaffney -
Kenneth Schneider -
Mike -
Peter Czanik -
Philipp Thomas -
Robert Schiele -
Siegbert Baude -
Steffen Winterfeldt