Hi, because that's not what you need for all the cards. Broadcom provides the Linux STA drivers ( http://www.broadcom.com/support/802.11/linux_sta.php ), which offer excellent functionality on the supported models and are packaged in Packman. Ubuntu tool automatically detects if you need them, and retrieves them from a repository. It has been discussed in the past if it was possible to have them included or provided in some other way than unofficial repositories on openSUSE, and the answer was that it is not possible due to legal concerns (violation of the kernel licence according to what Novell kernel developers said). I do not know how Ubuntu manages the problem, but Dell provides the same drivers in binary form on the Dell Mini 9 and on other laptops sold with ubuntu and the broadcom cards, for example. It would be interesting to have a deeper insight in what/how they do it. From the licence in the drivers it seems to it *can* be redistributed if the conditions written there are respected. Best, A. Il giorno lun, 28/09/2009 alle 06.28 -0400, Robison, Jonathon (M.) ha scritto:
I'm curious - if we can sense and determine the Broadcom chip during system setup, why then can we not add the install_bcm43xx_firmware to the setup, or to "first-boot"? Sort of like we do with the MS fonts?
Of course, since we ARE dealing with network drivers, there's always the "chicken and egg" problem. Crap.
Jonathon M. Robison Infrastructure Architect, Research Ford Motor Company
-----Original Message----- From: Larry Finger [mailto:larry.finger@gmail.com] On Behalf Of Larry Finger Sent: Sunday, September 27, 2009 11:05 PM To: Bernhard Wiedemann Cc: opensuse-testing@opensuse.org Subject: Re: [opensuse-testing] installation report
Bernhard Wiedemann wrote:
wontfix: b43 (WLAN) firmware missing -> install_bcm43xx_firmware helps
Just for clarity: This is a "cannot fix" rather than a "won't fix". The copyright on the firmware files is held by Broadcom and they will not give permission to distribute them. The script /usr/sbin/install_bcm43xx_firmware is the most we can do. It downloads driver files that Broadcom had to supply when they were caught in a GPL violation, then extracts the firmware from those files.
There is a group in Italy that is working on open-source firmware for the Broadcom chips. Once that package is available, then this whole issue will be avoided.
-- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-testing+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-testing+help@opensuse.org
-- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse-testing+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse-testing+help@opensuse.org