Re: Freescale Linux BSP review
Konstantinos, thanks, I agree with your thoughts. My approach has been to accept small steps in the right direction and encourage reasoned discussion. I also think that Linaro's main function is as a place where all the moving parts can collaborate.Right now, the GPU 'problem' is that of getting both open source and proprietary pieces of the BSPs to work really well together in products. That's really the focus of the Graphics WGs and the partner landing teams. This is a heavy lifting engineering job, and it will take time, but everyone is willing and hopeful of good results.Doing this will also help us have a reasoned discussion about where the open source and proprietary boundaries make sense. Now for a bit of a rant. Personally, I have a deep and abiding respect for open source (for me, it's the key social invention of the internet age), however I also recognise that it would not exist without companies using open source as part of their products.Let's face it, an awful lot of open source engineers are getting their mortgages paid by companies that make use of open source. No company invests in open source for philanthropic reasons; they understand that it is necessary for their businesses.The tricky problem is always in how ethical a company's usage is (and I use the word 'ethical' deliberately because this is wider than mere legal words smithing); whenever I give talks on GPL, I emphasise both the moral as well as the legal duties.In my experience, most companies struggle to understand open source when they first start to interact with it. It usually takes some open source zealots within the company to persuade their management of the right way to behave. The best way to get companies to change their behaviour is to find them and support them. Making threatening GPL noises in email does not help them in any way. Dave David Rusling, CTO http://www.linaro.org Linaro Lockton House Clarendon Rd Cambridge CB2 8FH ___ dri-devel mailing list dri-devel@lists.freedesktop.org http://lists.freedesktop.org/mailman/listinfo/dri-devel
Re: Freescale Linux BSP review
Alan,
I still stand by my assertion that educating companies as to the
realities and philosophies of open source is better than threatening them.
Your analogy of open source as a standard, a practical de facto standard
written in a programming language is a good one.Forking code (by never
upstreaming it) tends not to be sustainable (although some companies still
try).Proprietary code exists for all sorts of reasons, often a bogus belief
in an intrinsic value.Graphics, in particular, is a very litigious world
and also, the biggest cause of proprietary code, surely some link?
Back to the plot. Linaro is trying to help here, both in reducing
non-optimal code forking and in helping its members work better with the open
source communities. As I said in my earlier mail, this will take time. That
said, I've seen enormous shifts within the ARM partnership already this year
and look forward to more next year.
Merry Christmas / Happy Holidays to one and all.
Dave
ps nice to see that you keep your old email address.Are you still in Wales?
On 23 Dec 2010, at 17:17, Alan Cox wrote:
>> way to behave. The best way to get companies to change their behaviour is
>> to find them and support them. Making threatening GPL noises in email does
>> not help them in any way.
>
> I would disagree based on years of history.
>
> The best way to get a company to change behaviour is for a situation to
> occur in which it is in their own hardcore capitalist self interest to
> change.
>
> In my experience open source usually mirrors standards in this. The
> leading vendors refuse to take part, the smaller vendors see the
> opportunity - often working together - and the bigger vendor eithers gets
> its backside kicked or does a sharp turn in the right direction.
>
> That's the story of email, of the web, and is occuring currently in
> telephony and other areas.
>
> It's also why folks like Dell deserve a lot more credit than they get for
> the success of Linux.
>
> If its not commercially sensible it doesn't matter what the licensing
> says. They are corporations not charities, if it's not economically
> viable for them to manage it all themselves including new driver
> releases, legal risk, all their own review and keeping up with DRI then
> they have to decide which way to go - some go the "hit and run" approach
> ('not got kernel X then sorry but not our problem'), some do the work to
> support it release by release but don't go GPL (eg Nvidia), some open up,
> others just walk away.
>
> Alan
___
dri-devel mailing list
dri-devel@lists.freedesktop.org
http://lists.freedesktop.org/mailman/listinfo/dri-devel
Freescale Linux BSP review
Konstantinos, thanks, I agree with your thoughts. My approach has been to accept small steps in the right direction and encourage reasoned discussion. I also think that Linaro's main function is as a place where all the moving parts can collaborate.Right now, the GPU 'problem' is that of getting both open source and proprietary pieces of the BSPs to work really well together in products. That's really the focus of the Graphics WGs and the partner landing teams. This is a heavy lifting engineering job, and it will take time, but everyone is willing and hopeful of good results.Doing this will also help us have a reasoned discussion about where the open source and proprietary boundaries make sense. Now for a bit of a rant. Personally, I have a deep and abiding respect for open source (for me, it's the key social invention of the internet age), however I also recognise that it would not exist without companies using open source as part of their products.Let's face it, an awful lot of open source engineers are getting their mortgages paid by companies that make use of open source. No company invests in open source for philanthropic reasons; they understand that it is necessary for their businesses.The tricky problem is always in how ethical a company's usage is (and I use the word 'ethical' deliberately because this is wider than mere legal words smithing); whenever I give talks on GPL, I emphasise both the moral as well as the legal duties.In my experience, most companies struggle to understand open source when they first start to interact with it. It usually takes some open source zealots within the company to persuade their management of the right way to behave. The best way to get companies to change their behaviour is to find them and support them. Making threatening GPL noises in email does not help them in any way. Dave David Rusling, CTO http://www.linaro.org Linaro Lockton House Clarendon Rd Cambridge CB2 8FH
Freescale Linux BSP review
Alan,
I still stand by my assertion that educating companies as to the
realities and philosophies of open source is better than threatening them.
Your analogy of open source as a standard, a practical de facto standard
written in a programming language is a good one.Forking code (by never
upstreaming it) tends not to be sustainable (although some companies still
try).Proprietary code exists for all sorts of reasons, often a bogus belief
in an intrinsic value.Graphics, in particular, is a very litigious world
and also, the biggest cause of proprietary code, surely some link?
Back to the plot. Linaro is trying to help here, both in reducing
non-optimal code forking and in helping its members work better with the open
source communities. As I said in my earlier mail, this will take time. That
said, I've seen enormous shifts within the ARM partnership already this year
and look forward to more next year.
Merry Christmas / Happy Holidays to one and all.
Dave
ps nice to see that you keep your old email address.Are you still in Wales?
On 23 Dec 2010, at 17:17, Alan Cox wrote:
>> way to behave. The best way to get companies to change their behaviour is
>> to find them and support them. Making threatening GPL noises in email does
>> not help them in any way.
>
> I would disagree based on years of history.
>
> The best way to get a company to change behaviour is for a situation to
> occur in which it is in their own hardcore capitalist self interest to
> change.
>
> In my experience open source usually mirrors standards in this. The
> leading vendors refuse to take part, the smaller vendors see the
> opportunity - often working together - and the bigger vendor eithers gets
> its backside kicked or does a sharp turn in the right direction.
>
> That's the story of email, of the web, and is occuring currently in
> telephony and other areas.
>
> It's also why folks like Dell deserve a lot more credit than they get for
> the success of Linux.
>
> If its not commercially sensible it doesn't matter what the licensing
> says. They are corporations not charities, if it's not economically
> viable for them to manage it all themselves including new driver
> releases, legal risk, all their own review and keeping up with DRI then
> they have to decide which way to go - some go the "hit and run" approach
> ('not got kernel X then sorry but not our problem'), some do the work to
> support it release by release but don't go GPL (eg Nvidia), some open up,
> others just walk away.
>
> Alan
