Fedora Freedom and linux-libre

[Les Mikesell]

jeff wrote:
> 

>>> I look at tg3.c and I can't tell where this "aggregation" begins and 
>>> ends. It's the *SAME FILE*. Can you clearly say which line numbers 
>>> are GPL and which line numbers are not GPL?
>>
>> I don't know much about kernel drivers and I don't think ordinary 
>> humans are expected to.
> 
> Well ordinary humans don't post 20 times to fedora-devel arguing about 
> kernel drivers either--but you have. You can't just cop out and plead 
> ignorance now. How lame of you.

My point is that the details of the aggregation are irrelevant and the 
format of the storage doesn't matter.   The fact that the firmware 
loader can find the correct chunk of data to load for each separate 
device shows that the storage maintains the separation.

>>  I'd approach the question more mechanically, on the same order as 
>> trying to establish if the elements within a tar file are separate 
>> things,
> 
> Well, if that tar file is distributed as a GPL file, then everything in 
> it would be GPL, no?

It's the other way around.  Putting things in the same container doesn't 
  change the copyright of the separate parts.  If anything is wrong, it 
is  the label of the container.

>> or if the files represented within an iso image are separate things.
> 
> If the entire ISO is distributed as GPL, it wouldn't be separate would it?

Likewise.

>>  If the compiler stores in a form that the loader can identify and 
>> download to the correct device, I'd be convinced that it is a separate 
>> thing regardless of any intermediate mechanical transformations or 
>> representations.
> 
> But they are being *shipped together* in a package whose license says: 
> GPLv2.
> 
> $ rpm -qp --queryformat "%{LICENSE}\n" 
> kernel-2.6.26-0.67.rc6.git1.fc10.src.rpm
> GPLv2
> 
> So RedHat is claiming they are shipping a GPLv2 kernel, when they 
> clearly aren't (they are also doing it knowingly). Note, there are 
> packages that have a mix of licenses, and this gets clearly pointed out 
> in the LICENSE tag.

Perhaps a valid issue - and perhaps mistakenly left over from when the 
broadcom portion was tagged as GPL.

> So you may be convinced that it is a separate thing (though you are 
> really really really stretching things, when both tg3.c and tg3.o have 
> everything combined), but by calling the whole thing GPL, it would 
> encompass that firmware as well. They are not saying "GPLv2 and 
> Proprietary firmware that is merely aggregated into the same .o"....

That would be a reasonable change.  How is it done in drivers where the 
firmware has always been known to be non-GPL but redistributable?   tg3 
might be a special case due to its copyright change.

-- 
   Les Mikesell
    lesmikesell at gmail.com