Infinite Freedom???

Stephen Krenzel sgk284 at gmail.com
Wed Jun 20 00:45:29 UTC 2007


Hey Rodrigo,
    While your input and enthusiasm is appreciated and in the right spirit,
I think in this instance you need to take a step back and realize the
practicality (or lack thereof) of what you're suggesting. You've been told
the current stance on the subject and given a good justification for why it
is currently as such, so perhaps we shouldn't push the issue much further.
Regards,
Steve

On 6/19/07, Rodrigo Padula <rodrigopadula at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>
> The question is not purely technique, is philosophical!
>
> The philosophy is the base of our work!
>
> If the Free Software Foundation says that the use of non free firmwares
> affect our freedom, us must take this in consideration when including this
> in the distribution.
>
> If the firmware isn't free or "modifiable", if we dont have this
> permission our freedom is not infinite, it is finite.
>
> I think that firmwares would not have to be distributed in fedora Medias
> (CDS, DVDS).
>
> We use the "Infinite Freedom" as slogan, we must follow the
> recommendations of the FSF,
> not including non free firmwares.
>
> Rodrigo Padula de Oliveira
> http://www.projetofedora.org
>
>  On 6/19/07, Bryan J Smith <b.j.smith at ieee.org> wrote:
> >
> > I'll give you a "real world" example that binds companies.
> >
> > The US FCC, for regulator reasons, does *NOT* want WLAN cards to be
> > reprogrammable to broadcast in other frequencies.
> > This means that at least parts of *ALL* WLAN firmware these days is
> > basically "closed" these days.
> > >From Broadcom to Intel, this is the reality, sorry.
> > This has been the case since the original Linux firmware tools were
> > developed for the Intersil PRISM*1* cards.
> >
> > Furthermore, in many other cases, firmware is often *NOT* merely "source
> > code."
> > In many cases and significant portions, it's often pure machine code or
> > other pure byte code, sometimes just binary data/values.
> > Allowing users to tinker with this code leads to massive support issues
> > (even beyond what they can already do with the loader already - which is a
> > support issue).
> >
> > The Linux community has *NO* business dorking with the firmware logic
> > othat drives the on-device intelligence.
> > Linux only needs to know how to interface with the device, not how to
> > change the device's internal logic.
> > Anyone who knows the first thing about embedded or intelligent hardware
> > device development knows this!
> >
> > It is *NOT* against the terms of the GPL license, and Linus himself has
> > talked about this repeatedly.
> > We're *NOT* talking about support functions in the Linux kernel itself (
> > e.g., they are not the same as GPU memory functions, such as those from
> > ATI or nVidia, that go in the kernel itself).
> >
> > It's gross ignorance and blanket statements like this that make us EEs
> > and other hardware and device friver developers roll our eyes!
> >
> > Most of the time the "firmware update" option included in the kernel is
> > just an "added option" in a kernel driver so you don't have to boot into
> > DOS.
> > The driver does *NOT* require it to function in Linux at all!
> >
> > Another example ...
> >
> > Linux talks to the uC/ASIC on a true hardware RAID card, like the PPC400
> > on the AMCC/3Ware products.
> > The kernel has *NO* business changing how the on-board PPC400 uses it's
> > memory and it's ATA channels.
> > Linux *NEVER* communications directly to those components (except for
> > DMA as setup by the PPC).
> >
> > So if you do *NOT* know the first thing of what I'm talking about, you
> > have *NO* business talking about it from the standpoint of ignorance.
> > Leave the legal debate to the sound, technically knowledgable developers
> > who do.
> > Otherwise, you're only going to mis-represent the issue - especially
> > when it's often *NOT* a GPL issue either.
> >
> > -- Bryan
> >
> > *1*NOTE:  I used to work with Mark Mathews and Brian Mathews at AVS.
> > Brian Mathews (EE) helped develop the PRISM MAC hardware at Intersil.
> > Mark Mathews (CS) developed the original tools for various PRISM
> > functions, including firmware and other frequency support/modification.
> > Many of these functions canNOT be open source because of FCC mandate.
> >
> >
> > --
> > Bryan J Smith - mailto:b.j.smith at ieee.org
> > http://thebs413.blogspot.com
> > Sent via BlackBerry from T-Mobile
> >
> >
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: "Rodrigo Padula" <rodrigopadula at gmail.com>
> >
> > Date: Tue, 19 Jun 2007 18:46:40
> > To:"For discussions about marketing and expanding the Fedora user base"
> > <fedora-marketing-list at redhat.com>
> > Subject: Re: Infinite Freedom???
> >
> >
> > Firmware IS SOFTWARE!! <br><br>firmware = software<br><br>The FSF
> > considers firmware as software.<br><br>If the firmware isnt free, the Fedora
> > isnt FREE!! <br><br>We can&#39;t change the firmware, then the firmware
> > isn&#39;t FREE!!
> > <br><br>Where are the Infinite Freedom ? Freedom to change the Code, to
> > change the firmware!!<br><br>Please, read this <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Firmware
> > ">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Firmware</a> &quot;<b>firmware
> > </b> is software&quot;<br><br><br>Rodrigo Padula de Oliveira<br><a
> > href=" http://www.projetofedora.org">www.projetofedora.org</a><br><br><div><span
> > class="gmail_quote">On 6/19/07, <b class="gmail_sendername">Rex Dieter</b>
> > &lt;<a href="mailto:rdieter at math.unl.edu">rdieter at math.unl.edu</a>&gt;
> > wrote:</span><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid
> > rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left:
> > 1ex;">Rodrigo Padula wrote:
> > <br><br>&gt; - FREE SOFTWARE DEFINITION - By Free Software
> > Foundation<br>...<br>&gt; These firmwares below affect us directly, affect
> > our freedom!<br><br>software != firmware.<br><br>The Board&#39;s current
> > position is that firmware (that doesn&#39;t run on the host
> > <br>CPU) is a reasonable exception (to modifiability).&nbsp;&nbsp;It is
> > our hope that<br>once these ground-rules are established and well
> > understood, hardware<br>manufacturers will be more willing to
> > produce/support high-quality linux
> > <br>drivers (preferably in the upstream kernel).<br><br>--
> > Rex<br><br>--<br>Fedora-marketing-list mailing list<br><a href="mailto:Fedora-marketing-list at redhat.com
> > ">Fedora-marketing-list at redhat.com</a><br><a href="https://www.redhat.com/mailman/listinfo/fedora-marketing-list
> > ">
> > https://www.redhat.com/mailman/listinfo/fedora-marketing-list</a><br></blockquote></div><br>
> >
> >
> > --
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> >
> > --
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> >
>
>
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