Messages in this thread | | | Date | Tue, 6 Dec 2005 08:47:00 -0800 | From | Greg KH <> | Subject | Re: Linux in a binary world... a doomsday scenario |
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On Tue, Dec 06, 2005 at 07:07:34AM +0100, Willy Tarreau wrote: > It's not about being dumb, but this problem is -I think- what prevents > some companies from releasing drivers for their hardware (when they > don't consider that opening it will give their IP away). I've played > several times with opensource drivers for ADSL modems, LCD modules, > watchdogs, ethernet adapters, IDE drivers, etc... and their problem > was that what worked well in 2.4.21 did not even build in 2.4.22 > and became difficult to fix starting with 2.4.23. Most of those > small companies who propose a Linux driver simply start by paying > a student during summer for porting their windows/sco/whatever > driver to linux. They think the job is done when he leaves. > Unfortunately, they receive complaints 3 months later from users > because the driver is broken and does not build. They don't have > the resources to keep a permanent developer on it, and they > quickly understand that Linux is just a "geek OS" and that it's > the last time they release any driver.
That's why Documentation/HOWTO was written, to help those people realize what needs to be done in order to do it properly.
thanks,
greg k-h - To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-kernel" in the body of a message to majordomo@vger.kernel.org More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html Please read the FAQ at http://www.tux.org/lkml/
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