Messages in this thread |  | | From | Torrey Hoffman <> | Subject | RE: Fwd: Copyright infringement in linux/drivers/usb/serial/keysp an*fw.h | Date | Fri, 25 May 2001 11:06:15 -0700 |
| |
Adam J. Richter wrote: > Doug Ledford wrote: > >"Adam J. Richter" wrote: > > >> On the question of whether this is nothing more than > >> aggregation,
... [patent law definition of aggregation] ...
Well, I'm just an interested bystander. But having read the recent lkml posts on this issue, it seems to me that the critical points are:
From the point of view of the kernel, the firmware code is just a big magic number that "turns on" the firmware.
The kernel is not _linked_ _with_ the firmware code.
The kernel doesn't even _exec_ the firmware.
The firmware code can be used, unmodified, in other operating systems.
The firmware code does not run in the same address space as the kernel.
In principle, and maybe in practice, that firmware code might be running on a different processor, with different RAM, and a different instruction set.
It's obviously not part of the kernel!
Torrey Hoffman - torrey.hoffman@myrio.com ------------------------------------------- I find this corpse guilty of carrying a concealed weapon and I fine it $40. -- Judge Roy Bean, finding a pistol and $40 on a man he'd just shot. - 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/
|  |