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Linus Denounces NDISWrapper, Denies It GPL Status
eldavojohn writes "On message boards, Linus Torvalds was explaining why NDISWrapper is not eligible to be released under the GPL even though the project claims to be. Linus remarked, "Ndiswrapper itself is *not* compatible with the GPL. Trying to claim that ndiswrapper somehow itself is GPL'd even though it then loads modules that aren't is stupid and pointless. Clearly it just re-exports those GPLONLY functions to code that is *not* GPL'd." This all sprung up with someone restricted NDISWrapper's access to GPL-only symbols thereby breaking the utility. Linus merely replied that "If it loads non-GPL modules, it shouldn't be able to use GPLONLY symbols." As you may know, NDISWrapper implements Windows kernel API and then loads Windows binaries for a number of devices and runs them natively to avoid the cost and complication of emulation."
As long as there are no usable alternatives for many common chipsets, you won't win this one, Linus. People are then going to mod the kernel source so ndiswrapper appears kosher, and all you'll get is a +nd version for all major distributions, and fewer people using relatively clean source.
-- Linus, in this post
Before people flame Linus for whining, or trying to sabotage Linux users' ability to run drivers that they need, look at how OpenBSD handled this matter. They too rejected ndiswrapper, and ended up putting their energy towards reverse engineering wireless drivers instead. The results were positive, and in some cases the Linux folks ended up picking up their code too.
And, when you write an open driver, you can maintain it more effectively. You can check it for security problems. You can fix its bugs. With ndiswrapper, you are putting a completely unknown blob of code inside your kernel and trusting it. This is never a good idea when other alternatives exist!
So, use ndiswrapper if you feel that you absolutely must... But it shouldn't receive any official endorsement that would cause most users to be dependent on it. Kernel developers shouldn't think of the wireless driver issue as a "resolved" one. The ideal situation is to reverse engineer a free driver.
Isn't ndiswrapper just a shim, even if it's does very little translation? Businesses have been making proprietary to GPL shim's for ages, you know like Nvidia's driver. Why wouldn't the converse acceptable, or at least worthy of discussion?
-b
As ridiculous as it may sound, it's theoretically possible for a Windows driver to be licensed under the GPL. Thus, no legal troubles when loaded by ndiswrapper :)
And this is the year of the Linux desktop, right?
... and that's why they have a Mac. Seriously - nice concept, the whole Linux thing, but it just isn't going to be for the masses. Sorry to tell you that.
I've been hearing that for 10+ years now, and this is a prime example of where the Linux folks miss the boat.
Do you really think my parents give a rolling fig about GPL vs. non-GPL code, who's exporting who's symbols or any of that? They just want their damned wireless Internet to work...
Time to re-arm and focus on the enterprise - you stand a shot there. But even there - it needs work. Stability, for one. A Red Hat box that is out of date the day we deploy it does nobody any good. A real patch management strategy would be nice.
Binary compatibility for another. I can pick up an HP-UX PA-RISC 9 binary, drop it on an HP-UX 11.31 Itanium system and it _just runs_. Same holds true for Sun -- drop a SunOS 4 binary on a SunOS 5.10 (yes, that's Solaris 10) system, and it _just runs_.
Once Linux can do that - without recompiling, without having to resolve mutually exclusive dependencies - you just might give enterprise Unix a run for the money. Oh, and you'll have to scale up to 128+ processors too. Again - HPUX and Solaris both do that fine.
There may be a valid argument for saying that ndiswrapper can't be GPL'd, but this isn't it. In what context would this sort of reasoning be considered sound?
...and so on. The claim may be valid but this argument certainly can't be used to establish it.
--MarkusQ
I'm sorry, Linus. But that argument makes no sense.
The GPL is a distribution license. NdisWrappers doesn't distribute any binary code that isn't licensed under the GPL, and the code is available. It's up to the end user to use their own binary drivers, and such use isn't covered under the GPLv2.
I see nothing that prohibits the distribution of NdisWrappers based on the GPLv2, regardless of what that code does when it executes on the users machine.
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The difference is module and program. One is considered part of the kernel, the other isn't.
Linus was a bit brusque about it but I do see his point. Of course if all the kernel symbols needed to make wireless drivers work are GPLONLY, then well, Linux has a bigger problem, doesn't it.
Done with slashdot, done with nerds, getting a life.
this is funny, most of the time I get the impression that Linus is NOT a "GPL natzi", but at times like this you could mistake him for RMS.
but it is his tree so if he says it is not GPL compatible then it's not GPL compatible.
for the record, I have to agree with Linus on this one (but thats me and who am i).
preview button, my computer does't have any preview button
So will GPL'd virtualization projects be similarly excluded? It seems to me they are the functional equivalent of NDISWrapper.
Summary is missing a HUGE portion of what actually happened. The discussion continued. After the discussion, Linus applied a patch to ALLOW access to GPL_ONLY symbols (for those who care, it's git commit 9b37ccfc637be27d9a652fcedc35e6e782c3aa78).
Look at the second entry from the top in the changelog:
http://kernel.org/pub/linux/kernel/v2.6/testing/ChangeLog-2.6.25-rc4
The battle is over, the discussion is at end and Linus has already signed off a change to restore Ndiswrapper functionality.
the difference is in how the kernel project uses the "GPL only" flag versus actual legality.
.docs, and so on. As NDIS doesn't DISTRIBUTE the program WITH the windows drivers (they don't own that code) it's perfectly fine for their "emulator" to be GPL same as an emulator for a Nintendo NES system.
It's perfectly legal for NDIS to be GPL because all of the code they provide is open. That's the legal standard. That the USER loads non-GPL modules at runtime is a known loophole.
Lots of other projects use GPL for the same thing... Console emulators, word processing programs that read binary
Linus Uses the flag for people like Nvidia who it's NOT OK to use the GPL for their drivers because they own and distribute the binary code AND the wrapper in the same package. It's not legal for them to claim to be GPL. But in this case NDIS is only liable for the part they distribute and the user is responsible for how the program is used on the system. The license is fine it's just Linus is assuming that a "license flag" will cover all the programming options (so they can deny support) when that's not the case.
If ndiswrapper loads proprietary binary-only drivers and provides an API translation between Windows & Linux, then when ndiswrapper itself gets loaded as a kernel module, the kernel's "taint" flag should be set. The purpose of the taint flag is clear and it is quite applicable in this case. I don't think that Linus is saying the ndiswrapper authors cannot release their code under the GPL, what he's saying is that the run-time environment is not "pure GPL".
The stance isn't as crazy as the context-free summary makes it out to be. Linus isn't talking about the license for the ndiswrapper code. He's talking about access to kernel functions which have been marked as "GPLONLY". These are functions which are intentionally not exported to non-GPL code. Linus is saying that allowing ndiswrapper to use them is equivalent to allowing calls from non-GPL windows binary drivers. Which is true.
The debate then is whether or not this should be considered a problem. The contributors who added many of the GPLONLY functions may have different opinions on the topic. Linus hints that the contributors for the USB functions would prefer a strict interpretation and deny ndiswrapper access to the GPLONLY kernel-level functions, because there is a perfectly good user-space API. But everyone involved agrees that ndiswrapper is will never live in user-space, because there's no programmer who would do it and it's a crazy idea anyway. Anyway you slice it, it's clear that ndiswrapper will get fixed one way or another, and nobody is accusing the ndiswrapper project of misusing the GPL.
In summmary, it's a tempest in a teapot: someone accidentally broke ndiswrapper, kernel API discussion ensues, Slashdot posts inflammatory summary, life goes on.
NDIS wrapper might itself be GPL but a kernel that uses it is not because the kernel is monolithic. Linus is actually giving everyone what they want.
What is this about GPLONLY symbols?.
Loading a non GPL kernel module makes the whole kernel non GPL and hard to debug because it's a monolithic program. Check out the Linuxant controversy of 2001.
Linus won't keep you from making and loading non free modules but he's not going to be responsible when changes break your module. If others would cooperate, this would not be an issue. The NDIS wrapper people will have to reimplement functions written by GPL strict coders. That kind of sucks for them but they can do it. If Linus were to piss off the GPL strict coders, NDIS wrapper still would not work because those coders would quit contributing. A project as large as the kernel demands give and take. GPLONLY was a nice compromise.
NDIS wrapper has never been a great idea. It puts you at the mercy of Microsoft bugs and malice all for the benefit of a $30 network card. The kind of card that needs NDIS wrapper is usually worst of class and should be shunned. It's brain dead much like a winmodem and the "firmware" game is intentional. The card maker wants to be Windows only so don't buy it. Sooner or later hardware vendors will have to come around.
I'm not even sure that linking statically creates a derivative work, as much as it creates a compilation. It's more similar to including a poem in a book of poems than it is to changing the poem itself. A derivative work involves changing or recasting the original -- static linking doesn't do this. The reason that you can't (w/o permission) distribute a program with an embedded library is more basic -- you're violating the distribution right of the library (and, presumably, the duplication right also.)
It's not a completely clear area of law. But, it seems wrong that using an interface exported by another piece of code (whether via a procedure call, a remote object invocation or just sending an appropriately formatted text message to a socket) creates a derivative work.
OpenBSD rejected NDISWrapper first, due to their "anti-binary blob" policy.
That and Linus changed his mind shortly after this was posted to Kernel Trap. Read a few comments up.
The ndiswrapper developers can release their code under any license they like, including the GPL; Linus has nothing to say about that. Furthermore, as long as Linux is under the GPL, Linus has no say over what I link into my kernel. If I want to link code under non-GPL compatible licenses into my kernel, that's my good right, under the GPL.
Linus possibly has a say over whether distributors can simultaneously distribute the Linux kernel and ndiswrapper as pre-packaged binaries. But even there, I don't see a problem: ndiswrapper itself is under the GPL and complies with the GPL. The fact that it allows end users to link code under non-GPL compliant licenses into the kernel doesn't change that.
While I think it would be nice if we didn't have to use ndiswrapper, and while one can argue either way about the desirability of its existence, now that it exists, Linus needs to honor the letter of the GPL and not try to redefine the terms after the fact. If he wants to, he can always relicense his code under different licenses in the future.
The only time GPLONLY is used is when submitting kernel crashes. Linus (and other developers) doesn't want to get backtraces for code that cannot be debugged, because it's in a Windows-only blob. You can still use ndiswrapper, just like you can use the Nvidia drivers -- the only caveat being that you cannot send a kernel hacker a dump.
The wheel is turning, but the hamster is dead.
To quote the Register, In a post on the Real World Technologies discussion board appropriately titled "Hypocrisy the worst of human traits", Torvalds takes advantage of Tridgell's vow of silence on the matter. For the first third of his response, Torvalds gently tries to persuade us that ethics doesn't belong in the software business, taking a strictly utilitarian view. Or, as he puts it,
"So I think open source tends to become technically better over time (but it does take time), but I don't think it's a moral imperative." he writes. What a pity the people involved in Open Source give my boss another reason to distrust the community and all their projects.
we learn that in spite of his contributions to the open source community, Linus does not have the right to deny GPL status to anything. (yeah yeah, I know, it's a misleading headine... this *is* Slashdot after all) It's a software license. If the software developpers decide to release under the GPL or LGPL, then it's GPL software. Period. Whether or not the software is a shim for a binary blob that itself may or may not be proprietary, like NDISWrapper, is irrelevant. NDISWrapper, itself, is *not* closed source.
It's kinda like the Quake III engine. That's been released as open source, and there's an awful lot of games out there that make use of it. But it still relies on a binary blob that is itself rarely released as free. That doesn't make the engine itself any less free/open.
If you believe everything you read, you'd better not read. - Japanese proverb
Try the other way around. The NDISWrapper folks are trying to GPL something that Linus doesn't believe merits it. They're the ones trying to add the restrictions, and Linus isn't having it.
Done with slashdot, done with nerds, getting a life.
Userspace programs don't link against the kernel. Additionally, from http://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/kernel/COPYING:
Dewey, what part of this looks like authorities should be involved?
HUH??
No, the wording of the license and its interpretation by legally qualified people determines whether or not something is GPL compatible, not the whims and say-so of a person, be it Linus, RMS, or whomsoever.
I don't think Linus ever had any doubts about whether Bitkeeper was proprietary or not. He simply stated that it was the best tool for the job.
Here, he claims "well, go ahead and use it, but don't call it GPL code because it isn't. Oh, and if you use it, I'm not responsible".
Hope your boss can now breath more easily.
"I think it would be a good idea!"
Gandhi, about Internet Security
What a pity the people involved in Open Source give my boss another reason to distrust the community and all their projects.
Yeh, too bad he got a start with the Microsoft people and all the honesty they bring to the table.
/sarcasm (included because you sound like someone who will miss it otherwise)
Infuriate left and right
Isn't it rather obvious? What happens if someone tries to GPL code that needs non-free libraries - or worse, contains code that has been copied or reverse engineered from another program without the author's consent, or that uses an incompatible license?
which is totally what she said
Agreed. This is precisely the reason why I regularly rail against the GPL as a license and think that all libraries should be under the LGPL. In effect, the kernel acts as a giant library. Any public interfaces to the kernel should be treated like a library and licensed appropriately, not under some idiotic license that doesn't allow linking non-GPLed code against it.
Indeed, this is doubly true for a plug-in API. There should not be restrictions for who can write code to a public specification, period. There are far too many people who say that the GPL should have this right and still decry Microsoft for their shady, intentionally non-GPL-compatible licenses. That is the height of hypocrisy.
More to the point, though, as long as something provides a public interface and uses only public interfaces, it is entirely the right of the author to decide how to license it, and if the author decides to license it under the GPL but provide a linking exception to allow closed source drivers to call it, that is the author's right. Linus himself said that he felt binary-only drivers should be allowed, so he took advantage of the right to provide a linking exception, and yet now he wants to deny it to others? What's wrong with this picture?
Heck, it wouldn't even be wrong in my book if it directly exported GPLONLY symbols as-is. The purpose of the GPL was supposed to be that non-open source can't directly call into GPLed code to avoid compatibility problems if the open source code changed. Since this code is providing a layer of indirection, if the kernel changes, it can become a compatibility shim. As such, even a direct export indirection layer would be in the true spirit of the GPL, IMHO. But this isn't even doing that. This is providing a translation layer from one API to another. This is providing an emulation of an entirely different API and uses GPLed symbols to do so. That is absolutely in the spirit of the GPL, as the whole thing is already a translation layer. This doesn't allow the closed source driver developers access to GPLONLY symbols. It's not a workaround to dodge the GPL. It's an enabling tool that makes the overall Linux user experience better, and if someone's interpretation of the GPL causes such a tool to be effectively banned, then it is the GPL that needs to be changed, not the tool.
IMHO, the GPL is a BAD license precisely because it causes fights like this to break out with regularity. Instead of providing the best service we can to the users of open source software (and thus promoting the power of open source over closed, proprietary solutions), we, the open source/free software community, end up fighting amongst ourselves over how to interpret a license written by Stallman out of spite for closed software vendors. Instead of supporting free software against proprietary solutions, we end up causing people to think of us as a bunch of loons who are dogmatic about an ideal no matter how much it hurts the users. That's not a good way to encourage adoption by anything but the most zealous free software extremists, and most of those folks already use Linux, so basically it isn't a good way to encourage adoption, period..
Remember, every time the GPL is used to impede progress, proprietary software wins.
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The demonstrated intent of the copyright holder does have some bearing on the interpretation of a license, however.
DNA just wants to be free...
At the core of this issue is the GPL definition of a derivative work.
Do not flame me for what I am about to write as it is my understanding of RMS' guidelines, if you have a problem with it, take it up with him.
To clarify what is and what is not a derivative work, the GPL and its supporting documents claim that a GPL work is not how self contained as it may seem i.e. shared libraries or loadable modules, but whether or not it inhabits the "process space" of the GPL work.
When a non-GPL module is loaded into the process space of a GPL application, it violates the GPL license of the application. This is why NDIS wrapper violates the GPL because its job is to load non-GPL code into the process space of the kernel, thus tainting it.
Do I agree? I'm not sure as I can see both sides of the argument. One side is that the module is self contained and isolated. The other side is that one of the purposes of the GPL is to protect the work of the people who contribute frm being unfairly used. It can be argued that the NIC card vendors who's drivers are enabled by NDISWrapper are unfairly enriched by the work of GPL developers in that their proprietary hardware is supported on a free platform without themselves being free.
> IMHO, the GPL is a BAD license precisely because it causes fights like this to break out with regularity.
I don't necessarily think it's a bad license, I just don't think it's a one-size-fits-all thing. When you bring together a group of intelligent, opinionated, and (in large part) socially awkward people, fights are going to break out. Now it's true that things like religion and licenses tend to act as amplifiers (thus why I don't buy the classic "people will kill each other anyway" argument about religion) but I think this is just a pretty isolated case of Linus having another tirade. Reportedly he's already backing off.
Done with slashdot, done with nerds, getting a life.
This would be different if it were purely their code, but it isn't. This isn't stand-alone code. What they created is a derivative work of the Linux kernel. They used code which they didn't write and they don't own. Your argument is that the people who actually wrote the original kernel code have no right to say how it and its derivative works are used. Legally, you are completely and totally wrong. Essentially, you are advocating an end to copyrights on computer code. That's fine, but it has nothing to do with the GPL.
A piece of software may not be GPL if it -relies- on non-GPL code. Not if it -optionally uses- it.
Say, I release a game which requires DirectX, links against the proprietary library, depends on it. It can't be GPL. But if I make the game run on both DirectX and SDL, it's enough to make it GPL. It's not crippled by lack of DirectX, it's just a user's choice, a preference to use it.
This way NDISWrapper just -could- be GPL if only someone writes GPL counterparts of the modules it uses. It would mean then, that it's a generic module wrapper which can load a variety of modules, GPL or not, and it's up to the user to feed it the restricted ones in place of the free ones. It may load any -generic- modules, but it should have no provisions towards any specific restricted modules without having an equivalent free part.
45 5F E1 04 22 CA 29 C4 93 3F 95 05 2B 79 2A B2
The problem is that it is not "their code". They claim that the "project implements Windows kernel API and NDIS (Network Driver Interface Specification) API within Linux kernel." That means it is a derivative work of the kernel. That means that they don't own all the code themselves, and that they have to follow the license of the other code they are using. And Linus's interpretation of the GPL and kernel modules is a lot more permissive than what is probably legally correct.
I've said it before and I'll keep on saying it: ndiswrapper is evil. The biggest obstacle right now to greater Linux usage, IMO, is the lack of wireless chipset drivers. ndiswrapper is a crutch, not a solution. Intel may have provided enough datasheets to enable writing wireless drivers for their chipsets, but Broadcomm is the 800 lb. gorilla in the room.
"Dude, just like load it with ndiswrapper and move on with working wifi!"
That attitude, I maintin, is actually harmful in the long run.
As you point out "it is entirely the right of the author to decide how to license it" and "Linus himself said that he felt binary-only drivers should be allowed, so he took advantage of the right to provide a linking exception". That "linking" exception requires that a module properly declare whether its license is GPL or not. If not, then its access to the kernel is restricted; if it is, it is given access to most all the symbols - the GPLONLY symbols. This is for (a) compatibility, but also (b) stability. They didn't want binary drivers breaking the kernel.
From the sounds of it, they don't agree with the NDISWrapper guys (or whoever is complaining) that NDISWrapper deserves the ability to access the GPLONLY symbols. Perhaps the way NDISWrapper functions is breaks compatibility with the GPL - by loading non-GPL code . I don't know the whole story, but I think I would have to side with the Linux guys on this one. It's their "linking" exception, and you have to play by the rules.
Note: This is not a GPL issue with respect to the Linux kernel; if it's a GPL issue at all, it is with NDISWrapper not validly being able to use the GPL, and if that is the case, then they should not be allowed to access the GPLONLY symbols. The primary issue is a matter of playing by the rules the developers set - and that goes for GPL and non-GPL code alike, regardless of projects, commercialization, etc. (And no, I'm not claiming, implying, or otherwise stating the the Linux Kernel guys determine that for everyone. Look at the project authors and who has the right, the ability, to make such a rule. It'll change for every project.)
Truth is like the sun. You can shut it out for a time, but it ain't goin' away. - Elvis Presley (source: imdb.com)
With out it, many of us would be screwed for drivers.
Who really cares if its bla bla bla compliant?
---- Booth was a patriot ----
What Linus himself *has* said in the past was that he considers binary modules ok *if* those modules weren't developed specifically for Linux. Take nvidia as an example: they have a binary driver core (possibly developed for Windows, possibly developed just as a generic driver core) which has an open-source shim to adapt it to the Linux kernel's specific interfaces. NDISWrapper could be thought of similarly, as an open-source shim to adapt Windows drivers to Linux's specific interfaces. However, this doesn't mean that NDISWrapper itself can be licensed under the GPL (of course, it can be licensed under "GPL with linking exception"), which is not compatible with Linux's GPLONLY symbols. Heck, it wouldn't even be wrong in my book if it directly exported GPLONLY symbols as-is. Sorry, but your book isn't relevant here. (I assume by "it" you mean NDISWrapper.) You don't own the copyright on the kernel, so you don't get to decide. While this stuff may not be tested in court, seems like the copyright holders are in the right here. The purpose of the GPL was supposed to be that non-open source can't directly call into GPLed code to avoid compatibility problems if the open source code changed. No, the purpose of the GPL is to allow anyone to freely modify and redistribute source code, but to require that the source code remain open. The GPL is about idealism (with a bit of pragmatism mixed in); it has nothing to do with "compatibility problems." It's not a workaround to dodge the GPL. Oh, I agree, it's not. NDISWrapper is a great (temporary!) tool to fill a void until manufacturers get their act together or people have the time and motivation to reverse-engineer the relevant chipsets. Can it be licensed under the GPL? No, it can't. It does things anathema to the GPL's purpose (linking to code with an incompatible license). Can it be licensed under the "GPL with linking exception"? Sure. Is "GPL with linking exception" compatible with the Linux kernel's license for a derived work? No, it's not.
You're at the mercy of the copyright holders and the courts as to whether or not you're allowed to use NDISWrapper with Linux (and you are, it just can't use GPLONLY symbols!). Deal with it, or find some supported hardware or a different OS. Remember, every time the GPL is used to impede progress, proprietary software wins. You're implying that there's some sort of competition going on here. Your personal agenda for open source might be to rule the world, but that's not everyone's. And some people who do share your agenda would like to "win" without cutting corners and compromising on their ideals. Is that naive? Maybe. But just because you don't understand other people's motivations, it doesn't make them wrong.
Xfce: Lighter than some, heavier than others. Just right.
Read what I read again. I didn't say he was denying access to the driver. I said he was using his right to allow binary linking but denying the developers of the NDISWrapper code that same right. Sorry, poor choice of wording on my part.
This code is not giving binary-only drivers access to GPLONLY symbols. It is strictly providing an emulation layer that happens to require some of those symbols in order to work correctly. Those are two completely different things. About the only valid reason to complain would be if the NDISWrapper code didn't set the tainted flag. If it doesn't, that's a one line fix.
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First there is a lot of hardware that don't have Linux native drivers, mostly wireless network cards and Winmodems. NDISWrapper allows people to use Windows drivers under Linux for when there isn't a native Linux driver available for Linux.
That is the Achilles heel of Linux, lack of third party driver support. Heck that's the Achilles Heel of any Non-Windows operating system be it OS/2, BeOS, AmigaOS, even Mac OSX. One OS, ReactOS, is trying to implement Windows' WDM driver model in GPLed software so that ReactOS can use Windows drivers. I would like to see Linux have the ability to use Windows drivers via some GPLed software, so Linus can borrow that from ReactOS, or write it from scratch, or maybe the WINE team can make a Linux module that loads Windows drivers for Linux that uses the WINE libraries.
I have myself gone through several different wireless cards to get a Linux desktop working and eventually I gave up because I couldn't find a Linux native driver that wasn't flaky or lost the connection, and the only success I had was with NDISWrapper, but as soon as the Linux kernel is updated it breaks NDISWrapper forcing me to recompile the code and reinstall the Windows drivers.
In fact, I have a Linux desktop near my wireless router that uses a CAT5 cable to hook into it and then use VNC from a Windows desktop in another part of the house to log into the Linux system that way. It would be nice if I was able to get good wireless networking support from a Linux native driver without losing the connection or going flaky on me. But I suppose I'll always have a VMWare Virtual Machine to use as well if I wanted to run Linux from any part of my house and not just where the router is located.
Remember, Slashdot does not have a -1 disagree moderation, and no, troll, flamebait, and overrated are not substitutes.
Excerpted from Linus mail of 29 Feb:
What's confusing to slashdotters about this whole shebang is that there are two separate issues going on.
First, there is a technical/legal issue relating ndiswrapper's access to the Linux kernel (specifically, access to symbols marked GPLONLY). On this matter Linus is doing his job, which is to enforce existing policy for GPLONLY stuff. Workarounds had been discussed, including the possibility that the people who actually wrote the code (USB stuff mostly) agree to remove the GPLONLY restriction that *they* imposed. Linus is not opposed to the workarounds, but he won't brook discussion about bending enforcement of GPLONLY.
Secondly, Linus' expressed personal opinion about ndiswrapper (whose only purpose is to load Windows code) is complete indifference. He simply doesn't agree that because users depend heavily on ndiswrapper, he should go out of his way to bend the GPLONLY policy or make other special efforts. And he's not alone in the kernel community. Which freaks out the users who are afraid they won't be able to keep using their wireless cards and whatnot.
So people see these two issues fused together and think that Linus is killing off ndiswrapper by personal fiat.
NDISWrapper is not a derived work of the Linux kernel. That is a gross misuse of the term "derived work". Using headers and linking against something does not make it a derived work. That was, IMHO, decided way back in the early 80s with Galoob v Nintendo, though no GPL linking case has gone far enough in court to test this, AFAIK.
You are correct that I can't take someone else's code and add a linking exception, but that's not what is being done here by any stretch of the imagination, and there are numerous cases where open source wrappers have been written as a border between proprietary and GPLed code. Again, to my knowledge, no cases about this have ever made it to court, in part because arguments that such linking is a GPL violation are relatively precarious, and in part because most companies that have found themselves getting threatened with a lawsuit have been small enough that they choose to settle out of court rather than risk a lengthy and expensive court battle.
More to the point, you can argue that the GPLONLY limitations were intended to disallow linking by code that is licensed as GPL with a linking exception, but then you would also have to disallow any code within the Linux kernel itself that calls those functions unless those pieces of code are also marked with the GPLONLY restriction. That makes the GPLONLY functions substantially less useful to the point of being nearly worthless.
NDISWrapper is a module that loads binaries specifically developed for Windows, so there you go.
Funny, I saw Stallman give a speech, and he basically said that he started hating proprietary software specifically when a printer failed to work with a new computer setup. Had the driver been open, he could have fixed it. Had the OS been open, he could have fixed it to be compatible. Neither was, so he couldn't. While the goals of the GPL may have drifted from that original purpose these days, compatibility was a very important part of the reason the Free Software movement was created in the first place, and I think it is important that the movement not lose touch with its roots.
Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.
Microsoft is saying "here are some specifications for a document format, and here is a vague 'promise'. You might be able to use these specifications, but if you do, we might sue you, but we won't tell you how we'll actually decide that, or what parts of the specification we think we could sue you over."
Linus is saying "here is an API for kernel modules, and here is the GNU GPL. You can use the whole specification if you place your code under a GPL-compatible license; otherwise you can use this, this, and this, but you cannot use this, this, or this. If that's not clear, ask us and we'll tell you whether we agree with what you're planning to do."
Can you see the difference? Because if you can't, then I suggest you take a deep breath, step back, suppress your dislike of the GPL for a moment, and think about it. You don't have to agree that Linus is being reasonable. All I'm asking is that you recognise that what Microsoft is doing is not the same as what Linus is doing, and therefore that people who approve of either activity but disapprove of the other are not being hypocrites.
(Lest you dismiss me as a mindless GPL fanboy, let me point out that when I've released software I've always made a point of choosing LGPL or MIT-style licenses for libraries, and in this instance I'm not at all convinced Linus is right. I just think the rhetoric needs toning down a bit. I'm sure you can argue against Linus' ideas without having to fling around blanket accusations of hypocrisy.)
People on this forum are not understanding what is being discussed. There are two issues -- licensing and Kernel tainting, and these actually are separate issues. Licensing: GPL only covers derived works. Making code that interfaces from a GPL'd software to a binary that is a windows derivative IS legal. Linus specifically made this point in his posts, and several times. Tainting: Tainting has two purposes... First, it tells the Kernel that a module is suspect. If someone reports a Kernel bug on a Tainted Kernel, then the Kernel maintainers have no visibility into the binary that may or may not causing an issue. Kernel maintainers then require removal of whatever is causing the tainting as a first step in tracking down a bug. The second purpose of tainting is to indicate to the outside world that if they used certain calls in a module, that that module would definitely indicate that it was a "derived work." Currently NDISWrapper taints the Kernel by itself if it loads a proprietary driver. All agree that this tainting is necessary -- especially for the first purpose. Linus wanted to know which symbols that NDISWrapper was using so that he could find out if those symbols really needed to be GPL_ONLY symbols. Additionally, there seemed to be some confusion if NDISWrapper was simply acting as a pass-thru vehicle for avoidance of the GPL -- and we found through the posts, and through the lists of exports, that it clearly was not. There was also discussion on if the exports could be removed from NDISWrapper or the exports could be made non-GPL_ONLY -- presumably, so that it didn't /have/ to do the funky chicken with tainting, or to make more people happy & reduce the chance of NDISWrapper being bullied again...
Wireless cards have to be closed source to use US radio frequency spectrum. In many cases, merely the ability to change frequency or power via software will render these cards unuseable in a legal context.
Hello, that is some interesting information, would you care to elaborate (some links or other citations would be nice). I am authentically interested in your claim as I have never heard about such thing.
Ubuntu is an African word meaning 'I can't configure Debian'
NDISWrapper deals with Window's binary blob drivers.
That, under anyone's definition, means nothing GPLed can touch them.
NDISWrapper tried calling its self GPL while exposing all of Linux's GPLed interfaces to the binary blobs.
A very straight forward violation.
Personally I never liked NDISWrapper.
I use Linux to get away from Windows. I dont want their drivers running on my system.
Many people use it even when there are superior native drivers.
Its been portrayed as a quick fix so if your hardware doesnt work out of the box, just use NDISWrapper.
> Its been portrayed as a quick fix so if your hardware doesnt work out of the box, just use NDISWrapper.
If it doesn't work out of the box, I don't much care that it's superior. I'm tired of "learning how the system works" for the 1000th time. Not all toil is virtuous.
Done with slashdot, done with nerds, getting a life.
Since ndiswrapper taints itself when it loads a proprietary NDIS module
Can someone explain to me how creating a computability layer for a proprietary model inherently violates GPL? Linus is trying to claim that loading the Windows Driver violates GPL. But I really fail to see how, ndiswrapper is a computability layer, and itself GPL'd, the windows driver is not loaded into the kernel like other modules it is sandboxed by ndiswrapper. It edges towards that gray area of the GPL, but itself doesn't violate it.
If i had one dollar for every brain you dont have, i would have $1.
Thank God the kernel is GPL. I can go in there and remove all this stupid GPLONLY garbage.
I think that it's a horribly misunderstood license. While the concepts themselves are easy to understand, when you get into the nitty gritty details of interoperating with other software, things get sticky really quickly.
BSD is so much easier, but you run the risk of someone doing more with your code (and getting paid for it) than you did, without getting anything out of it. Personally, that doesn't bother me all that much.
I think almost all of these types of problems come down to the fact that, for copyright law with respect to computer software, the most *sane* approach is that linking does not create a derivative work, and therefor license terms cannot be applied to other works which link to the licensed work. NOTE: I am not a lawyer, this is not a statement of fact regarding current law, this is a statement of personal opinion. In otherwords, my opinion is that, if my view of copyright were adopted, there would be no GPL, only the LGPL. That is to say, since the only difference between the GPL and LGPL is the linking clause, and since I do not believe copyright should extend to other linked works, the GPL 'decays' to become the same thing as the LGPL.
Let me state it this way: It is my understanding that copyright law, currently, has no notion of 'linking'. Copyright covers copying material, or creating derivative works (such as translations, modified versions, etc). I don't know the full definition of derived work (I've tried to research it before, and it appears to get a bit complicated), but it is my understanding that the basic principle of a derived work is that it contains all or part of the work from which it is derived. For example, a translation is a derived work because, while all the words may be literally different, being in a different language, the works still essentially contains all the ideas and expressions from the original work.
It's also my understanding that copyright does not govern what you can and cannot do with with copyrighted work, except to the extent that you cannot copy, distribute, or perform for other people, the copyrighted work or distribute derivatives without permission (I think you can create derivatives without permission, even, you just can't distribute/copy/perform that derivative). So, copyright doesn't give me the power to say you can't 'link' your work with mine, unless such 'linking' creates a derivative and you then subsequently distribute/copy/perform that derivative work (so even if a derivative is created on the on the end-user computer, which I believe is not the case, I don't think copyright law would prohibit that).
The thing about software which dynamically links other software is, the two software works are fundamentally almost completely separate works, if I understand dynamic linking correctly. They are distributed separately (or at least, *can be* distributed separately), they are loaded into memory separately, and the works are never really combined, even in computer memory, I believe. Is that not correct? My understanding of 'dynamic linking' is that the computer is running code in one segment of memory, and encounters an instructions which just causes it to jump to another part of memory and start executing what's there, and when finished executing the linked function, to return to the original memory location + 1. If that is, in fact, the case, then it's rather like a note in a book which says, "Go read such-and-such magazine article, then return to this page and continue reading". Even if my book makes *no sense* unless you read the article I put the note in for, my book is still not a derivative, because it contains no copy of the magazine article. (I mention that last part because I've read where Linus, and some other people, make the claim that the test for derivative work should be whether software can run without the linked software - I personally think that is an irrelevant fact, because where there is no copying, there can be no violation of copyright).
Anyhow, I just ultimately believe that all this stuff about restricting what symbols can and can't be used by non-GPL software is just a mess, and not reasonable. I think the idea that because one work links another work, that the author of the linked work gets some kind of control over the second work is not reasonable. Separate works should have separate copyrights which do not touch each other AT ALL.
Now, it's my understanding that all this linking stuff vis-a-vis the GPL has never
Since "you" is ambiguous referring to an AC, I will post my $.02 worth of searching.
FCC Rules on FOSS and Software-Defined Radio
Cognitive Radio Technologies and Software Defined Radios
As far as I can gather the main problem is that part of the licensing requirements is that "security measures" that need to be in place to prevent use of the device outside the specifications for which it is licensed.
With the boundary between driver software on the computer vs. firmware on the device shifting ever more away from the device, it becomes harder to implement these security measures.
The Hacker's Guide To The Kernel: Don't panic()!
http://linux.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=476560&cid=22656000
by F452 (97091) Alter Relationship on 14:11 Wednesday 05 March 2008
Cheers to F452 for this information.
Yet Socrates himself is particularly missed.
A lovely little thinker but a bugger when he's pissed.
Hey,
.so and source code in the same zip file, CD, or installer as my seperate program, does that make the zip file, CD, or installer a derivative work? I know Linus has talked about that issue before, which he refers to as 'mere aggregation', which I believe is a reference to the GPL which explicitely allows mere aggregation. Where do you draw the line between aggregation and derivation? Maybe Rosen's suggestion is the simplest way to resolve the question, but it makes the GPL very weak, as a result.
Thanks for the link to the discussion on Rosenlaw. That's a great link. I'm not sure I *completely* agree with Rosen - the one point where I think he might lose the argument is that statically-linked binaries are not derivatives. I understand where he's coming from - he's trying to find the simplest definition of derivative work.
But the problem is, a statically linked binary *does* contain your original work in part or in whole. In my earlier post, I put forth a statement of principle that, where there is no copying, there can be no copyright infringement. I think most reasonable people can say that the converse of that holds as well - where there is copying (without permission), there is copyright infringement.
Although, I suppose possibly what Rosen is getting at is that it would be possible for me to ship the original static library source code, and so fulfil the obligations of the GPL wrt providing access to the source code for the original work, and that my binary is not a derivative work. But, I think that still may be a weak argument.
Man, I don't know. It does get rather complicated. I mean if I dynamically link, and distribute the GPL
But, we can't let the GPL be too strong, either. I really think these issues of loading proprietary drivers with GPL wrappers like NDISWrapper really expose the absurdity of the 'dynamic linking violates the GPL' idea, too.