PWC issue

PWC issue

[Steve Parker]

How does the Philips WebCam (pwc/pwcx) issue affect the speedtch 
project? AIUI, that project requires additional proprietary microcode to 
work.

The ramifications are potentially huge...

Steve
steve@steve-parker.org
sparkz@users.sourceforge.net
(current maintainer of speedtouchconf.sf.net; hoping to resign soon as 
the speedtouch.sf.net project gains more steam, or the speedtch module 
becomes more popular - either way, reducing the importance of my 
project, and allowing me to resign ;-)

Re: PWC issue

[Greg KH]

On Sat, Aug 28, 2004 at 10:50:05AM -0700, Adam J. Richter wrote:
> 
> 	By the way, I have a long running dispute with Greg K-H
> about his refusal so far to remove replace the GPL incompatible
> firmware in certain USB serial drivers with such a user level
> loading mechanism.  Go figure.

Send me a patch to do so, and I will apply it (must include userspace
files so that hotplug can load them properly.)

The last time we went around about this I rejected it as we were in a
stable kernel series.  As that is now not true, I'm open to the patch.

It's not an idealogical issue for me, given Linus's statements about
firmware in the kernel, but I do agree that it is a better thing as we
have used up less kernel memory.

thanks,

greg k-h

Re: PWC issue

[Randy.Dunlap]

On Fri, 27 Aug 2004 22:19:19 -0700 Greg KH wrote:

| On Sat, Aug 28, 2004 at 10:50:05AM -0700, Adam J. Richter wrote:
| > 
| > 	By the way, I have a long running dispute with Greg K-H
| > about his refusal so far to remove replace the GPL incompatible
| > firmware in certain USB serial drivers with such a user level
| > loading mechanism.  Go figure.
| 
| Send me a patch to do so, and I will apply it (must include userspace
| files so that hotplug can load them properly.)
| 
| The last time we went around about this I rejected it as we were in a
| stable kernel series.  As that is now not true, I'm open to the patch.

Which part is now not true?

| It's not an idealogical issue for me, given Linus's statements about
| firmware in the kernel, but I do agree that it is a better thing as we
| have used up less kernel memory.


--
~Randy

Re: PWC issue

[Kasper Sandberg]

On Sat, 2004-08-28 at 08:11 -0700, Randy.Dunlap wrote:
> On Fri, 27 Aug 2004 22:19:19 -0700 Greg KH wrote:
> 
> | On Sat, Aug 28, 2004 at 10:50:05AM -0700, Adam J. Richter wrote:
> | > 
> | > 	By the way, I have a long running dispute with Greg K-H
> | > about his refusal so far to remove replace the GPL incompatible
> | > firmware in certain USB serial drivers with such a user level
> | > loading mechanism.  Go figure.
> | 
> | Send me a patch to do so, and I will apply it (must include userspace
> | files so that hotplug can load them properly.)
> | 
> | The last time we went around about this I rejected it as we were in a
> | stable kernel series.  As that is now not true, I'm open to the patch.
> 
> Which part is now not true?
i believe what he means is, that the new development model permits doing
such stuff even now where 2.6 is a stable release
> 
> | It's not an idealogical issue for me, given Linus's statements about
> | firmware in the kernel, but I do agree that it is a better thing as we
> | have used up less kernel memory.
> 
> 
> --
> ~Randy
> -
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Re: PWC issue

[Greg KH]

On Sat, Aug 28, 2004 at 08:11:00AM -0700, Randy.Dunlap wrote:
> On Fri, 27 Aug 2004 22:19:19 -0700 Greg KH wrote:
> 
> | On Sat, Aug 28, 2004 at 10:50:05AM -0700, Adam J. Richter wrote:
> | > 
> | > 	By the way, I have a long running dispute with Greg K-H
> | > about his refusal so far to remove replace the GPL incompatible
> | > firmware in certain USB serial drivers with such a user level
> | > loading mechanism.  Go figure.
> | 
> | Send me a patch to do so, and I will apply it (must include userspace
> | files so that hotplug can load them properly.)
> | 
> | The last time we went around about this I rejected it as we were in a
> | stable kernel series.  As that is now not true, I'm open to the patch.
> 
> Which part is now not true?

The "stable" part.

Actually in thinking about it some more, we should offer up both options
for at least 6 months, with a warning that the in-kernel stuff is going
to be deleted on a specific date.  That gives everyone time to convert
their userspace utilities to use the new firmware download code.

Sound good?

thanks,

greg k-h

Re: PWC issue

[Randy.Dunlap]

On Sat, 28 Aug 2004 09:12:42 -0700 Greg KH wrote:

| On Sat, Aug 28, 2004 at 08:11:00AM -0700, Randy.Dunlap wrote:
| > On Fri, 27 Aug 2004 22:19:19 -0700 Greg KH wrote:
| > 
| > | On Sat, Aug 28, 2004 at 10:50:05AM -0700, Adam J. Richter wrote:
| > | > 
| > | > 	By the way, I have a long running dispute with Greg K-H
| > | > about his refusal so far to remove replace the GPL incompatible
| > | > firmware in certain USB serial drivers with such a user level
| > | > loading mechanism.  Go figure.
| > | 
| > | Send me a patch to do so, and I will apply it (must include userspace
| > | files so that hotplug can load them properly.)
| > | 
| > | The last time we went around about this I rejected it as we were in a
| > | stable kernel series.  As that is now not true, I'm open to the patch.
| > 
| > Which part is now not true?
| 
| The "stable" part.

I guess I'm still confused by some of what I consider contradictory
remarks by Linus at the kernel summit, and the lack of a summary of
that particular kernel summit session (other than on lwn.net).

I think that we have only a stable kernel and not a development
kernel series now, and that's a loss.  But it's a loss either way
that we toss & turn it...

| Actually in thinking about it some more, we should offer up both options
| for at least 6 months, with a warning that the in-kernel stuff is going
| to be deleted on a specific date.  That gives everyone time to convert
| their userspace utilities to use the new firmware download code.
| 
| Sound good?

Some bounded time would be good, yes.  Would have been good for pwc also,
although Nemosoft has had 4 years to move the kernel decompression to
userspace afaik, so it seems that he has taken way too long to get
that done.

--
~Randy

Re: PWC issue

[Adam J. Richter]

>How does the Philips WebCam (pwc/pwcx) issue affect the speedtch 
>project? AIUI, that project requires additional proprietary microcode to 
>work.
>
>The ramifications are potentially huge...
>
>Steve
>steve@steve-parker.org
>sparkz@users.sourceforge.net
>(current maintainer of speedtouchconf.sf.net; hoping to resign soon as 
>the speedtouch.sf.net project gains more steam, or the speedtch module 
>becomes more popular - either way, reducing the importance of my 
>project, and allowing me to resign ;-)

	I am not a lawyer, so please do not use this as legal advice.

	You should keep the proprietary module in a file loaded by
a user space utility that should be invoked by hot plug, and not
just for the legal reason that loading a module with proprietary
firmware would have the user illegally create a GPL-infringing work
in memory (there are US court decisions that copying into RAM is
copying for the purposes of copyright infringement).  There are
also several technical reasons.

	The amount of unswappable kernel memory is reduced, at least
in the case of a kernel that supports USB hot plugging, since the
kernel will keep that blob around in case another Speedtouch USB
device is plugged in.  Even on system that have no swap, this still
means that a page or two more of disk files will be cached into
memory, and every once in a blue moon, the user will save 10
milliseconds by not having to reread that page from disk.

	The user can upgrade or modify the microcode without needing
to recompile and unload and reload the module.

	Unusual customizations are possible, such as having
two devices plugged in running different "microcode", for example
one unit running stable software on an actual internet connection
and the other running a version for, say, turning the unit into
an answering machine, or for debugging or for performance profiling.

	By the way, I have a long running dispute with Greg K-H
about his refusal so far to remove replace the GPL incompatible
firmware in certain USB serial drivers with such a user level
loading mechanism.  Go figure.

                    __     ______________ 
Adam J. Richter        \ /
adam@yggdrasil.com      | g g d r a s i l

Re: PWC issue

[Adam J. Richter]

On Sat, 28 Aug 2004 at 09:12:42 -0700, Greg KH wrote:
>On Sat, Aug 28, 2004 at 08:11:00AM -0700, Randy.Dunlap wrote:
>> On Fri, 27 Aug 2004 22:19:19 -0700 Greg KH wrote:
>> 
>> | On Sat, Aug 28, 2004 at 10:50:05AM -0700, Adam J. Richter wrote:
>> | > 
>> | > 	By the way, I have a long running dispute with Greg K-H
>> | > about his refusal so far to remove replace the GPL incompatible
>> | > firmware in certain USB serial drivers with such a user level
>> | > loading mechanism.  Go figure.
>> | 
>> | Send me a patch to do so, and I will apply it (must include userspace
>> | files so that hotplug can load them properly.)
>> | 
>> | The last time we went around about this I rejected it as we were in a
>> | stable kernel series.  As that is now not true, I'm open to the patch.
>> 
>> Which part is now not true?

>The "stable" part.

>Actually in thinking about it some more, we should offer up both options
>for at least 6 months, with a warning that the in-kernel stuff is going
>to be deleted on a specific date.  That gives everyone time to convert
>their userspace utilities to use the new firmware download code.

>Sound good?

>thanks,

>greg k-h

	Since you've cc'ed me soliciting an opinion in a way where
my silence might be misinterpreted as consent, I'll answer, reluctantly,
knowing that you're making me choose between such misinterpretation
and being potentially accused of provoking a flame war.

	Please do not look to me for any kind of implicit endorsement
of what I believe to be your continuing willful contributory copyright
infringement.  Six additional months of it does not "sound good" to me.
I do not condone it, and I never have.

                    __     ______________
Adam J. Richter        \ /
adam@yggdrasil.com      | g g d r a s i l

Re: PWC issue

[Adam J. Richter]

	I hasten to add that, while I think that the binary firmware
images that I believe violate the GPL should be removed from the
kernel immediately, there are also some binary firmware images
covered by GPL compatible copying permissions, which include
source code, such as xircom_pgs.S.  For the GPL-compatible
firmware binaries that include source code, I have no problem
with a six month warning period.

                    __     ______________
Adam J. Richter        \ /
adam@yggdrasil.com      | g g d r a s i l

Re: PWC issue

[Adam J. Richter]

Greg K-H wrote:
>So, what do you want to do?  If no one sends me a patch to even provide
>the option of the images moving out of the kernel at some point in time,
>it's not going to get done.

	I plan to make a patch and user level software (as I've been
unable to find the old user level programs so far) and post them to
linux-usb for testing, probably by the end of the weekend.

                    __     ______________
Adam J. Richter        \ /
adam@yggdrasil.com      | g g d r a s i l

Re: PWC issue

[Greg KH]

On Sat, Aug 28, 2004 at 07:06:07PM -0700, Adam J. Richter wrote:
> 	I hasten to add that, while I think that the binary firmware
> images that I believe violate the GPL should be removed from the
> kernel immediately, there are also some binary firmware images
> covered by GPL compatible copying permissions, which include
> source code, such as xircom_pgs.S.  For the GPL-compatible
> firmware binaries that include source code, I have no problem
> with a six month warning period.

I understand that we currently disagree about this point, and am
comfortable with our disagreement :)

So, what do you want to do?  If no one sends me a patch to even provide
the option of the images moving out of the kernel at some point in time,
it's not going to get done.

thanks,

greg k-h