Re: Developing non-commercial drivers ?

["Fredrik Markström" <fredrik.markstrom@avalonenterprise.com>]

Well, who knows ? If you read my email carefully enough you should see
that that is not the question or issue here.
This was my first question to this list ever and I'm impressed with
the good and constructive answers I've gotten, but I really do not
understand the purpose of your response.

/Fredrik

On Wed, Nov 19, 2008 at 7:38 PM, Lennart Sorensen
<lsorense@csclub.uwaterloo.ca> wrote:
>
> On Tue, Nov 18, 2008 at 05:16:44PM +0100, Fredrik Markstr?m wrote:
> > Linus, others...
> >
> > I'm working for as a consultant for a large hardware company porting
> > Linux to their new cpu-architecture and everything is pretty much
> > up and running. Now they want us to develop a closed-source (to
> > protect their IP) ethernet driver for their proprietary Ethernet MAC.
>
> Ethernet MACs are a commodity these days.  Who is dumb enough to think
> their ethernet MAC needs to be protected these days?
>
> You make an ethernet MAC... good for you.  You have not invented
> anything new and amazing that needs protecting.  Really.  Get over it,
> you are not that special. :)
>
> > My question is:    Is there a fair way to do this and still comply to
> > the intent and spirit of the Linux licensing ?
> >
> > If yes, how ?
>
> Probably not, but I think the real issue is the previous one.
>
> --
> Len Sorensen