[PLUG] A bit confused about 2.6 kernel and X drivers

Ned Flanders plug_0 at robinson-west.com
Fri Jun 4 15:57:02 UTC 2004


Elliott Mitchell wrote:

>>From: Brian Beattie <beattie at beattie-home.net>
>>
>>Why is this not a problem for ATI?  I don't buy it for one second.
>>    
>>
>
>That would be an excellent argument; except it is a problem for ATi.
>There is an open source driver for ATi's cards, however, as with the open
>source nVidia driver, the open source ATi driver is *strictly* 2D, none
>of the 3D capabilities. If you want to make use of the 3D capabilities,
>you must go for a binary-only module.
>
>
>  
>
>>From: Brian Beattie <beattie at beattie-home.net>
>>On Fri, 2004-06-04 at 11:26, AthlonRob wrote:
>>    
>>
>>>On Friday 04 June 2004 08:08 am, Brian Beattie wrote:
>>>      
>>>
>>>>Why is this not a problem for ATI?  I don't buy it for one second.
>>>>        
>>>>
>>>I haven't looked at ATi cards for quite some time... but when last I did,=
>>>their drivers worked similarly to nVidia's... a chunk of binary-only and =
>>>chunk of code to make that binary stuff work.
>>>Are their drivers fully opensource now?
>>>      
>>>
>>All I know, is that the video cards I have used over the years, have all
>>been supported by X, no kernel modules have been needed.  But of course
>>I'm not a l337 gamer.  I do not believe that patents are the real reason
>>that Nvida refuses to provide the information needed for drivers to be
>>written, unless they really are violating somebodies valid patent.  I
>>think they a just paranoid and afraid that is anybody actually saw their
>>design they would laugh.  I see it all the time companies are so
>>convinced that they have some magic jewel of a technique that gives them
>>a leg up on everybody else, and they are almost always wrong.  In every
>>case, it would be easier to implement the functionality from scratch,
>>based on public knowledge, that it would be to aquire the magic jewels.
>>    
>>
>
>No commentary on whether the patents are valid (non-obvious and
>non-trivial).
>
>They provide enough information for a 2D driver (well not exactly, they
>wrote the 2D driver and have no problem with that being open source).
>Just nVidia does not provide information on utilizing the 3D capabilites,
>but then again no one else does either. If open source is the critical
>factor for you, the driver is "nv"; no problems with 4K stacks, no evil
>closed source; but you sacrifice the (software 3D works, but is hideously
>slow in comparison with hardware).
>
>Looking at the companies involved, it does seem likely they've got those
>magic jewels. They're large enough to hire very smart people, and create
>very fast and efficient hardware and software.
>
Sorry, closed source means people's computers often don't work and they 
don't know
why.  You can't prevent someone else from growing an apple for example, 
but this does
not mean that having an orchard is nonprofitable.  The problem is 
clearly patent law,
noone should be able to sue someone else for using a common idea.  I 
also feel that
the outsourcing of valuable jobs by companies importing or exporting 
goods needs
to be limited.  We should not let any company this country does business 
with outsource
more than 30% of it's well paid jobs.  If all coding does end up in 
India, I hope
Al-Queda doesn't catch on and send operatives there to work.  No matter 
where you are
in the world, you have a right to be a coder, janitor, farmer, etc. 
 Countries should compete,
they shouldn't outsource instead.

These very smart people do things in ways the not-so-smart world doesn't 
understand.
What happens when those people die?  

What if I patented say, some popular mailing list software?  Would this 
mean that everyone
who has a mailing list using that software has to pay me to keep it? 
 What judge would
render such a misguided verdict?  Is there any legal approach to rein in 
patent law abuse
so that open source hardware becomes possible again?  The Commodore 64 
was open
design.  If you hand Joe blow the schematics to a complex video card he 
can't profit
from them as easily as someone who knows what they are.  Joe blow will 
also need
a billion dollars or more if he wants to build a factory and start 
producing them himself.  
One of the reasons Microsoft has been declared a monopoly is that noone 
can get a
proprietary system up to the same level economically before Microsoft 
partially or
completely owns that system.  Microsoft classically either buys you out 
or sues you
out.  Perhaps it's about time that the judges who make this possible 
felt our pain.





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