To begin;
No-one has to pay a fee to make x86-compatible hardware (or, indeed,
entire motherboards and processors that are functionally compatible
and/or nearly identical with other x86 hardware). VIA/Transmeta might
do this, but they are buying a design, not the rights to make "clones".
Otherwise, companies like AMD would have been out of business a long
time ago - Intel could have just set the fee high enough so that no-one
else could compete.
Secondly...having a clear concise picture of how to interface with a
particular piece of hardware does not necessarily reveal how that
hardware works. Being a programmer, I can tell you that there are many
times when I might work with a piece of hardware, and know every detail
of what that hardware is going to do, and even how that hardware might
work; but I couldn't even begin to tell you how it was manufactured, and
what was going on behind in the scenes. I couldn't "build" one with the
knowledge that I had.
But, the benefit from having open-source drivers means that end
users, (Linux end users, specifically) can take those drivers and make
them better (which they often have). I can guarantee you that, in my
own case, with the Nvidia driver 6629 vs. 6111 fiasco, that if they were
completely open-source, they would be fixed by now; if someone else
hadn't done it, I would have done it myself.
Wow...out of the blue - a perfect example of why we need open source
hardware drivers. It makes perfect sense to. Why hardware vendors
don't want to share their drivers with the world, is only blind paranoia.
To imply that it is more practical to use a non-free product, and
that it is not worth the effort to support something because of a set of
principles, truly begs the question; why aren't you using Windows then?
Windows XP has an unprecedented level of stability (in Windows
history). It performs well, is fairly secure, and even though you have
to endure quite a lot of rampant advertising and commercialism, is very
easy to use. They have a huge software library. Every hardware vendor
in the world makes a Windows version (with the exception of Macs).
Why waste your time on a community-driven, free-spirited OS, that
doesn't always "just work" perfectly, when you can just pay money to
the corporate overlords to have it "just work", in the way that they
decide that it should work?
There is no good reason. There are a lot of unpleasant realities we
tend to avoid when we talk about Linux, and the fact that it's not
perfect always seems to be one of them.
I choose Linux not because it is perfect, but because it represents
the principles that I have had about computing since I began in this
hobby/field/passion back in 1982. And my uses of computers are just as
practical as yours, and my time is just as valuable as yours.
David
>On Tuesday 11 January 2005 03:51 pm, Baudouin, Andrew wrote:
>...
>
>
>>I do not support free (speech and beer, open-sourced) hardware drivers; and
>>the reason is this:
>>
>>Companies such as nVidia and ATI have spent millions upon billions of
>>dollars investing in people and time to develop hardware. Open sourced,
>>fully-accelerated drivers would reveal the architectural designs behind
>>this hardware and allow competitors to virtually take down the financial
>>capabilities of those companies. (Note that this does not apply to things
>>like the X86 architecture as that is available from Intel for a fee, so
>>anyone could pay to design their own x86 clones (see VIA/Transmeta)...).
>>Knowing this, I embrace and accept Nvidia's free (beer) yet closed-source
>>drivers.
>>
>>I (and many other) users of free software cannot afford to settle for a
>>product having less features/stability just because it appeals to our
>>ideals. We have limited time and or capability to contribute to the
>>development and support of this software and we need something that "Just
>>Works".
>>
>>
