On Mon, May 15, 2000 at 11:27:59PM -0700, Brian J. Murrell wrote:
> from the quill of Matthew Dharm <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> on scroll
> <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> >
> > The problem is that the manufacturer of the core chipset won't release
> > information about the programming interface for these chips. No
> > communication with these devices is possible.
>
> And here I was going getting all excited that another vendor was doing
> what it could to support (or at least be supported under) Linux when it
> turns out that in reality it is yet another vendor that needs to be
> blacklisted for not being co-operative with the Linux market. Have I
> got this wrong?
I think, in this case, that is a bad idea.
SanDisk would love to help me. They've sent me product samples to work
with and put me in touch with all the right people at SCM to try an
convince them to release specs for their chipset. So far, SCM has not
given me a firm 'no' -- they're still debating.
Given the fact that SanDisk (for all it's new products) has decided to work
_with_ the Linux community to make sure that all its products are fully
compatible with Linux, giving them a hard time for their older products
just seems wrong to me. We want to encourage the right behavior from them,
and they are moving towards this right behavior. Let's not give them a
hard time now.
> > The problem is that there is a different device marketed under the
> > same
> > name which _does_ work with Linux -- the only outward difference is
> > that
> > the one that works has an eject button on the front. Hence the talk
> > of the
> > "non-eject" version.
>
> Yeah this whole concept of marketing multiple devices which "under the
> hood" are completely different beasts as the same device is just plain
> wrong/stupid IMHO. How is one to go and buy the right device other than
> to roll the dice, get it home and try it out, waaaaaaaaaaay too late to
> be able to take it back when it doesn't work. This practice, AFAIAC
> just makes me want to avoid, and advise others to avoid a vendor. I
> have done it with Iomega and have steered many a folk away from them
> when they were considering purchasing Iomega products. SanDisk will
> just have to be another vendor on my blacklist I guess. ~sigh~
I take it you've never worked in embedded electronics, have you? It's just
not as simple as you make it out to be.
I'll admit, it's annoying when two things which are _completely_ different
under the hood are marketed under the same name is annoying. So far, I
haven't seen this with Iomega (the various variants of the Zip100 are just
different sets of bugs). I'll admit, with the "USB Imagemate" from
SanDisk, this is annoying. But if you read the packaging carefully, you
can tell the difference. The one without the eject button (that doesn't
work) is the SDDR-05. The one with the eject button (that _does_ work) is
the SDDR-01.
And (just to repeat myself), I really think "blacklisting" a vendor for
something they've done in the past, especially when they're doing the right
thing now (releasing specs, providing samples, providing a point of contact
for driver development) is just a bad idea. What you should do if you
really want to encourage companies to be Linux-friendly is go out and buy a
SDDR-31 CF reader as soon as it hits the shelves in your local stores.
They work wonderfully with linux.
Matt Dharm
--
Matthew Dharm Home: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Senior Engineer, QCP Inc. Work: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
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