On Nov 12, 2007 4:42 PM, Alan Coopersmith <alan.coopersmith at sun.com> wrote: > Shawn Walker wrote: > >> Software that didn't meet those rules (closed source binaries, NDA covering > >> ARC review) could still be installed on the distro, but couldn't be a core > >> part of it. > > > > I disagree with this for the reasons I listed above. Good work and > > drivers shouldn't be excluded as long as sufficient redistribution > > rights are available for them. We don't want to handicap ourselves > > just to be able to claim "100% open source." > > Do we want to be able to have a reference distro that can be easily ported to > new platforms (PowerPC, Itanium, or whatever else people want) or one that is > limited to the existing platforms due to core closed binaries? > > Perhaps a middle ground of allowing closed drivers for specific hardware that > isn't as likely to be of interest to other platforms would allow for both > portability to other platforms and being able to run as much hardware as > possible on selected platforms.
I am completely in favor of the stance in the constitution that requires community software releases to be wholly opensource. Also, a "reference" should include source code that could be "referred" to. As it stands we have MartUX, Shillix, Nexenta, and Belenix, which are all fully OpenSource. Clearly 100% OpenSource is doable. I also feel that the driver argument is a non-starter, as "generic" open source drivers can be substituted for the majority of video cards. Also there is nothing that says that the reference has to run on every bit of hardware out there. One other thing, I don't feel that the OpenSolaris reference should contain binaries that aren't built by the community, nor contain blackbox functionality. If there are other components that need closed source bits, we should exclude them from the reference. e.g. Sparc disassembler is currently closed, it should be excluded from the reference specification. However, every effort should be made to identify and close those gaps... No wait I mean "open" those gaps. :) Although I don't agree that a community reference should have any closed source bits, I am open to education. (If I understand, it isn't drivers that are preventing SXCE and Indiana from being fully open.) -Brian > -- > -Alan Coopersmith- alan.coopersmith at sun.com > Sun Microsystems, Inc. - X Window System Engineering > > _______________________________________________ > > ogb-discuss mailing list > ogb-discuss at opensolaris.org > http://mail.opensolaris.org/mailman/listinfo/ogb-discuss -- - Brian Gupta http://opensolaris.org/os/project/nycosug/
