Re: If you really want Free firmware...

2004-12-16 Thread Chasecreek Systemhouse
On Thu, 16 Dec 2004 19:55:02 +1100, Hamish Moffatt <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > WC -Sx- Jones > > "Dash Sx Dash" must be hard to pronounce quickly.. LOL :-) Sx is an Action Verb. And it's damn easy to find in search engines; however my first mumblings into Usenet are likely deleted now -- I

Re: If you really want Free firmware...

2004-12-16 Thread Hamish Moffatt
On Wed, Dec 15, 2004 at 07:59:34AM -0500, Chasecreek Systemhouse wrote: > On Wed, 15 Dec 2004 23:32:39 +1100, Hamish Moffatt <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > On Tue, Dec 14, 2004 at 10:01:59AM -0500, Chasecreek Systemhouse wrote: > > > > It would be nice if you included your name in your posts. > >

Re: If you really want Free firmware...

2004-12-15 Thread Kenneth Pronovici
On Wed, Dec 15, 2004 at 05:40:30PM +, Steve McIntyre wrote: > [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: > >On Wed, Dec 15, 2004 at 05:00:12PM +, Andrew Suffield wrote: > >> > >> Ah, you misinterpreted my point in quite an impressive way. Valid > >> numbers or not, his statement was of the form "Here is how

Re: If you really want Free firmware...

2004-12-15 Thread Steve McIntyre
[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: >On Wed, Dec 15, 2004 at 05:00:12PM +, Andrew Suffield wrote: >> >> Ah, you misinterpreted my point in quite an impressive way. Valid >> numbers or not, his statement was of the form "Here is how we do it, >> and our way is the only way in which it is possible to do it

Re: If you really want Free firmware...

2004-12-15 Thread Kenneth Pronovici
On Wed, Dec 15, 2004 at 05:00:12PM +, Andrew Suffield wrote: > On Tue, Dec 14, 2004 at 11:27:45AM -0600, Kenneth Pronovici wrote: > > Message-ID: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > > Hamish said, "Manufacturing an ASIC involves NRE...of hundreds of > > thousands to millions per revision..." > > > > Message

Re: If you really want Free firmware...

2004-12-15 Thread Andrew Suffield
On Tue, Dec 14, 2004 at 11:27:45AM -0600, Kenneth Pronovici wrote: > Message-ID: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > Hamish said, "Manufacturing an ASIC involves NRE...of hundreds of > thousands to millions per revision..." > > Message-ID: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > You said, "Manufacturing an operating system invol

Re: If you really want Free firmware...

2004-12-15 Thread Brendan
On Monday 13 December 2004 21:24, Andrew Suffield wrote: > > What does that have to do with hardware, please? > > I mean, it's a lovely statement and all, but it's wrong. > > Right back at you. Smarmy, but useless. Ok, I have figured out that you have nothing useful to say. Thank you. And from a

Re: If you really want Free firmware...

2004-12-15 Thread Chasecreek Systemhouse
On Wed, 15 Dec 2004 23:32:39 +1100, Hamish Moffatt <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > On Tue, Dec 14, 2004 at 10:01:59AM -0500, Chasecreek Systemhouse wrote: > > It would be nice if you included your name in your posts. Lordy. :-) It *is* in my posts. See below here ... -- WC -Sx- Jones http://inse

Re: If you really want Free firmware...

2004-12-15 Thread Hamish Moffatt
On Tue, Dec 14, 2004 at 10:01:59AM -0500, Chasecreek Systemhouse wrote: It would be nice if you included your name in your posts. > On 14 Dec 2004 09:03:20 -0500, Michael Poole <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > Hardware design has very different and higher third-party costs than > > software design,

Re: If you really want Free firmware...

2004-12-14 Thread Bruce Perens
Kenneth Pronovici wrote: Aha, I see where you found this in my original note (although you didn't quote it). In that paragraph, "thousands of dollars" was just an example for illustration, although I chose the magnitude of the cost from one of the links Bruce posted (I recall seeing a $5400 fabric

Re: If you really want Free firmware...

2004-12-14 Thread Ron Johnson
On Tue, 2004-12-14 at 14:42 -0800, Bruce Perens wrote: > Ron Johnson wrote: > > The *price* of product has *nothing* to do with how much it *cost* > > to create. > > > In a purely competitive market the price of goods would approach their > cost. The system of "intellectual property" is a barrie

Re: If you really want Free firmware...

2004-12-14 Thread Bruce Perens
Ron Johnson wrote: The *price* of product has *nothing* to do with how much it *cost* to create. In a purely competitive market the price of goods would approach their cost. The system of "intellectual property" is a barrier that prevents certain goods from becoming commodities. There ar

Re: If you really want Free firmware...

2004-12-14 Thread Kenneth Pronovici
[Yes, replying to myself.] On Tue, Dec 14, 2004 at 11:05:44AM -0600, Kenneth Pronovici wrote: > On Tue, Dec 14, 2004 at 11:17:24AM +0100, Tollef Fog Heen wrote: > > * Kenneth Pronovici > > > > | I think what you're forgetting (or at least ignoring) is that designing > > | hardware is not exactly

Re: If you really want Free firmware...

2004-12-14 Thread Kenneth Pronovici
On Tue, Dec 14, 2004 at 03:51:43PM +, Andrew Suffield wrote: > On Mon, Dec 13, 2004 at 08:57:20PM -0600, Kenneth Pronovici wrote: > > And no, I can't confirm or refute the numbers, which is why *I* didn't > > comment on whether they were realistic. You might want to try that > > sometime. > >

Re: If you really want Free firmware...

2004-12-14 Thread Ron Johnson
On Tue, 2004-12-14 at 17:43 +0100, Jonas Meurer wrote: > On 14/12/2004 Chasecreek Systemhouse wrote: > > Personally I'm not buying it. Hardware costs what it does for the > > same reasons as software -- to advance the state of the art and to > > create better hardware (or software as the case may

Re: If you really want Free firmware...

2004-12-14 Thread Kenneth Pronovici
On Tue, Dec 14, 2004 at 11:17:24AM +0100, Tollef Fog Heen wrote: > * Kenneth Pronovici > > | I think what you're forgetting (or at least ignoring) is that designing > | hardware is not exactly like designing software. The process is > | similar, yes, but it's not an apples-to-apples comparison.

Re: If you really want Free firmware...

2004-12-14 Thread Jonas Meurer
On 14/12/2004 Chasecreek Systemhouse wrote: > Personally I'm not buying it. Hardware costs what it does for the > same reasons as software -- to advance the state of the art and to > create better hardware (or software as the case may be.) I personally don't think that the price of products in a

Re: If you really want Free firmware...

2004-12-14 Thread Andrew Suffield
On Mon, Dec 13, 2004 at 09:20:53PM -0600, Kenneth Pronovici wrote: > > > I think what you're forgetting (or at least ignoring) is that designing > > > hardware is not exactly like designing software. The process is > > > similar, yes, but it's not an apples-to-apples comparison. At the > > > leas

Re: If you really want Free firmware...

2004-12-14 Thread Michael Poole
Chasecreek Systemhouse writes: > On 14 Dec 2004 09:03:20 -0500, Michael Poole <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > > Hardware design has very different and higher third-party costs than > > software design, and the cost to make and test minor revisions can be > > a significant fraction of the cost to d

Re: If you really want Free firmware...

2004-12-14 Thread Andrew Suffield
On Mon, Dec 13, 2004 at 08:57:20PM -0600, Kenneth Pronovici wrote: > And no, I can't confirm or refute the numbers, which is why *I* didn't > comment on whether they were realistic. You might want to try that > sometime. I cannot figure out what mail you were reading. -- .''`. ** Debian GNU/

Re: If you really want Free firmware...

2004-12-14 Thread Chasecreek Systemhouse
[Please Note that I'm not trying to create a hardware holy war. Of all the OSes I have used and upon all the architectures I have built - both commercial and non-commercial -- Debian has consistently delivered a great wholistic, as well as holistic, system solution.] On 14 Dec 2004 09:03:20 -050

Re: If you really want Free firmware...

2004-12-14 Thread Bluefuture
Another interesting link is Electronic Design Automation (EDA) software on Linux: http://www.linuxeda.com/ Cheers, Blue.

Re: If you really want Free firmware...

2004-12-14 Thread Michael Poole
Chasecreek Systemhouse writes: > > To design software, all you need is a fully functional computer. > > > > To design hardware, you need to create and test a prototype every once > > in a while. That'll cost you. > > > Your logic doesnt follow. > Why, then, isn't Be (BeOS) still around ? > >

Re: If you really want Free firmware...

2004-12-14 Thread Bluefuture
Try to take a look to this http://lists.duskglow.com/open-graphics/ about problems, solutions and ASIC vs FPGA proposed for a real project to build a open design 2d/3d graphic card. Cheers, Blue.

Re: If you really want Free firmware...

2004-12-14 Thread Wouter Verhelst
Op di, 14-12-2004 te 07:48 -0500, schreef Chasecreek Systemhouse: > > To design software, all you need is a fully functional computer. > > > > To design hardware, you need to create and test a prototype every once > > in a while. That'll cost you. > > > Your logic doesnt follow. > Why, then, i

Re: If you really want Free firmware...

2004-12-14 Thread Chasecreek Systemhouse
> To design software, all you need is a fully functional computer. > > To design hardware, you need to create and test a prototype every once > in a while. That'll cost you. Your logic doesnt follow. Why, then, isn't Be (BeOS) still around ? Plenty of fully functional computers around at the

Re: If you really want Free firmware...

2004-12-14 Thread Chasecreek Systemhouse
> Any commercial software company will tell you exactly the same thing > about software: testing is not free. Testing is not free only in the sense that a *vendor* might lose clients if said clients "are" the *testers*... Historically, lots of clients are performed free testng for vendors. I'm

Re: If you really want Free firmware...

2004-12-14 Thread Wouter Verhelst
Op di, 14-12-2004 te 02:24 +, schreef Andrew Suffield: > On Mon, Dec 13, 2004 at 03:57:19PM -0500, Brendan wrote: > > On Monday 13 December 2004 14:50, Andrew Suffield wrote: > > > On Mon, Dec 13, 2004 at 11:21:54AM -0800, Bruce Perens wrote: > > > > My surmise is that we'd need an effort like

Re: If you really want Free firmware...

2004-12-14 Thread Hamish Moffatt
On Tue, Dec 14, 2004 at 11:17:24AM +0100, Tollef Fog Heen wrote: > * Kenneth Pronovici > > | I think what you're forgetting (or at least ignoring) is that designing > | hardware is not exactly like designing software. The process is > | similar, yes, but it's not an apples-to-apples comparison.

Re: If you really want Free firmware...

2004-12-14 Thread Tollef Fog Heen
* Kenneth Pronovici | I think what you're forgetting (or at least ignoring) is that designing | hardware is not exactly like designing software. The process is | similar, yes, but it's not an apples-to-apples comparison. At the | least, this is because testing your hardware "implementation" is

Re: If you really want Free firmware...

2004-12-13 Thread Hamish Moffatt
On Tue, Dec 14, 2004 at 02:26:46AM +, Andrew Suffield wrote: > On Tue, Dec 14, 2004 at 08:43:37AM +1100, Hamish Moffatt wrote: > > Manufacturing an ASIC involves NRE (non-recurring engineering) costs > > of hundreds of thousands to millions per revision. A manufacturing > > company is going to

Re: If you really want Free firmware...

2004-12-13 Thread Kenneth Pronovici
On Tue, Dec 14, 2004 at 02:39:07AM +, Andrew Suffield wrote: > On Mon, Dec 13, 2004 at 02:13:53PM -0600, Kenneth Pronovici wrote: > > On Mon, Dec 13, 2004 at 07:50:02PM +, Andrew Suffield wrote: > > > On Mon, Dec 13, 2004 at 11:21:54AM -0800, Bruce Perens wrote: > > > > My surmise is that w

Re: If you really want Free firmware...

2004-12-13 Thread Glenn Maynard
On Tue, Dec 14, 2004 at 02:24:08AM +, Andrew Suffield wrote: > I don't care about it. It's the people who want it done badly enough > to whine about it on public mailing lists who should go do it. The issue is people who care about it enough that they want Debian's policies to encourage vendor

Re: If you really want Free firmware...

2004-12-13 Thread Kenneth Pronovici
On Tue, Dec 14, 2004 at 02:26:46AM +, Andrew Suffield wrote: > On Tue, Dec 14, 2004 at 08:43:37AM +1100, Hamish Moffatt wrote: > > On Mon, Dec 13, 2004 at 07:50:02PM +, Andrew Suffield wrote: > > > On Mon, Dec 13, 2004 at 11:21:54AM -0800, Bruce Perens wrote: > > > > My surmise is that we'd

Re: If you really want Free firmware...

2004-12-13 Thread Andrew Suffield
On Mon, Dec 13, 2004 at 02:13:53PM -0600, Kenneth Pronovici wrote: > On Mon, Dec 13, 2004 at 07:50:02PM +, Andrew Suffield wrote: > > On Mon, Dec 13, 2004 at 11:21:54AM -0800, Bruce Perens wrote: > > > My surmise is that we'd need an effort like that, raising $250K, to > > > design and go to f

Re: If you really want Free firmware...

2004-12-13 Thread Andrew Suffield
On Tue, Dec 14, 2004 at 08:43:37AM +1100, Hamish Moffatt wrote: > On Mon, Dec 13, 2004 at 07:50:02PM +, Andrew Suffield wrote: > > On Mon, Dec 13, 2004 at 11:21:54AM -0800, Bruce Perens wrote: > > > My surmise is that we'd need an effort like that, raising $250K, to > > > design and go to full

Re: If you really want Free firmware...

2004-12-13 Thread Andrew Suffield
On Mon, Dec 13, 2004 at 03:57:19PM -0500, Brendan wrote: > On Monday 13 December 2004 14:50, Andrew Suffield wrote: > > On Mon, Dec 13, 2004 at 11:21:54AM -0800, Bruce Perens wrote: > > > My surmise is that we'd need an effort like that, raising $250K, to > > > design and go to full-custom fabricat

Re: If you really want Free firmware...

2004-12-13 Thread Hamish Moffatt
On Mon, Dec 13, 2004 at 07:50:02PM +, Andrew Suffield wrote: > On Mon, Dec 13, 2004 at 11:21:54AM -0800, Bruce Perens wrote: > > My surmise is that we'd need an effort like that, raising $250K, to > > design and go to full-custom fabrication of an FPLA with fully-open > > design. > > Mine is

Re: If you really want Free firmware...

2004-12-13 Thread Brendan
On Monday 13 December 2004 14:50, Andrew Suffield wrote: > On Mon, Dec 13, 2004 at 11:21:54AM -0800, Bruce Perens wrote: > > My surmise is that we'd need an effort like that, raising $250K, to > > design and go to full-custom fabrication of an FPLA with fully-open > > design. > > Mine is that one c

Re: If you really want Free firmware...

2004-12-13 Thread Bruce Perens
Andrew Suffield wrote: There is absolutely no reason why any money is needed for this. Design the damn thing. My personal EE skill is insufficient for the task. I can help someone else get it done. Regarding how much money it takes, it's a matter of how soon we want it. I've no doubt that

Re: If you really want Free firmware...

2004-12-13 Thread Kenneth Pronovici
On Mon, Dec 13, 2004 at 07:50:02PM +, Andrew Suffield wrote: > On Mon, Dec 13, 2004 at 11:21:54AM -0800, Bruce Perens wrote: > > My surmise is that we'd need an effort like that, raising $250K, to > > design and go to full-custom fabrication of an FPLA with fully-open > > design. > > Mine is

Re: If you really want Free firmware...

2004-12-13 Thread Andrew Suffield
On Mon, Dec 13, 2004 at 11:21:54AM -0800, Bruce Perens wrote: > My surmise is that we'd need an effort like that, raising $250K, to > design and go to full-custom fabrication of an FPLA with fully-open > design. Mine is that one can get useful things done without having to spend ridiculous amoun

Re: If you really want Free firmware...

2004-12-13 Thread Bruce Perens
Andrew Suffield wrote: On Mon, Dec 13, 2004 at 11:07:35AM -0800, Bruce Perens wrote: It will take fund-raising to do it. ^&&##$@@. There goes that "free software is impossible" argument again. Well, maybe I'm doing the wrong thing to feed a troll like this, but I'll g

Re: If you really want Free firmware...

2004-12-13 Thread Andrew Suffield
On Mon, Dec 13, 2004 at 11:07:35AM -0800, Bruce Perens wrote: > It will take fund-raising to do it. Bullshit. There goes that "free software is impossible" argument again. -- .''`. ** Debian GNU/Linux ** | Andrew Suffield : :' : http://www.debian.org/ | `. `' |

If you really want Free firmware...

2004-12-13 Thread Bruce Perens
Matthew Garrett wrote: No, you're missing the point. I understand that there are practical arguments against this desire for freedom, but that doesn't alter the philosophical basis - as far as freedom is concerned, there is no difference in having non-free code in ROM or on disk. Yes, but w