From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 From: Jonathan Larmour To: Alfredo Knecht Cc: ecos-discuss@sources.redhat.com Subject: Re: [ECOS] Re: eCos PCI problem and NEC vrc4373 build option. Date: Wed, 30 Aug 2000 17:20:00 -0000 Message-id: <39ADA4CC.BD6FB3F0@redhat.com> References: <20000829133621.A4206@visi.com> <39AC078C.4EFF255D@redhat.co.uk> <000901c011ef$b8839160$1201a8c0@crusoe> <39AC1265.947D9697@redhat.co.uk> <39AC12F4.9C2F7678@redhat.co.uk> <000f01c01217$df482950$0201a8c0@raccoon> <39AD89EC.69AD0185@redhat.com> <001901c012d5$3cf3f990$1201a8c0@crusoe> <3.0.5.32.20000831013839.00ace4c0@mailhost> X-SW-Source: 2000-08/msg00351.html Alfredo Knecht wrote: > > Jonathan, do you really mean that redhat is actually maintaining two > separate threads of gdd/gdb/ecos, and that the one we're sweating on (I > myself for one) is just some sort of bait? No. We have tools here that we did QA with eCos on, and our compiler engineers worked through the problems we found, fixed these bugs (i.e. "stabilized" the sources). But most importantly, the bug fixes we found were made to the free tools as well. And rightly so. What we haven't done, and won't do, is continually track the free sources to ensure no-one else then breaks the tools when used with eCos. If problems are reported they'll be fixed (and not necessarily just by Red Hat engineers of course), but we simply don't have the time to track every change people make. We try our best to fix what bugs we do find, and add improvements where we can. But at the end of the day, it is up to the *whole* free software community, Red Hat included, to make sure these tools are as good as they can be. But just to be clear - the sources Red Hat uses internally for eCos are almost exactly the same as the public ones. The only differences are for confidential information, ports for specific customers and unfinished code. Ditto for gcc/gdb. There are no separate "threads". The only thing we do is that we will occasionally "stabilize" a particular set of sources to ensure they are of high quality for release to our customers. And all fixes resulting from that stabilization are applied to the main free sources. That doesn't count as a separate "thread". > And all this in the name of the sacred open source, the plan being to get > us hooked on the light and buggy weed, then sell us the harder stuff for > real cash? No the sources are of the same ilk. All that happened in this case is that Red Hat took the time to internally stabilize the tools so that they reliably worked with eCos. This took time, money and effort; but we still ensured all the fixes found went into the free repository. We can't be responsible if people subsequently broke things there again! > This is an interesting business model indeed, and reminds me of another one. > So, if I understand it right, the purpose of the open-source part including > this list is to bring us to the point where we say "now that the project is > late, we went this far, and invested all this time on that ecos thing, > there is no alternative left" ...as to plunk down a lot of good money to > get what was there all the time in the first place, namely the various > shrink-wrapped products like VxWorks, Psos, QNX, and the like? > > Or am I missing something eye-opening? We try and provide free support when we have time - the activity on this list should surely be proof of that! And not just from Red Hat folks either. Plenty of people use eCos and the GNU tools with no problems. But there are always going to be times when people have problems that are too big for us to solve on the list. You can't really expect us to solve everyone's problems! Anyway, if you don't like it, you can get a full refund of everything you paid :-). Seriously, this is the whole point - all the sources are there for *you* to fix if you want. That's the power of open source for you. But that doesn't mean you can expect someone else to fix things for you for free! Hope this clears things up, Jifl -- Red Hat, 35 Cambridge Place, Cambridge, UK. CB2 1NS Tel: +44 (1223) 728762 "Plan to be spontaneous tomorrow." || These opinions are all my own fault