Re: drivers with proprietary code

[Gary Thomas <gary@mlbassoc.com>]

On Wed, 2003-04-02 at 06:13, Mark Salter wrote:
> I'm working on a board that has proprietary network hardware. The
> CPU contains dedicated "network engines" that require binary-only
> microcode to run. The interface between this microcode and the CPU
> core is provided by a proprietary library which is available in
> source form but under a license that requires permission for use
> and distribution. I have written an eCos driver which incorporates
> parts of this library to support the builtin ethernet ports in
> RedBoot.
> 
> I'd like to get a sense of how folks feel about this sort of thing.
> Its clear to me that such code goes against the tenets of s.r.c, so
> I don't see this driver ever being hosted there. I think in this
> case the board manufacturer should supply the driver as a .epk file.
> So, I'm thinking that a link from the board's info page on s.r.c to
> the board maker's site along with some instructions on building and
> using the driver would be okay. What to others think?

This can work, and even be OK with the rest of the license
as I read it.  The way I would handle this would be to set
up a parallel repository for just these drivers, including
the CDL to create them, etc.  With the latest ecosconfig
changes, this should work just like a merged repository.

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Gary Thomas                 |
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