Re: Let's stop feeding the NVidia cuckoo

[Henning Makholm <henning@makholm.net>]

Scripsit Ben Johnson <camilledalmeras@yahoo.com>

> If the majority of the values is utilized no more than once or
> twice, with only a handful that keep being used, it does not really
> justify giving them human-friendly names, but what if the programmer
> always needs a large number of them at hand ? Could you clarify this
> to me please ?

I'm not really sure I understand what you are asking. It may well be
that *you* would prefer having symbolic constants instead of magic
numbers. My point is just that is quite conceivable that the
programmer of the code in question _actually_ prefers working with the
raw numbers, and that the code as distributed is therefore "source
code" according to any reasonable definition.

> Two problems remain in my opinion:
> -security
> -the unhackability of the driver, which, if not
> contrary to the strict letter of the DFSG, are
> colliding at least with its spirit, in my opinion.

In my opinion, the spirit of the DFSG does not express any opinion
about hackability. Badly written, horribly bug-ridden code that nobody
alive has any idea how to begin fixing can still be free software. Our
mechanism for avoiding such code in Debian is not articifically
broadening the scope of the concept of legal freedom, but instead the
very powerful concept of "the mainatiner's discretion".

Practical unhackability is a _technical_ problem and should be handled
through our procedures for resolving technical problems:

  1) The maintainer should not package the code unless he feels that
     it can be maintained to Debian's standards of non-buggyness.

  2) If somebody else thinks that the maintainer is deluding himself
     when he thinks the code is maintainable, he can try to convince
     the Technical Committee to override the maintainer's decision.

  3) If the TC cannot be bothered to do anything about it, a GR can be
     proposed.

-- 
Henning Makholm                   "The great secret, known to internists and
                         learned early in marriage by internists' wives, but
               still hidden from the general public, is that most things get
         better by themselves. Most things, in fact, are better by morning."