--- Begin Message ---
- To: Debian Bug Tracking System <submit@bugs.debian.org>
- Subject: linux-2.6: [legal] the current kernel tarball doesn't respect the GR 2006-007
- From: Sven Luther <luther@debian.org>
- Date: Thu, 01 Mar 2007 08:30:02 +0100
- Message-id: <20070301073002.21654.7182.reportbug@pegasos.powerlinux.fr>
Package: linux-2.6
Severity: serious
Justification: http://www.debian.org/vote/2006/vote_007
Well, in http://www.debian.org/vote/2006/vote_007, we voted about the kernel
firmwares, and among others claimed :
3. We assure the community that there will be no regressions in the progress
made for freedom in the kernel distributed by Debian relative to the Sarge
release in Etch
and :
4. ... as long as we are legally allowed to do so, and the firmware is
distributed upstream under a license that complies with the DFSG.
Both of these restrictions are not respected by the current linux-2.6 source
tarball, and the tg3 firmware driver in particular.
The tg3 firmware was stripped from the sarge kernel, it is a non-free but
redistributable binary blob, and this is thus a regression with regard to the
sarge release.
Secondly, the tg3 firmware licence is :
* Firmware is:
* Derived from proprietary unpublished source code,
* Copyright (C) 2000-2003 Broadcom Corporation.
*
* Permission is hereby granted for the distribution of this firmware
* data in hexadecimal or equivalent format, provided this copyright
* notice is accompanying it.
which would never pass the DFSG in any way. The licence clearly state it is a
binary derived from unpublished source code, and neither the source code is
available, nor is there any right of modification involved in it.
It is astounding how, Steve Langasek as the lead RM, specifically asked for
a GR on the subject in order to know how to act as RM, and then, even before
the vote finished, claimed he would not respect it.
Friendly,
Sven Luther
-- System Information:
Debian Release: 4.0
APT prefers testing
APT policy: (500, 'testing')
Architecture: powerpc (ppc)
Shell: /bin/sh linked to /bin/bash
Kernel: Linux 2.6.18-3-powerpc
Locale: LANG=fr_FR.UTF-8, LC_CTYPE=fr_FR.UTF-8 (charmap=UTF-8)
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--- Begin Message ---
- To: 242866-done@bugs.debian.org
- Subject: Re: drivers containing firmware blobs
- From: maximilian attems <max@stro.at>
- Date: Thu, 15 May 2008 16:44:56 +0200
- Message-id: <20080515144456.GA20661@stro.at>
Version: 2.6.24-1
The Debian Kernel Team is guilty of uploading a disjointed kernel. For the
record Bastian Blank <waldi@debian.org> coded the infrastructure for the
stripping and the stripping itself. The FTP masters threatened to block
any future Linux uploads or alternatively would launch an NMU (non
maintainer upload) stripping the affected drivers.
I very strongly disagreed with that decision, but the Debian Developer
made their position clear in the General Resolution 2006-007, which is
binding for us. In the long run it might be a win for Free Software -
history will tell. In the short term this is an annoyance for existing
hardware driver support.
As expected none of the vocal minority, aka Mr. Nerode and Mr. Doolittle,
demanding DFSG freeness helped to work out this transition nor to cleanup
the created mess. The stripping presents an additional maintenance burden.
But I'm sick of the arguments. Rather then fighting I'd like to see people
working together to make things work, both on the licensing side
(BSD firmware) and on the code side (firmware_request()), neither is easy.
I'm thus closing the bug reports regarding firmware blobs and pointing the
reporters to the following wiki page in order to finaly help a bit
-> http://wiki.debian.org/KernelFirmwareLicensing
Possible DFSG violations in current and future linux-2.6 uploads should be
filed seperately.
kthxbye
--
maks
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