Keyspan Firmware fun

[Greg KH <greg@kroah.com>]

Hi all,

I see that Adam has taken his discussion of the Keyspan firmware over to
this list (you might have warned me Adam :)

Anyway, to try to clear up some misconceptions I've seen in the
archives:
	- the file keyspan_pda_fw.h is under the GPL.  Is is a compiled
	  image of the keyspan_pda.S in the same directory
	  (drivers/usb/serial in the kernel tree.)  This is a wonderful
	  achievement by Brian Warner who wrote his own firmware to
	  control this device, before Keyspan ever released their specs.
	- The license on the files keyspan_usa*_fw.h is the only files
	  effected by the Keyspan license.  This license was drawn up by
	  Keyspan's lawyers after consulting other firmware licenses in
	  the kernel, talking to me, the driver's author Hugh Blemings,
	  and Linus.  In the end, Linus accepted the current wording on
	  the files, Keyspan was happy, Hugh and I were happy that we
	  got some new drivers in the kernel, and users were happy to
	  see more devices supported.

Keyspan has been very helpful in development of the Linux drivers.  They
offered specs to Hugh and support.  This enabled Linux to have support
for devices before other os's did (like the Mac and Windows.)

As Adam left the conversation on the linux-usb-devel list, he didn't say
that he was going to continue on with this.  We (Hugh and I) thought he
was happy.  If Adam, and the Debian developers still object to the
Keyspan license, please try to work with Hugh (copied on this message)
and Keyspan to resolve this.  I don't think that Keyspan wants to be a
pain about this at all.

Now a few questions of my own:

  - This isn't the only firmware file in the kernel that has a "odd"
    license.  Read the file fore200e_firmware_copyright in drivers/atm
    and let me know what you think.  There are others in the tree, like
    this last time I checked.

  - Since this Keyspan license seems to be objectionable, what kind of
    license can/should a company put on its binary firmware image that
    has to be included in the Linux kernel.  They can't/will not put GPL
    on the binary image, as we/Linus has been saying for quite some time
    that this is not necessary (the whole "mere aggregation" point.)
    There are lots of firmware images in your computer that don't have a
    OpenSource license on them, just that now some of these devices
    require the host to send the image to them before they can work
    properly.


Thanks for your time,

greg k-h
(linux usb-serial maintainer)