Re: Announce: ndiswrapper

[Nick Piggin]

Neil Brown wrote:

> On Thursday November 20, piggin@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx wrote:
>
> > You have to admit its good for end users though. And indirectly, what
> > is good for them is good for us. Take the nvidia example: end users get
> > either a binary driver or nothing. If we were somehow able to stop
> > nvidia from distributing their binary driver, they would say "OK".
>
> Is it good for end users?  It allows them to buy a computer with an
> nvidia graphics controller because "NVidia supply drivers", and then
> discover that support is only as good as NVidia are willing to make
> it.  I'm still waiting for some sort of power management support for
> the nvidia controller in my notebook.  If the driver and the specs
> were open, I could possibly do it myself.  On the other hand if there
> were no NVidia drivers, I never would have made the (arguable) mistake
> of buying this notebook.

I'm all for open specs, but in reality that doesn't always happen.
(out of interest, are there any OS 3d drivers for any current cards?)

I know what you mean, but I would find nvidia more at fault for not
providing power management than no OS drivers.

> Ofcourse we cannot and should not stop people from providing the
> option of binary only drivers, but I'm not convinced that we should
> acknowlege that people who provide binary-only drivers are doing a
> useful service for anyone but themselves.

No I wouldn't say that, I meant the Linux Kernel is doing the end users
a favour by allowing binary modules.


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