Return-Path: Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org via listexpand id S264925AbUD2Suq (ORCPT ); Thu, 29 Apr 2004 14:50:46 -0400 Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org id S264921AbUD2Suq (ORCPT ); Thu, 29 Apr 2004 14:50:46 -0400 Received: from mail2.webmessenger.it ([193.70.193.55]:29635 "EHLO mail1a.webmessenger.it") by vger.kernel.org with ESMTP id S264925AbUD2Stf (ORCPT ); Thu, 29 Apr 2004 14:49:35 -0400 Message-ID: <40914C35.1030802@copeca.dsnet.it> Date: Thu, 29 Apr 2004 20:40:53 +0200 From: Giuliano Colla User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux i686; it-IT; rv:1.5) Gecko/20031007 X-Accept-Language: it, en, en-us MIME-Version: 1.0 To: Carl-Daniel Hailfinger , hsflinux@lists.mbsi.ca CC: Rusty Russell , Andrew Morton , Linus Torvalds , Linux Kernel Mailing List Subject: Re: [hsflinux] [PATCH] Blacklist binary-only modules lying about their license References: <408DC0E0.7090500@gmx.net> In-Reply-To: <408DC0E0.7090500@gmx.net> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: linux-kernel-owner@vger.kernel.org X-Mailing-List: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org Content-Length: 2929 Lines: 80 Carl-Daniel Hailfinger ha scritto: >Hi, > >LinuxAnt offers binary only modules without any sources. To circumvent our >MODULE_LICENSE checks LinuxAnt has inserted a "\0" into their declaration: > >MODULE_LICENSE("GPL\0for files in the \"GPL\" directory; for others, only >LICENSE file applies"); > >Since string comparisons stop at the first "\0" character, the kernel is >tricked into thinking the modules are GPL. Btw, the "GPL" directory they >are speaking about is empty. > >The attached patch blacklists all modules having "Linuxant" or "Conexant" >in their author string. This may seem a bit broad, but AFAIK both >companies never have released anything under the GPL and have a strong >history of binary-only modules. > > >Regards, >Carl-Daniel > > Let's try not to be ridiculous, please. As an end user, if I buy a full fledged modem, I get some amount of proprietary, non GPL, code which executes within the board or the PCMCIA card of the modem. The GPL driver may even support the functionality of downloading a new version of *proprietary* code into the flash Eprom of the device. The GPL linux driver interfaces with it, and all is kosher. On the other hand, I have the misfortune of being stuck with a soft-modem, roughly the *same* proprietary code is provided as a binary file, and a linux driver (source provided) interfaces with it. In that case the kernel is flagged as "tainted". But in both cases, if the driver is poorly written, because of developer's inadequacy, or because of the proprietary code being poorly documented and/or implemented, my kernel may go nuts, be it tainted or not. Can you honestly tell apart the two cases, if you don't make a it a case of "religion war"? For sake of completeness. *My* download of https://www.linuxant.com/drivers/hsf/full/archive/hsfmodem-6.03.00lnxt04032800full/hsfmodem-6.03.00lnxt04032800full.tar.gz contains, in the /modules/GPL/ directory the following files: -rw-r--r-- 1 colla colla 18860 ago 23 2003 COPYING -rw-r--r-- 1 colla colla 13609 gen 18 00:51 oscompat.h -rw-r--r-- 1 colla colla 32573 mar 26 09:16 serial_cnxt.c -rw-r--r-- 1 colla colla 3392 ago 23 2003 serial_cnxt.h -rw-r--r-- 1 colla colla 57857 ago 24 2003 serial_core.c -rw-r--r-- 1 colla colla 9789 ago 22 2003 serial_core.h I strongly hope that developers' efforts will be addressed to more valuable topics than detecting the "Linuxant" string in a loadable module. Not forgetting that Linux\0ant, L\0inuxant, etc. would display the same way ;-) Kind Regards -- Ing. Giuliano Colla Direttore Tecnico Copeca srl Bologna Italy - To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-kernel" in the body of a message to majordomo@vger.kernel.org More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html Please read the FAQ at http://www.tux.org/lkml/