Return-Path: Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org via listexpand id S1161161AbWLPQdy (ORCPT ); Sat, 16 Dec 2006 11:33:54 -0500 Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org id S1161162AbWLPQdy (ORCPT ); Sat, 16 Dec 2006 11:33:54 -0500 Received: from smtp.osdl.org ([65.172.181.25]:53925 "EHLO smtp.osdl.org" rhost-flags-OK-OK-OK-OK) by vger.kernel.org with ESMTP id S1161161AbWLPQdx (ORCPT ); Sat, 16 Dec 2006 11:33:53 -0500 Date: Sat, 16 Dec 2006 08:33:27 -0800 (PST) From: Linus Torvalds To: "Rafael J. Wysocki" cc: Willy Tarreau , karderio , linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org Subject: Re: GPL only modules [was Re: [GIT PATCH] more Driver core patches for 2.6.19] In-Reply-To: <200612161128.27721.rjw@sisk.pl> Message-ID: References: <1166226982.12721.78.camel@localhost> <20061216064344.GF24090@1wt.eu> <200612161128.27721.rjw@sisk.pl> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: linux-kernel-owner@vger.kernel.org X-Mailing-List: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org Content-Length: 1773 Lines: 41 On Sat, 16 Dec 2006, Rafael J. Wysocki wrote: > > I think the most important problem with the binary-only drivers is that we > can't support their users _at_ _all_, but some of them expect us to support > them somehow. Actually, I do think that we've made our position on that side pretty clear. I think people do by-and-large know that if they load a binary module, they simply can't get supported by the kernel developers. We make that fairly clear at module loadign time, and I think it's also something that people who have read linux-kernel or seen other peoples bug-reports are reasonably aware of. I realize that a lot of people never read the kernel mailing list, but they probably don't look at www.kernel.org either - they got their kernel from their distribution. The only way they realize is probably by looking at where they got whatever binary modules they use. That said - it should be noted that a lot of the time when you use a binary module and have an oops, the oops doesn't necessarily have anything to do with your binary module. If I recognize the oops from other reports, I certainly won't say "I'm not going to help you, because you used a binary module". If I can tell where the problem is, the binary module is a non-issue. It's only when we try to debug things that we say "You've got a binary module, you need to reproduce this problem _without_ it, because otherwise we can't bother to waste our time on trying to debug something that may be due to somebody else". Linus - 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/