Return-path: Received: from mx2.redhat.com ([66.187.237.31]:58988 "EHLO mx2.redhat.com" rhost-flags-OK-OK-OK-OK) by vger.kernel.org with ESMTP id S1754003AbYJBUcw (ORCPT ); Thu, 2 Oct 2008 16:32:52 -0400 Subject: Re: Agere Hermes source-code: copyright situation From: Dan Williams To: Greg KH Cc: Andrey Borzenkov , Dave , TJ , Linux Kernel Mailing List , "Casual J. Programmer" , linux-wireless@vger.kernel.org, Alexander Shirshikov In-Reply-To: <20081002200023.GC20902@kroah.com> References: <200809290949.35749.arvidjaar@mail.ru> <20081001200039.GA29874@kroah.com> <48E400FA.2090305@gmail.com> <200810020637.27321.arvidjaar@mail.ru> <20081002200023.GC20902@kroah.com> Content-Type: text/plain Date: Thu, 02 Oct 2008 16:31:57 -0400 Message-Id: <1222979517.12505.33.camel@72-58-93-37.area3.spcsdns.net> (sfid-20081002_223257_379869_3F18B909) Mime-Version: 1.0 Sender: linux-wireless-owner@vger.kernel.org List-ID: On Thu, 2008-10-02 at 13:00 -0700, Greg KH wrote: > On Thu, Oct 02, 2008 at 06:37:18AM +0400, Andrey Borzenkov wrote: > > TJ you can answer me using arvidjaar (at) newmail dot ru. Hopefully > > one of them works. Re WPA2 - there is no information how to setup > > CCMP/AES (even if firmware supports it); so no WPA2. > > > > On Thursday 02 October 2008, Dave wrote: > > > Greg KH wrote: > > > > On Wed, Oct 01, 2008 at 05:40:29PM +0100, TJ wrote: > > > >> On Wed, 2008-10-01 at 14:13 +0400, Andrey Borzenkov wrote: > > > >>>On Wednesday 01 October 2008, Greg KH wrote: > > > >>>> On Mon, Sep 29, 2008 at 09:49:34AM +0400, Andrey Borzenkov wrote: > > > >>>>> I have here driver that can be built for two different types of > > > >>>>> hardware from basically the same sources (this is port of old Agere > > > >>>>> drivers for Hermes-I/Hermes-II chipsets). > > > >>>> > > > >>>> Cool, do you have a link to the code, I'd be glad to add it to > > > >>>> drivers/staging/ if it's not in a fully-mergable state yet to get wider > > > >>>> users for it. > > > >>> > > > >>> You can look at it here: http://arvidjaar.newmail.ru/wlags49.tar.bz > > > >>> > > > >>> I doubt that it is suitable for inclusion at current state if ever. > > > >>> This is taken directly from Agere 2.4 sources; the only parts that were > > > >>> touched are kernel glue and wireless extensions interface. > > > >>> > > > >>> And it is not GPL'ed, of course. I attach E-Mail I received a while > > > >>> back with answere from Agere legal department. > > > >> > > > >> I'm attaching the original email I sent to Agere and their response for > > > >> the record, hoping it helps clarify the legal position. > > > > > > > > Very nice, thanks for forwarding this on. > > > > > > > > As the license is BSD, that means we can place it in the kernel tree. > > > > Do you all mind if I add it to the drivers/staging/ directory so you can > > > > work on cleaning it up within the main kernel tree infrastructure? > > > > > > > I do not mind but it is likely makes no sense for H-I now; and > > I do not own H-II myself so cannot work on it. If we are focusing on > > H-2/2.5, it would make more sense to make similar modifications to > > 7.22 driver set from Agere to avoid overlap with Orinoco. > > Ok, let me know what you think is the best thing to do, and I'll be glad > to help you out with it. I tend to think that only for USB hardware do we need a new driver, and that driver can share some things with both hostap and orinoco. If at all possible, lets integrate missing hardware support into _existing_ drivers instead of importing drivers of questionable quality. I've seen wlags49 before and it's not great. Right now we don't have any viable Orinoco USB driver, and while linux-wlan-ng was proposed, there's no way we're taking a third 802.11 "stack" or the bits in those drivers that overlap with existing drivers' hardware support. Dan