Message-ID: <1478864146.4129.4.camel@sipsolutions.net> (sfid-20161111_123557_329089_97732DE0)
Subject: Re: [RFC] qtn: add FullMAC firmware for Quantenna QSR10G wifi device
From: Johannes Berg <johannes@sipsolutions.net>
To: IgorMitsyanko <igor.mitsyanko.os@quantenna.com>
Cc: linux-wireless@vger.kernel.org, btherthala@quantenna.com,
        hwang@quantenna.com, smaksimenko@quantenna.com,
        dlebed@quantenna.com, Igor Mitsyanko <imitsyanko@quantenna.com>,
        Kamlesh Rath <krath@quantenna.com>,
        Sergey Matyukevich <smatyukevich@quantenna.com>,
        Avinash Patil <avinashp@quantenna.com>,
        Ben Hutchings <ben@decadent.org.uk>,
        Kyle McMartin <kyle@kernel.org>
Date: Fri, 11 Nov 2016 12:35:46 +0100
In-Reply-To: <d1cfaf8a-55a6-3a7c-9e9d-ec810fe5b80d@quantenna.com>
References: <1478700000-11624-1-git-send-email-igor.mitsyanko.os@quantenna.com>
         <1478706966.18306.1.camel@sipsolutions.net>
         <2fcb5f28-808e-f296-7e91-e5185e7577c9@quantenna.com>
         <1478725543.21403.4.camel@sipsolutions.net>
         <d1cfaf8a-55a6-3a7c-9e9d-ec810fe5b80d@quantenna.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="UTF-8"
Mime-Version: 1.0
Sender: linux-wireless-owner@vger.kernel.org

Adding linux-firmware people to Cc, since presumably they don't
necessarily read linux-wireless...

> Johannes, from that perspective, who are the "redistributors"? 

> Specifically, is linux-firmware git repository considered a
> redistributor or its just hosting files? I mean, at what moment
> someone else other then Quantenna will start to be legally obliged to
> make GPL code used in firmware available for others?

Look, I don't know. I'd assume people who ship it, like any regular
distro, would be (re)distributors thereof. "Normal" (non-GPL) firmware
images come with a redistribution license, but that obviously can't
work here.

There's some info from Ben here regarding the carl9170 case:
http://lkml.iu.edu/hypermail/linux/kernel/1605.3/01176.html

> Personally I still hope that linux-firmware itself is not legally 
> concerned with what is the content of firmware its hosting, but looks
> like there already was a precedent case  with carl9170 driver and
> we have to somehow deal with it.

That's really all I wanted to bring up. I'm not involved with the
linux-firmware git tree.

> There still may be a difference though: Quantenna is semiconductor 
> company only, software
> used on actual products based on Quantenna chipsets is released by
> other 
> companies.
> I just want to present our legal team with a clear case (and position
> of 
> Linux maintainers) so that they can
> work with it and make decision on how to proceed.
> 
>  From technical perspective, as I mentioned, SDK is quite huge and 
> include a lot of opensource
> components including full Linux, I don't think its reasonable to have
> it 
> inside linux-firmware tree.
> What are the options to share it other then providing it on request
> basis:
> - git repository
> - store tarball somewhere on official website

Clearly that wasn't deemed appropriate for carl9170, so I don't see why
it'd be different here.

johannes