Fwd: AMD deciding _now_ what to do about Linux

[Wilko Bulte]

On Sat, Jun 16, 2007 at 02:16:48PM -0700, Garrett Cooper wrote..
> Wilko Bulte wrote:
> >On Sat, Jun 16, 2007 at 10:33:00AM +0100, Dieter wrote..
> >  
> >>So who, exactly, is the best person to write to requesting
> >>docs for AMD/ATI graphics/video chips?
> >>
> >>We need to politely inform them that
> >>
> >>	There are a lot of operating systems out there,
> >>	and they all need high quality, fully functional drivers.
> >>	FreeBSD, NetBSD, OpenBSD, Plan-9, Open-Solaris, ...
> >>
> >>	We might want to add a ATI graphics/video card to a computer
> >>	with a different CPU architecture (Alpha, Sparc, PPC, ...)
> >>
> >>	Binary drivers are useless, because:
> >>		Too many OSes.
> >>		Too many CPU archs.
> >>		Can't fix bugs.
> >>		Can't fix security holes.
> >>	Therefore we need documentation on how to program the chips.
> >>
> >>	2D is not enough.  We need video decoding and 3D.
> >>
> >>	If we can't have high quality, fully functional source code drivers
> >>	for the OS and CPU arch of our choice, then there is no reason to
> >>	buy the product.
> >>
> >>Have I left out anything?
> >>    
> >
> >Well.. yes.  "How much revenue ($$) AMD will loose when these open
> >source projects do not get the chip docs".
> >
> >Ultimately the $$ question is what exec level management will ask.
> >
> >  
>    Countering the above statements (the following are important 

I would not call that countering, I think we agree?

> questions to answer, and should be done by their business types with 
> more hard data):
>    How much money will AMD lose on competitive edge versus market 
> segment share for the particular open source customer base?

And is that enough to be noticable in the grander (MS-Windows) scheme of
things>

>    How much of the ATI drivers will they have to modify in order to 
> ensure that they remain IP protected and the extremely proprietary 
> sections don't get put out in the open by accident?

The outcome might even be that this is not worthwhile for them..
(blackest possible outcome, I agree).

> -Garrett

-- 
Wilko Bulte				wilko at FreeBSD.org