policy on GPL'd drivers?

[David Leimbach]

On Tuesday, May 27, 2003, at 01:40PM, David O'Brien <dev-null at NUXI.com> wrote:

>On Tue, May 27, 2003 at 07:43:15AM -0500, David Leimbach wrote:
>> >However the idea is that all GPL infected stuff be isolated, allowing a
>> >fully working kernel without GPL stuff in there.
>> 
>> Sounds like a "kernel module" is the way to go then.  Perhaps it could
>> exist in the ports tree instead of the mainline kernel sources :).  I
>> know I'd be happy with that... the problem is hosting the driver since
>> I am sure "patching" it won't be enough to map the linux innards to
>> freebsd's.
>
>Depending on the functionality the driver provides, and the kernel API's
>it uses; having it as a port may be impractical.  The driver probably
>needs to change with the kernel and that is hard to handle as a port.


I agree it could get sticky.  But a patch or series of patches per kernel 
delta [as needed] may not be so bad.  There has to be a fairly simple way
to map the two together :).  And I really only would "have to" support releases.

I'd prefer to burn that bridge once I've got a working driver though....  Don't want
to jump ahead too much for fear of the old bike shed.

Dave