On 27/11/2006, at 3:49 PM, Les Mikesell wrote:
Well, thanks to google, you can still find something closer to what he really meant back when he wrote it. Here is an excerpt from an interview circa 1998: "The reason I accept binary-only modules at all is that in many cases you have for example a device driver that is not written for Linux at all, but for example works on SCO Unix or other operating systems, and the manufacturer suddenly wakes up and notices that Linux has a larger audience than the other groups. And as a result he wants to port that driver to Linux. But because that driver was obviously not _derived_ from Linux (it had a life of its own regardless of any Linux development), I didn't feel that I had the moral right to require that it be put under the GPL, so the binary-only module interface allows those kinds of modules to exist and work with Linux." I don't see much room for doubt about his intent then or any reason to question that moral judgement.
Linus, like everybody, is entitled to an opinion and has the right to voice it. He may or may not find binary-only modules acceptable, but this has no bearing whatsoever on the licensing terms of code released under the GPL. Cheers Steffen.
