Date: Thu, 11 Oct 2001 12:34:16 -0500 From: "Scot W. Hetzel" <hetzels@westbend.net> To: "Brandon D. Valentine" <bandix@looksharp.net>, "Benjamin Close" <cisbjc@cs.unisa.edu.au> Cc: <freebsd-current@FreeBSD.ORG> Subject: Re: Approach to integrate a driver into the kernel [winmodem] Message-ID: <007201c1527a$f683b900$7d7885c0@genroco.com> References: <20011011010049.L97540-100000@turtle.looksharp.net>
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From: "Brandon D. Valentine" <bandix@looksharp.net> > On Thu, 11 Oct 2001, Benjamin Close wrote: > > I've now been using the FreeBSD winmodem driver (Available at: > >http://www.geocities.com/wtnbkysh/) under -current for a few weeks now > >and haven't noticed a single glitch. Whilst I know this is a port of a > >linux drivers and contains a binary only object from Lucent. Is there > >any chance of getting this as part of the FreeBSD kernel? There is a lot > >of people out in laptop land who would welcome this. > > I would think the license probably precludes it from inclusion. If you > want to push for commital you might do well to research a bit about how > Lucent licenses their WinModem driver under Linux, then find out if the > patches at that site you listed are BSD licensed. If your email > contains that info it probably has a better chance of getting attention. > > If the license on the kernel module is incompatible with the base > system, you might be able to get the hooks to support it committed to > FreeBSD and get the kernel modules made installable as a port. > /usr/local/modules anyone? =) > The kernel module has this copy right in it's ltmdmsio.c file: "Copyright (c) 1991 The Regents of the University of California." Upon doing a search for i56lvp578, I located a license for the ltmdmobj.o file (see ltmodem-6.00b4.tar.gz at http://www.heby.de/ltmodem): "Software sources and responsibilities. -------------------------------------------------------------- Agere Systems, Inc, (AS herein is a branch of Lucent Technologies, Inc.) AS provides the core Digital Signal Processor (DSP) code supporting the Mars/Apollo chipset used in the compatible modems. Diverse manufacturers incorporate the chips onto diverse modem cards, generally optimizing them for use under MS Windows. AS has NO responsibility for downstream modem functionality under Linux. !! Please do not annoy AS with support queries !! The List discuss@linmodems.org is the only medium for the current support of these modems under Linux. Origins of the ltmodem-5.nn series kits enhancing upon the AS base are described in DOCs/CREDITS. These resources are used at your own risk." I didn't see any other licenses in the ltmodem-6.00b4.tar.gz archive. One of the other sites mentioned that the linux ltmodem driver was GPL'd, but they also complained about the non-availablility of the source for the ltmdmobj.o file, claiming that since the linux ltmodem driver is GPL'd that the ltmdmobj.o file is also and source code should be available for it. My best guess is that the ltmdmobj.o file is the DSP code from Agere Systems, and that Agere Systems holds the copyright on it. We would need verification from Agere Systems (docmaster@agere.com ?) before including the ltmdmobj.o file. Until the license is clarified, we could make a port for the FreeBSD ltmodem driver. Scot To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-current" in the body of the message
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