Binary-only kernel modules may be banned [LWN.net]

Binary-only kernel modules may be banned

Posted Dec 14, 2006 3:16 UTC (Thu) by tjc (guest, #137)
In reply to: Binary-only kernel modules may be banned by einstein
Parent article: Binary-only kernel modules may be banned

If this takes effect, linux desktop adoption will stagnate, and Linux will generally be used only in server rooms until replaced by microsoft boxes. On the desktop, linux will be used only by hobbyists or others with no requirement for good graphics performance, or possibly used by shrill extremists. It's a shame really, Linux had the potential to be a world class desktop, and gain a foothold in the market - Solaris and BSD are beginning to look like the best last hope for a non-microsoft dominated future.

Your doomsday prediction seems to be based on the assumption that we all play games, or have some other need for fast 3D graphics, but many of us don't. This change could be in effect for a year or more before I even noticed it. So my prediction is much less dramatic: I think a few people might go back to dual-booting Windows, but that's about it.

Linux isn't a great gaming platform anyway, so at this point there isn't a big gaming community to defect. People can't leave it they aren't even here.

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Binary-only kernel modules may be banned

Posted Dec 14, 2006 6:32 UTC (Thu) by einstein (subscriber, #2052) [Link]

> Your doomsday prediction seems to be based on the assumption that we all play games, or have some other need for fast 3D graphics, but many of us don't. This change could be in effect for a year or more before I even noticed it. So my prediction is much less dramatic: I think a few people might go back to dual-booting Windows, but that's about it.

Actually, the death of linux on the desktop is not a doomsday prediction - it's sad, but life will go on, and another platform will take the place of linux. It would have been great if the linux developers could have either created drivers that people would want to use instead of the proprietary ones, or learned to work with 3rd parties like nvidia. But instead of working to address the problems, they instead are going to tell the 3rd party vendors to go take a hike, and leave the users high and dry. Not a good situation.

BTW you're mistaken in thinking that "nobody cares about good graphics anyway, except for a handful of gamers". Yeah, who wants to watch DVDs or use google earth anyway? I'll bet you also thought 640k or RAM ought to be enough for anybody, right?

> Linux isn't a great gaming platform anyway, so at this point there isn't a big gaming community to defect. People can't leave it they aren't even here.

Actually linux is a marvelous gaming platform - I've been playing hardware accelerated networked 3D FPS games on linux for years, and it absolutely rocks. The fact that you either don't play games, or choose to use a windoze peecee for all your gaming, doesn't really earn you any credibility points to talk about gaming on linux...

Binary-only kernel modules may be banned

Posted Dec 14, 2006 8:48 UTC (Thu) by kune (guest, #172) [Link]

I don't think that the Linux community is to blame for the situation. It's pretty damn hard to write a driver for a complex hardware, for which you don't have access to the hardware developers. Even if you have some documentation and source code available, it's incomplete, might have errors and doesn't tell you about hardware bugs. It's pretty difficult if you know that hundreds of registers are filled with some values and you have no bloody idea, what the function of 95% of those registers are.

Binary-only kernel modules may be banned

Posted Dec 14, 2006 9:50 UTC (Thu) by seyman (subscriber, #1172) [Link]

> I don't think that the Linux community is to blame for the situation.

It's interesting to note the blame-shifting that occurs where NVidia's binary video drivers are concerned.

- The free drivers suck. This apparently isn't NVidia's fault (which is strange since they maintain it) but the kernel developers'.
- The non-free drivers aren't free. This apparently isn't NVidia's fault.
- This makes the drivers impossible to ship as part of the distribution. This is somehow the distribution's fault.
- They won't release the specs. This apparently isn't their fault.
- They badmouth the open source developement model. I have no idea why but this isn't their fault.

There has got to be a reason for the amount of support NVidia gets from their linux user crowd but I can't see it.

Binary-only kernel modules may be banned

Posted Dec 14, 2006 10:09 UTC (Thu) by man_ls (subscriber, #15091) [Link]

But instead of working to address the problems, they instead are going to tell the 3rd party vendors to go take a hike, and leave the users high and dry.

I would say that Linux developers have given a fair amount of support and have tried to address the problems with graphics cards vendors. In fact devs have cried out loud for card specs for years, which is everything vendors would need to release. Or release their drivers under the GPL. Their decision to release binary drivers is the worst of both worlds.

The fact that you either don't play games, or choose to use a windoze peecee for all your gaming, doesn't really earn you any credibility points to talk about gaming on linux...

There are other alternatives, you know. I don't want to risk my credibility points, but I hear consoles are pretty popular these days.

Binary-only kernel modules may be banned

Posted Dec 14, 2006 15:25 UTC (Thu) by tjc (guest, #137) [Link]

BTW you're mistaken in thinking that "nobody cares about good graphics anyway, except for a handful of gamers". Yeah, who wants to watch DVDs or use google earth anyway? I'll bet you also thought 640k or RAM ought to be enough for anybody, right?

You must have misread my post. I was speaking specifically about "fast 3D graphics" -- I made no mention of watching DVDs, and I sure didn't say anything about memory requirements.