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To Greg Kroah-HartmanTo Greg Kroah-HartmanPosted Sep 29, 2007 0:59 UTC (Sat) by sobdk (guest, #38278)In reply to: To Greg Kroah-Hartman by Zoborov Parent article: The Linux Driver Project takes off
>If register level programming documentation's necessary to writing a fully functional driver, then how can "others who did not sign a NDA", i.e., those not privy to that documentation, able to substantially improve on it?
Well, really that depends on the NDA (Non Disclosure Agreement). Specifically it depends on what the agreement says you are not allowed to disclose. Often they simply prevent you from disclosing information about the device before it is released to the public. Or they may prevent you from disclosing information you learn about the design process or other internal hardware/software (Maybe you'll get to see the VHDL code).
As long as the NDA allows you to write a non obfuscated GPL driver then the source code should provide all of the information others will need to work on the driver in the future. All registers and "magic" numbers will be defined as clearly named constants, functions and variables will have useful names, and of course there will be comments.
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Improving the driver Posted Sep 30, 2007 18:07 UTC (Sun) by filker0 (guest, #31278) [Link] It also depends on how the driver is being improved. If the improvement is in how it interacts withthe hardware, having access to the additional information may be very useful. If the improvement is, however, in any other area of the driver, that can be done without reference to the hardware docs (if any exist).
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