They are competing on hardware, but...

They are competing on hardware, but...

Posted Feb 17, 2008 11:20 UTC (Sun) by khim (subscriber, #9252)
In reply to: Android opens door to IC open source (EE Times) by kripkenstein
Parent article: Android opens door to IC open source (EE Times)

Interface is big part of hardware, you know. And you can patch flaws with driver. The only visible part when driver is closed-source is driver's interface - and that's not a problem since it's designed by Microsoft (Sun, whatever) not manufacturer so there are no any secrets. When you publish the driver which actually talks to hardware you always have possibility of showing "too much". That being said it's all looks pretty stupid to me: modern hardware is so complex that to recreate is starting from driver is major problem - easier to design your own...

The only case to worry is when software is major part of package (remember WinModems?), but I don't know how often that happens nowadays...

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