[PATCH v2] linux-firmware: brcm: Removed codeversion from firmware filenames.

[Rafał Miłecki]

2010/12/9 Henry Ptasinski <henryp at broadcom.com>:
> On Wed, Dec 08, 2010 at 02:23:49PM -0800, Greg KH wrote:
>> On Wed, Dec 08, 2010 at 11:07:53PM +0100, Rafał Miłecki wrote:
>> > 2010/12/8 Henry Ptasinski <henryp at broadcom.com>:
>> > > Second attempt at cleaning up firmware filenames.
>> > >
>> > > The basename-apiversion-codeversion construction for firmware filenames is not
>> > > used by most other firmware files, adds complexity, and is not providing any
>> > > value.  Renamed the firmware files using just basename-apiversion.  Also, fixed
>> > > WHENCE to have correct path to brcmfmac files.
>> > >
>> > > Signed-off-by: Henry Ptasinski <henryp at broadcom.com>
>> >
>> > Henry, I believe we got report that Red Hat can not include your
>> > firmware anyway because of licensing. Can you change license to some
>> > common one which allows providing your firmware with distributions?
>>
>> That's news to me, what specific licensing issue have you heard about
>> here?  Last I saw, the issues were resolved and everyone could
>> redistribute this firmware.
>
> On a thread about other firmware, Dan Williams wrote:
>
>> There's an existing Broadcom license in linux-firmware.git, and it *may*
>> be OK, but it's really, really long and given that other major companies
>> adopted the "shorter is better" approach, it's hard to believe that all
>> the existing Broadcom license text is actually needed.
>
> I'm not sure that translates to "can not include your firmware". Regardless, I
> am trying to get our license simplified.  Obviously that's taking some time,
> and I don't have any resolution yet, but I'll keep working on it.

You quoted just a selected part of Dan's message. Earlier he mentioned
about Fedora's problems (sorry, I misremembered distro)


---------- Wiadomość przekazana dalej ----------
Od: Dan Williams <dcbw at redhat.com>
Data: 21 października 2010 17:21
Temat: Re: Request for free-distributable Broadcom's (G|LP)-PHY firmware
Do: Rafał Miłecki <zajec5 at gmail.com>
DW: Henry Ptasinski <henryp at broadcom.com>, Brett Rudley
<brudley at broadcom.com>, Nohee Ko <noheek at broadcom.com>, Greg
Kroah-Hartman <gregkh at suse.de>, "linux-wireless at vger.kernel.org"
<linux-wireless at vger.kernel.org>, b43-dev
<b43-dev at lists.infradead.org>

That's not enough to allow Fedora to ship it.  We'd need a clear license
from Broadcom (ex the existing Intel or Marvell firmware licenses)
before Fedora could feel comfortable about shipping it legally in all
jurisdictions.

http://git.kernel.org/?p=linux/kernel/git/dwmw2/linux-firmware.git;a=blob;f=LICENCE.mwl8k;h=3224e1bbfba8ccd1d980f57eb88378f20bb2d146;hb=HEAD
http://git.kernel.org/?p=linux/kernel/git/dwmw2/linux-firmware.git;a=blob;f=LICENCE.libertas;h=1fd8766c26a170b50605455ae6f54b607baa12cf;hb=HEAD

There's an existing Broadcom license in linux-firmware.git, and it *may*
be OK, but it's really, really long and given that other major companies
adopted the "shorter is better" approach, it's hard to believe that all
the existing Broadcom license text is actually needed.