From owner-freebsd-usb@FreeBSD.ORG Fri Jun 29 19:50:19 2007 Return-Path: X-Original-To: freebsd-usb@freebsd.org Delivered-To: freebsd-usb@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.freebsd.org (mx1.freebsd.org [69.147.83.52]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 1D6AB16A421 for ; Fri, 29 Jun 2007 19:50:19 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from imp@bsdimp.com) Received: from harmony.bsdimp.com (bsdimp.com [199.45.160.85]) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id CF04013C448 for ; Fri, 29 Jun 2007 19:50:18 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from imp@bsdimp.com) Received: from localhost (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by harmony.bsdimp.com (8.13.8/8.13.4) with ESMTP id l5TJo3nA062235; Fri, 29 Jun 2007 13:50:04 -0600 (MDT) (envelope-from imp@bsdimp.com) Date: Fri, 29 Jun 2007 13:50:41 -0600 (MDT) Message-Id: <20070629.135041.43008293.imp@bsdimp.com> To: jani.piitulainen@gmail.com From: "M. Warner Losh" In-Reply-To: <46855928.8040508@gmail.com> References: <46855928.8040508@gmail.com> X-Mailer: Mew version 5.2 on Emacs 21.3 / Mule 5.0 (SAKAKI) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: Text/Plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Greylist: Sender IP whitelisted, not delayed by milter-greylist-2.0 (harmony.bsdimp.com [127.0.0.1]); Fri, 29 Jun 2007 13:50:04 -0600 (MDT) Cc: freebsd-usb@freebsd.org Subject: Re: RTL8187 USB wireless dongle X-BeenThere: freebsd-usb@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: FreeBSD support for USB List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Fri, 29 Jun 2007 19:50:19 -0000 In message: <46855928.8040508@gmail.com> Jani Piitulainen writes: : I'd want to attempt partly writing or porting Linux driver to FreeBSD. Cool! : Which readymade usb-wifi driver would be a good "template" to start : from? if_rum I think is the most modern, but if_ural isn't bad either. I've not looked at the others. : Any GPL-license issues if I choose to port the Linux driver? As for GPL code, if you create a derivative work, you must license it under GPL. If the driver is GPL'd, then it won't be in the default kernel. If you use it as a hardware manual for the device and write your own driver from scratch, then you are free to license it however you want. Do not cut and paste code between the two, which is a definite legal no no. It would be better if you made sure that things weren't too similar either. Obviously, tables of register values to write to the card are hard to do differently, and copyright law recognizes this and tends not to offer copyright protection to those sorts of things[*]. : RTL8187 appears to be a common 802.11g chipset now, in a local store : most dongles were based on that chipset (like Netgear wg111v2, D-link : and several OEMs for ex. Digitus) and it's also been integrated on many : motherboards. : : Linux driver for RTL8187 can be found at : "http://sourceforge.net/projects/rtl8180-sa2400". They were selling here for $20 a little while ago. Warner [*] I'm not a lawyer, but merely relating a layman's understanding to another layman. If you need legal advise, consult with a competent lawyer. Copyright law can get quite murky at times around the edges and you are best off not trying to guess which side of the line any specific action would be w/o consulting a lawyer.