On 20/11/05, Lee Revell <rlrevell@email-addr-hidden-job.com> wrote:
> [...] a completely undebuggable setup [...]
> we have NO IDEA what the nvidia driver is
> doing thus we CANNOT help you with any kernel problem at all.
Bleh :-) All that's necessary is to verify the same problem exists
without the closed driver loaded, then go back to using it and
debug away, isn't it?
Then, you may not know what the closed driver is doing, but you
do know what it's not doing - ie. causing the problem you're
trying to debug.
Additionally, since it's very likely that debugging of setups which
make use of closed drivers has occured, and will continue to
occur, often with success, it's far from true to say that such a setup
is "completely undebuggable". Because, simply, in many cases
the fault being debugged is just not due to the closed driver,
which is working perfectly well, and according to the manufacturer's
description. (For examples of this, look at the many instances on
distro support lists of people debugging their installations of non-free
drivers. glxgears, anyone? ;-)
If you want to take an ethical stance of not helping anyone who
uses closed drivers, that may be a defensible position. But it's no
use pretending there are well-founded and absolute technical
reasons for it -- it's an ethical choice, a thoroughgoing boycott if
you like, not a technical necessity.
It's true that the use of closed drivers brings with it an element
of uncertainty, which may deter people from getting involved in
solving a problem, but that doesn't make it "completely
undebuggable".
So it seems to me, anyway.
- Pete.
Received on Mon Nov 21 00:15:05 2005
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