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Weblog:   Is Linksys shirking the GPL? (Maybe not.)
Subject:   GCC Issues
Date:   2003-07-30 11:06:33
From:   rflicken
Response to: GCC Issues

You're probably right there. It would make more sense to go bug Broadcom. But it can't hurt to ask, can it?


I'm also encouraged by the fact that the chap who got a shell running on it did so using code I compiled using a standard GCC on a Cobalt Qube. There might still be a licensing question, but if code from the standard compiler runs on the WRT54G, that's a relief.
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Showing messages 1 through 5 of 5.

  • GCC Issues
    2003-07-31 04:20:19  anonymous2 [Reply | View]

    Broadcom's under no obligation to release the mods to gcc except to their downstream users. According to RMS, use within a company does not constitute "distribution" in a sense that triggers the GPL. Linksys is also under no obligation to actually ask Broadcom for the source.
    • GCC Issues
      2003-07-31 08:12:04  anonymous2 [Reply | View]

      No, Linksys IS in a position to ask them for the source if Broadcom gave them a modified GCC binary to use. You and I, having no modified GCC binary in our possession, have no right to the source, either.
      • GCC Issues
        2003-07-31 09:17:03  anonymous2 [Reply | View]

        Read again, he said "not under obligation" not "have no right". They may not CARE what mods were made to the source.

        I agree with a previous poster, changing the config file dirs is a simple matter of messin' with the Makefile. To prove they actually made changes to the source itself, you would have to prove that the binary does something different. Comparing MD5's with a known clean GPL copy (proabably) won't work either, as they used a modified compiler. You would have to prove that the program(s) in question do something in a basicly different way than a clean version of the sources with an unmodified compiler. Good luck with that, could take a LOT of testing.
        • How I'd cheat
          2003-07-31 10:45:04  anonymous2 [Reply | View]

          First, I'd hack on GCC to accept a table of line numbers, file names, line text, and "foreign text files". Next when I invoke GCC to read a GPL'ed source file, When GCC sees a matching line number and text, it sees an implied #include, and fetches whatever mods I want to make but not publish. So this way, I've modified the GCC (which mods I may keep private), but have not touched the source. Distribute new binary, Profit!
          Sincerely (somewhat), phred.
          • How I'd cheat
            2003-07-31 22:02:33  anonymous2 [Reply | View]

            You still then would be releasing a modified binary. What does it matter how you modified it?
Showing messages 1 through 5 of 5.