Alexandre Oliva wrote:
- Sorry, I don't understand them myself. I just copied them from the
Windows driver.
I didn't write this driver, but this is the most likely correct
answer. Still given that I needed to explain color correction lookup
tables to you. I _seriously_ doubt your ability to decide if this
makes some code non free.
What does one thing have to do with the other? You're talking of
technical matters, I'm talking of ethical matters.
But the difference is only technical.
> How would my
technical lack of knowledge about one particular kind of device make
me unable to figure out whether someone is trying to stop others from
enjoying the four freedoms on a piece of code?
There a many pieces of source code I don't understand. Does that make
the person who wrote them evil?
That's not a technical
issue at all.
If it is possible for me to understand something and I don't, then it is
a technical issue.
Now, once it performs a functional role, then studying and
understanding it has a broader meaning: you have to understand what
each number actually means.
There was a time before compilers were ubiquitous that people routinely
did this. The fact the for some devices now there may be an easier way
doesn't affect the morality of doing it by hand.
Now, compare that with the register initialization code. How can I
adapt it such that the code does what I need, if I can't really know
what it's doing?
Have you established, for each of these cases, that it is impossible for
you or someone else to learn what the numbers mean and modify them?
I don't buy that. If there's a register there, it's because someone
put it there for a reason, and changing it must have some effect,
otherwise it wouldn't be there in the first place. But there's a big
difference between "we don't know, it was like this when we got here"
to "we know it, but we're not going to tell you".
Exactly. And have you followed up every instance to prove that your
failure to understand the values is in fact because the required
information is intentionally withheld?
--
Les Mikesell
lesmikesell@xxxxxxxxx
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