Re: [gNewSense-users] firmware in cx88-blackbird.c

[Karl Goetz]

On Fri, 2008-06-20 at 09:58 +0200, Carsten Agger wrote:
> Karl Goetz <address@hidden> wrote:
> > >

<trim>

> If this is the preferred form of modification, then it *must* be argued that 
> it is free; if there´s no hidden source code, then the hex data *is* the 
> source code in and of itself, and then the software is free if the file is 
> under a free license.

This is probably true - i tend to think of 'prefered form of
modification' (workding ok?) as something understandable
<trim>

> That would be nice, but this is more a question about coding practises: Yes, 
> writing code so that it´s clear and easy to read, and keeping it well 
> documented, is a good coding practise which I myself strive to follow. It 
> does not, however, have anything to do with the question of whether the code 
> is free/non-free.
> 
> Otherwise, I know of a great number of Perl scripts which would also have to 
> be marked as non-free because they contain so convoluted one-liners and 
> regular expressions that they can probably only ever be understood by the 
> author.
> 

*grin*
point well made.

> What matters is ultimately not whether data is hexadecimal or not, but whether
> 
> a) you´re free to use, modify, share and improve it and
> b) it "hides" some source code which was used to generate it
> 
> if ( a and not b) -> the software is free, and this would be true even if it 
> was all hexadecimal.
> 

Your right of course, thanks for clarifying it.
kk

> br
> Carsten
> 
> --
> http://www.modspil.dk
> 
> 
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-- 
Karl Goetz,
Debian user / Ubuntu contributor / gNewSense contributor
http://www.kgoetz.id.au

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