some explanation

[sanpei]

1. GPL-Violation

i think that movikun is right. I do not have rights to give my binary to anyone before I would post my sources.

and I am not sure if I have rights to determine the time I post my sources too.

see movikun's reply here: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showpost.php?p=6047882&postcount=2

so I decide to stop posting anything temporarily. thank you movikun, you teach me a lesson.

there are many devices running a .29 kernel now, they are all formal/official distributions but their sources have not open yet.

and after HTC release their .29 binary for 32A and HERO, if they don't release the sources immediately and you think it violate the GPL, please kick their ass. you will get what you want from there.

2. what I had done.

I did little things as someone said. that's TRUE. the most time I spent, were just looking into the sources, and try to understand everything. if one get enough understandings, there are not many things to do.

we have a working kernel, proper device specified files and configurations, you can find them all in msm-kernel .29/.32 and htc-kernel .27. everyone could make same changes what I did, if he have proper skills.

I had not took a look at others works, it's unnecessary and it may have noise with other's tweaks. so it doesn't make sense that I must post my sources just because they had posted theirs.

in fact, in a programmer's view, I never think these works are much valuable.

3 why I don't release my sources.

a) I know we won't get any contribution except different binary version if I would posted my patches at current. these binaries just make things more complicated.

though you can't get my sources, but if you take a look at android/HAL sources on Google's repo and Qualcomm's site, you will find something valuable about problems we faced.

but no one except me works on that. I don't believe in some people who named everything they can name. I won't work with them, or let them get my works so easily, unless they would have made some real contribution for our community.

b) after months I had posted my kernel, yongzi posted his patch. but how many people care about his work? everyone just remember something like XXkernel. what are these XXkernels?

I don't like that. I am not someone like yongzi. it's a game for me: I want to see if I do not post my patches, could these people get things done by themselves? I have shown what could be done at least, now it's our heroes's turn. they won't have any excuse to make their great named kernel staying with old radio anymore.

I am not aiming at users and ROM devs, I am talking about someone made their brand on a kernel they mashed up. if they named it as XXkernels, they should provide something special, but not a normal kernel with others patches.

even Ubuntu won't name the kernel they used as "UbuntuKernel", though they did much more. but it happened in our community. yes GPL don't prevent that, but I don't want these named kernels to include my work.

c) when I had posted the kernel binary, GPS could not work in some ROM. some people just said that the bug is in the kernel, and they didn't have the kernel sources.

now, we all get GPS working by replacing a different libgps.so, with same kernel binary.

how can you expect me to work with these people? they even don't want to understand anything, just try to mash things up and name it. if it doesn't work, all faults belong to others. and if you ask them something they have known, they never response. yes, they obeyed the GPL with their "release".

you could think they are good. but personally, I won't encourage their behaviors. the only way I can choose, just refuse to share my sources. if I have other choices, I won't be so disagreeable.

--------------

the .32 kernel is deleted temporary.

 

[movikun]

First off, let me commend you for coming clean, and at least trying to explain yourself, and not just getting angry and slurring those criticising. Thank you.

However, you seriously misunderstand the GPL. It is NOT up to you to decide if the license applies to you or not, dependent on how many changes you made. Normally i would just link to the license and scream "rtfl!", but I do NOT want this to turn into a flamewar. However, before i begin let me be clear, i am ONLY talking about the linux kernel. The rest of android is licensed under MIT, and sense bit are propietary. And it's only the Linux kernel i'm concerned about. So, let's go:

- You get the source from google/htc/motorolla/someone else. It is licensed under to you under the GPL. Which means you must abide by it, or not use the code.
- You modify it for you personal needs. This is permitted, and encouraged. You do not need to distribute anything, since it's only for you personal use.
- You've decided you want to pass along the binaries to your friend, with your changes. AT THIS VERY MOMENT you MUST give him the source code, and this is NOT NEGOTIABLE. He has every right to get the source code, just as you did when you got the source code from google, and thats because you made changes to GPL code. GPL is viral and it was deisgined SPECIFICALLY to do JUST THAT.

Also, another error that you make, is that you think that you can make a non-gpl release. Such a thing doesn't exist. You cannot change the license of GPL code. Once code is GPL, it STAYS GPL.

And yes, HTC was VERY late on numerous occasions with it's sources. We know that. However, that's not an excuse. Do you kill people just because there are murders on the world? Of course not, because they're wrong. GPL-Violations is already informed and working on getting the 32A 1.2 sources, and if it comes to that, they'll work on that too. However, that does NOT give you the right to whithold your sources.

To summarize : either you don't release the sources to the kernel, admit you're breaking the GPL, stop distributing your 2.6.29 and 2.6.32, or you put up a tarball/github somewhere, and the community will gladly accept it. The choice is yours.

P.S. This has made me, and a couple of other close devs feel extremely distastefull. The Magic scene is loosing developers to the N1 extremely fast, and it's just sad that we have to fight each other to play by the rules.

#teamdouche

 

[bcrook]

sanpei, we all know what its like to work for this community. You release something and people blame you for any little bug and also never give you credit.

Despite this, I really hope you decide to post your sources, it would great to have and there are lots of people who could do great work with it. The point of this community to work together and not withhold your work because you want to be the only one with it.

 

[wesgarner]

Honestly, I just want to ask where did you get the information needed to create the AMSS 6355 patch or where did you obtain that code?

 

[kud0s]

sanpei, we all know what its like to work for this community. You release something and people blame you for any little bug and also never give you credit.

Despite this, I really hope you decide to post your sources, it would great to have and there are lots of people who could do great work with it. The point of this community to work together and not withhold your work because you want to be the only one with it.

Just as an outsider who lurks but really does not post anything usefull. I find the majority of the posters are very thankful on this forum. The problem is, for every 15 thank you's the one flame will be heard more than all the gratitude.

I think you should just ignore the detractors and focus on the thankful people. Pissy people will always make a bigger fuss than a happy one, yet the happy ones are the ones you need to keep happy. The unhappy ones can go to hell.

 

[sanpei]

First off, let me commend you for coming clean, and at least trying to explain yourself, and not just getting angry and slurring those criticising. Thank you.

However, you seriously misunderstand the GPL. It is NOT up to you to decide if the license applies to you or not, dependent on how many changes you made. Normally i would just link to the license and scream "rtfl!", but I do NOT want this to turn into a flamewar. However, before i begin let me be clear, i am ONLY talking about the linux kernel. The rest of android is licensed under MIT, and sense bit are propietary. And it's only the Linux kernel i'm concerned about. So, let's go:

- You get the source from google/htc/motorolla/someone else. It is licensed under to you under the GPL. Which means you must abide by it, or not use the code.
- You modify it for you personal needs. This is permitted, and encouraged. You do not need to distribute anything, since it's only for you personal use.
- You've decided you want to pass along the binaries to your friend, with your changes. AT THIS VERY MOMENT you MUST give him the source code, and this is NOT NEGOTIABLE. He has every right to get the source code, just as you did when you got the source code from google, and thats because you made changes to GPL code. GPL is viral and it was deisgined SPECIFICALLY to do JUST THAT.

Also, another error that you make, is that you think that you can make a non-gpl release. Such a thing doesn't exist. You cannot change the license of GPL code. Once code is GPL, it STAYS GPL.

And yes, HTC was VERY late on numerous occasions with it's sources. We know that. However, that's not an excuse. Do you kill people just because there are murders on the world? Of course not, because they're wrong. GPL-Violations is already informed and working on getting the 32A 1.2 sources, and if it comes to that, they'll work on that too. However, that does NOT give you the right to whithold your sources.

To summarize : either you don't release the sources to the kernel, admit you're breaking the GPL, stop distributing your 2.6.29 and 2.6.32, or you put up a tarball/github somewhere, and the community will gladly accept it. The choice is yours.

P.S. This has made me, and a couple of other close devs feel extremely distastefull. The Magic scene is loosing developers to the N1 extremely fast, and it's just sad that we have to fight each other to play by the rules.

I think you are right. thank you for this lesson

for discussions:

I think I have a workaround on this: if I claim a organization, and our members can get my binary, and this organization never distribute anything to the world out of it. then it will not violate the GPL.

Honestly, I just want to ask where did you get the information needed to create the AMSS 6355 patch or where did you obtain that code?

you already have all things as I have.

in fact, I think you could make the patch in 1 or 2 days if you would think about how things work seriously.

 

[alan090]

I think you are right. thank you for this lesson

for discussions:

I think I have a workaround on this: if I claim a organization, and our members can get my binary, and this organization never distribute anything to the world out of it. then it will not violate the GPL.



you already have all things as I have.

in fact, I think you could make the patch in 1 or 2 days if you would think about how things work seriously.

i have your binary and everyone on xda has it
we want the source for it and you refuse
you are a good coder im sure but you dont share the OSS spirit many of us do obviously - we just want everyone to share the code and give credit where credit is due
do you see people ripping off cyanogen for his kernel? they modify and give credit to cyanogen and this is the SPIRIT of the GPL (thanks for your work bcrook on cm kernel)
same with wes - thanks for all your work too wes - hopefully we can get NR kernel over from you soon - love your old radio version that was compiled

your above comment proves you just use FOSS and dont abide by the rules
dont release anything in the future if u dont have sources

thanks

edit: looking at your OP i dont believe you grasp OSS and the liscense
to release anything to the public can be done w/o source
the liscense states that if someone requests the source you must provide it (lots of request for your source)
HTC COMPLIES BECAUSE IF ASKED THEY WILL RELEASE



second to ahkmsk - i looked at your thread and honestly if you dont want to develop for a device you dont have then DONT
your roms are always half cooked and rarely updated / fixed - personally the only DAILY rom you released was your superD port (daily meaning i can use it on a daily basis and not be hampered by bugs or lost functionality)
maybe you should wait to own a device before you develop so you are motivated to release fully functioning roms and not half baked sense roms based on dumps


you guys are the queens of drama...

 

[wesgarner]

I think you are right. thank you for this lesson

for discussions:

I think I have a workaround on this: if I claim a organization, and our members can get my binary, and this organization never distribute anything to the world out of it. then it will not violate the GPL.



you already have all things as I have.

in fact, I think you could make the patch in 1 or 2 days if you would think about how things work seriously.

Or as the beauty of the dev community, share
Of course I always give credit where credit is due - you wouldn't be disincluded
I have all of the code and have cleaned it up nicely only one bug left in it for audio - if you would like you could look at the commits and see if u see my (probable) typo

 

[sanpei]

sanpei, we all know what its like to work for this community. You release something and people blame you for any little bug and also never give you credit.

Despite this, I really hope you decide to post your sources, it would great to have and there are lots of people who could do great work with it. The point of this community to work together and not withhold your work because you want to be the only one with it.

I never said I won't release the sources forever. I just feel uncomfortable many people did things in such a way.

so if they have troubles, I don't want this trouble to be resolved by me.

and not to put too fine a point on it, I find that there not so many people who could do some serious work with the kernel, if they just wait for someone to provide the correct patches.

they should try to understand what they MUST understand. after this, we would believe that they could do something valuable, but not just name things already exists.

 

[sanpei]

...

...

my request is very simple:

create a real project which belongs to community only, do not call it with any uncommon name.

I don't think that cm-kernel, WGKernel, or sanpei kernel do really exist. all of these are just normal linux kernel, with some public patches and little changes.

we should not name the kernel binary we release to users too. because what we did just too trivial to mention if we compare these works with real kernel development. and some option tweaks are absolute nothing.

(you could name the ROM releases)

and we should promise that we will work in this project in the future, and we won't make a named kernel again, unless you rewrite more than 1/10 codes of the kernel and make it real different from a common kernel.

then, I will work with you guys together, you will find that I am not so idiotic as you may think now.

 

[Case_]

you already have all things as I have.

in fact, I think you could make the patch in 1 or 2 days if you think about how things work seriously.

Oh for god's sake, if you know the solution, why don't you just TELL us what to do?? Or better yet, produce a kernel patch? Stop playing this annoying "I know something you don't, tee-hee, figure it out yourself!" game of yours.

I don't have much against you personally and I didn't want to get involved in this at all, because I really didn't give that much to Android community myself in the first place (and it's not because I wouldn't want to), but this selfish attitude of yours is annoying the hell out of me really (to put it mildly). What good is it to know something and sit on it selfishly for months instead of sharing it so others can benefit from it? And why not in exchange let others help YOU figure out the things you seem to struggle with, whenever it is because you're busy or simply because you don't know the solution, which happens to any of us sometimes, even the brightest? Isn't that the whole point of joining a community in the first place?

If everyone in the Android community was following your example, there would most likely be no community at all by now. There would just be a bunch of people like Cyanogen or Wes posting about what great things have they done with their phones that they won't allow others to reuse. What a community feeliing...

If you don't want to release something, don't, that's fine by me, I don't care that much as others do about you following GPL or not (although I really should, it exists for a reason), but if you decide so, then please also stop boasting to others about all those awesome things you have and won't give them. It doesn't make you look wise, it just makes you look like a wiseass.

You're also saying you don't like that people are splicing ROMs together with bits and pieces of other ROMs, yet instead of setting an example on how to do it right all you do is give people your kernel binary (and I mean the .29 in your ROMs, not just the .32 you've shared here earlier today) instead of kernel source. What good is the kernel binary if people can't modify it and/or compile it themselves as they should? If someone wants to make a ROM for 32A new radio, they pretty much have to do exactly what you dislike - splice your kernel binary with some other ROM and hope for the best. The effect is that you've been deliberately slowing the 32A community's progress for months now, because of...of what, exactly? Fame? The feeling of uniqueness? The community is already weakening as the many are moving to N1, why the hell would you want to weaken it even more and intentionally by denying others access to what you have available? What's the point? Unless you really don't have the sources as some people are implying, but then, why don't simply confess and be done with it with style?

I really don't get this at all.

 

[GuestK00288]

On a separate but related note, if devs in general don't like the hacks among us (such as myself ) cooking ROMs by taking bits and pieces from everyone and splicing them together, then please let us know. I don't want to post the little I have done if it will upset the majority of devs.

Unfortunately as Case just stated, I personally have felt the need to try (as lame as my efforts may seem to the far more knowledgeable devs) to put ROMs together for the 32a Magic community and myself even if they have some bugs. We just don't have any other option at this point if we want to go with the new radio.

The majority of posters seem to always give credit where it is deserved when taking from devs.

 

[alan090]

my request is very simple:

create a real project which belongs to community only, do not call it with any uncommon name.

I don't think that cm-kernel, WGKernel, or sanpei kernel does really exist. all of these are just normal linux kernel, with some public patches and little changes.

we should not name the kernel binary we release to users too. because what we did just too trivial to mention if we compare these works with real kernel development.

(you could name the ROM releases)

and we should promise that we will work in this project in the future, and we won't make a named kernel again, except you rewrite more than 1/10 codes of kernel at least.

then, I will work with you guys together. you will find that I am not so idiotic as you think now.

I don't think your an idiot sanpei
I just think we all have a little ways to go here
If you are willing to work on a community kernel with WG im sure all the people involved in porting/rom building will be happy to make you proud of your work
sure people like bcrook and others would be happy to contribute as well
what we just want is you to work with us - not for us

i know i will be happy to work with a new kernel on porting
i will also look into rom cooking more and work with other members to release awesome roms based on 32a community kernel
we just want to work together right

 

[sanpei]

...

...

I have already said that I am NOT aiming at ROM devs. the ROM is full filled with your personal styles. that's why people love your ROM. and do you think the kernel works is more difficult or valuable than what you did? absolutely NO.

I am just talking about the kernel. every named kernels are nothing different essentially. they are all one thing and they all have same patches. would you copy Cyanogen's ROM, just install/remove some apps, and name it as yours?

and I don't feel I am wise, uniqueness or somewhat, I just want to struggle with these behaviors. so I refuse to share my work with any named kernel.

the only way to prevent them from getting my patches, just do not post the sources until they are really work together, at a common project as things should go.

 

[sanpei]

...

and if all of you think what I did just slowing your progress, OK , I will QUIT. anyway, all of you will get HTC's kernel in next months.

and may I remind you, before I had posted the binary, most people had thought that it's impossible to let msm-kernel work with new radio. at least, they know it could work now. make your efforts, it's not so late.

btw, there are not any spiritual needs what I could get from these works, except the understandings on how these devices work. I have more important things in my life. I just did things on my way. that's all.

you are right on one thing. I shouldn't talk about all these bull-****. if I just had taken the binary from others who you don't know and they couldn't release their sources for some reasons, all of you will be satisfied.

so everybody here, I am just a LIAR . what you have got is STOLEN by me from somewhere. what I said above just my EXCUSEs. the fact is: I DO NOT have the sources

 

[trivita]

to me it's simple
your feelings could be understood
but once you release the binary to the public
you have to release the source code according to GPL

you may want to define the word 'public'
but you never want to redefine GPL license

that's it

 

[sanpei]

I don't think your an idiot sanpei
I just think we all have a little ways to go here
If you are willing to work on a community kernel with WG im sure all the people involved in porting/rom building will be happy to make you proud of your work
sure people like bcrook and others would be happy to contribute as well
what we just want is you to work with us - not for us

i know i will be happy to work with a new kernel on porting
i will also look into rom cooking more and work with other members to release awesome roms based on 32a community kernel
we just want to work together right

first, thank you for your kind words.

and I hope that other developers could make the patches soon, then I don't need to steal something from somewhere anymore.

you may not get the patches from me, because I am not sure if I can steal sources.

 

[novat]

my request is very simple:

create a real project which belongs to community only, do not call it with any uncommon name.

I don't think that cm-kernel, WGKernel, or sanpei kernel do really exist. all of these are just normal linux kernel, with some public patches and little changes.

we should not name the kernel binary we release to users too. because what we did just too trivial to mention if we compare these works with real kernel development. and some option tweaks are absolute nothing.

(you could name the ROM releases)

and we should promise that we will work in this project in the future, and we won't make a named kernel again, unless you rewrite more than 1/10 codes of the kernel and make it real different from a common kernel.

then, I will work with you guys together, you will find that I am not so idiotic as you may think now.

Hey Sanpei,

First of all I wanted to say thanks for the work you have done for 32a! I really appreciate it - it is something that I cannot do and have no knowledge of!

Secondly, I can understand the issue you have with the naming of the Kernel given that its more just tweaks to the linux kernel that is being done and not a whole new Kernel re-write. However, I think it is still necessary to give it some sort of a name for version tracking and to make sure that people know which version of the Kernel is being discussed / used.

So how about this: For the Kernel that you and others collectively work on for the community why don't we give it a generic name that is not specific to any one developer? We could call it "XDA32a Kernel" or something, that way we can track changes to our community Kernel and if something goes wrong or if there are bugs, people don't point the finger at any one developer/coder.

What do you think?

 

[sanpei]

Hey Sanpei,

First of all I wanted to say thanks for the work you have done for 32a! I really appreciate it - it is something that I cannot do and have no knowledge of!

Secondly, I can understand the issue you have with the naming of the Kernel given that its more just tweaks to the linux kernel that is being done and not a whole new Kernel re-write. However, I think it is still necessary to give it some sort of a name for version tracking and to make sure that people know which version of the Kernel is being discussed / used.

So how about this: For the Kernel that you and others collectively work on for the community why don't we give it a generic name that is not specific to any one developer? We could call it "XDA32a Kernel" or something, that way we can track changes to our community Kernel and if something goes wrong or if there are bugs, people don't point the finger at any one developer/coder.

What do you think?

I agree with a generic name.

every binary release should provide correct commit code. they will give all the information we need in a build.

but you should talk to other developers. I just a thief and I can't get sources

 

[novat]

Awesome Well I can't code or anything but I am a software tester by profession, and so I have some idea of project management... Maybe I could help get our 32a devs together to work on a joint kernel project?

Who would you suggest I contact to try to get together on a kernel dev team? Yourself, wez, cursor, any others?