Re: [LONG RANT] Re: Linux stifles innovation...

[Peter Samuelson]

[Jacob Luna Lundberg]
> Just out of curiosity, why can't the specification be along the lines
> of a vendor data file saying ``if you want the printer to do x then
> say y'' and ``if the printer says x then it means y''.  That ought to
> add a lot of functionality right there.

Think about it.  A spec based on what you say would be quite easy to
reverse-compile, no?  In which case, obviously the company's IP, such
as it is, is not protected.  In which case, why not just do an open
source driver and be done with it?

The concept of architecture-independent device drivers goes back to
Open Firmware.  But in that case, there is a practical consideration:
the drivers couldn't be compiled down to machine language since they
had to be accessible as-is at boot time.

Peter