[mythtv-users] Is NVIDIA worth the bother?

[Eric Sharkey]

On Mon, Sep 28, 2009 at 4:04 PM, David Brodbeck <gull at gull.us> wrote:
> On Fri, September 25, 2009 7:24 am, Eric Sharkey wrote:
>> And
>> dealing with the fact that your kernel is officially tainted at that
>> point.
>
> Is this really a problem if you're not a kernel developer?  To me the
> "taint flag" has always just seemed like one of those political things.

I personally haven't had a problem with this issue.  There are two
ways in which the tainted flag can be problematic.  One is kernel devs
that refuse to even help diagnose a problem on a tainted kernel.
Another are drivers or other modules that refuse to load with a
tainted kernel.

The latter case is the real purpose of the tainted flag.  Since
there's been some disagreement about the GPL and exactly what
constitutes creation of a derivative work, the tainted flag allows
both view points to coexist more or less peacefully.  When authoring a
module, strict GPL adherents may choose to forbid the module to load
into a tainted kernel to prevent the module from linking with
incompatible code.  On the other hand, those module authors who don't
see loading a module into a kernel as creating a derivative work can
simply ignore the flag.

Most module authors appear to be in the latter camp, at least
officially.  I suspect that some of them do feel that a derivative
work is created, but still choose to ignore the flag anyway on
practical or pragmatic grounds, with the desire to open their work to
a larger audience.

Eric