Originally Posted by Richard Matthew Stallman

The Linux sources themselves have an even more serious problem with non-free software: they actually contain some. Quite a few device drivers contain series of numbers that represent firmware programs to be installed in the device. These programs are not free software. A few numbers to be deposited into device registers are one thing; a substantial program in binary is another.

The presence of these binary-only programs in ``source'' files of Linux creates a secondary problem: it calls into question whether Linux binaries can legally be redistributed at all. The GPL requires ``complete corresponding source code,'' and a sequence of integers is not the source code. By the same token, adding such a binary to the Linux sources violates the GPL.

The Linux developers have a plan to move these firmware programs into separate files; it will take a few years to mature, but when completed it will solve the secondary problem; we could make a ``free Linux'' version that doesn't have the non-free firmware files. That by itself won't do much good if most people use the non-free ``official'' version of Linux. That may well occur, because on many platforms the free version won't run without the non-free firmware. The ``free Linux'' project will have to figure out what the firmware does and write source code for it, perhaps in assembler language for whatever embedded processor it runs on. It's a daunting job. It would be less daunting if we had done it little by little over the years, rather than letting it mount up. In recruiting people to do this job, we will have to overcome the idea, spread by some Linux developers, that the job is not necessary.

Originally Posted by Whistler

GNU Coding Standards

Originally Posted by Pierre-Marie Baty

ATOMROFL!!!!!!

wahahahaha
they have a Coding Standard at GNU ? And one with a capital C and a capital S even !!! bwahahaha :D :D :D

Originally Posted by Whistler

Reverse engineering isn't illegal in some countries, and if someone can figure out how the drivers work and then reimplement it, it will be a good workaround

The kernel named Linux does includes some non-free bits (aka "firmware", which is essensially binaries rather than source code, and we can't tell where they come from), but the GNU project don't actually support this. Linus Torvalds may be one of those "open source" guys who think everything in a pragmatic way, and only care about technical advancements and "success" (draw more users by saying "we have good software!" and not freedom)
http://www.eff.org/privnow/