Ndiswrapper… Farewell?

Ok, so it is well known on here that I am an avid Linux user and supporter of the Open Source community and also support the freedom of software, the freedom to do what I want on my computer and on the web. Now it seems, however, that that community has taken a step towards becoming what I hate so much about the Microsoft business model: loss of freedoms. And this is being begun by none other than Linus Trovalds.

Now, if you don't know who Linus Trovalds is, he is the man who originally wrote the Linux kernel back in the early 1990's. He is now the project coordinator for the kernel development team, and he has final say as to what goes into it. This is all fine and dandy, however there are a few problems that could arise out of this, and I feel that one has.

The kernel development team is working hard on the next stable version of the 2.6 kernel, 2.6.24. According to this report the most recent update to the 2.6.24 kernel "…broke ndiswrapper by accidentally removing its access to GPL-only symbols." According to the report, Pavel Roskin, who is an avid supporter of the GNU Operating System, said, "Revert that change and add comments about the reasons why ndiswrapper and driverloader are treated in a special way."

Linus responded with the following statement:

"I'm not seeing why ndiswrapper should be treated separately.

If it loads non-GPL modules, it shouldn't be able to use GPLONLY symbols.

So if ndiswrapper needs GPL-only symbols, you'd better ask the people who made those symbols GPL-only whether they could be made available to ndiswrapper.

ndiswrapper itself is *not* compatible with the GPL. Trying to claim that ndiswrapper somehow itself is GPL'd even though it then loads modules that aren't is stupid and pointless. Clearly it just re-exports those GPLONLY functions to code that is *not* GPL'd."

My biggest confusion with this whole thing is I am not sure if this is a legal issue or not. If what the developers of ndiswrapper are doing technically doesn't follow copyright law with the windows drivers, then I would understand why Linus and other authors of the new kernel would want support dropped for it.

However, if it is not a legal issue, in anyway, and the only reason that they are trying to basically get rid of it is because THEY don't see a point in the app, or don't particularly care for it, then I think that they should just suck it up, and let it stay. There are many people out there (including myself) who are pretty much forced to use ndiswrapper because there are no default Linux drivers for their wireless cards.

I know that as of right now, I would be unable to use my Linux laptop wirelessly if ndiswrapper, or another app similar to it, was not available. Taking out the ability for the app to work to push a personal agenda will only deter potential Linux users away from the OS, and undermine what the whole ideology of the open source community. I honestly feel that they are starting to make themselves no better than Microsoft by wanting to take support out for something they do not care about. Hopefully the developers of ndiswrapper will combat this change by rewriting their code to allow ndiswrapper to work in the new kernel.