Members of the Linux community have complained that the hot new sub-notebook from Asus, the eeePC, may have violated the spirit of the Linux General Public License. Some Linux advocates claim the eeePC has not included required source code with the installed Xandros Linux distribution and does not easily enable users to install another distro. However, there are indications that eeePC fans probably don't care.
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Member since:2005-06-29
I'm glad folks like you and Priest are out there with the voice of reason. There were hundreds of zealots on Slashdot who jumped on the "boycott ASUS" bandwagon with this. Only a relative few were insightful enough to say the obvious, which is that ASUS hasn't yet violated the GPL. Just because nearly every OSS developer out there automatically ships or overtly offers for download the source to their project doesn't mean they explicitly have to. As you both said, "make available upon request" is the only requirement.
I wonder if any of the accusers have bothered to email, call or snail mail ASUS and request the source? I doubt it, but unless that happened and ASUS flat out said "no", there's really no reason to get upset at the present time.
EDIT: According to bremac's post below, it was requested and not provided. I'm still going to wait on the sidelines and see what happens here. There's no need in my mind to jump to any conclusions until more is known. I'm sincerely hoping ASUS does the right thing though; it would be a shame for such a nice piece of hardware to go away because of a stupid mistake.
Edited 2007-11-26 00:09
Member since:2005-07-06
Not provided, or the person emailing unwilling to tell us what was in the email reply or simply because the company didn't email back a reply within 5 minutes, they're obviously rebuffing him.
Dear god, not all of us sit running shotgun on the email send/receive button, and reply within 5 minutes. If there is a reason for not instantly providing the source, it would have been within the email. Too bad there is more focus on the one solitary whiner than what was actually in the email that came form ASUS in regards to the source code request.
As for the person who requested it, anyone find it rather confusing that he is silent in the whole matter? why doesn't he have the backbone to step forward and tell us the WHOLE story.
Edit: Interesting, someone has provided a link to the source code - and the forum seems to go quiet - isn't it annoying when sensationalism is destroyed in one act of fact providing?
Edited 2007-11-26 01:21
Member since:2006-03-23
i believe they are also required to provide a written offer, which i believe they did, which provided an url for download..
and if this is really the case, i think he needs not contact them, as the paper states where to download - and should this be the case, asus had better deliver the code now. its simply not acceptable that they push the product like this before they are ready to comply with the licenses, just as they wouldnt want others to do, and because its free software it doesent give them this right.
Member since:
2006-08-30
Somewhat stupid conclusion, since no one asked for the code!
The GPL clearly says that you must provide access to the source, not that you must make it available through download channels!
Edited 2007-11-25 23:36 UTC