Last night I spent a lot of time thinking about an issue that has hit the OpenBSD community and how it will be seen by the general public (those who are interested). Theo de Raadt has made a decision not to support some Adaptec controllers due to lack of documentation being provided by Adaptec to create the proper drivers for the controllers. (The OpenBSD community is not asking for drivers to be written, they are asking for information so they may do the proper work and write the drivers themselves.) After following the thread on this topic, I finally decided to respond. Here were my thoughts:
After watching this debate go on and seeing comments on issues that I deal with every day in a completely different industry, I couldn't help but feel obliged to comment.
Below, I included a note that Mr. Long wrote earlier in this thread that got me thinking. The All-or-Nothing attitude is often the most effective way to stay true to your philosophical beliefs - and especially a mission statement you claim to abide by. Mr. Long treats this as a downfall, not a positive. I realize that compromise is a part of life, but this is not one of those areas where OpenBSD can even dream to compromise. It would shake the core philosophy/goals of what Theo and the OpenBSD developers have promised the community at large that they would follow. Mr. Long laments Theo's insistence on documentation and claims he is drawing users into "...political fights depriving them of stuff that works now but isn't exactly everything [they] want..." No, Mr. Long, Theo is insisting that the OpenBSD project does not compromise where it matters most. Most users expect (if they have paid any attention to the press OpenBSD has received with regards to these types of issues) Theo (and the developers) to do the Right Thing. The Right Thing in this case is not ignoring the clause, "Integrate good code from any source with acceptable copyright (ISC or Berkeley style preferred, GPL acceptable as a last recourse but not in the kernel, NDA never acceptable). We want to make available source code that anyone can use for ANY PURPOSE, with no restrictions." - http://openbsd.org/goals.html
I am personally involved in two manufacturing operations that deal with customers who are much larger than us. When GM comes to us and offers the possibility of doing business we get excited. Sure, we deal with huge corp's like Freightliner, Isuzu, and Carrier Transicold (& tc.), but GM has stigma where we live (seeing as most of us in our organization drive one type of GM car or truck) and it would be with great pride that we could tell people we do business with GM. On the other hand, part our mission is to do work our way. We want complete control over those things that we are responsible for - namely, manufacturing the product and making sure it meets or exceeds the quality expectations of our customers. Customers like GM often take the approach that they know better how to conduct business (which is laughable considering the fact that a corp. as large as GM constantly struggles to be profitable). Therefore, they think they ought have a say in our manufacturing methods, financial management, personnel management, purchasing management - the list goes on. To be honest, it is quite amazing that they feel they know our business better than us and yet aren't doing it themselves. There is a time and place for compromise (I did so earlier this evening with my wife...), but when someone suggests that we change what we do and who we are to fit *their* needs or wants, we *fail* through acquiescence. While the stigma that comes with saying we can *do* or *handle* this or that feels good, it isn't right. If Adaptec feels that their customers are better helped by not providing documentation needed by OpenBSD developers, then it is certainly their choice. I don't see how this supports them doing more business, though. The OpenBSD community is asking for nothing more than documentation. Are there hidden functions that Adaptec doesn't want us to see or have access to? I fail to see how our requests are unreasonable. It seems to me that my above analogy of GM is befitting of this situation. Adaptec wants to have control where it doesn't matter or, more importantly, make any sense. This is a choice they are free to make. I would hate, however, to be the one lying down and accepting this because I think that a greater good can come of such compromise. This is nothing more than tomfoolery. Each time we choose to compromise on our core values, we are headed towards ruin.
I hope OpenBSD is able to support Adaptec, but it is more important to me that I can trust that whatever hardware is supported can run unencumbered by legal agreements that do nothing but restrict us users from using a product to it's fullest capabilities. I am already forced to do so every day because people I do business with require me to use one software product or another and I am vehemently working on ways of getting myself (and my companies) out of this predicament. I don't need yet another OS/software project fooling me into thinking I'm using free software.
I could go on... Thank goodness I have paid attention to threads like these to know who I can trust to follow through with what they say they are going to do.
snf
These thoughts brought to you by:
Scott Long wrote:
>
> I can't see how the All Or Nothing attitude here is productive. Good,
> you guys want to produce fully open and unencumbered stuff. That's
> wonderful. But why is it so important to go around screaming and
> yelling about it and alientating those who do try to help? Let me
> tell you, Doug is about the most positive and supportive guy you'll
> ever have at Adaptec, pissing him off really won't produce results.
> Why is it so important to drag your users into your political fights
> by depriving them of stuff that works now but isn't exactly everything
> that you want? I'd love to have fully open stuff from all the RAID
> companies too, but I also want the users of FreeBSD to be able to use
> the resources that are out there to their full advantage and not be
> pinned down by my political beliefs on the subject.
>
> Scott
>
I feel good about the choice Theo has made and the way he has dealt with the issue. Many people are trying to claim he is being rude and inflexible. As I stated above, I don't see how anyone can interpret his actions as such. Work was done on trying to get Adaptec to release the documentation and they have refused to do so. Instead they have asked for more patience on a topic where further patience is unacceptable. They have shipped a product that does not work because of lack of documentation and expect us to wait until summer for the fix. Nonsense. OpenBSD's responsibility is twofold. First and foremost to support the ideas set out by the project's goals and to help its developer and user base to make a better product. Sometimes making a better product means breaking or removing something that worked only half heartedly.
As I said in my email to the list - it is nice to know where the priorities are and who I can trust to follow through with what they say they are going to do.
