Thread: PETITION to Nokia to release the full source code of the Maemo OS to this Community.
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momcilo is offline momcilo
2011-06-01 , 19:35
Posts: 673 | Thanked: 856 times | Joined on Mar 2006
#323
Originally Posted by erendorn View Post
If you produce software just to support the hardware you sell and software that does not work on any other hardware, chances are you aren't a software company.
Well by my definition Nokia has so far produced several devices (770, N800, N810, N900 and undisclosed one or two devices) based on the same code base, so I don't think how this applies.

Originally Posted by erendorn View Post
So as nokia is a hardware manufacturer, it produces as little code as it must to support their hardware. That means use already written code when licence permitts it, buy external OS when you need real support (mass-market), ditch internal OS when it's too bloby and heavy.
This external software base is very significant in volume, the maemo is not that lightweight (e.g. they did not produce mp3 player running barebone GNU/Linux system). The fate of their propitiatory OS (symbian) is not relevant to maemo story. What is relevant is that the majority of re-used external code is released under GPL and LGPL. Where LGPL is permissive in terms of linking propitiatory software against libraries covered by it, GPL is certainly not.

Originally Posted by erendorn View Post
That accidentaly also means don't support hardware that you specifically don't produce (other manufacturers) anymore (n900).
Irrelevant in my opinion, they have used the GPL software and linked their software against it, so we ask them to contribute back to the community(you know you borrow something from you neighbour, than one day you return the favour) . Please not that the definition of community is not Nokia community, but a greater of GPL.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_Software_Foundation
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Last edited by momcilo; 2011-06-01 at 19:45.
 

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