Re: Inprocomm and their module

On Fri, Jan 13, 2006 at 12:23:50AM +0100, Carlos Martín wrote:
> > >  I've been trying to get some information about my Inprocomm IPN2220
> > > wireless card and I've stumbled upon D-Link's GPL source tarball for
> > > it's DI-624M device. It is available from D-Link's and from
> >
> > Are you referring to the DI-634M ?  I cannot find a DI-624M.
> 
> I can, both in ftp://ftp.gpl-devices/verndor/D-Link/ and in D-Link.com's ftp 
> site.

Ok, the device is apparently not sold in .de, that's why I was unaware
of it.

> > > This has become quite hard recently, as the company doesn't
> > > seem to exist anymore. The website went down early 2005 and its domain
> > > (inprocomm.com.tw) stopped resolving some time later.
> >
> > IIRC, they've been bought by another .tw company, though I don't
> > remember their name.
> 
> So there's still something that can be done. Good.
> 
> >
> > >  The Makefile references some .o files which should get linked with
> > > the binary blob in order to make the driver, though neither those
> > > files ore their corresponding sources are available.
> >
> > ok, at least those .o files need to be available.
> 
> Hopefully these will give more information about the driver being a 
> derivative 
> work.

I would hope to, but I think there is usually little practical chance, sorry.

> > In any way, there is the exception for interoperability.  There you
> > first need to ask the vendor for sufficient documentation - and when
> > they don't give it to you in some specified period of time, you're
> > allowed to do re-engineering for interoperability purpose.
> 
> I'd ask, but I'm not sure where I should direct my queries. My laptop vendor 
> answered with a link to linux-laptops.com, and when I sent back a reply 
> saying that I wanted information about the hardware or any information about 
> who has the docs, they never answered. I didn't expect them to have the docs, 
> but at least that they gave me a pointer about who own the IP now.

Send a written letter, preferrably via registered mail, in which you
explicitly refer to the EU interoperability regulations, and that you
"in accordance with section FOO of EU directive BAR" request technical
information (specifying which information, give examples) and that you
expect a reply within X weeks.  If not, you will (again in accordance
with section BAZ of EU directive XYZ) start reverse engineering in order
to create interoperable software.

If then afterwards they ever want to make legal claims against your
re-engineering, you can refer to that letter, and that they clearly had
the chance to give out docs, but choose not to.

It would be good to create such a template letter, have it reviewed by
some lawyers (I can take care of that) and publish it on the internet
(maybe on the upcoming www.gpl-devices.org site) so others can just use
that template in the future.

-- 
- Harald Welte <laforge@xxxxxxxxxxxx>                   http://gnumonks.org/
============================================================================
"Privacy in residential applications is a desirable marketing option."
                                                  (ETSI EN 300 175-7 Ch. A6)

pgpAHn5GTX7p5.pgp
Description: PGP signature