NEW YORK (02/04/2000) - Last week I picked up a shiny, new package of Corel Corp.'s Linux and tried to install it on a fairly vanilla Dell Computer Corp.
Pentium III-700. Unfortunately, I couldn't. Corel's much-touted Linux distribution didn't recognize either the hard drive controller or the graphics adapter.
Similarly, if I walk into any Comp USA, I can't buy any printer off the shelf, since Linux drivers for many popular printer models don't even exist.
These device driver problems are endemic to Linux, and they might just prove more of a hurdle to its acceptance on the desktop than the lack of software applications.
But why, exactly, do these problems exist?
In a session at the LinuxWorld show here, a panel of hardware vendors shed some light.
Patented Technology Doesn't Want to Be FreeMuch of the Linux community subscribes to the philosophy that software should be free -- in the sense that you can "run, copy, distribute, study, change, and improve the software," according to Richard Stallman, founder of the Free Software Foundation.
But information on how a hardware device works may not be free, since it can incorporate a vendor's most precious trade secrets.
Mike Minnica, senior driver engineer at 3-D sound card manufacturer Aureal, said companies want to provide open-source drivers -- but worry they put their patented technologies at risk.
"Some companies still want to move to a 100 percent open driver," he says. "But by opening our specifications, we are taking a risk that our competitors will figure out our technology."
"We want to protect our intellectual property (the 3-D core) and we want to protect our engineering information," agreed Allain Thiffault, worldwide software development manager at Matrox, which makes graphics and video cards, among other products.
Use Our Old Stuff, or Just Our Version
One solution is to release specifications for older technologies no longer valuable as intellectual properties. For instance, Matrox released specifications for its 2-D cards. The result: thousands of Linux boxes are now running Matrox chips, "and the company didn't have to write one line of code," Thiffault says.
Another option is for manufacturers to build more closed-source drivers for Linux (ones the community cannot tweak), as multimedia products and peripherals manufacturer Creative Labs is writing for its 3-D sound cards.
While some companies are warming up to gaining more users, most will only serve up closed drivers.
Purists hate this, of course. "If you're an open-source zealot, you won't be able to be convinced to use something that's not completely open," said Jake Hawley, who leads the engineering team at Creative Labs.
On the other hand, Hawley added: "If you abstract everything, open source it all, it's suicide (for the manufacturers). Your secret sauce needs to be kept secret."