Re: [Discuss-gnuradio] Ettus Research News

[Jeff Brower]

NI has a reputation for fiercely protecting their patents.  They sued The 
MathWorks
over Simulink in a lengthy and hard-fought case and won in a jury trial in 
2003. 
This is why, to this day, you can't change source block parameters via dialog 
box or
other visual or "control panel" means while a simulation is running in 
Simulink. 
After that court decision, NI used litigation (or the threat of it) to subdue 
(or
acquire) certain program vendors with block diagram style user-interfaces.

My guess is that at some future point, new additions to Ettus radio will be 
offered
under some type of business-oriented licensing model that ensures a software 
revenue
stream for NI (in addition to the radio hardware).  That has been NI's model; in
following this company since the mid-1980s, I don't see it changing.

-Jeff