On Fri, Feb 5, 2010 at 2:01 PM, Matt Ettus
<address@hidden> wrote:
Don,
If anyone out there that is actually a part of this community feels the way you do, I'd love to hear it. But you just showed up and started making accusations. I've been contributing to GNU Radio for nine years now. I'll answer your questions for the sake of everyone else, though.
Matt,
Your work is very commendable in regards to GNU Radio and you deserve your accolades as well as your new success with NI where I wish you even more success. The questions I've had for you have been purely business and nothing personal so if you feel that the questions I've asked are accusations, then please accept my humble apologies as to the intent.
My goal here is to further the longevity of any open source project by making sure the knowledge and IP is there for future generations. It is all too often that a company such as Ettus LLC will change or do something that is contradictory to the open source movement thusly creating a "landlocked" community. For instance a certain radio company that advertises a piece of equipment with a "open standard" however uses proprietary vocodecs.
On 02/05/2010 01:20 PM, Don Fanning wrote:
Heh... You know I wondered the exact same thing a few weeks ago. Matt
"informed" me that the .PCB files were never released. I did find a
copy of the gEDA files used to make the schematic drawings for the USRP
from a older GNURadio mirror. So much of what I'm seeing from Matt has
been a move away from Open Source and more towards "Closed Development".
This is nothing new. The .PCB files for the USRP1 and USRP2 were never released. This has been openly discussed on this mailing list in the past, and you are the first to express any real problem with it. Besides, the .PCB files are all in PADS format, and licenses to that program cost tens of thousands of dollars.
First, this was in reply to someone else's question. And yes, you did inform me of the .PCB's never being released a few weeks ago. Do I have a problem with it? Yes and no. Yes, because you didn't even bother converting them to PCB or even just releasing the PADS files and letting the "teeming millions" convert them for the project. And no, because I understand it's your IP that you're giving to the community.
As for the .sch files, we have moved our source control, our hosting, and our website, and been moving to a new build system all at the same time. We've also been trying to clean up these (sometimes very old) schematics to make them work with the current gEDA tools.
Again understandable. However very surprised (like others) that the hardware directory was gone. It took a little googling to find a old mirror that was still online.
Also, we've had a number of people build their own copies of our hardware, and when they don't work, try to get us to replace them by lying and saying they bought it from us.
That's down right douchebaggery right there and I can understand not supporting a product you didn't build. But I'm sure you have ways of identifying a board built by Ettus and a board build by someone else.
So I hope you can excuse us for not rushing to get schematic files to someone who has never paid us anything more than insults.
Again, no insults. Just appeared you were dropping off the face of the planet with your announcement and taking the USRP with you. Again, I've iterated that it's your right to do so since you own the copyright. But if you had done that move, you would have given a good slap to the open source community. As for your new ventures, there's no telling what they will ask of you since I'm assuming they bought the rights to the USRP and whether or not it remains in open source. Anything to the future would be speculation for which I did speculate to the worse case.
I love how the USRP brochure has this blurb:
"Open Source Community
The entire USRP design is open source, including schematics,
firmware, drivers, and even the FPGA and daughterboard
designs. When combined with the open source GNU Radio
software, you get a completely open software radio system
enabling host-based signal processing on commodity platforms.
No software or licenses need to be purchased."
Not a word in that is, was, or will be false.
That part was not clear in your press release as to how it will affect the USRP and future driver development. And I think it should be clarified for the general public in how this will work out to the community.