[maemo-community] Proposal for community firmware images

[From: Carsten V. Munk]

quim.gil at nokia.com wrote:
> Carsten V. Munk wrote:
>   
>> The need for distribution of 3rd party items (so far) is 
>> mostly with bits that are required to get a wireless network 
>> connection going. Such as, the firmware (.arm/.bin, umac.ko) 
>> existing in initfs for wi-fi and bluetooth, which is of 
>> possible 3rd party origin. This is the technical blocker for 
>> community firmware images, as there is quite a lot of interest 
>> in community to alter initfs to fit user needs.
>>     
>
> Technical blockers need to be addressed, agreed. Let's identify them as
> soon as possible so we have time to sort the blocks properly, or at
> least decently.
>   
As part of the work to provide images for the Mer project, I've been 
investigating which parts are initial technical blockers for community 
firmware images. The first step for this, is the contents of the initfs, 
which include firmware blobs and such as described above needed for 
basic connectivity and other basics.

I've documented the ones relating to initfs and the contents of it, on 
http://wiki.maemo.org/Task:Community_firmware_image_distribution in the 
section "First request: Distribution of initfs jffs2 (or other formats) 
image from maemo.org", along with reasoning for why they are needed to 
provide useful community firmware images for any kind of community 
distribution targeting the tablets.

The purpose of this request is to establish what would be needed legally 
(Nokia) and technically (maemo.org) to be able to distribute these 
initfs images containing these items from maemo.org to N800, N810 and 
N810WE users, and to lay the foundation for future requests for 
inclusion of closed source bits into community firmware images.

Regards,
Stskeeps/Carsten V. Munk