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Re: [Xen-devel] Is anyone working on HVM Paravirt drivers for windows?

To: Michael Paesold <mpaesold@xxxxxx>
Subject: Re: [Xen-devel] Is anyone working on HVM Paravirt drivers for windows?
From: "Daniel P. Berrange" <berrange@xxxxxxxxxx>
Date: Thu, 16 Nov 2006 21:07:52 +0000
Cc: Hiromichi Itou <ito@xxxxxxxx>, Xen Devel <xen-devel@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>, "Bruce J \(HP-Labs\) Walker" <bruce.walker@xxxxxx>, Ky Srinivasan <ksrinivasan@xxxxxxxxxx>, aball@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx, Alan <alan@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
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Reply-to: "Daniel P. Berrange" <berrange@xxxxxxxxxx>
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On Thu, Nov 16, 2006 at 09:46:00PM +0100, Michael Paesold wrote:
> Daniel P. Berrange wrote:
> >On Thu, Nov 16, 2006 at 08:14:52PM +0100, Michael Paesold wrote:
> >>Andrew D. Ball wrote:
> >>>That would be sad, but is possible.  Just like I don't believe Linux
> >>>drivers should be allowed to be non-GPL, not allowing drivers for
> >>>Windows to be GPL makes sense, unless the kernel is organized with much
> >>>more isolation as more of a microkernel.
> >>>
> >>>Anyone's more informed thoughts on this would be appreciated.
> >>>
> >>>Peace.
> >>>Andrew
> >>>
> >>>On Wed, 2006-11-15 at 07:46 -0700, Ky Srinivasan wrote:
> >>>>I may be wrong here; but I think windows drivers cannot be 
> >>>>open-sourced. I recall reading that in windows DDK documentation.
> >>I don't believe the problem is with Windows drivers, but with the Windows 
> >>Driver Development Kit. The DDK has a license incompatible with the GPL. 
> >>I think writing a driver without the kit would still be possible, 
> >>although difficult because it would require much more knowledge about the 
> >>Windows kernel.
> >
> >Just do a chinese wall, clean room implementation then. One person has the
> >DDK and writes a spec for the driver. The second writes the actual driver
> >based on the spec - never looking at the DDK directly. A little more work
> >sure, but certainly doable.
> 
> Yes, of course. Just find two guys to do the work. ;-)

Well as has been pointed out before there are several sets of closed source
PV drivers around from XenSource, VirtualIron and other companies. So there
are clearly resources to write PV drivers for Windows, just no one who is yet
committed to open sourcing them for the benefit of the whole Xen userbase
/ community :-(

Regards,
Dan.
-- 
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