GM & MS

[Mike McCarty]

Gene Heskett wrote:
> On Thursday 08 February 2007 11:06, Wolfgang S. Rupprecht wrote:
> 
>>Joe Smith <jes at martnet.com> writes:
>>
>>>I'm sure you're not poking fun at Linux because the maintainers are
>>>unwilling to break the law, are you?
>>
>>I'm poking fun at the manufacturers that claim they can't allow
>>open-source drivers for their wifi radios.
>>
>>BTW: I don't recall seeing a law that says it is illegal to write
>>open-source drivers.
> 
> 
> Here in the states, the FCC gets into this loop somehow.  I've got a 
> current copy of 47CFR coming, so I might be able to quote something 
> eventually.

It has to do with "type acceptance" and all that implies. In order
for a device to be type accepted, and hence legal to sell, it must
not only satisfy certain techical specifications, but also not be
"easily modified" by the end user so as to violate those same technical
specifications. In some cases this means having an integral antenna
which cannot be removed and replaced with a larger one without
doing damage, as an example. Providing drivers which could be
modified to initialize the chipset on the board to provide
frequencies or powers outside those specified for the application
might constitute making an "easily modified" device.

IANAL

I have constructed quite a few Part 15 devices, and am reasonably
familiar with CFR 47.15

Mike
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