[Assist] Objet

[192.ejaj at netcmail.com]

> it seems that you are preferring the realtek-based devices because of
> the license of the opensource driver in an attempt to reward that
> company for choosing that license

Yes I am preferring the realtek-based devices because of the licence
of the open-source in order to reward the company's work for the
open-source community.

> - that is assuming that the
> manufacturer is the one who wrote the opensource device driver but that
> is often or usually not the case - many (or most) opensource drivers
> exist for devices where the manufacture released only a closed-source
> driver and some programmer who bought the device wrote a linux driver
> (perhaps for their own use) and then opensourced it - so if this was
> your thinking then you could as well be regarding the wrong company -

According to this page:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_open-source_wireless_drivers
the GPL source code was not written by hackers but by Realtek. Which is
very good.

> it would be more reasonable to look at how many devices in the past
> have been usable with an opensource driver - using that criteria i
> think there are many more devices that work with the atheros drivers
> than realtek drivers - that could must mean that atheros chips are more
> popular though so this may not be good thinking either

>From what I am analysing Qualcomm Atheros is an **opportunist** company:
  - the latest versions of USB dongles were delivered with proprietary source
code. So a work of reverse-engineering was done to be able to use the
device with “free” code from the community
  - in consequence Qualcomm Atheros only decided in May 2015 to
“liberate” theirs devices for the next products.
In consequence I believe Qualcomm Atheros is the wrong company,
because as you said, they released a closed-source driver and some
programmer.s. wrote a linux driver and open-sourced it.

> On Thu 2017-10-19 12:32:22 AM - 192.ejaj at netcmail.com wrote:
> > in the ISC licence there are "?" so we do not know if it is allowed
> 
> if what is allowed? commercial use? - the GPL and most opensource
> licenses also allow commercial use

if it is allowed or not for private use. As indicated in the following page:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_free_and_open-source_software_licenses#General_comparison
we do not know about:
- Patent grant
- Private use
- Sublicensing
- TM grant

> the last thing to say is that you answered to the question of "safety"
> with concerns of "freedom" - these concepts should not be confused -
> "safety" and "freedom" are not at all the same thing - in fact they are
> more appropriately viewed as opposite extremes on a spectrum

Yes, maybe. But for me, a “safe” society is a free society and
not a “controlled” society as it is wrongly assumed nowadays. That is
why when you asked me to explain myself about "safety" and in "which
regards", I talked about freedom and "we should guarantee to the future
generations that our work today will remain free and libre, available to
the public domain and why not a commons".

So at this stage, the “good” libre products are so far:
- https://www.thinkpenguin.com/gnu-linux/penguin-wireless-g-usb-adapter
- https://h-node.org/wifi/view/en/137/Realtek-RTL8187L--Realtek-Semiconductor-Corp--RTL8187-Wireless-Adapter-/1/1/Realtek-Semiconductor-Corp./undef/yes/undef/wifi-works/undef
- https://h-node.org/wifi/view/en/166/-Realtek-Semiconductor-Corp--RTL8187B-Wireless-802-11g-54Mbps-Network-Adapter/1/1/Realtek-Semiconductor-Corp./undef/yes/undef/wifi-works/undef
(be careful to not choose the TRENDnet TEW-424UB model)
But at any case I will try to get a RTL8187[B|L] chipset model after looking the products in the shops within my area.

Cheers,
Ejaj