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Building a Linux GPU Driver for the M4 Mac Mini in One Month

422 points · 290 comments · ADevWithAnIdea

  1. MoltenMonster · · focus · HN ↗
    <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.reddit.com&#x2F;r&#x2F;AsahiLinux&#x2F;comments&#x2F;1whecn1&#x2F;comment&#x2F;pa1spia&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.reddit.com&#x2F;r&#x2F;AsahiLinux&#x2F;comments&#x2F;1whecn1&#x2F;comment...

    &gt; The author was banned from Asahi Linux for hiding his extensive use of LLMs from us in another attempted contribution, and (more importantly) for concealing that he is a former Apple engineer with direct contacts to the people involved in Apple Silicon development. Make of this what you will.

    1. alightsoul · · focus · HN ↗
      Even if this is the case, this is still a valuable contribution to learn upon.
      1. MBCook · · focus · HN ↗
        It’s taint. Anyone who looks at it can’t work on a real open source driver because they will have had access to information they’re not supposed to.

        It won’t be clean room like the stuff Alyssa did.

        1. theoreticalmal · · focus · HN ↗
          That’s the most abstract and esoteric argument I’ve ever heard I think
          1. MBCook · · focus · HN ↗
            Wasn’t that exactly the legal standard Compaq had to prove when they did a clean room implementation of the IBM BIOS?
          2. st_goliath · · focus · HN ↗
            The argument is not esoteric. An Apple employee working on a reverse engineered GPU driver might (intentionally or not) incorporate internal knowledge that they are contractually obligated to keep secret or write an implementation that is too close to proprietary code they had access to, to the point that it could be argued that it is a derived work.

            This sort of thing has always been a concern for projects that re-implement some existing piece of software, e.g. there were concerns early on during development of the GNU project about people contributing after having been exposed to Unix source code. Similarly, it is an ongoing concern for the Wine project[1], as well as ReactOS. The later even had a code freeze and internal audit in 2006, after allegations came forward that code had been derived from disassembled Windows binaries[2].

            [1] <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;gitlab.winehq.org&#x2F;wine&#x2F;wine&#x2F;-&#x2F;wikis&#x2F;Clean-Room-Guidelines" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;gitlab.winehq.org&#x2F;wine&#x2F;wine&#x2F;-&#x2F;wikis&#x2F;Clean-Room-Guide...

            [2] <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;ReactOS#Internal_audit" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;ReactOS#Internal_audit

            1. tomaskafka · · focus · HN ↗
              Exactly! That’s why companies create a clone every time they hire someone, put a clone into vat, and upon person quitting, the person is disposed of and the clone is sent to his family to take upon his role, without leaking company’s internal knowledge.
              1. tomaskafka · · focus · HN ↗
                Damn, I might have accidentally clean room reimplemented Severance without ever seeing as much as trailer, expecting Ternus’ kill squad any minute.
              2. mitxela · · focus · HN ↗
                They still have to prove you did it. In accidental or small leaks they can&#x27;t prove it. But there have been enough cases of provable IP theft.
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