Re: [Libusb-devel] USB VID/PID for open source projects

[Greg KH <gr...@kr...>]

On Thu, Mar 24, 2011 at 06:03:44PM +0100, François Revol wrote:
> 
> Le 24 mars 2011 à 17:50, Tyler W. Wilson a écrit :
> 
> >>> And I do not really like to use random USB VID/PID like
> >>> what we do right now -- that is the motivation to get a
> >>> valid PID in the first place.
> >> I don't see any good alternative.  One advantage of using an obviously
> >> bogus VID/PID (like DEAD/BEEF) is that it will (hopefully) make it
> >> obvious to people that they have to provide their own.  Untold misery
> >> ensued after some idiot company released a product using the FX2's
> >> default VID/PID, then submitted their driver to WHQL and got it
> >> installed in the Windows Driver Library.  After that, any time anyone
> >> plugged in an unconfigured FX2, Windows helpfully installed the wrong
> >> driver.
> > We ran into the same thing with Pleo, which used an Atmel ARM7. There 
> > was some GPS manufacturer which used the default Atmel VID/PID and got 
> > their driver (usbser.sys based) approved via WHQL. Ugly.
> 
> This really looks like a flaw in WHQL itself then...
> they shouldn't approve a driver from someone that is not the vendor of
> the advertised IDs unless they have an explicit authorization from the
> real manufacturer...  hmm this would prevent writing FLOSS driver
> though... (but then signed binaries can hardly be Free Software, at
> least not real one, and certainly not copyleft).

Microsoft already makes it very difficult to write opensource windows
drivers, as their DDK license prohibits it.

It is still possible, but I think the signing process is the least of
your worries :)

thanks,

greg k-h