Device drivers (Was: [Desktop_architects] wine?)

[Bastian, Waldo]

>On Wed, 2005-11-09 at 11:18 -0800, John Cherry wrote:
>> On Wed, 2005-11-09 at 12:07 -0600, Robert Williamson wrote:
>> > Was there any consideration given to inviting someone to represent
the
>wine
>> > Windows emulator (http://www.winehq.com/)...or is this beyond the
scope
>of
>> > this meeting.
>>
>> Since the ability to run Windows applications is one of the biggest
>> inhibitors to Linux desktop acceptance, wine would be a great
addition
>> to the Desktop Tools Session.
>
>The second biggest problem is the lack of device drivers.  Will anyone
>at the meeting be representing this problem?

I think it's a good topic but something that should be considered
relative to a specific device class. With the current agenda the current
status wrt graphics drivers and printer drivers would be interesting to
look at.

Given the audience the question would be "What technical steps can an
OSS project take to facilitate device driver availability?".

The other (bigger) part of the device driver problem seems to me more of
a marketing issue and a matter of getting (more) IHV interested in
Linux. I don't think this meeting is the right place to discuss that,
but maybe OSDL can dedicate an other meeting to this very topic.

Cheers,
Waldo