> right now I'm
> tired of telling people "sorry Linux doesn't support that" I'd rather say
> "yea it works but it's gonna be slower then the competition"
>
>If Linux the free kernel cannot handle a certain piece of hardware on
>its own, if it needs the help of a non-free driver, what does that mean?
>It means that *as far as free software is concerned*, we don't support
>that hardware.
>
>So we should tell people, "That hardware is not supported--so buy some
>other model!"
I agree with the "*we* do not suppor that hardware" part, and I
would certainly tell people to choose hardware that does support
linux, however if you have the hardware allready, it doesn't help
much to say "it doesn't work under Linux". Rather it is better
to say "well, there is a driver, but it isn't free, or supported
by the free development community."
If someone has a necessary piece of hardware, and it doesn't work
for them, and you say "sorry, no driver exists" when there is
one, just not a GPL one, then they may decide to use an alternate
system instead of Linux.
-- Mike A. Harris - Computer Consultant - Linux advocateLinux software galore: http://freshmeat.net
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