[OT] Re: iPod support in Linux

[Avi Greenbury]

On Tue, 15 Apr 2008 22:04:41 +0200
Mario Vukelic <mario.vukelic at dantian.org> wrote:

> 
> > [...] but I don't feel strongly enough about it to turn down something that
> > does the job exactly as well as I want it to because it wouldn't work on
> > someone else's system. 
> 
> This is very shortsighted (not to speak of selfish). Are you aware that,
> e.g., many of the linux wifi drivers actually came from the BSDs, who
> were forced to develop them because they couldn't use the binary blobs?
> 

Yes, I am.
Where there are two competing products, each of which does the job as well as the other, I will obviously go with the more interoperable one. Where there are two or three products on the market, one of which works in the way I want it to and the others which don't, but would work similarly badly[1] on anyone else's system, I'd be an idiot to buy either of the latter.

> 
> > I'd imagine that someone that does would go with a BSD licensed OS,
> > given the greater degrees of freedom for the user
> 
> I assume you compare the BSD license to the GPL. However, the user has
> the same rights with both licenses. The GPL states specifically that use
> is outside of the scope of the license.
> 
> The only difference is for developers who want to distribute code they
> didn't write.
> 

OK, I meant 'developers'.

> 
> > I bought my iPod because it works so well with Linux. I plug it in to Amarok
> > and they talk to each other. When I bought it, there was little else of a
> > similar capacity that would work like that. 
> 
> I am sure you must be pleased that Apple invested your money wisely into
> more restrictions.
> 

No, I'm pretty pissed at that. 

> > Now that this has changed,
> > if I wanted to replace it, I'd have to look for something else that does work easily with Linux.
> 
> Yeah, like only EVERY player that simply supports the USB mass storage
> device protocol. Hard to find, indeed.
> 

While one may well exist, I didn't have any to hand to see if UMS has been integrated into any of the music players I use (or any I don't) to organise and manage the collections on the player. I couldn't find any evidence either way, but found plenty of documented success managing ipods like that.
I was somewhat restricted in that this was yet another warranty replacement, so ideally I wanted something from the same place as its predecessors. That meant Apple, Creative or iRiver.

-- 
Avi Greenbury