Dear Sylvain Lamontagne,
In message n2m3e45db431005040739m7ff0eb77x712f3e39681f44f8@mail.gmail.com you wrote:
Ok, I am now in the seat of someone that could push the idea of putting the next platform we develop into the mainline. But other MBA/Finance/Manager persons that really take decisions will surely ask my department why I would like to give internal informations of our product in a way that any of our competitors could get it easily. How could I give them an answer that would be aligned with the philosophy ?
First, U-Boot is covered by the GPL, so you will have to give the full sources anyway to any of your customers who asks for it - even if it's one of your direct competitors.
Second, do you really think there is any intellectual property in a port of U-Boot that is worth such protection? If so, you better write your own proprietary boot loader from scratch.
Third: according to Ohloh (http://www.ohloh.net/p/u-boot) it would cost you (or your company) some 270+ man-years or $_15,000,000 to develop something like U-Boot from scratch. You got all this code completely for free, so it seems only just and equitable that you return the little you added to the community, too.
I did not intend to be rude, but I have to admit that your attitude is not exactly in line how community projects like this work.
Then I'm sorry, but for me this project sounds like it is directed by a bunch of elitist who would not accept someone that don't already know how the project work. Criticizing and judging questions asked by people that may never have work on or with something like U-Boot before. If you are afraid of getting to much dumb questions then this means that the documentation and the FAQ from the U-Boot website could be improve in a way that new comers would find easily the informations they need.
All the documentation is in a wiki - please feel free to add any parts you consider missing.
Wolfgang Denk