@tapeworm wrote:
@calv wrote:
It would be nice, if someone from Sandisk (who works on firmware development) could invest 10 or 15 minutes a week talking to rockbox people on their IRC channel, I think that would speed up development by magnitudes. As far as I know, the Sansa line would be the only players supported by rockbox that are still available (wow!).
Nice maybe, but not likely to happen. Most, if not all software developers have to sign & abide a contract stating they will not discuss ‘company secrets’ or participate in any other software development for any other project that is similar to what their employer creates now and sometimes for some period of time after they leave the company.
There was a thread on the RB forums regarding this exact subject. Someone knew how to fix something to do with RB, but couldn’t for fear of not only losing his job, but being sued by his employer on top of it.
This is why I loathe all closed-source software, software patents, etc… This is one reason I refuse to use M$ Windoze and why I don’t own an iPod (even though Apple is semi-friendly to FLOSS). This is why I own a TomTom GPS (runs on the Linux kernel) as opposed to Garmin, Magellan, etc. But that’s another story for another forum. 
But to answer the OP’s question – Rockbox will load (experimental builds) on the Fuze v1 but does not work at all on the v2. The reason is the V2 has some changed hardware that is undocumented by the manufacturer. Without the manufacturer spec sheets, it will take reverse engineering which is a PITA and slow go. And without these details, it is unlikely that Rockbox will ever be all that usable on the Fuze v2.
@niko_sama wrote:
The lawyers always have to complicate things. Sansa has nondisclosure agreements with all of their employees along with non-compete agreements. It is necessary so proprietary information, trade secrets and potential patents remain their property under their control.
There have been some historical collaborations between open source groups and corporate companies, that have worked out to everyone’s benefit. It’s possible.
The rockbox team has gifted programmers who are capable of disassembly of the firmware and reverse engineering, and they will deny it. I won’t tell you what I did as a teen, I’m sure Blizzard lawyers frowned on it ><. Inspired programmers will get the job done. 
Cheers to Rockbox 
There are many brilliant “inspired” programmers who haven’t been able to do much with closed, propreitary, patented hardware. For instance, the open-source Nvidia drivers ■■■■ azz, even after years of development (they still don’t have 3D acceleration, for instance). It’s not that these FLOSS coders ■■■■, it’s that Nvidia refuses to document the hardware used in the GPU’s. I don’t care how brilliant you are, without hardware specs it will be hard to create a driver anywhere near the quality and features of the closed-source proprietary version. AMD/ATI, on the other hand, has released all hardware specs and has extended a hand to the open-source community. That’s why every *nix user should buy their products. But I digress.
Sandisk has been pretty friendly to open-standards so far (for instance their players will play Ogg/Vorbis whereas iPod and M$ Zune will not). When I saw on the back of the Fuze box that it would work with Linux, I instantly bought one. Good luck seeing the word “Linux” or “ogg/Vorbis” on the back of a M$ Zune or iPod box. I suppose M$ and Apple (M$ especially) are just averse to anything open-source?
Yes, Sandisk, some of us appreciate your friendliness to Linux, ogg/vorbis, and FLOSS in general. There are many of us who do care about open-standards and will only give our money to companies that support it.
Message Edited by rookcifer on 11-02-2009 01:19 AM