[9fans] hardware documentation (was Plan 9 future)

[presotto@plan9.bell-labs.com presotto@plan9.bell-labs.com]

It is true that Microsoft's dominance has has an influence on
the nonexistence of hardware documentation, though I think its
not so much because of bullying.  By making the x86 architecture
the only one worth building hardware for, Microsoft turned
computing into a commodoties market.  That brought the price of
hardware down.  More signiicantly, the manufacturer's margin and
time to market came down and differentiation between products
became negligible.  Hence, there is nothing driving a company
to disclose hardware info:  one driver gets them 97% of the market,
documenting mistakes is embarassing, and disclosing too much
information helps your competitors copy or surpass you.

Of course, the same factors should be making makers of other
boxes based on non x86 architectures that much more helpful.
I've been told Apple is a lot easier to get info out of these
days though I personally have not experienced such.  The reduced
time to market makes everyone harder to get info out of because
they really don't have it encapsulatd in a usable form.  In
many cases we've gotten Unix, Plan 9, and Linux drivers for
new hardware only because someone inside the company was enough
of a fan to take the time to help get the driver built in
his/her spare time.  In most cases the company wasn't being
paranoid or secretive, it just didn't have the time to devote.

Of course, I'm now seeing secretive from the inside out.
Win LT modems are finding their way into most notebooks and
laptops that I'm interested in buying.  Lucent spits the
work between the chip and the host cpu and is very afraid
of letting the code out.  There was plenty of time and money
to get a Windows driver out since it represented a huge
market.  Due to Linux fans both in Research and Microelectronics,
a binary only Linux driver now exists, with he company
actually supporting it.  I've just gotten the source code
for it with the stipulation that I also release binary only
versions for Plan 9 (if and when I figure out the code).
Hopefully, I'll find the time before the release,
especially since my favorite IBM laptop has a Win LT modem.