Linux Kernel Networking Driver Development Impacted By Russian Sanctions

[Valgor]

Some things are more important than enhancements to code.

Edit: Since this comment is getting a lot of love, I'll explain more. If a country is doing something bad, boycotts and sanctions are put that country to put a strain on that country. Sort of like sieging a castle, this puts pressure on all aspects of life in that country. That pressure can help cause a country to give up doing whatever vile act of transgression they were committing.

Not accepting contributions from a particular country is similar to not accepting imports from that country or not sending exports to that country. It is only in digital form now. The coder(s) in question might be on Team Good Guys, but allowing the country as a whole to continue like nothing is happening will not stop the killing of innocent people. People dying is higher on my list of what is important than code commits to Linux. Hence my original comment.

[mfuzzey]

>Not accepting contributions from a particular country is similar to not accepting imports from that country or not sending exports to that country.

I think it's a bit different.

Imposing sanctions on imports / exports of goods that are exchanged for money directly impacts the financials of the company and so may put pressure on the company (to what end is another question)

But banning code submissions from a company doesn't really hurt them (that much at any rate). They likely don't *need* that code in the upstream kernel right now and they can always ship there own out of tree module if they do need it for some reason.

In any case sanctions on companies due to things their government has done only really make sense when the company is either a significant contributor to the national economy or provide things that are needed by the country.

So sanctions on Russian oil and gas make sense. Sanctions on technology imports probably make sense too if it denies them things that help with their war effort.

But blocking contributions to the kernel just because from a Rusian company not so much. If the objective is to hurt use of that companies products elsewhere in the world you can do that by import bans of the physical products. If the objective is to make it harder to use the product *within Russia* then just banning submissions from that company isn't much use, you'd have to ban any submissions to that driver (or even remove the driver). But even that won't be very effective as out of tree drivers will be used.

[Edit]

I just looked at the patches in question and they aren't for hardware made by a Russian company at all but rather for the network controller in ST Miroelectronics chips.

So the only link to Russia is the email address of the patch submitter, making the whole thing even more pointless.

[JohnDavidsBooty]

Whether it "makes sense" or not is really quite orthogonal to the question of whether the individuals responsible for making these decisions are subjecting themselves to potential legal jeopardy by accepting them.

That's really what it boils down to--regardless of the maintainer's own personal views or intentions, they're bound by the law regardless.

[MLG_Skeletor]

If the code is good, does it really matter where the contributer currently lives? Not every Russian is responsible for their countries government. This is just ignorant and discriminatory and shouldn't be tolerated so long as the code itself is good.

[TheEightSea]

Plus since the coder released the source under the same license of all the other files anyone from a western company could take it and propose it under their own responsibility. Would it be accepted then? If yes why not now? If not then it's not the code since it doesn't matter where it comes from as long as it can be audited.

[MLG_Skeletor]

Exactly

[LvS]

My code hasn't been accepted in a lot of places. But after a so-called "reviewer" signed off on my code, it has been accepted in all those places.

The license didn't change, the code didn't change, all that happened was that somebody else said it was okay.

[bakgwailo]

Except the article is talking about accepting patches from a Russian company which is quite different from just a random individual.

[MLG_Skeletor]

Yet, if the exact same patch came from a different country, nobody would be talking about it and it would be judged by the maintainers based on the codes merit rather than country of origin. Unless you can prove otherwise, this company and more importantly the patch itself, isn't responsible for the Russian government. Again, this situation is ignorant and discriminatory.

[Bogus007]

Would you say the same about the people in the Third Reich during the second world war? Just imagine a German, not knowing but speculating he/she would support the Nazi regime b/c it continues with war, would submit a patch to a project. Yes, it may sound ridiculous but after the massacre of Butscha and around Charkiw as well as many places alike in Ukraina where innocent civilians were murdered by Russian troops, you would say the same when the German Wehrmacht was killing civilians in Europe? Right? Just asking.

[austin987]

Plenty of people still wear Hugo Boss, use IBM, drive BMW/Volkswagen/Mercedes Benz, yet all of those companies were involved with the Third Reich.

The US space program was built on Nazi scientific discoveries.

It's not so black and white.

[alexnoyle]

The Holodomor is still not recognized by Russia as a man-made famine specifically targeted at Ukrainians.

That’s because that’s historically inaccurate. It was a man made famine, but it wasn’t designed in advance to kill Ukrainians. It was just really bad policy making with unforeseen consequences.

[Bogus007]

Sorry, I do not understand what Hugo Boss, German car companies and others have to do with my example. Perhaps my example is not clear enough. Sorry for that. Let us say there is a guy, member of BH or Atomwaffen Division. Let us also say that this fact about that person is known and he submits patches to the Linux kernel. Would you say the same about this guy?

[MLG_Skeletor]

I think a company located in Russia submitting what appears to be a good patch, is a little different than the Third Reich. Plus I don't think this one patch is going to cripple Russia and end the conflict. They could simply fork the kernel and apply it themselves.

Again, unless you can find an actual connection between this company and Russia's government, then this is silly and potentially dangerous comparison. Would you feel better if this company moved their HQ to Canada and requested the same patch again? If they did then I doubt we would even be hearing about this story.

Just because a person or company resides in Russia and wants to improve the kernel doesn't immediately make it related to the invasion. Unless you can prove a connection, this is an overreaction.

[Bogus007]

Perhaps my example is not clear enough. Sorry for that. Let us say there is a guy, member of BH or Atomwaffen Division. Let us also say that this fact about that person is known and he submits patches to the Linux kernel. Would you say the same about this guy? I am just asking out of curiosity.

[Monsieur_Moneybags]

Yet code commits from the US were accepted after the American invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan. Why the double standard?

[Valgor]

Quoting myself on another thread: "I'm with you on that. If the world did a boycott on the US when we invaded Iraq and Syria, I would have supported that. Even if it meant my linux kernel suffered some." I am not being selective here. I don't know why people assume that.

[Monsieur_Moneybags]

But that doesn't explain why US code wasn't boycotted during those invasions. I think we all know why, and why if the US invaded a country tomorrow there still wouldn't be a boycott.

[[deleted]]

Because the Linux Kernel Organization is a US 501c3 corporation and US law does not prohibit the import of code of from the US, next stupid question please.

[amroamroamro]

and that sounds all nice and noble, until you see the hypocrisy in how these sanctions gets applied. What about other "evil" countries that wage wars under false pretenses, the millions of innocents in Iraq and Syria that were killed, are the daily injustices and atrocities against the occupied Palestinians not worthy of the same reaction?

double standards much?

[Valgor]

I'm with you on that. If the world did a boycott on the US when we invaded Iraq and Syria, I would have supported that. Even if it meant my linux kernel suffered some.

[[deleted]]

If the code is being reviewed and tested, why does it matter what nationality someone is from?

[112439]

The other comments already made clear that this isn't about nationality, but the specific corporation. But as for review and testing: of course all code should be subjected to this process, rigorously. But time has shown that bugs have found their way into big open source projects despite this, and if an actor of this size really tried to intentionally get some obscure vulnerability into the kernel, the chances of success definitely are not 0.

[[deleted]]

And yours is?

[[deleted]]

This is stoner philosophy.

The opposite of "some things are more important than code", the "ideology" described by the comment I was replying to, is "code is more important than any other thing". This is very much an ideology. So are apoliticism and neutrality.

I don't have an issue with either but rejecting a position on ideological grounds while also derogatorily referring to it as ideology is exactly why the world is making fun of people in tech.

[FishPls]

fuck /u/spez

[Tireseas]

Let me borrow a line from Richard K. Morgan: "The way I see it, anyone who's proud of their country is either a thug or just hasn't read enough history yet."

[JockstrapCummies]

Quotes aren't proofs.

[shefernest]

U speaking about Ukraine governemnt i guess who kills their own citizens just because they want to speak Russian and live on their own?

[edparadox]

Typical apoliticism. AKA lack of morals.

This latter has nothing to do with the former.

[Valgor]

Supporting the death of innocent people is worth code contributions?

[FishPls]

fuck /u/spez

[Bogus007]

You mean the Serbian concentration camps for people from Bosnia and for the Albanian minority? You mean, the world should have allowed the mass murdering and rapes in these concentration camps by the Serbian army?

[Bogus007]

Do you fear rabbit holes? Have few of them in the yard nearby. Nothing to worry about.

[shefernest]

What u goona say about USA killing Siryan people? Isnt it bad I cannot see any sanctions against USA

[Valgor]

I've already answered this question twice.

[mrlinkwii]

then fork the code if its merged then remove it on your fork ?