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I think this is a more nuanced point that just running "CUDA software" which is what's been commonly discussed. Nvidia is licensing their shared libraries in su

I think this is a more nuanced point that just running "CUDA software" which is what's been commonly discussed. Nvidia is licensing their shared libraries in such a way that you can only run then on their hardware. It's notable however, that both of the examples you give are for Operating Systems, rather than a library which is part of a larger work. Do you know of an example of a single application or library being hardware locked? the only instance I can think of off the top of my head are the old Dos versions of Autocad which had a physical dongle. But even that was DRM and not just an EULA restriction. Actually, that might be an interesting direction for them to go. Include some key in Nvidia hardware which the library validates. Then they'd get DMCA protection for their DRM.

bri3d 3y ago
Hardware-dongle DRM was the default licensing model in the 90s for any kind of enterprise-type software. Pretty much all audio and video production and editing software for many years, and even today. C compilers, for many years, as well. PhysX for awhile. Native Instruments stuff. Saleae logic analyzer software. Another message in this thread reminded me, too, of the Google Play frameworks on Android, which are also a very good analogy - Google ship these libraries licensed for use only on approved phones.
fragmede 3y ago
> old Dos versions of Autocad which had a physical dongle. Those didn't go away in the industry, though AutoCAD moved away from them. Resolume (professional VJ software) and Avid (professional video editing software) still have hardware dongles. Arguably so does Davinci, theirs are just much bigger ;). progeCAD (AutoCAD compatible CAD program) also has USB protection dongles available as a license option.