1. So, what is this "Gargoyle" Project all about
2. What hardware does Gargoyle work with
3. What browsers does Gargoyle work with
4. What versions of OpenWrt will Gargoyle work with
5. Is Gargoyle a fork of OpenWrt
6. Is Gargoyle a fork of X-Wrt or LuCI
7. What is the point of starting an entirely new interface instead of contributing to an existing project
8. What about Tomato and DD-Wrt
9. Is Gargoyle Open Source
10. What is the reasoning/rationale behind releasing gargoyle with the additional clarification/exception to the GPL
11. The screenshots you have posted look really nice but when I try viewing Gargoyle on my Windows PC, the fonts, especially the small ones, look really grainy and ugly. How do I make it look like what I see in your screenshots
12. Why do you only report bandwidth usage on the WAN interface
13. All the other firmwares have feature X! I want feature X! Gimme, Gimme, GIMME NOW!
14. I'm interested in contributing to Gargoyle. What should I do
15. Where can I get more information on the implementation details of Gargoyle
16. I'm interested in donating to your project, what should I do
17. I'm interested in hiring you as a contractor to implement new functionality. Are you interested
18. Is there a forum where I can discuss this project with other users

Gargoyle is an interface for small, widely available routers such as the Linksys WRT54G series. It provides functionality and customizability above and beyond what the default software provides including sophisticated quality of service and bandwidth monitoring tools. The primary goal of Gargoyle is to provide a polished interface for these advanced tools that is at least as easy to configure as any existing firmware.

Gargoyle is open-source software. Currently, there are several user-friendly router firmware projects. These projects even release their source code, but the license of the user interface prohibits the distribution of modified versions of the software without the author's permission. This means that they do NOT qualify as “open source” or “free software” even though the source code is made available. There are also genuine open-source router firmware projects, but these tend to place a higher priority on providing maximum functionality, rather than on usability. Gargoyle aims to be the first open-source firmware project to place a strong focus on creating a user-friendly interface.

Gargoyle is based on the most recent Kamikaze release of the OpenWrt firmware. In fact, Gargoyle can easily be installed as a series of packages on top of a default Kamikaze installation. In this sense Gargoyle is a “front-end” for OpenWrt. Because it is based on OpenWrt, additional features not provided by Gargoyle can be added by installing custom packages which are available for OpenWrt. Therefore there need not be a tradeoff between usability and customizability, even though more advanced functionality must be configured manually.

I have personally tested Gargoyle on a Linksys WRT54G v2, a Linksys WRTSL54GS, an Asus WL500G premium and a La Fonera. Gargoyle images and packages are provided for routers that have broadcom and atheros chipsets with the mips archetecture, which includes many popular routers. Refer to the Openwrt table of hardware for more details on what chipsets are found in various routers.

Be aware that while older versions of the Linksys WRT54G routers will work newer versions (v5+) will NOT work. This is because these routers do not have enough disk space or enough memory. Consider purchasing a Linksys WRT54GL or WRTSL54GS instead, as these routers should work. If you are in doubt as to what version you have see here.

Gargoyle is open source and there is no reason it couldn't be compiled for any architecture supported by Openwrt Kamikaze, even though packages/images may not currently be available. If you are interested in helping to compile/test Gargoyle on a different architecture please let me know – I would love to provide official packages for a larger number of architectures, but I don't have the hardware to test such packages.

Gargoyle has been tested with Firefox 1.5+, Internet Explorer 6+ as well as the latest versions of Opera and Safari.

In order to view the SVG bandwidth graphics in Internet Explorer you will need to install the SVG plugin from Adobe, while the other browsers support this functionality without needing the plugin.

While every effort has been (and will continue to be made) to support all browsers, it is recommended that you do not use Microsoft Internet Explorer. Internet Explorer, especially the older version 6, is not standards compliant which means that it is more likely that you will encounter problems when using Gargoyle as well as when browsing the Web. Internet Explorer is also much less secure than other Browsers. For this reason, it is highly recommended that you use Firefox, Safari or Opera.

At this time, Gargoyle has only been designed for/tested on the latest Kamikaze 8.09 release. Older versions of Gargoyle (Beta1-3) were designed for the older Kamikaze 7.09, but are no longer supported. An effort will be made to keep Gargoyle compatible with the latest official releases of OpenWrt. However, only official releases will be supported. You're on your own if you want to get Gargoyle working with the OpenWrt Trunk, which is updated daily.

Currently, there are no plans to back-port Gargoyle to work with White Russian.

No. It will always be possile to install Gargoyle on top of a default OpenWrt installation. Gargoyle is a front-end/web interface for OpenWrt, not a fork. In this way, it is similar to X-Wrt and LuCI.

No. All three are front-ends for OpenWrt. However, they share no code in common. Gargoyle (at least the web interface portion) was written entirely from scratch.

While X-Wrt, LuCI and Gargoyle are very similar, there are distinct difference between the goals of the projects.

Both X-Wrt and LuCI seems focused on providing a web interface that provides maximum functionality, but this often comes at the expense of making the interface straightforward to understand and to use. Gargoyle is founded on the principle that it is more important to have an interface that is usable than one that has maximum functionality. The functionality available should be very simple and straightforward to configure – that's the whole point of having a web interface rather than using SSH to access the router and configure it via the command line.

No. While both of these projects 1) provide source code and 2) run on top of GPL software, the license of the user interface prohibits the distribution of modified versions of the software without the author's permission. This means that they do NOT qualify as “open source” or “free software” even though the source code is made available.

Is Gargoyle Open Source? If so, what license is it released under?

Yes. Gargoyle is released under the terms of the GNU General Public License version 2.0 as published by the Free Software Foundation, with the following clarification/exception that permits adapting the program to configure proprietary “back end” software provided that all modifications to the web interface portion remain covered by this license:

<quote> The GNU General Public License (GPL) is vague as to what constitutes “mere aggregation” under section 2, and what contitutes a work “based on the Program.” In the special case in which the Program is modified for the purpose of configuring other (potentially GPL-incompatible) software, the combination of the Program and this other software shall be considered “mere aggregation” if and only if the ONLY interaction between the Program and the other software being configured takes place via CGI (Common Gateway Interface) scripts and/or programs. However, these CGI scripts/programs as well as any other additions and modifications necessary for the configuration of the other software shall be considered “based on the Program” for the purposes of this license. Further, if any portion of the Program is used as part of an interface that can be rendered via a web browser, all portions of that interface that can be rendered via a web browser (including, but not limited to, javascript, svg/ecmascript, css, html, and shell/perl/php/other cgi scripts) shall be considered “based on the Program.”

This clarification/exception shall apply to the license of all derived works, and must appear in all relevant documentation. If you choose to release your modification to the Program under a later version of the GPL that directly contridicts this clarification/exception, this clarification/exception shall supersede any contradictory language in that version. </quote>