GNU Boot 0.1 RC1 Released For This Coreboot/Libreboot Fork

[blackiwid]

Calling shenanigans. No one is confused about whether LibreOffice is GNU (it isn't). No one owns or has trademarked the term.

Libre simply denotes software that is free (as in speech).

Well the point is not if it's official GNU Project but if it uses the same definition as GNU / GPL about freedom, and libreoffice has no different view on freedom or different license. Sure it's Apache Lisense and other "Opensource lisence", but Opensource is just another wording for free software for the most part.

https://www.gnu.org/licenses/license-list.html#apache2

libreboot claims to be GPL but I don't understand how you can packages some free /open software with proprietary software and license it all as GPL that seems to me something that would not hold a court case, but maybe I misunderstand GPL and you can just add some % free software to your proprietary software and license it all as GPLv3 and never give out the source of your proprietary software. I would be very surprised. Just downloaded the main release file and there is a folder "blob". So they might even do something illegal. It's very strange to me.

I think they think they address this problem by offer a alternative version without blobs but obviously that is not enough. But the existence of this other version implies that they see the problem if the GPL would just allow that there would not be any reason for a alternative defect version that is mostly if not completely unusable without the blobs.

I mean there is some microcode or something that GNU considers like hardware or something, but I think this goes further than that, I am no lawyer but GPL 3 should be even more restrictive than v2 that is used by the kernel, and they excluded some blobs in a separate package / file (Linux-firmware).

[ll1025]

....also Libre is a GNU marketing term, stolen by this person to trick people into believing they get GNU Software, many here fall for that read it often that they believed it was a freedom as defined by the GNU Project project.

Calling shenanigans. No one is confused about whether LibreOffice is GNU (it isn't). No one owns or has trademarked the term.

Libre simply denotes software that is free (as in speech).

[rogerx]

Yeah, with the insane momentum Core/Libreboot got, a fork is exactly what will ensure these will keep going

It is the way of Debian/Ubuntu, and the way of Systemd/Wayland... keep forking, it feels good.


Just wish more manufacturers would realize the benefits of Coreboot project, rather than relying upon proprietary BIOS/firmware. After five or so years, should just roll their proprietary BIOS into Coreboot, rather than wasting computer hardware, requiring users to toss hardware into the garbage can.

[TroyRoberts]

So, there seems to be confusion over the history. To quote wikipedia.

image.png

On the GNU Boot project they say:
Registration Date: Sun 11 Jun 2023 12:14:23 PM UTC

So, It seems likely that Leah had the name well before the GNU people were starting anything. Though, I did not see any information that makes me think that the GNU people attempted to steal the name Libreboot.

It does seem that Leah had a bit of a strange idea on how to "help" or maybe it was parity. I don't know. But the original page on her announcement clearly indicated that it was not an official release.

Concerning Libre as marketing language for GNU, I don't think a reasonable argument can be made for that point of view. The project the really brought Libre into the open source scene was LibreOffice. LibreOffice was never a GNU project, it is a project of the The Document Foundation (TDF) and licensed under MPL-2.0.

[Quackdoc]

It's a massive shame they couldn't come together for this. Setting drama aside, Gnu Boot is actually pretty important from a security perspective too. Now that libreboot allows blobs this can pose a potential attack vector. The security concerns were wrongfully dismissed saying something along the lines of having the blobs adds to security due to being able to use newer hardware and whatnot. This is 50% true. Yes it absolutely closes some attack vectors, but it also opens those blobs up.

Here is the thing these people seem to forget, different people have different risks, lets say I am very confident in my ability to prevent my computer from being tampered with without me knowing. I do not benefit from these new securities because I don't run untrusted programs thanks to indepth vetting of the device (which is possible to a large degree thanks to blob free firmware), I use programs only authored by some entity I have absolute faith in wont leak my data to whatever risk factors exist and no one can access my device without me knowing due to a myriad of protections that would make it evident if the device was so much as touched wrong. any sign that something may have gone wrong, I assume the device is compromised.

in this totally fictional that could never ever be possible situation, the enhanced protections from running newer hardware don't matter one lick, However the security risk posed by proprietary blobs is very much real, no matter how small or unlikely. if you need the utmost confidence in your system to be secure, you need the source to those blobs or someone you trust to have accsess to those blobs. Libreboot no longer offers this, and so gnuboot does have, if only an extremely small one, a place.

[blackiwid]

Look at who is listed on https://libreboot.at/ and who's responsible for GNU Boot. Same folks, same objective.

I would assume that at least Leah is not in the team otherwise I can't tell who is overlaping between the 2 projects goal is different, also saying the goal is the same is not relevant, I can proclaim to reach world peace and than claim that I have to steel money from somebody to get there or I can try to send politicians letters... so ploclaiming a goal that is nearly impossible to reach and having the same does not make 2 projects the same.

Probably you could find same official goals of Microsoft (make the world better) and some GNU projects that does not make them the same.

It's also heavily encroaching to not accept that somebody has a different opinion how to reach a certain goal, how can you be so arrogant and try to force your way of believing in freedom on others, you can do on your website with your VCS what you want the GNU Project, that's like going in somebody elses house and try to tell them that they have to beat their children to make them good adults...

[blackiwid]

It started out as a non-GNU project, then was a GNU project for some 7 months or so, then fell back to non-GNU. All under her leadership, by the way (troublesome as it certainly was).

If she got not funding? at least she got GNU advertisement and many people gone after she changed her politics to her site because they wanted a libre version, heck 99% of people that use Linux expect a libre software to be GNU Libre not with blobs.

And even before it was a official GNU Project I imagine that it followed the classic "libre" term, or did GNU say, ohh you called that libre it's totally proprietary crap let's get rid of the blobs for this 7 months and then add the blobs back in? So GNU project or not the product became popular under GNU freedom values and then changed that.

And with a free software project leadership is not ownership, so other people participated leadership is meant more like a manager post where the owner of the companies are other people the stakeholders. But I think she thinks it's her project I don't know maybe she wrote at any time 99% of the code, then I could understand that otherwise not.

See https://web.archive.org/web/20230719...t.vimuser.org/, that big salmon-red box at the bottom end of the screen seems pretty visible to me.
Look at who is listed on https://libreboot.at/ and who's responsible for GNU Boot. Same folks, same objective.

Well it has gnuboot in the URL and not as libreboot.org/gnuboot so it will logically compete about rank on google if somebody types in GNU boot, and there is no notice alla "we have this site only only to block google searches for a short time period" so it makes totally sense to kill this. If it's meant as joke or not it has a negative effect on the GNU Boot project and their visibility, it hurts the GNU Boot project.

Also I would not see it as joke more as a mockery like "look they are incompetent" I proof that they are incompetent, because they can't do what I do so fast, attempt to undermine their image, so you can excuse that as joke as much as you want I and apperently GNU saw that as a attack, and again I fully agree.

[StarterX4]

Sounds like another crazy project that is going to end up like Hurd.

[pgeorgi]

Well that ignores that she stole the name Libreboot first. It was a freesoftware GNU project ...

It started out as a non-GNU project, then was a GNU project for some 7 months or so, then fell back to non-GNU. All under her leadership, by the way (troublesome as it certainly was).

And when the Lea claims it was parody GNU didn't share this opinion otherwise they wouldn't threatened legal action they did not share this opinion "on the site" is relative was it big on the primary website or somewhere hidden under 1000 links?

See https://web.archive.org/web/20230719...t.vimuser.org/, that big salmon-red box at the bottom end of the screen seems pretty visible to me.

Any proof that they tried to name it Libreboot first?

Look at who is listed on https://libreboot.at/ and who's responsible for GNU Boot. Same folks, same objective.

[PublicNuisance]

Well core and Libreboot are practically identical project

This wasn't always the case. Libreboot was Coreboot minus the blobs which meant less hardware supported but more FSF oriented. With the current state of Libreboot i'd be more inclined to agree as Leah started introducing blob support. At that point may as well just use Coreboot. Granted this GNU Boot is pointless because Leah still offers a blobless version of Libreboot for those who want it although not without taking several jabs at the user base.