FSF-Approved gNewSense Maintainer Parts Way With Project

[bridgman]

I myself for example tend to leave out the contrib and non-free repos on the computers I run Debian on. I try to get by with what's there and it usually works quite well. However sometimes hardware needs a package or two from the non-free repos and while I would ideally prefer to not use it , you have to be practical about it as well. So thanks to pulling in a couple of non-free bits I can run everything else from the free repository without having to be pushed into a corned with a more restrictive distro e.g. you can't use your hardware and therefore you don't use the rest of the OS (that is free) either. Some less technical people pick the easy way out and end up using Windows or even Ubuntu to get things working and that is not helping anybody!

A related concern with the totally libre distros is that they amplify the somewhat arbitrary distinction between non-free microcode stored in ROM or flash and the same non-free microcode stored in a file. In the first case HW works fine and in the second case HW is broken.

And yes, this is coming from a HW manufacturer who stores their microcode in files

[waxhead]

A related concern with the totally libre distros is that they amplify the somewhat arbitrary distinction between non-free microcode stored in ROM or flash and the same non-free microcode stored in a file. In the first case HW works fine and in the second case HW is broken.

And yes, this is coming from a HW manufacturer who stores their microcode in files

Absolutely and this sort of proves my point as well. To run free software you sometimes have to compromise a bit. The compromise being that you are willing to accept non-free blobs to be able to run your system until a free alternative is ready. The Raspberry Pi is a brilliant example - because so much free software is available it therefore have gained enough traction for people to be interested in working on projects to provide a free bootstrap for it.

[andyprough]

A related concern with the totally libre distros is that they amplify the somewhat arbitrary distinction between non-free microcode stored in ROM or flash and the same non-free microcode stored in a file. In the first case HW works fine and in the second case HW is broken.

And yes, this is coming from a HW manufacturer who stores their microcode in files

Has AMD made their CPU microcode completely open to inspection and audit? I would imagine the libre folks would welcome your microcode files with open arms if they were transparent.

[kpedersen]

In the first case HW works fine and in the second case HW is broken.

Well for a true Libre distro I am pretty sure both types of HW are classed as "broken". It seems that libre distros have already made a very large compromise on the processor microcode because in this day and age we are still yet to have a fully open processor (which I find a little bit disgraceful I might add).

So possibly a "libre" distro should only be able to run inside qemu with a 100% simulated albeit open processor. It sounds daft but why not? No point lying to ourselves and calling a non-libre kernel "fully open" when it isn't. Kinda feels like we are rushing things and making compromises for the sake of it.

GNU Hurd could be made 100% libre and not lose anything, since that only really works in an emulator anyway .

I don't even think of myself as an idealist; I use any hardware that works... I just don't have an obsessive desire to call anything libre when it isn't absolutely 100% open.

[Charlie68]

The FSF should have had the balls to endorse Debian. I know that they have explained why the non-free and contrib is a problem, but as long as they are ok with the main repo I think they should at least endorse that part of it. Instead of supporting what strives to be a totally free system it appears like the FSF are in some ways fighting against their own goals.

openSUSE is out for the same reason as Debian.