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Enter gNewSense - the free Ubuntu (FSM)
Free Software Magazine has posted a
review of gNewSense for those of you wanting to live a firmware-free
life. "Considering the explanations above it is no surprise that
using gNewSense is more restricting than using Ubuntu. Missing support for
many WLAN cards, missing GLX as well as no Firefox do not make gNewSense
more attractive for the user. In order to prevent disappointment it is
strongly recommended to read up on hardware support and provided software
before the installation."
(Log in to post comments)
Enter gNewSense - the free Ubuntu (FSM) Posted Apr 15, 2009 17:03 UTC (Wed) by Cyberax (✭ supporter ✭, #52523) [Link]
What's the point of gNewSense? A GNU nuisance?
It's about in the same league as Wallbuntu ( http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=Nz... ).
Enter gNewSense - the free Ubuntu (FSM) Posted Apr 15, 2009 17:19 UTC (Wed) by michaeljt (subscriber, #39183) [Link]
I do also sometimes wonder about people's choice of names...
Enter gNewSense - the free Ubuntu (FSM) Posted Apr 15, 2009 20:16 UTC (Wed) by dtlin (✭ supporter ✭, #36537) [Link]
http://www.mail-archive.com/gnewsense-users@nongnu.org/ms...
http://www.gnewsense.org/index.php?n=FAQ.FAQ#toc4
Rhyming with "nuisance" is completely intentional. This isn't a
Enter gNewSense - the free Ubuntu (FSM) Posted Apr 15, 2009 20:56 UTC (Wed) by dbruce (subscriber, #57948) [Link]
>In practise, this means that gNewSense aims to:
>1. only distribute free software according to the FSFs definition and >2. not to facilitate the installation of non-free software.
I can see the rationale and value in #1, particularly as a benchmark to see what areas still need to be addressed for mainstream distros to be fully FSF-compliant.
#2 strikes me as being really unhelpful to your users for no good reason: "Yes, we know exactly why your WLAN won't work and that your laptop is basically worthless with our OS, but we won't tell you how to get it working until you get a laptop with all free drivers. It's your fault for buying it, anyway."
Enter gNewSense - the free Ubuntu (FSM) Posted Apr 15, 2009 22:11 UTC (Wed) by nevyn (subscriber, #33129) [Link]
> #2 strikes me as being really unhelpful to your users for no good reason:
From what I've seen/heard, in practise this is just there so that GNU people can say they are using gNewSense instead of Fedora because of "the firmware problem" ... but actually install/promote Ubuntu. If it's because they genuinely think Ubuntu is better for the community, or that they just hate RH isn't as clear.
Enter gNewSense - the free Ubuntu (FSM) Posted Apr 15, 2009 17:26 UTC (Wed) by dennisk (guest, #12308) [Link]
Even if you use another (less Free) distribution gNewSense still serves as a useful benchmark as to what remains to be done to achieve a totally Free OS.
Dennisk
The firmware irony Posted Apr 15, 2009 18:56 UTC (Wed) by JoeBuck (subscriber, #2330) [Link] In many cases, the difference between a card that the gNewSense folks claim is supported by free software, and one that has a free software driver but has non-free firmware, is simply that the first card has its non-free firmware pre-loaded in nonvolatile storage and the second card uses the driver to load the firmware.This raises some uncomfortable questions. A device that relies on a driver to load its firmware can be reprogrammed; a device that has firmware in ROM will probably soon be obsolete. How can we say that the latter is more free?
The firmware irony Posted Apr 15, 2009 19:36 UTC (Wed) by mjw (subscriber, #16740) [Link] A device that relies on a driver to load its firmware can be reprogrammed; a device that has firmware in ROM will probably soon be obsolete. How can we say that the latter is more free?I think the point is that a device that has free firmware that can easily be changed by its user is more free. The case of non-changeable firmware ROM seems more about equality. Nobody has the freedom to change such things (they are essentially just like any other piece of unchangeable hardware that you buy). The question about software freedom just doesn't come up because nobody has freedom to run, copy, distribute, study, change and improve it, because it is fixed. The uncomfortable questions seem to come only in play at the time that this is possible, with user changeable firmware. At that time it is clear that the user needs such freedoms, just like they have with any other (free) software.
The firmware irony Posted Apr 15, 2009 20:52 UTC (Wed) by mjg59 (subscriber, #23239) [Link]
The majority of devices ship with firmware in eeprom rather than in rom. How does the user not have as much freedom to modify that as the vendor does?
The firmware irony Posted Apr 15, 2009 21:14 UTC (Wed) by mjw (subscriber, #16740) [Link]
Agreed. So free software distributions shouldn't be shipping proprietary eeprom blobs that users will need to flash their devices with. I think the point is that such devices should be running free software though, for the user to have full control. Just like devices that need firmware loaded on them during bootup (although in that case, there are some GNU/Linux distros that ship proprietary blobs currently).
The firmware irony Posted Apr 15, 2009 21:20 UTC (Wed) by mjg59 (subscriber, #23239) [Link]
I agree, but only to the extent that I believe such distributions should also refuse to function with hardware that carries non-free firmware on eeproms. Concentrating on distribution and ignoring the fact that the amount of non-free code on the user's system hasn't got any smaller just strikes me as hypocrisy.
The firmware irony Posted Apr 16, 2009 0:30 UTC (Thu) by drag (subscriber, #31333) [Link]
Everybody would probably be served better by having the Gnusense folks point out what hardware to use to avoid proprietary programmable eeproms or firmware or whatever.
It's not information that is easy to come by...
The firmware irony Posted Apr 16, 2009 4:21 UTC (Thu) by JoeBuck (subscriber, #2330) [Link] To me, a device that attempts to prevent the user from reprogramming it is non-free, while a device that can be easily reprogrammed is free, even if, at a given point in time, only a binary is available. If it has some common processor like an ARM, and relatively simple peripherals, it's hackable. If it has DRM that prevents firmware from being loaded that isn't signed by the manufacturer, it's non-free. But some people are happier if the hardware looks like a black box.I'm not impressed with arguments that non-programmable devices that make everyone equally non-free are better. It reminds me of the joke about the Soviet-era peasant: "Commissar, my neighbor has two cows and I only have one. Please shoot one of my neighbor's cows".
The firmware irony Posted Apr 16, 2009 10:03 UTC (Thu) by hppnq (guest, #14462) [Link] I think the point is that a device that has free firmware that can easily be changed by its user is more free. Perhaps the idea that anything can be "more free" than another thing is wrong: freedom is intimately related to choice, and not an attribute of anything. I would simply buy a new device, to me that is a very simple change. What would be "not free" to me, is not being able to change the device. So if you own a device that cannot have its firmware changed, and yet you think that it should be possible, perhaps you made the wrong choice when buying it.
Enter gNewSense - the free Ubuntu (FSM) Posted Apr 16, 2009 10:01 UTC (Thu) by jengelh (subscriber, #33263) [Link]
>Enter gNewSense - the free Ubuntu (FSM)
Wait, free *buntu, was not that called Debian... (you don't have to install the nonfree components!)
Enter gNewSense - the free Ubuntu (FSM) Posted Apr 16, 2009 17:19 UTC (Thu) by tajyrink (subscriber, #2750) [Link]
Even Debian main has a few non-free bits in there. The non-free GLX code was there for 5+ years.
The point of gNewSense is to _concentrate_ on the freedom issues. Others can then learn from gNewSense and mimick when possible. Even Debian has also a other priorities besides absolutely free code (like developing new stuff, serving users, building for 11+ architectures and 3+ kernels), so it's useful to have gNewSense, which takes everything as a ready package from Ubuntu, as a thing to compare others to.
Enter gNewSense - the free Ubuntu (FSM) Posted Apr 18, 2009 1:02 UTC (Sat) by pabs (subscriber, #43278) [Link]
If you find non-free code in Debian main, please open bugs at severity serious. Where the maintainer is non-responsive you can create a non-maintainer upload and request it be uploaded on debian-mentors.
I do hope the gNewSense folks will push their changes upstream, both into Debian/Ubuntu and the individual projects.
Enter gNewSense - the free Ubuntu (FSM) Posted Apr 19, 2009 7:09 UTC (Sun) by maco (guest, #53641) [Link]
Uh, they specifically decided in Lenny that it was OK for certain binary-only firmware to be included.
Enter gNewSense - the free Ubuntu (FSM) Posted Apr 20, 2009 6:53 UTC (Mon) by pabs (subscriber, #43278) [Link]
Thats lenny only since some Debian people didn't want to wait. Since then lots of firmware has been split out.
Enter gNewSense - the free Ubuntu (FSM) Posted Apr 20, 2009 13:07 UTC (Mon) by maco (guest, #53641) [Link]
Lenny-only does mean the current Debian has binary firmware though. Wonder if Squeeze will end up getting the same treatment.
Enter gNewSense - the free Ubuntu (FSM) Posted Apr 28, 2009 18:58 UTC (Tue) by pabs (subscriber, #43278) [Link]
Looks like it won't, some Fedora & Debian folks got the firmware removed upstream in Linus' tree.
Enter gNewSense - the free Ubuntu (FSM) Posted Apr 16, 2009 17:22 UTC (Thu) by tzafrir (subscriber, #11501) [Link]
Right. Debian can't afford to be over-lunatic as it also has to cater for real users.
This distribution, however, has Ubuntu with its free and less than free repositories at the disposal of the users, just in case they decide they want a usable system.
There's a similar distribution using the same trick for Fedora.
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