Re: What Linux^W distribution would you most like to see supported on a ThinkPad?
On Fri, 14 Sep 2007 10:50:12 +0200 Julian H. Stacey [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Lenovo is asking this at http://lenovoblogs.com/insidethebox/?p=3D98 and, yes!, FreeBSD is a proposed choice. ATM, the first choice is Anyone that refuses to carry binary-only drivers, so that all others will also benefit, as it will require documented hardware, which is also a very good choice. I of course like source too, but this rather destroys the force of that argument: On FreeBSD-6.2-RELEASE: man nve then go use find on /usr/src. it's a BLOB Linux MS compat PS there's source coming in from elsewhere now for man nfe in 7-current patches for stable 6.2 Summary: binary only doesnt seem to have precluded FreeBSD in case of nve, though again, yes we all prefer source avail. too :-) Yup, the only mainstream operating systems / distributions that match Anyone that refuses to carry binary-only drivers, so that all others will also benefit, as it will require documented hardware are Debian GNU/Linux and OpenBSD. Jona -- I am chaos. I am the substance from which your artists and scientists build rhythms. I am the spirit with which your children and clowns laugh in happy anarchy. I am chaos. I am alive, and tell you that you are free. Eris, Goddess Of Chaos, Discord Confusion ___ freebsd-advocacy@freebsd.org mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-advocacy To unsubscribe, send any mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: allBSD's Stop the Blob Campaign
On Mon, 19 Mar 2007 06:32:26 +0100 Szilveszter Adam [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I tread very carefully here, after all, the area is full of dead horses and I might accidentally commit violence against some of them by beating them up some more... On Mon, Mar 19, 2007 at 02:19:03AM +0100, Jona Joachim wrote: I followed the discussion on openbsd-misc, that's why I started this thread, to hear what the FreeBSD folks have to say about it. It's really unfortunate that FreeBSD-GENERIC ships with that whole bunch of blobs IMHO. Open source projects that distribute proprietary software bite their own tail. I think we agree on the fact that blobs are bad and a lot of other FreeBSD users share that same opinion. It would be interesting to hear what the leaders of the projects have to say about this. Is it more important to support hardware than to claim the right for free documentation? Are there other interests involved? Finally I'd like to remind everyone of the fact that not buying undocumented hardware is a good way to fight it. I think you are quite misguided when you say that FreeBSD ships with a whole bunch of blobs by default. This comes from the fact that - it seems so to me - many people confuse binary closed-source drivers (the ones that really can be could blobs) and closed-source *firmware*. But the difference is quite there. I do not think anyone should have anything against binary *firmware* Just because firmware is no longer soldered into your hardware, but needs to be loaded into it from your HDD every time, it still remains firmware. Just because it is on your filesystem, it still remains firmware. While there are some efforts to produce opensource firmware for certain hardware, there is nothing wrong with using the original closed-source one, this poses *no* threat to opensource developers or users. Most of the blobs that DES listed in this thread are just that: firmware. If you do not like that, fine, but then start by not buying any machine that has a proprietary BIOS. That will somewhat reduce the selection available to... uhm... yeah. To about 0. Reflashing does not count. Yes, I know. I'm aware of three blob drivers that are frequently used on FreeBSD: the NVIDIA graphics driver, the Atheros HAL (could possibly be replaced by OpenHAL) and the Adaptec RAID driver. A whole bunch was perhaps a bit exaggerated but I think it's more a matter of principle than a matter of quantity. The fact that closed-source firmware is inevitable these days is not to be encouraged IMO, it's just a sad fact. But, as you mentioned, things are changing. The real blobs are quite few on FreeBSD, because vendors do not see enough incentive to develop drivers for FreeBSD yet mostly, not even closed-source. The only prominent example would be the Nvidia drivers, which are a) not in any way included by default b) are not required for the operation of FreeBSD itself, but rather are for Xorg. You can of course decide to not use those, but the simple reality is that for some hardware, they are the only way to work somewhat ok. This is so much so, that even Ubuntu decided to include the Nvidia and ATI blob drivers by default into their next release instead of just by direct request. If the vendors released their specs and provided appropriate documentation they wouldn't need to write drivers for *BSD or even Linux. A lot of developers would be more than happy to write good drivers with the help of the vendor instead of having to do reverse engineering. So, even if someone does not like blobs, they are quite well off on FreeBSD. If you do not use the Nvidia drivers, you are mostly ok unless you use some funky vendor-provided third-party stuff but then it is not FreeBSD's but your responsibility. And no, do not let the OpenBSD propagada mislead you: just because *firmware* is licensed and cannot be freely distributed for some hardware, that does not make it a blob. I think I'm able to process information and make up my own opinion. Regards, Jona -- I am chaos. I am the substance from which your artists and scientists build rhythms. I am the spirit with which your children and clowns laugh in happy anarchy. I am chaos. I am alive, and tell you that you are free. Eris, Goddess Of Chaos, Discord Confusion signature.asc Description: PGP signature
Re: allBSD's Stop the Blob Campaign
On Sun, 18 Mar 2007 23:52:30 +0100 Daniel Seuffert [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Jona Joachim schrieb: On Sat, 17 Mar 2007 21:47:46 +0100 [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Dag-Erling Smørgrav) wrote: Jan Husar [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: Dag-Erling Smørgrav [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: OK. That's a clear trademark violation. I expect AllBSD will be hearing from the FreeBSD Foundation's lawyers... What this suppose to mean? Allbsd is doing a pretty awesome job! No matter how good a job they do, they still have to follow the law. What makes you say they violated the law? I'm quite sure some people of the FreeBSD Foundation were shown this before it was made public. Jona Sure, allBSD has permission to use the Freebsd logo etc. and we use it on labels, flyers etc. for years and we are following every advice Deb Godkin has given us and I frequently mail him to take care everything is done according to the policy the FreeBSD foundation has. If somebody is irritated here: Yes, FreeBSD uses Blobs, but a lot of people don't think this is a good idea (to promote that use). This campaign is about telling people why Blobs are bad and why we need support for freely available documentation. The upcoming flyer will explain all the details. This poster is just the beginning please don't forget. Nobody told you Blobs are forbidden or FreeBSD should abandon all Blobs etc. You are the user, you are the one responsible for your machines. If you want to use Blobs please use them. That's the Free in FreeBSD contrary to the policy of OpenBSD and nobody wants to change that ;-) Hi Daniel! I followed the discussion on openbsd-misc, that's why I started this thread, to hear what the FreeBSD folks have to say about it. It's really unfortunate that FreeBSD-GENERIC ships with that whole bunch of blobs IMHO. Open source projects that distribute proprietary software bite their own tail. I think we agree on the fact that blobs are bad and a lot of other FreeBSD users share that same opinion. It would be interesting to hear what the leaders of the projects have to say about this. Is it more important to support hardware than to claim the right for free documentation? Are there other interests involved? Finally I'd like to remind everyone of the fact that not buying undocumented hardware is a good way to fight it. Regards, Jona -- I am chaos. I am the substance from which your artists and scientists build rhythms. I am the spirit with which your children and clowns laugh in happy anarchy. I am chaos. I am alive, and tell you that you are free. Eris, Goddess Of Chaos, Discord Confusion signature.asc Description: PGP signature
Re: allBSD's Stop the Blob Campaign
On Sat, 17 Mar 2007 19:14:32 +0100 [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Dag-Erling Smørgrav) wrote: Jona Joachim [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: I heard of the Stop the Blob campaign led by allBSD [1] today. The FreeBSD logo is used in their flyer [2] which means that the FreeBSD Project is supporting the campaign. I don't see a FreeBSD logo there. All I see is the BSD daemon, which is a common mascot for all BSD derivatives. The FreeBSD logo is here: URL:http://www.freebsd.org/logo.html You have to scroll to the bottom of the flyer. I hope this is not too much of an effort. http://misc.allbsd.de/Kampagnen/NoBlob/NoBlob-en-Poster.jpg Jona -- I am chaos. I am the substance from which your artists and scientists build rhythms. I am the spirit with which your children and clowns laugh in happy anarchy. I am chaos. I am alive, and tell you that you are free. Eris, Goddess Of Chaos, Discord Confusion signature.asc Description: PGP signature
Re: allBSD's Stop the Blob Campaign
On Sat, 17 Mar 2007 21:25:21 +0100 [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Dag-Erling Smørgrav) wrote: Jona Joachim [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: Dag-Erling Smørgrav [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: Jona Joachim [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: I heard of the Stop the Blob campaign led by allBSD [1] today. The FreeBSD logo is used in their flyer [2] which means that the FreeBSD Project is supporting the campaign. I don't see a FreeBSD logo there. All I see is the BSD daemon, which is a common mascot for all BSD derivatives. The FreeBSD logo is here: URL:http://www.freebsd.org/logo.html You have to scroll to the bottom of the flyer. I hope this is not too much of an effort. http://misc.allbsd.de/Kampagnen/NoBlob/NoBlob-en-Poster.jpg OK. That's a clear trademark violation. I expect AllBSD will be hearing from the FreeBSD Foundation's lawyers... Does this mean that the FreeBSD Project leaders didn't know that our logo was used for this campaign? Does this mean that the FreeBSD Project encourages blobs? Jona -- I am chaos. I am the substance from which your artists and scientists build rhythms. I am the spirit with which your children and clowns laugh in happy anarchy. I am chaos. I am alive, and tell you that you are free. Eris, Goddess Of Chaos, Discord Confusion signature.asc Description: PGP signature
Re: allBSD's Stop the Blob Campaign
On Sat, 17 Mar 2007 21:47:46 +0100 [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Dag-Erling Smørgrav) wrote: Jan Husar [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: Dag-Erling Smørgrav [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: OK. That's a clear trademark violation. I expect AllBSD will be hearing from the FreeBSD Foundation's lawyers... What this suppose to mean? Allbsd is doing a pretty awesome job! No matter how good a job they do, they still have to follow the law. What makes you say they violated the law? I'm quite sure some people of the FreeBSD Foundation were shown this before it was made public. Jona -- I am chaos. I am the substance from which your artists and scientists build rhythms. I am the spirit with which your children and clowns laugh in happy anarchy. I am chaos. I am alive, and tell you that you are free. Eris, Goddess Of Chaos, Discord Confusion signature.asc Description: PGP signature
Re: allBSD's Stop the Blob Campaign
On Sat, 17 Mar 2007 22:05:32 +0100 [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Dag-Erling Smørgrav) wrote: Jona Joachim [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: Dag-Erling Smørgrav [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: OK. That's a clear trademark violation. I expect AllBSD will be hearing from the FreeBSD Foundation's lawyers... Does this mean that the FreeBSD Project leaders didn't know that our logo was used for this campaign? Does this mean that the FreeBSD Project encourages blobs? It means that the matter is now in the hands of those who are qualified to handle it. As for the FreeBSD Project's stance on closed-source drivers, I will let the source tree speak for itself: [EMAIL PROTECTED] ~% find /sys/contrib -name \*.uu snip listing of binaries How about porting OpenHAL to FreeBSD? Jona -- I am chaos. I am the substance from which your artists and scientists build rhythms. I am the spirit with which your children and clowns laugh in happy anarchy. I am chaos. I am alive, and tell you that you are free. Eris, Goddess Of Chaos, Discord Confusion signature.asc Description: PGP signature
allBSD's Stop the Blob Campaign
Hi! I heard of the Stop the Blob campaign led by allBSD [1] today. The FreeBSD logo is used in their flyer [2] which means that the FreeBSD Project is supporting the campaign. However FreeBSD uses binary blobs (even includes them in the source tree), notably those provided by Atheros and NVIDIA. Including third party code in the main tree of FreeBSD makes the project depend on the organization providing the software. On top of that there is a big security concern. The FreeBSD developers have absolutely no idea about how well and how secure the code provided by these companies is written. Not later than October last year a huge security hole was discovered in NVIDIA blob drivers permitting to acquire root privileges [3]. Would it be possible to clarify the position of the project regarding proprietary drivers? Best regards, Jona [1] http://www.allbsd.de/en/ [2] http://misc.allbsd.de/Kampagnen/NoBlob/NoBlob-en-Poster.jpg [3] http://download2.rapid7.com/r7-0025/ -- I am chaos. I am the substance from which your artists and scientists build rhythms. I am the spirit with which your children and clowns laugh in happy anarchy. I am chaos. I am alive, and tell you that you are free. Eris, Goddess Of Chaos, Discord Confusion signature.asc Description: PGP signature
Re: sysinstall vs BSD Installer
On Sun, 18 Feb 2007 11:27:06 -0800 (PST) Nicole [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: --- Jona Joachim [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Hi! There has been a lot of discussion recently about whether sysinstall should be replaced or not. The purpose of sysinstall is to initially install FreeBSD and it serves this purpose quite well. However sysinstall is also the first thing a new user gets to see of FreeBSD. People which are used to shiny Linux Live CDs with Framebuffer boot sequences and all the jewelry are shoked when they are confronted with the ncurses interface and walk away most of the time. This is a pity because you really use the installer once every couple of years and it says nothing about the OS. Would it be worth considering to provide the BSD Installer [1] as an alternate choice to sysinstall for a default FreeBSD installation? I'm sure several people already thought of it and it might be interesting to hear their conclusions. Regards, Jona To me the whole issue boils down to flash vs substance. (stands on soapbox) If someone is building a server, they want something easy, simple, fast, and will work on any of the myriad of weak built-in video cards available... or even via a serial port. The current installer is fine. For those people sysinstall is perhaps already too shiny. They may want a CLI installer. Some, however, while building a workstation for X-windows etc. might expect something pretty, to belay the experience to come while running the the full X experience. They may want some flashiness and the appearence of something gee wiz and cool. Is this what I am giving up windows for? But, you cannot please everyone. However, I believe that if people get past the where's my gee wiz flashy installer they will enjoy the ncurses elegant simplicity. FreeBSD, to me, has always stood for stability, not flashiness. The BSD Installer comes with a backend library for which you can have several frontends. There is a GUI and ncurses frontend ready to be downloaded. People could choose what they prefer. As for the disk space needed it should be manageable because the FreesBIE project is already providing ISOs with this installer. Of course elegant simplicity is not what the internet is about these days is it? We now even have advertisements that flash and spin and now even play video at us! So why can't they make an installer do the same thing? It's not about the Internet, really. You don't have to install Flash. As for animated SVGs, I love them ;) Advertisements are annoying, also in the real world. The installer shouldn't flash and spin. It should be usable and comfortable. Just like with the barrage of annoying adverts these days, just because something can be done, doesn't mean its the right thing to do. I didn't say that, I just asked for opinions. At least one document which is distributed with every official FreeBSD copy states that sysinstall is semi-officially at its End-Of-Life [1]. I don't think the BSD Installer would be a bad alternative, it looks clean, usable, not too flashy and has already been ported to FBSD. I wanted to know what the leaders of the project envisioned for the future. Jona [1] http://www.freebsd.org/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/articles/fbsd-from-scratch/why.html -- Hi, I'm a .signature virus! Copy me to your .signature file and help me propagate, thanks! ___ freebsd-advocacy@freebsd.org mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-advocacy To unsubscribe, send any mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
