Re: Non-free firmware [was: Debian install Question]
On Friday, March 05, 2021 08:44:26 PM David Wright wrote:
> On Fri 05 Mar 2021 at 14:30:30 (-0500), rhkramer@gmail.com wrote:
> > On Friday, March 05, 2021 11:56:24 AM David Wright wrote:
> > > On Thu 04 Mar 2021 at 15:47:37 (-0500), rhkramer@gmail.com wrote:
> > <cutting the context ;-) >
> >
> > > If a device is sold on a separate card, it's not necessarily
> > > enough to know the model number of the card. Many "identical"
> > > models are sold with various different chips, which will
> > > require different firmware. You might not know which chip you've
> > > got until you look at the board, or even read its codes from
> > > the dmesg output.
> > >
> > > Being non-free, the firmware usually originates/d from some
> > > manufacturer or other. If the firmware fails to work with the
> > > device, there's not much that Debian can do about it. It might
> > > be something for some sub-sub-group of the linux kernel people,
> > > if the problem lies in how the driver and firmware interact.
> > >
> > > So in your scheme, the "unofficial installers" that have to be
> > > "vetted" by someone to confirm they "indeed work on those
> > > hardware configurations" are actually hundreds of different
> > > combinations, each one comprising one particular firmware blob,
> > >
> > > plus the same old official installer image:
> > > iwlwifi-100-5.ucode + official installer ✓ Vetted ✓ Passed
> > > iwlwifi-105-6.ucode + official installer ✓ Vetted ✓ Passed
> > > iwlwifi-135-6.ucode + official installer ✓ Vetted ✓ Passed
> > > iwlwifi-1000-5.ucode + official installer ✓ Vetted ✓ Passed
> > > iwlwifi-2000-6.ucode + official installer ✓ Vetted ✓ Passed
> > > iwlwifi-2030-6.ucode + official installer ✓ Vetted ✓ Passed
> > > … … … … …
> > >
> > > ad infinitum …
> >
> > It would be nice (imho), but may be difficult. ;-)
>
> Imagine you are part of the team, and you've volunteered to shoulder
> the responsibility for firmware-iwlwifi_20190114-2_all.deb. In order
> to vet it, you have to track down, purchase and install 35 different
> types of wifi "cards", and over half a dozen more for bluetooth. With
> each, you need to run the first half dozen steps of the installer,
> presumably by preseed.
>
> I wrote "cards" because you're not just juggling PCI cards here, but
> excavating tiny little boards out of the guts of various sorts of
> laptop. But you picked an easy option. Many of the ethernet hardware
> options are integrated with the mobo.
>
> IMHO, "difficult" doesn't cover it. Nor expensive, nor tedious.
That's not how I would do it, and not what I'm trying to suggest. If person A
has hardware B and he tries installer C and it works, he reports (or even
updates a web page himself) the point that he successfully used installer C
on hardware B.
Somebody else might do the same for hardware they have.
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