Re: Firmware - what are we going to do about it?
Hi Steve,
thank you for bringing this up.
On 2022-04-19 02:27, Steve McIntyre wrote:
> 1. Keep the existing setup. It's horrible, but maybe it's the best we can do?
> (I hope not!)>
> 2. We could just stop providing the non-free unofficial images altogether.
> That's not really a promising route to follow - we'd be making it even
> harder for users to install our software. While ideologically pure, it's
> not going to advance the cause of Free Software.
Here's a somewhat radical idea: I propose that we make option (1) and
(2) conditional on all Debian infra switching to hardware entirely free
of binary firmware/microcode blobs.
Because if *we* can't do it, then imposing this stringency on our users
is outright idealist hypocrisy.
[Spoiler: we can't, unless some open x86_64 silicon has popped up
somewhere (doubtful, because of the required patents).]
> 3. We could stop pretending that the non-free images are unofficial, and maybe
> move them alongside the normal free images so they're published together.
> This would make them easier to find for people that need them, but is
> likely to cause users to question why we still make any images without
> firmware if they're otherwise identical.
>
> 4. The images team technically could simply include non-free into the official
> images, and add firmware packages to the input lists for those images.
> However, that would still leave us with problem 3 from above (non-free
> generally enabled on most installations).
>
> 5. We could split out the non-free firmware packages into a new
> non-free-firmware component in the archive, and allow a specific exception
> only to allow inclusion of those packages on our official media. We would
> then generate only one set of official media, including those non-free
> firmware packages.
I'd vote for option 5, and alternatively option 3.
Best,
Christian
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