Re: Automatic downloading of non-free software by stuff in main
Josh Triplett writes ("Re: Automatic downloading of non-free software by stuff in main"):
> - Packages in main must not point the user to specific non-free or
> contrib software and recommend its installation,
I agree with this as a goal for at least some configuration settings.
I'm basically sympathetic. But:
Unfortunately, this statement is inconsistent with the Technical
Committee decision in #681419. That is, it cannot be implemented
without a General Resolution[1], or someone persuading the TC to
reverse #681419.
[1] The GR would require a 2:3 supermajority because the TC abandoned
my efforts to reform the bugs in its constitutional foundations, when
I left the TC.
> Such an opt-in
I was hoping to get away from questions of default configuration, and
to do the technical work first.
I was also hoping to avoid trying to make a long list of political
demands, which is what your bullet points are.
Finally, your set of bullet points doesn't explain to me what the
"additional distinction" it is you are trying to make.
> - For the sake of avoiding ambiguity, an interpreter for file formats or
> network protocols that include software, such as scripts, may consider
> the user browsing to a site or opening a file as "user interaction"
> for the purposes of processing the software embedded or referenced by
> that site or file. However, this does not extend to automatically
> downloading or installing separate non-free software to interpret such
> sites or files, such as non-free codecs or plugins; that must still
> require explicit user interaction.
Does that mean that a web browser is allowed to execute non-free
Javascript ? What about nominally-free Javascript
(Libre-JS-permitted) which the user doesn't have the practical
capability to modify because of the way it website JS deployed and
distributed ?
These are questions I would prefer to avoid answering now.
Summary: please help me try to avoid making the best the enemy of
improvement.
Ian.
--
Ian Jackson <ijackson@chiark.greenend.org.uk> These opinions are my own.
If I emailed you from an address @fyvzl.net or @evade.org.uk, that is
a private address which bypasses my fierce spamfilter.
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