On Wed, Jan 12, 2005 at 09:27:43PM +0100, Peter Vandenabeele wrote: > On Wed, Jan 12, 2005 at 10:33:40AM +0000, Matthew Garrett wrote: > > Manoj Srivastava <srivasta@debian.org> wrote: > > > I must confess I do not see it that way. I think of Debian as > > > distriuting softwware that runs on a platform, this platform consists > > > of hardware, and, perhaps, associated software burned into > > > ROM/flash. We do not distribute the hardware, and the user arranges > > > for control to be transferred to Debian on power on. > > > I, thus, draw a line between what runs above this line, and > > > things that run below, that existed before Debian started running. > > As you say, there is a line to be drawn, and where that line gets drawn > > is fairly subjective. I'd prefer to draw the line at a point that > > results in consistent provision of freedom - if the availability of free > > firmware is a worthwhile thing, then I think we ought to want it in the > > "firmware in flash" case too. On the other hand, if our users don't need > > free firmware when it's in flash, why do they need it when it's on disk? > That's the question that I see unanswered. Is the first motivation of banning > non-free firmware from main to allow distribution consistent with DFSG > or is it because we want to promote free firmware (if realistic) ? I think you're looking at the wrong question here. The recent GR is a clear statement that under our current policies, non-free firmware should not be included in main. Much of the firmware we're talking about also isn't even redistributable, let alone free. The current point of discussion is, what should happen to the *drivers* that require such firmware to be loaded from disk before they're operational? The wording in the social contract here is much more ambiguous, and allows us latitude in deciding where to draw the line for creating a system that doesn't "depend" on non-free software. -- Steve Langasek postmodern programmer
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