Re: Changing how we handle non-free firmware
On Mon, Aug 22, 2022 at 12:32:54PM -0500, Gunnar Wolf wrote:
> I hereby propose the following alternative text to Steve's original
> proposal.
>
> I'm only suggesting to modify the third paragraph, offering to produce
> two sets of images (fully-free and with-non-free-firmware), being the
> later more prominent.
>
> =================================
>
> We will include non-free firmware packages from the
> "non-free-firmware" section of the Debian archive on our official
> media (installer images and live images). The included firmware
> binaries will *normally* be enabled by default where the system
> determines that they are required, but where possible we will include
> ways for users to disable this at boot (boot menu option, kernel
> command line etc.).
>
> When the installer/live system is running we will provide information
> to the user about what firmware has been loaded (both free and
> non-free), and we will also store that information on the target
> system such that users will be able to find it later. The target
> system will *also* be configured to use the non-free-firmware
> component by default in the apt sources.list file. Our users should
> receive security updates and important fixes to firmware binaries just
> like any other installed software.
>
> While we will publish these images as official Debian media, they will
> *not* replace the current media sets that do not include non-free
> firmware packages, but offered alongside. Images that do include
> non-free firmware will be presented more prominently, so that
> newcomers will find them more easily; fully-free images will not be
I would state here instead
"Images that do include non-free firmware *may* be presented more
prominently, at the relevant teams' discretion".
(or something along those lines)
Rationale: we don't want to bind ourselves to an action that we're
taking because the situation is *currently* problematic. While unlikely,
it is certainly possible (given enough pressure) that at some undefined
point in the future the *majority* of firmware packages will no longer
be in the non-free section. At that point, we may want to decide to give
the image without non-free firmware priority again.
> hidden away; they will be linked from the same project pages, but with
> less visual priority.
Other than that, I would second this if I had a functional GPG key ;-)
--
w@uter.{be,co.za}
wouter@{grep.be,fosdem.org,debian.org}
I will have a Tin-Actinium-Potassium mixture, thanks.
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