[Mageia-dev] Non-free firmwares in installer

Thu Mar 24 23:44:36 CET 2011

On Thu, 24 Mar 2011 17:41:18 -0400, andre999 <andr55 at laposte.net> wrote:
+
+> Romain d'Alverny a écrit :
+> >
+> > On Thu, Mar 24, 2011 at 20:08, Anssi Hannula<anssi.hannula at iki.fi>  wrote:
+> >> On 24.03.2011 19:35, Romain d'Alverny wrote:
+> >>> Summary (from http://mageia.org/wiki/doku.php?id=licensing_policy):
+> >>>   * core: stuff that is not Free/Open Source according to OSI/FSF does
+> >>> not belong here. Not even closed-source stuff that we can
+> >>> redistribute. So if there is at this time, that's something to fix.
+> >>
+> >> Most of files in kernel-firmware (which is in core) are not OSI/FSF free
+> >> (approximate list from 2010 [1]). There was a short thread about that
+> >> [2] where I asked the question if they should be moved to non-free due
+> >> to them not being OSI/FSF free, and tmb agreed, while pterjan disagreed
+> >> (saying BSD without source code (where a portion of the firmware files
+> >> in question fall) is eligible for core).
+> >>
+> >> [1] http://lists.mandriva.com/cooker/2010-01/msg00525.php
+> >> [2] https://mageia.org/pipermail/mageia-dev/20110115/002172.html
+> >
+> > Ah right, sorry for overlooking this.
+> >
+> > So what do we do? amend core inclusion definition for that? or move
+> > these to nonfree? (and at what cost?) topic for next Council meeting
+> > to decide? would you like to write a summary for this in
+> > http://mageia.org/wiki/doku.php?id=meeting:council_notes_2011_03_28#open_questions
+> > ?
+> >
+> > Romain
+> 
+> fwiw, I think the best solution is to have an express policy to include 
+> such firmware in core.
+> Without it, much hardware simply won't work.  Firmware/drivers are 
+> essentially extensions to hardware, so that software can work with them.
+> The hardware is changed, and firmware/drivers have to be changed to 
+> accommodate the hardware.
+> These firmware/drivers provide an interface which allows (free) software 
+> to run.
+> A practical solution, which doesn't hurt free software.
+> The alternative is (free) software that doesn't run properly.
+> 
+> my 2 cents :)
+
+Sincerely, I would be more than happy than nVidia drivers went to core,
+but I'm pragmatic. I can understand that moving only firmwares to
+core, and leaving nVidia, ATI and other closed source drivers in non-free
+can be a compromise solution. It's the difference between losing
+100% functionality of an important piece of hardware/system (network,
+for example -now that I read the list in Anssi's mail, 80% of firmwares
+in non-free are network- o fiber-channel), or getting a not so performant
+system 'cause you dont have the binary drivers for your graphics card
+(and I'm not aware of any other binary driver so popular/needed, nVidia
+and ATI).
+
+So in short, there are three important pieces of software:
+- net/fc/radeon firmwares, mandatory for some free drivers
+- nVidia/ATI binary drivers, wanted but optional, not mandatory
+
+Firmwares and drivers, they are different beasts for me.
+
+And anyways, you already have firmwares in your hardware and in your
+kernel which source you can't look at...
+And cherry picking firmwares from standard kernel source looks like
+madness for me.
+
+-- 
+J.A. Magallon <jamagallon()ono!com>     \               Software is like sex:
+                                         \         It's better when it's free
+