[Mageia-discuss] Hauppauge WinTV PVR-250

Sat Jun 4 19:10:56 CEST 2011

+
+On 06/04/2011 11:57 AM, Hoyt Duff wrote:
+> On 6/3/11, Gary Montalbine<gmontalbine at cox.net>  wrote:
+>
+>>
+>> I got the firmware from the IVTV site and copied  it to /lib/firmware
+>>
+>
+>
+> But that is a band-aid, a kludge, that gives you a cobbled-together
+> system, not to mention it does not really solve the problem for the
+> distro and the wider user base. And every time you need to install
+> Mageia on that hardware, you'll need to apply the kludge again and
+> again.
+>
+> The goal should be to have a distro that 'just works'. Solving the
+> problem by copying files from outside the repositories may point out a
+> deficiency in Mageia repos, but not if the solution can be found
+> within.
+>
+> And this brings up a point of having the tainted repos as "opt-in".
+> This thinking comes from a philosophy of some kind of "pure" Linux
+> which eschews non-free licensed software.However, some hardware can
+> only be useful with non-free software and it's unrealistic to pretend
+> that such hardware does not exist nor that those using such hardware
+> will have the knowledge and skill to enable the tainted repo.
+>
+> I realize that the purists among us have decide to disable the tainted
+> repos by default, but those same people are the ones most likely to
+> have selected hardware that does not depend on non-free software and
+> they are also skilled Linux users. The opt-in approach serves to
+> advance their political agenda at the expense of having a distro that
+> 'just works' for the average to non-technical user.
+>
+> It may be more sense to enable the tainted repos by default and
+> provide an opt-out screen during the installation: "Repositories
+> offering access to software that have non-free licenses are enabled by
+> default. To keep your Mageia system unencumbered by software with
+> restrictive or non-free licenses, please un-check the box. Certain
+> hardware may not function without such non-free software and if you
+> are unsure, leave the box checked."
+>
+> That gives users a choice, makes Mageia a 'just works' distro for the
+> average user and reduces the number of requests for assistance that
+> can be solved by using non-free software.
+>
+I had the tainted repos installed since initial installation. The 
+firmware I needed was not there. At least not according to the software 
+manager.
+
+Gary
+