Mike Hommey said: > > a) it's not in any release of Debian, and it's not in any upcoming > release of Debian either. It's in a package from experimental.
I had no idea I was running experimental packages on a machine with wheezy and a few wheezy-backports (openssh-server and debian-security-support). I followed the directions at http://mozilla.debian.net/: Add to sources.list: deb http://mozilla.debian.net/ wheezy-backports iceweasel-release $ apt-get update $ apt-get install -t wheezy-backports iceweasel So I have iceweasel 33.1-1~bpo70+1 installed. And this confirms the binary blob. $ ls -l ~/.mozilla/firefox/*/gmp-gmpopenh264/1.1 total 1000 -rw-r--r-- 1 cp cp 114 Sep 2 16:36 gmpopenh264.info -rwxr-xr-x 1 cp cp 1018138 Sep 2 16:37 libgmpopenh264.so > b) everyone knows what's actually contained in that binary blob, since > it's built from open source code, and the build is (supposed to be) > reproductible. I'll assume you meant s/knows/can confirm/ because I certainly don't know. > So it's not as bad as you make it sound. That's good to know! However I think many of us would be more comfortable if the Debian systems built the source. http://www.openh264.org/faq.html explains that "In order for Cisco to be responsible for the MPEG LA licensing royalties for the module, Cisco must provide the packaging and distribution of this code in a binary module format (think of it like a plug-in, but not using the same APIs as existing plugins), in addition to several other constraints." http://www.mpegla.com/main/programs/M2/Pages/Agreement.aspx says the license fee would be $2.00 per unit. http://www.mpegla.com/main/programs/M2/Pages/Agreement.aspx also says: License Term Coverage is from June 1, 1994 through the expiration of the MPEG-2 Patent Portfolio Patents and may be voluntarily terminated by the Licensee after December 31, 2015 (Sections 6.1 and 6.4). If what I am reading is correct, unless someone gets a MPEG LA License that allows Debian to distribute the source and binaries we may not see it until 2016 or perhaps later... According to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Term_of_patent#United_States the patent term is over, so how is it more than 20 years and why can't Debian distribute it now, ie. after June 1, 2014? Chuck -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-bugs-rc-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org