Re: DFSG violations in Lenny: Summarizing the choices

2008-11-11 Thread Gustavo Noronha Silva
On Sat, 2008-11-08 at 14:11 -0500, Theodore Tso wrote: > So realistically, let's be honest with ourselves. Not supporting > devices that require non-free firmwares is not going to help make the > world a better place. What it will probably do is that users, once > they find out that that a Debian

Re: DFSG violations in Lenny: Summarizing the choices

2008-11-10 Thread Sebastian Krause
Theodore Tso <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > Another consequence of making it easy for the users to add non-free to > the repositories so they can download firmware necessary to make their > hardware useful is that a huge number of users may end up enabling > non-free just to make their hardware work,

Re: DFSG violations in Lenny: Summarizing the choices

2008-11-10 Thread Michelle Konzack
Am 2008-11-10 12:56:26, schrieb Karl Goetz: > Why are they making hardware that can transmit on *any* frequency? Why > are they not making hardware that transmits in the 2.4GHz ISM band > perhaps with firmware to 'fine tune' it? Seems strange to pour lots of > money into making an all-band radio th

Re: DFSG violations in Lenny: Summarizing the choices

2008-11-10 Thread Michelle Konzack
Am 2008-11-10 09:54:24, schrieb Johannes Wiedersich: > I think the best way out of this dilemma is to add a 'non-free firmware' > section and make this section part of official debian. A provision is But this should be a "volatile" archive, which allow the upload of new firmware releases and not

Re: DFSG violations in Lenny: Summarizing the choices

2008-11-10 Thread Michelle Konzack
Am 2008-11-09 12:19:06, schrieb Josselin Mouette: > Why in the world would we do that when we have all that???s needed to > simply move the firmware images to non-free? And what, if peoples do not want to use non-free but get there hardware working? The best would be to create a new flavour cal

Re: DFSG violations in Lenny: Summarizing the choices

2008-11-10 Thread Michelle Konzack
Am 2008-11-08 15:29:44, schrieb Thomas Bushnell BSG: > It seems to me that, if this is really true, then the hardware > manufacturers have been lying to the FCC for years, claiming that the > user cannot reprogram the card, without explaining that, in fact, it's > just that users may not know how t

Re: DFSG violations in Lenny: Summarizing the choices

2008-11-10 Thread Alexandre Oliva
On Sat, Nov 8, 2008, Thomas Bushnell BSG wrote: > Why not just support it in non-free exactly the way we do other things? Indeed. Arguably, documentation is even more important than making non-Free firmware trivially-accessible to users, and users might be tempted to add non-free to their repo s

Re: DFSG violations in Lenny: Summarizing the choices

2008-11-10 Thread Bastian Blank
On Mon, Nov 10, 2008 at 12:56:26PM +1030, Karl Goetz wrote: > Why are they making hardware that can transmit on *any* frequency? Why > are they not making hardware that transmits in the 2.4GHz ISM band > perhaps with firmware to 'fine tune' it? Seems strange to pour lots of > money into making an a

Re: DFSG violations in Lenny: Summarizing the choices

2008-11-10 Thread Johannes Wiedersich
-BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE- Hash: SHA1 Peter Palfrader wrote: > On Sat, 08 Nov 2008, Theodore Tso wrote: > >>Fortunately for us, at the >> moment I am not aware of large numbers of highly popular laptops or >> servers for which non-free firmware

Re: DFSG violations in Lenny: Summarizing the choices

2008-11-10 Thread Josselin Mouette
Le lundi 10 novembre 2008 à 03:28 +0100, Marco d'Itri a écrit : > Myself, I'd like a Debian fork with RHEL kernels anyway... lol -- .''`. : :' : We are debian.org. Lower your prices, surrender your code. `. `' We will add your hardware and software distinctiveness to `-our

Re: DFSG violations in Lenny: Summarizing the choices

2008-11-09 Thread Marco d'Itri
On Nov 08, Theodore Tso <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > So while I am personally of the DFSG only makes sense for executable > *software* that runs on the host CPU, previous GR's have shown that > this position has a distinct minority. So why not let the DFSG > hard-liners win this one completely?

Re: DFSG violations in Lenny: Summarizing the choices

2008-11-09 Thread Karl Goetz
On Sat, 2008-11-08 at 14:11 -0500, Theodore Tso wrote: > On Fri, Nov 07, 2008 at 12:47:01PM +, David Given wrote: > > In which case things have changed within the past couple of years --- > > after all, the whole purpose of the Atheros HAL was to inforce those FCC > > limits. Do you have any re

Re: DFSG violations in Lenny: Summarizing the choices

2008-11-09 Thread Frans Pop
Joey Hess wrote: > http://kitenet.net/~joey/blog/entry/d-i_firmware_loading > http://cdimage.debian.org/cdimage/unofficial/non-free/firmware/ > > I'm not sure what to do about both the Debian project being generally > unaware of functionality already present in Debian. Document it better? It's al

Re: DFSG violations in Lenny: Summarizing the choices

2008-11-09 Thread Joey Hess
http://kitenet.net/~joey/blog/entry/d-i_firmware_loading http://cdimage.debian.org/cdimage/unofficial/non-free/firmware/ I'm not sure what to do about both the Debian project being generally unaware of functionality already present in Debian. Document it better? Wet fishes applied to anyone who st

Re: DFSG violations in Lenny: Summarizing the choices

2008-11-09 Thread Thomas Bushnell BSG
On Sun, 2008-11-09 at 06:55 -0500, Theodore Tso wrote: > Because according to you, Debian isn't allowed to ship any non-free > bits, right? No, not right. Please pay attention. Thomas -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROT

Re: DFSG violations in Lenny: Summarizing the choices

2008-11-09 Thread Holger Levsen
Hi, On Sunday 09 November 2008 13:37, Paul Wise wrote: > The images don't include non-free stuff, but they do allow loading > non-free firmware. Joey Hess blogged about how it works here: > > http://kitenet.net/~joey/blog/entry/d-i_firmware_loading/ So all we need is just a download location for

non-free firmware loading in d-i (was Re: DFSG violations in Lenny: Summarizing the choices)

2008-11-09 Thread Luca Capello
Hi there! On Sun, 09 Nov 2008 13:37:24 +0100, Paul Wise wrote: > On Sun, Nov 9, 2008 at 8:55 PM, Theodore Tso <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: >> If the proposal is to delay the release to make sure that **all** bits >> are moved into the non-free section, what about the debian >> installation CD itself

Re: DFSG violations in Lenny: Summarizing the choices

2008-11-09 Thread Paul Wise
On Sun, Nov 9, 2008 at 8:55 PM, Theodore Tso <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > If the proposal is to delay the release to make sure that **all** bits > are moved into the non-free section, what about the debian > installation CD itself? If it is true that __Debian__ never includes > any DFSG bits, I w

Re: DFSG violations in Lenny: Summarizing the choices

2008-11-09 Thread Theodore Tso
On Sat, Nov 08, 2008 at 10:24:16PM -0800, Thomas Bushnell BSG wrote: > > Neither does it (currently) contain an exception for debian.org > > machines, or very popular Dell machines with Broadcom ethernet > > firmware. Great! Cut them off!! Let's see how quickly we can get > > users moving to non

Re: DFSG violations in Lenny: Summarizing the choices

2008-11-09 Thread Paul Wise
On Sun, Nov 9, 2008 at 8:33 PM, Sam Morris <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > Here's an interesting problem with DFSG-free firmware such as those > created by the FreeMAC project (for prism54 cards): if they never get FCC- > certified, is it legal for Debian to distribute them? That would be something

Re: DFSG violations in Lenny: Summarizing the choices

2008-11-09 Thread Paul Wise
On Sun, Nov 9, 2008 at 8:30 PM, Sam Morris <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > I'd prefer to see firmware in a separate section, because it will be > easier to get that section enabled by default for new installs. This will > mean that the installer, or something hooked up to udev/hal, etc., will > be ab

Re: DFSG violations in Lenny: Summarizing the choices

2008-11-09 Thread Sam Morris
On Sun, 09 Nov 2008 00:39:26 -0500, Theodore Tso wrote: > So if people think that they are going to be able to get firmware in > source form so that popular wireless chips can be driven using 100% DFSG > pure firmware, I suspect they will have a very long wait ahead of them. > The issue is that s

Re: DFSG violations in Lenny: Summarizing the choices

2008-11-09 Thread Sam Morris
On Sat, 08 Nov 2008 22:24:16 -0800, Thomas Bushnell BSG wrote: > On Sun, 2008-11-09 at 00:39 -0500, Theodore Tso wrote: >> > And none of this is really relevent: the DFSG and the Social Contract >> > do not contain an exception for dishonest or scared hardware >> > manufacturers, or stupid FCC pol

Re: DFSG violations in Lenny: Summarizing the choices

2008-11-09 Thread Josselin Mouette
Le samedi 08 novembre 2008 à 18:55 -0500, Theodore Tso a écrit : > And as I said, I think we should let the DFSG hard-liners win. Let's > yank all of the binaries that require a firmware, and release Lenny > as-is. If that causes some users switch to some fork that actually > has a kernel that wo

Re: DFSG violations in Lenny: Summarizing the choices

2008-11-09 Thread Teemu Likonen
Ben Finney (2008-11-09 10:54 +1100) wrote: > We don't distribute non-free *anything* in Debian. That's what our > users are promised, at any rate. Yes, this claim has been repeated many times, but as a thought-exercise let us be more concrete: who exactly are those users who have been promised? I

Re: DFSG violations in Lenny: Summarizing the choices

2008-11-08 Thread Paul Wise
On Sun, Nov 9, 2008 at 2:42 PM, Theodore Tso <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > Oooh does that means Debian is distributing non-free bits? Yes, same as we've been doing for years - in the non-free part of the archive. -- bye, pabs http://wiki.debian.org/PaulWise -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [E

Re: DFSG violations in Lenny: Summarizing the choices

2008-11-08 Thread Thomas Bushnell BSG
On Sun, 2008-11-09 at 00:39 -0500, Theodore Tso wrote: > > And none of this is really relevent: the DFSG and the Social Contract do > > not contain an exception for dishonest or scared hardware manufacturers, > > or stupid FCC policies. > > Neither does it (currently) contain an exception for debi

Re: DFSG violations in Lenny: Summarizing the choices

2008-11-08 Thread Theodore Tso
On Sun, Nov 09, 2008 at 12:21:26PM +0900, Paul Wise wrote: > On Sun, Nov 9, 2008 at 4:11 AM, Theodore Tso <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > > Another choice open to Debian is to make it easier for users to opt > > into downloading firmware --- perhaps by making very easy through the > > installer to

Re: DFSG violations in Lenny: Summarizing the choices

2008-11-08 Thread Theodore Tso
On Sat, Nov 08, 2008 at 05:05:50PM -0800, Thomas Bushnell BSG wrote: > > But now we have this claim that the FCC's well-understood rule about > hardware does not apply to software: that software modifications *are* > traceable back to the manufacturer, even though hardware modifications > are not.

Re: DFSG violations in Lenny: Summarizing the choices

2008-11-08 Thread Paul Wise
On Sun, Nov 9, 2008 at 4:11 AM, Theodore Tso <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > Another choice open to Debian is to make it easier for users to opt > into downloading firmware --- perhaps by making very easy through the > installer to select the non-free section. For machines where non-free firmware is

Re: DFSG violations in Lenny: Summarizing the choices

2008-11-08 Thread Stephen Gran
This one time, at band camp, Ben Hutchings said: > On Sun, 2008-11-09 at 00:39 +0100, Peter Palfrader wrote: > > On Sat, 08 Nov 2008, Theodore Tso wrote: > > > > >Fortunately for us, at the > > > moment I am not aware of large numbers of highly popular l

Re: DFSG violations in Lenny: Summarizing the choices

2008-11-08 Thread Thomas Bushnell BSG
On Sat, 2008-11-08 at 18:55 -0500, Theodore Tso wrote: > > The FCC understands that you can't make it *impossible*. Even before > software radios, it was understood that someone posessing the skills, > say, of an amateur radio operator might be able to add a resistor or > capacitor in parallel wi

Re: DFSG violations in Lenny: Summarizing the choices

2008-11-08 Thread Ben Hutchings
On Sun, 2008-11-09 at 00:39 +0100, Peter Palfrader wrote: > On Sat, 08 Nov 2008, Theodore Tso wrote: > > >Fortunately for us, at the > > moment I am not aware of large numbers of highly popular laptops or > > servers for which non-free firmware is necess

Re: DFSG violations in Lenny: Summarizing the choices

2008-11-08 Thread Steve McIntyre
Peter wrote: >On Sat, 08 Nov 2008, Theodore Tso wrote: > >>Fortunately for us, at the >> moment I am not aware of large numbers of highly popular laptops or >> servers for which non-free firmware is necessary before the firmware >> would be able to access

Re: DFSG violations in Lenny: Summarizing the choices

2008-11-08 Thread Theodore Tso
On Sat, Nov 08, 2008 at 03:29:44PM -0800, Thomas Bushnell BSG wrote: > On Sat, 2008-11-08 at 14:11 -0500, Theodore Tso wrote: > > There are corporate lawyers who are very much afraid that the FCC > > could, if they were alerted to the fact that someone had figured out > > how to reverse engineer th

Re: DFSG violations in Lenny: Summarizing the choices

2008-11-08 Thread Ben Finney
Thomas Bushnell BSG <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: > Regardless, the DFSG doesn't say anything about "unless the FCC has > an annoying rule". We don't distribute non-free software in Debian. To forestall yet another round of debate about software vs. firmware: We don't distribute non-free *anything*

Re: DFSG violations in Lenny: Summarizing the choices

2008-11-08 Thread Peter Palfrader
On Sat, 08 Nov 2008, Theodore Tso wrote: >Fortunately for us, at the > moment I am not aware of large numbers of highly popular laptops or > servers for which non-free firmware is necessary before the firmware > would be able to access the network. HP D

Re: DFSG violations in Lenny: Summarizing the choices

2008-11-08 Thread Thomas Bushnell BSG
On Sat, 2008-11-08 at 14:11 -0500, Theodore Tso wrote: > There are corporate lawyers who are very much afraid that the FCC > could, if they were alerted to the fact that someone had figured out > how to reverse engineer the HAL and/or the firmware to cause their > WiFi unit to become a "super radio

DFSG violations in Lenny: Summarizing the choices

2008-11-08 Thread Theodore Tso
On Fri, Nov 07, 2008 at 12:47:01PM +, David Given wrote: > In which case things have changed within the past couple of years --- > after all, the whole purpose of the Atheros HAL was to inforce those FCC > limits. Do you have any references? Like, to an FCC statement of policy > change? If so,