when is atheros ar 9271 wifi free software?
After reading about free software wifi cards on this forum, I got the impression, that the ar9271 13d3:3327 usb card would run on free software on a gnulinux distro. I got a couple of wifi cards.
I found out that is not so. I tested it on an entirely free software debian 8 distro. Only by installing non free package atheros-firmware. Then it worked.
I have done reading on https://wireless.wiki.kernel.org/. Is https://wireless.wiki.kernel.org/en/developers/gsoc/2012/ath9k_htc_open_firmware a free software driver? Is its name ath9k_htc? If a free software driver is available, then how can I install it?
I have done reading on https://wireless.wiki.kernel.org/. Is https://wireless.wiki.kernel.org/en/developers/gsoc/2012/ath9k_htc_open_firmware a free software driver?
A free software firmware.
Is its name ath9k_htc?
Yes.
If a free software driver is available, then how can I install it?
It is in Trisquel's repository under the name "open-ath9k-htc-firmware".
I guess you can download the .deb package to install it on Debian (e.g., by double-clicking on it if you previously install GDebi from the package manager): http://packages.trisquel.info/belenos/all/open-ath9k-htc-firmware/download
"I guess you can download the .deb package to install it on Debian"
this will most likely work but i think some packages made for Ubuntu 14.04 based distros will not work correctly on debian
This package is just two firmware files in /lib/firmware, with no external dependencies, so it will work.
"I found out that is not so. I tested it on an entirely free software debian 8 distro. Only by installing non free package atheros-firmware. Then it worked."
This is because Debian hasn't packaged up the free firmware. They still to this day only provide people with the older version that's proprietary. For a distro that people proclaim about being all about freedom you'd think they'd have jumped on replacing the proprietary firmware with the free one. I mean, it's only been over two years so it's not like they haven't had time.