New user Q & A.
Trisquel
When will you release the next version of Trisquel? #newtrisquel
At present Trisquel is based on the LTS versions of Ubuntu. Once the upstream has been released it usually takes from six to eight months for the new version of Trisquel to be published. You should notice though that there is no planning and no official release dates, hence Trisquel is "released when ready". Be patient.
I need help with the issue "x" or the program "x". #helpneeded
Trisquel provides a variety of resources for assisting the user. You can look and ask for help here:
- The official documentation.
- The official Trisquel forum.
- Trisquel is based on Ubuntu, hence most of the issues you might encounter are common to and shared between the two distributions. A huge resource of relative information on Ubuntu can be found on the Internet – the solution for a problem in Ubuntu will most likely apply to Trisquel as well.
Hardware
Which laptop do you recommend? #laptop
We recommend hardware that works entirely with free software. Have a look at the h-node project, or the thinkpenguin website; you can also buy one of the laptops endorsed by the FSF.
My laptop's wireless connection does not work. #nowifi
It may be due to several reasons:
1.- My laptop used to work perfectly fine, but after shutting it down and booting back the wifi is gone.
A: It is probably a kernel issue. Most probably you wifi adapter isn't supported by the new version of the kernel. A solution might be a kernel downgrade, that is the installation of an older version of the linux libre kernel.
2.- Ever since I installed Trisquel the wifi on my laptop did not work:
A: Might be a kernel issue. You can try installing the latest version of the linux libre kernel. More information here. Search for the section "Using jxself's repository". Jxself provides a guide on his website.
3.- Ever since I installed Trisquel the wifi on my laptop did not work:
A: Probably the wifi adapter requires a proprietary firmware blob loaded in the linux kernel in order to work. Trisquel's kernel is a de-blobbed Ubuntu linux kernel, it doesn't contain proprietary firmware, so your wifi adapter will not work at all if it requires the blob. This terminal command will show you the model of your adapter:
lspci -nnk | grep Wireless
If you find out your wifi adapter isn't supported, you can switch it with one that works, either internal or an external one.
Software
¿How can I install Adobe Flash Player? #adobeflash
Adobe Flash Player is proprietary malware. We will never help our users with installing proprietary software – we value both freedom and computer security. An alternative for the Adobe malware is GNU Gnash, a package that is available in our software repository.
Where in the World is VirtualBox? #virtualbox
Virtualbox is free software, but the recent versions depend on a proprietary compiler. For this reason the package is not available on Trisquel. As an alternative you can use virt-manager & KVM.
Is Google Chrome free software? What about Chromium? #chromium
Google Chrome is proprietary. Chromium is free software but it recommends non free plugins. It also constantly phones home to google. An interesting read can be found here. Whether this was a honest mistake or intentional spyware, we leave it to the reader to form their own opinion.
Is Firefox free software? #firefox
Firefox is free software under the MPL 2.0 license. However, it recommends non free plugins and addons. It also implements proprietary technologies for handling DRM. The name and the logo are copyrighted and any change in the code requires the name change of the browser.
Other distributions of GNU/Linux and their relation with the GNU FSDG.
Is Debian free? #debian
Yes. By default Debian is a libre distribution of the GNU OS. More information about the reason why it was not endorsed by the FSF can be found here.
