[with JWMKIT!] Libre-antiX respin 32-bit version 2nd Beta version available for testing

54 respuestas [Último envío]
andyprough
Desconectado/a
se unió: 02/12/2015

I couldn't find my way through the old thread anymore, so starting this new one.

I've made the 2nd beta version for my "libre" respin of antiX-21, 32-bit, and uploaded it to archive.org: https://archive.org/details/2022-02-12anti-x-21-libre-respin-32bit

Same things apply as last time - archive.org torrents do NOT work well (if at all) with Transmission - if you download the torrent, use qbitorrent. This is "libre" in terms of that I've removed the obviously non-free stuff and installed Linux-libre 4.19 PAE for 32-bit, and installed 32-bit abrowser. It DOES still have the updated Intel microcode and the Intel microcode updater though - if you do not want those, feel free to remove them with:
sudo apt remove intel-microcode iucode-tool

I did a lot of work on the JWM window manager for this version, adding the "JWMKIT" suite of settings apps and themes. I think that if you try logging into it, you'll find it a prettier and more minimal window manager experience than Icewm. However, Icewm and Fluxbox are still on here like on normal antiX if you prefer them.

Overall, this thing is running fantastic on my 64-bit Dell. I'm glad everyone told me to try it, I didn't even know you could install a 32-bit distro on a 64-bit system without a bunch of extra work. This has been smooth as butter though.

Unless we find any show-stopper bugs, this will probably be a final version. Let me know any successes or failures. Once we finalize it, I'll post about it on the antiX forum and we'll get some more people poking around at it. Big thanks to antiX's lead dev anticapitalista - he made some changes to antiX 21 that made this much easier to do a Libre respin. And thanks to MagicBanana for the abrowser install script.

Now let's do what we do best and see if we can break it!!

jxself
Desconectado/a
se unió: 09/13/2010

It seems pointless to include the nonfree microcode software as Linux-libre won't load it even it's present.

andyprough
Desconectado/a
se unió: 02/12/2015

Ohhhh! Wow, that's confusing. So you are telling me Trisquel's kernel will load it, but Linux-libre will not load it?

Well then I guess we'll need another version after this. Although at the same time, it's just sitting there doing nothing.

jxself
Desconectado/a
se unió: 09/13/2010

Trisquel doesn't use Linux-libre directly but a cleaned up version of Ubuntu's kernel, with their own modifications too, so any reasoning about Trisquel's special snowflake kernel doesn't necessarily apply elsewhere.

Legimet
Desconectado/a
se unió: 12/10/2013

If you want to build Linux from source with all nonfree code stripped out but still allowing the loading of nonfree microcode, just take the source code from kernel.org and remove the files listed here under Files-Excluded: https://metadata.ftp-master.debian.org/changelogs//main/l/linux/linux_5.16.7-2_copyright

I guess you could start from the Antix package instead.

andyprough
Desconectado/a
se unió: 02/12/2015

I don't want to do that - I always use jxself's kernels, I even install them on Trisquel.

And whoever is downvoting you, I have no idea what they are thinking.

jxself
Desconectado/a
se unió: 09/13/2010

Just a random thought: https://trisquel.info/en/wiki/trisquel-community-guidelines

Point 1 "Our community's resources --the forum, documentation, etc-- are for free software only. Please do not distribute, recommend, or support non-free software here."

Since it was all about getting nonfree software up and running.

Wasn't me - Just thinking out loud for a potential rationale that would be consistent with the stated purpose of the buttons to "Please use the rating system to mark posts that go against the Community Guidelines."

Legimet
Desconectado/a
se unió: 12/10/2013

I did not provide instructions on how to use nonfree firmware. I provided instructions on how to build a libre kernel (but not Linux-libre) that is able to load nonfree firmware. There's a difference.

andyprough
Desconectado/a
se unió: 02/12/2015

The downvoting Karens brigade comes for us all at some point. Never fear though, I upvoted you to restore balance to the universe. Thanks to my quick action, we won't all fall into a black hole tonight. I don't think we will, anyway.

jxself
Desconectado/a
se unió: 09/13/2010

"I did not provide instructions on how to use nonfree firmware."
Sure, by building a kernel that does it. All in pursuit of the same goal: The use of nonfree software. "Please do not distribute, recommend, or support non-free software here" is quite clear, IMHO. "Our community's resources --the forum, documentation, etc-- are for free software only."

And besides, the kernel information isn't even correct or complete. If I can be allowed to put on my Linux-libre hat for a moment, in reality such a list of "excluded files" isn't actually a fixed target but subject to other variables that would make such a list of "excluded files" change (and no, I'm not referring to firmware or microcode loading, which would make it even longer.)

The post should have a warning added so as to help avoid people coming to the wrong conclusion about what they're doing, incorrectly thinking that they have removed all software with nonfree licenses from the kernel while in reality they have not (again, due to the other variables) and then accidentally falling into a hole of software with nonfree licenses from an incomplete cleanup.

If anyone else is reading this, please be aware that there are other variables not discussed in that post (which I'm not going in to in order to not advance the use of nonfree software), and saying that one can make a libre kernel by simply deleting 10 specific files from Linux is too simplistic and incomplete at best and incorrect at worst.

Legimet
Desconectado/a
se unió: 12/10/2013

> Sure, by building a kernel that does it. All in pursuit of the same goal: The use of nonfree software

You once said that Linux-libre not loading nonfree firmware is a bug: https://trisquel.info/en/forum/codemeter-and-fluendo-oneplay#comment-94116

> the kernel information isn't even correct or complete

Wrong. I looked into the changes made by Linux-libre, actually examined the entire diff between Linux and Linux-libre, and it does not remove any more nonfree code than what I listed. The rest of the changes just disable the firmware loader. Even Alexandre Oliva agrees that the Debian kernel is free (to the best of our knowledge). Prior to a few months ago, Debian's kernel was actually *more* free than Linux-libre, until I pointed out the existence of a few nonfree files (which I discovered by looking at that list), after which they were removed.

lanun
Desconectado/a
se unió: 04/01/2021

.

lanun
Desconectado/a
se unió: 04/01/2021

Oh, a downvoted dot. And I thought the mad downvoter brigade could not fall lower.

I think we should preserve this rare artwork so MS sensei can add it to his private collection, next to his "Better Drunks Carrying Collapsed Drunks" painting.

andyprough
Desconectado/a
se unió: 02/12/2015

I gave it an extra down vote just for good measure. It was a nasty, proprietary-loving software dot.

lanun
Desconectado/a
se unió: 04/01/2021

I have compared it with a Linux-libre dot, and I found no difference.

Even Alexandre Oliva agrees that the Debian dot is free (to the best of our knowledge).

andyprough
Desconectado/a
se unió: 02/12/2015

You convinced me - dot gets my upvote. Quite a reversal of fortunes for that young dot. It's got the brains to go on to be President of the United States someday.

jxself
Desconectado/a
se unió: 09/13/2010

> Even Alexandre Oliva agrees

It's not about the Debian kernel, but what's at kernel.org ("just take the source code from kernel.org and...") If you're not aware of the variables that would cause such a list of excluded files to change then that seems all the more reason to not be going over such things.

Legimet
Desconectado/a
se unió: 12/10/2013

It could change in the future, but at present, that list is accurate for recent versions of the kernel. Debian follows the same procedure for deblobbing (just removing that list of files), so if Debian's kernel is blob-free, it follows that removing those files from the upstream kernel would result in a blob-free kernel. You stated that that list is incomplete, but that is not true.

You can check this for yourself by taking a look at the diff between Linux and Linux-libre (versions 5.16.9): I have uploaded it here. There are no firmware blobs removed outside of those in the list.

And besides, before Linux-libre 5.14 was released, my procedure actually gave you a more free kernel than Linux-libre, because Linux-libre was erroneously including blobs that were in that list. So this procedure is perfectly acceptable for someone who wants a free kernel but doesn't care about whether it is able to load blobs or display error messages with the blob filenames. It might turn out some blob is added to Linux, but in that case you can easily check Debian's list as well as Linux-libre (which unfortunately doesn't provide such a convenient list) to make sure that you aren't missing something.

lanun
Desconectado/a
se unió: 04/01/2021

"My cat has been petrified. I want to see some punishment!"

I_want_punishment.jpg
Legimet
Desconectado/a
se unió: 12/10/2013

Are you saying that the firmware in Linux was introduced by a cat?

lanun
Desconectado/a
se unió: 04/01/2021

No, I think it was probably introduced by a basilisk.

In fact, I think there is a secret chamber in the Linux kernel, wherein lives a basilisk. And from time to time, the chamber is opened by an evil Red Hat and the basilisk releases a blob.

Anyway, I believe the cat is innocent. She can only concatenate whatever has been fed to her. The fact that she has been petrified only proves that the basilisk theory is true. I still want to see some punishment!

andyprough
Desconectado/a
se unió: 02/12/2015

I think lanun's saying "you, Legimet, are the basilisk who petrified your own cat by your gaze, and who is now complaining loudly about your cat being petrified".

I don't speak exactly the same language as lanun or jxself, but I get the feeling that they may both be hinting at the idea that you seem to argue too strongly in favor of the distro you are currently using. As if your fanboyism/fangirlism/fanpersonism for the distro you have fallen in love with bleeds over and corrupts your perception.

I could be wrong though. But if I'm right, I'm not sure I agree with that assessment. You have certainly been zealous in your pursuit of the facts, but I'm not seeing evidence that you are somehow using your investigation to hold up Debian at the expense of Trisquel or Linux-libre.

What I've seen is that people who really understand coding and people who really understand packaging rarely see eye to eye. And people who are experts on coding rarely see eye to eye with each other. And people who are experts on packaging rarely see eye to eye with each other. This months long pursuit of the facts by you seems to have put you at odds with some people who just simply are never going to completely agree on basic definitions of terms with you. If so - so what? You never entered yourself into a popularity contest - why should you care if someone disagrees with you?

That's what I think. Could be wrong.

Legimet
Desconectado/a
se unió: 12/10/2013

Thanks. Yes, I am not trying to argue in favor of Debian over Trisquel or anything like that. In fact, I've contributed to Trisquel more than anyone else in this thread. I simply pointed out that the list of blobs in that file is complete; Linux-libre does not remove any extra blobs, and this is a fact, not an opinion. I provided evidence above.

From my perspective, too many people in this forum are unable to have a nuanced view on these issues. Debian is not approved by the FSF, so everything about it must be bad, and they will not accept any evidence that goes contrary to that. Anyway, as you pointed out, I'm not trying to be popular on this forum.

andyprough
Desconectado/a
se unió: 02/12/2015

>"Anyway, as you pointed out, I'm not trying to be popular on this forum."

Everybody gets beat up at some point. Don't sweat it. Don't let them make you want to leave. We've lost too many people recently, especially nadebula and chaosmonk. I think nadebula got mad at me because I said he was turning normal tech discussions into opportunities to get on his soapbox about communism being superior to capitalism. I need to stop bugging people about that - some people get overwrought by politics, and they do not take it well when you point it out to them.

jxself
Desconectado/a
se unió: 09/13/2010

At least this is acknowledging some of the shortcomings of the original message (that the files to remove are version-dependent.) Thank you.

Legimet
Desconectado/a
se unió: 12/10/2013

But you never acknowledged that my deblobbing procedure is accurate. You claimed that the list is incomplete, and I demonstrated that it is not.

I never even claimed that that list is a fixed list that never changes. Although from what I have seen, it has not changed in a while.

jxself
Desconectado/a
se unió: 09/13/2010

Because I still maintain that the overall procedure to grab a kernel (any kernel because no version information was indicated), delete these 10 specific files and ta da it's libre does not account for version-specific differences (not for example the still-maintained 4.9 which would need a larger number of files to be removed.) The general process presented in the original message is missing such details, which should be accounted for to provide accurate information. The strokes are too broad to be good advice to the public about cleaning up an unspecified version from kernel.org.

lanun
Desconectado/a
se unió: 04/01/2021

> And whoever is downvoting you, I have no idea what they are thinking.

Sorry, had to report you for flame baiting.

andyprough
Desconectado/a
se unió: 02/12/2015

ABT - Always Be Trolling.

lanun
Desconectado/a
se unió: 04/01/2021

Great stuff, no comment (except that the default login is antix).

> sitting there doing nothing

That seems to be an appropriate punishment for such evil microcode. Although I agree you could be more forgiving and free it from its idle prison.

andyprough
Desconectado/a
se unió: 02/12/2015

Oh by the way, antix, antix and root, root are the logins and passwords. My bad for not mentioning it.

Did you try JWM? See the difference?

And are you blown away by that sophisticated wallpaper artwork?

lanun
Desconectado/a
se unió: 04/01/2021

You did a great job of de-bloating IceWM into JWM. Not that I don't like IceWM, but it looks like a whole manual to dive into.

Yes, I saw the ominous writing on the mirror: "Nipser Erbil 15 Xitna", and I think that's a good name.

Now trying to add persistence per your tutorial:

https://trisquel.info/en/forum/available-testing-alphaexperimental-respin-antix-distro-without-non-free-bits#comment-155966

EDIT: persistence went fine. Strangely, I was logged in as you when I visited the forum from Links2. Truly you are putting a great deal of yourself into that respin.

andyprough
Desconectado/a
se unió: 02/12/2015

>"I was logged in as you when I visited the forum from Links2"

I was worried something like that would happen. I almost posted a version where I was logged into several websites in abrowser, but I caught it first. The good thing is that I can be like a politician from now on and yell "I was hacked!!" anytime I post something stupid. "Wasn't me - it was that well-known conspiracy theorist lanun!"

lanun
Desconectado/a
se unió: 04/01/2021

I swear I can now see the world through your eyes. I see chickens running amock all over the place.

I also swear I have been abducted by a bunch of little blue people the other day. They took me to their village and kept me there prisoner until I told them the recipe for...well they partly erased my memory, but I remember the mushroom houses very vividly.

andyprough
Desconectado/a
se unió: 02/12/2015

>"I see chickens running amock all over the place."

They stopped laying eggs recently because it was too cold outside. So I brought them each into the kitchen, one at a time, and showed them the butcher knife and the frying pan. Yesterday they decided to start laying eggs again. You got to show these chickens who's the boss.

libredrs

I am a member!

Desconectado/a
se unió: 01/29/2012

It's like, how much more black could this be? And the answer is none. None more black.

All running swell on the Dell.

Thanks!

andyprough
Desconectado/a
se unió: 02/12/2015

All the other distros go up to 10, but Libre-antiX goes up to 11.

jxself
Desconectado/a
se unió: 09/13/2010

https://trisquel.info/en/wiki/trisquel-community-guidelines
"Our community's resources --the forum, documentation, etc-- are for free software only" Distributions that contain nonfree software should probably be considered offtopic and not appropriate for the Trisquel forums.

andyprough
Desconectado/a
se unió: 02/12/2015

Could not agree more - This is a forum for discussing liberating the worst offending GNU/Linux distro in history - Ubuntu.

In that same spirit of liberating a non-free distro, the new Libre-antiX-21 respin 32-bit ISO has been uploaded to the same URL as before, non-free microcode and microcode updater have been removed [along with deleting my Trisquel login credentials on links2] - https://archive.org/details/2022-02-12anti-x-21-libre-respin-32bit

I'm always happy to delete more non-free cruft from this ISO as it is found, just let me know. And when anyone else is interested in liberating another distro, I'm always game. My first project here years ago was when I compiled the Linux-libre kernel on opensuse Tumbleweed and ran it without non-free packages. I remain, as always, committed to the quest of trying to liberate even more distros.

For anyone using the prior version of this respin, be sure to run
sudo apt remove intel-microcode iucode-tool to get rid of those two non-free packages. As jxself pointed out, they can't even be used with the Linux-libre kernel, and are just taking up space and tainting your drive with non-free code.

lanun
Desconectado/a
se unió: 04/01/2021

> along with deleting my Trisquel login credentials on links2

Or so you think...but they seem to have been deleted indeed, no more meddling with your sockpuppets.

Anyway, it just seems faster by the day. There is just one small detail I had also noticed in the previous ISOs: one needs to logout and login again in JWM in oder to get the full version of the menu. At first login, the application categories do not appear.

EDIT: maybe we should now take to calling it by its libretized name, in order to avoid confusion with its non-free remote ancestor. May I suggest a naming tradition based on a combination of a periodic element and an insect? This one for instance would be Aluminium Ant. I reckon we still need to choose a name for the distro itself.

andyprough
Desconectado/a
se unió: 02/12/2015

>"one needs to logout and login again in JWM in oder to get the full version of the menu. At first login, the application categories do not appear"

That's weird, I didn't notice that when I downloaded it to a flash drive. But JWMKIT is a little bit complicated, as it acts like a flesh-eating zombie virus or something as it replaces JWM from the inside like a parasite attacking a host. So I'm not shocked that it might respond differently on first run for you.

lanun
Desconectado/a
se unió: 04/01/2021

What about Xanthia? We are told that it is "a genus of moths of the family Noctuidae". It also means "yellow" in Greek and there are beautiful archeological sites around the antic city of Xanthos. We could even use the simpler form Xanti.

Xanti 21 Aluminium Ant is now officially available on archive.org, since we want to keep the archeologists into it. Remember, it is 32-bit so it runs much faster than your regular carpenter ant.

andyprough
Desconectado/a
se unió: 02/12/2015

I like it, but I think Trisquel goes too far in hiding its Ubuntu roots from the unaware. A proper naming convention for it under the Ubuntu family should be Freebuntu or Librebuntu or something like that. And really, the project should apply to be an official Ubuntu derivative, and get some Canonical money. If your main selling point is going to be "Libre-software with all the convenience from the hell-spawned distro" then why not acknowledge it and make money from Canonical? The devs could possibly even be paid in that way. And they could do the 6-month release schedule of the other *buntu's, and get promoted on all the tech websites right beside Kubuntu and Xubuntu and so forth.

I'll have to talk to anticapitalista before giving it a name. My original agreement with him was just to be sure to put the word "respin" in any naming or description of it, and not to try to call it an official antiX project. But, since this could become more popular with the loss of Ubuntu-32-bit, it's possible he will eventually want to bring it into the official antiX family. They already have a number of different ISOs for different init systems and architectures. This respin is already free-er than Debian because of the Linux-libre kernel and abrowser. We could tweak a few things, maybe blacklist a bunch of non-free packages a la Parabola, and be almost ready to talk about an FSF application.

Magic Banana

I am a member!

I am a translator!

Desconectado/a
se unió: 07/24/2010

I do not think Canonical would make official a derivative with its own repository (what is a must for a 100% free distribution). Since the end of Gobuntu, which was an official derivative I had used for some months, and the addition of a "Free Software Only" installer option (does it still exist?) in mainline Ubuntu, Canonical (wrongly) considers there is no need for such a derivative: https://web.archive.org/web/20110929075747/https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/gobuntu-devel/2008-June/000795.html

andyprough
Desconectado/a
se unió: 02/12/2015

Canonical wrongly does a lot of stuff. However, the benefit of promoting themselves as having an official FSF-approved project could make them take another hard look. They are ultra-sensitive about how they are perceived publicly. I don't think Gobuntu ever received FSF approval.

lanun
Desconectado/a
se unió: 04/01/2021

> hinting at the idea

What a dangerous thing to do. No, surely I would never think about even getting close to any sort of serious idea, let alone hinting at it. People just take themselves too seriously in general, as illustrated above, and I would not want to become one of them and start counting contributions, distorting other users' posts from years ago, calling people names, downvoting innocent dots, etc.

That said, this whole sub-conversation, initiated by a well known argumentative resident troll, has now totally grown off-topic to the thread it has been inserted into, which is about 32-bit Xanti 21 Aluminium Ant, a great distro using the Linux-libre kernel. Although at this point it would arguably be a good fit in the Troll Lounge, really.

andyprough
Desconectado/a
se unió: 02/12/2015

>"counting contributions"

Andy was the first person I thought of who left in the past year. I miss him, he was probably our biggest contributor by word-count-per-post. We should create an AI-driven Andy-bot to replace him, that adds a few lines of text each day to its constant all-caps victimhood posts. Every 5th regular forum post gets an Andy-bot response, you'd never know when you were about to struck as if by lightning.

>"initiated by a well known argumentative resident troll"

I'm jealous - who is this world-famous wunderkind of trolldom? Is it me? I hope it's me.

>"downvoting innocent dots"

Dot is guilty of theft - he stole our hearts.

>"about 32-bit Xanti 21 Aluminium Ant, a great distro using the Linux-libre kernel"

The JWMKIT creator made a new release yesterday, and told me how to fix some things with my JWMKIT setup. I'm going to have to do another release soon. I'll wait a few days for any feedback from the antiX people, where I posted about this release yesterday. You are right - it might be best to stay in the Troll Lounge with these Xanti discussions for a bit. The Troll Lounge is the only safe place where we can keep a conversation on-topic.

lanun
Desconectado/a
se unió: 04/01/2021

> an AI-driven Andy-bot to replace him

That sounds like a good idea, although I'd suggest to complement it with an AI-driven flushing-bot which would be able to retrieve the worst trolling posts, scrap them, compost them and feed the compressed output to the Andy-bot.

> who is this world-famous wunderkind of trolldom

Argus Filch. Argus being a well known nick for Argumentativus.

andyprough
Desconectado/a
se unió: 02/12/2015

>"That sounds like a good idea, although I'd suggest to complement it with an AI-driven flushing-bot which would be able to retrieve the worst trolling posts, scrap them, compost them and feed the compressed output to the Andy-bot."

Sounds tasty - which reminds me, I'm starving. Too bad there's no compressed Andy-bot compost around here to eat...

lanun
Desconectado/a
se unió: 04/01/2021

In fact we might all get our own bot, so users could choose which flavor they want in their troll compost sandwich. They might as well get some random flavor.

That way we would have much more free time to help testing and improving Trisquel.

Somehow we always knew that bots would spell the end of us resident trolls.

andyprough
Desconectado/a
se unió: 02/12/2015

>"That way we would have much more free time to..."

...hack the troll-bot algorithms.

Fixed it for you.