Replicant 4.0 released
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>After months of working hard to bring Replicant to the next upstream release, we are proud to announce the release of the Replicant 4.0 0001 images. This new release comes with support for both new devices, such as the Galaxy Nexus or the Galaxy S2 and devices that were already there in Replicant 2.3, like the Nexus S and the Galaxy S. - From http://replicant.us/2012/11/replicant-4-0-0001-images-release/
I've never owned a 'smart'phone (I hate that term), but now I may seriously consider buying a galaxy nexus, now that it respects my freedom (with a few caveats).
Has anyone else used/using Replicant? What are your experiences with it?
I went ahead and put Replicant on my G1. I haven't been able to use my G1 for awhile since I moved off of T-Mobile (but I'll be going back to them next year). I honestly can say that most operations seem to be perfectly fine. I'd have to revisit the limitations, but because I wasn't trying to use cell networks anyways, I wasn't able to test things like call functions or mobile networks.
I know there are limitations, and I know there are still areas of firmware that have no free options yet. But it's the closest thing we have to a full free Android. From my perspective, the one thing that stands in the way of freedom are the device manufacturers -- they use hardware that refuses to publish specs for writing firmware and drivers.
i'm planning to get one to help with debugging. Now I have more to choose from!
----- Mensaje original -----
> I went ahead and put Replicant on my G1. I haven't been able to use my
> G1 for awhile since I moved off of T-Mobile (but I'll be going back to
> them next year). I honestly can say that most operations seem to be
> perfectly fine. I'd have to revisit the limitations, but because I
> wasn't trying to use cell networks anyways, I wasn't able to test
> things like call functions or mobile networks.
>
> I know there are limitations, and I know there are still areas of
> firmware that have no free options yet. But it's the closest thing we
> have to a full free Android. From my perspective, the one thing that
> stands in the way of freedom are the device manufacturers -- they use
> hardware that refuses to publish specs for writing firmware and
> drivers.
>
I am running replicant on my HTC Dream. I think it is version 2.2 or 2.3. It does have some issues I won't lie. However it does work. I am willing to deal with it because for a phone it is one of the most freedom respecting out there. For me I'd rather have freedom over something technically more powerful but proprietary.
I just upgraded to replicant 4.0 a few minutes ago. I've been running replicant 2.3 on my Nexus S for about six months or better. I was having issues with it freezing and rebooting and found it quite irritating. I've recently realized that those symptoms are common to android in general and not just replicant.
It is kind of annoying that wifi, gps and bluetooth don't work. On the other hand though I'd rather have those not work and have more freedom than have it the other way around.
Overall though things work quite well and it is the most freedom-friendly solution out there right now.
I figure without wifi and bluetooth might as well just have a regular old fashioned phone. Though do they even make those anymore?
I own a Samsung Galaxy S and currently run Cyanogenmod 10.0 with the F-Droid repository. Replicant supports this phone, and I was excited to see that the camera is now supported with replicant 4.0. Still missing according to the replicant wiki: 3D graphics, GPS and compass. Functional but with a non-free firmware: wifi and bluetooth. I may try it one day but I must say that CM10+FDroid works so well and is already quite free (although not perfect) that I have a hard time finding the motivation to do so.
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This is interesting.
I mean, if it's acceptable to use a mobile device with non-free firmware, then is it also permissible to run a GNU/Linux system with non-free firmware?
If anything, I'd like to think that running free system critical firmware is more important on a phone than a computer (although this could be debated).
If CyanogenMod is "free enough", then are distributions such as Ubuntu and Fedora, "free enough" as well?
Not being facetious, I respect your opinion and I'm always curious about the nuances of free software.
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I posted elsewhere something about this. If you ask me it is not "good enough" and we shouldn't be trading freedom for features.
Unfortunately every person here is human. Trying to be perfect will exclude you from ever using a computer at all. There is no 100% free computer. There is 95% free and there are 100% free distributions (like Trisquel). You can design a system that is 100% compatible with free software although it will still depend on some non-free code. By that I mean there still going to be a non-free BIOS in every system and other non-free microcode. The few work arounds do not result in a 100% free system either. Even switching to a high end motherboard without a built-in graphics card, using an older external NVIDIA graphics card with the free nouveau driver, and then installing coreboot does not rid your dependent on at least some non-free code. These will reduce further the amount of non-free code one is dependent on though. Such a setup is near impossible to offer on a commercial scale. With that I encourage people to do the next least destructive thing. Right now that means Intel graphics with a non-free BIOS and then go with free software friendly chipsets for everything else.
The non-free microcode is suppose to be the hardest issue to fix. It probably will never be completely fixable.
If you are not a total pessimist though we can grow the free software community. Investing in free software products will fix these types of issues. It may take a long time. I'm sure we can do it though if enough people help get GNU/Linux off the ground and there exists companies which take this issue seriously. I think there may be a solution out of China that could be made 100% free and may be one day be practical. Right now though your not going to achieve 100% free system with x86 or any other architecture that I'm aware of.
I would be the first in line to purchase a smartphone running 100% free software. But such a phone does not exist. In the meantime, I use an imperfect solution, one that is recommended by the FSFE : http://fsfe.org/campaigns/android/liberate.en.html
I am glad that we're able to run fully-free systems on our computers (although as Chris mentioned, there's always non-free software lurking somewhere, like in the BIOS), and look forward to the day when some smartphones (which are actually small computers that are able to make phone calls) will also be able to run fully-free operating systems. In the meantime, I am aware that I am making a compromise, a trade-off between ideological purity and functionality. I am glad that I don't have to make this trade-off for my computers as I only purchase free-software friendly hardware.
I was hoping the new Galaxy Nexus build would work on my CDMA GN. It does, but no modem working.
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I'll remind people that having a 'free' phone isn't really a solution to all the problems with these devices. Replicant is an OS that runs on the phone although there are other pieces which are non-free. From the boot loader to the modem firmware.
Besides being dependent on non-free software there are also other reasons these devices are bad. Every phone is a tracking device. Every movement you make gets recorded. Every time you use the rest room your movement gets recorded, every time you get a bite to eat your movement gets recorded, every time you get up to change the channel your movement gets recorded.
I'd highly encourage people to start calling these devices for what they are: tracking devices.
I agree. I think we should also follow Jacob Appelbaum's advice: To just leave the tracking device at home when you don't need it.
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