Questions RE: libre hardware & software, next release
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Hello all!
Long time lurker and home user here with a new microATX AM5 motherboard, AMD 7600 CPU, DDR5 RAM, using the AMD onboard graphics. I have some questions:
1. Unfortunately, distros boot to black screen with any kernel v5 distro (such as trisquel or GUIX). But works great using distros with the proprietary microcode and kernel v6:
user@xxxx:~$ vrms
Non-free packages installed on xxxx
amd64-microcode Processor microcode firmware for AMD CPUs
firmware-amd-graphics Binary firmware for AMD/ATI graphics chips
firmware-realtek Binary firmware for Realtek wired/wifi/BT adapters
3 non-free packages, 0.1% of 2209 installed packages.
user@7xxxx:~$ uname -v
#1 SMP PREEMPT_DYNAMIC Debian 6.1.76-1 (2024-02-01)
I tried a few things to get v5 distros working such as “nomodeset”, along with tweaking UEFI /BIOS settings to no avail…
Would manually updating to v6 kernel allow Trisquel to boot without proprietary AMD microcode? Also, will the next version of Trisquel get v6 kernel / AM5 support?
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2. Some app stores such as Debian / Gnome “Software” and “F-droid” (for mobile) have a nice feature that tells you which “FOSS” apps have proprietary tidbits or backends. Fdroid even tells you deeper insights, like showing “anti features” such as NSFW, Ads, etc..
Anyways, I was shocked to see some of my favorite “GPL” software listed by the Gnome app store as proprietary:
Ardour
LMMS
Thunar File Manager
Wireshark
Web Browsers (is Abrowser up to date and secure?)
Endless Sky, Teeworlds, warzone 2100
Others I cannot remember at the moment
Needless to say, I’ve been busy re-arranging my life to try and find new software to fill these roles!
My question: Is there a better way to audit FOSS apps for proprietary software? For example, I installed Ardour. Which showed as Proprietary in the Debian app store. However, vrms did not pick this up, and Synaptic shows this package is NOT from the “contrib” or non free sources. Upon digging online, users have complained of non free “plugins” and “demos” that get installed automatically without the user’s consent. But the website and star count on github make everything seem kosher. And unfortunately, Im not a developer. Im a computer enthusiast / sys admin for home and small business clients. I do not have time to learn all the programming languages or sift through thousands of lines of code and audit. All this makes me sketched out about downloading apps from any other source other than Debian software center and F-droid right now due to this issue.
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3. Is there a reason the community might be struggling to get fully FOSS firmware like libreboot, or even operating systems like Trisquel, to work on modern, "main" devices? A wifi card or printer is one thing that can easily be changed. But, are us diehards gonna be stuck using 4th gen Thinkpads, old chomebooks, rooted 3G era cellphones, or overpriced hardware from sketchy “privacy” companies for the rest of our lives? Or perhaps your like me, stuck somewhere in between with Coreboot and its proprietary blobs, or a potentially back doored pixel device with GrapheneOS / LineageOS and the proprietary firmware needed to boot an otherwise FOSS android OS.
Is there ANY upcoming freedom respecting hardware to look forward to? RISC-V?
Thank you all for your time!
Would manually updating to v6 kernel allow Trisquel to boot without proprietary AMD microcode?
You tell us. Here is how to install the latest Linux-libre kernel on a distribution using APT (Trisquel included): https://www.fsfla.org/ikiwiki/selibre/linux-libre/freesh.html
In your case, skipping the authenticity checks (that you may want!), here are the commands to execute in a terminal (linux-libre-lts is the package for the LTS version, 6.6 currently; there is linux-libre too):
$ wget https://linux-libre.fsfla.org/pub/linux-libre/freesh/pool/main/f/freesh-archive-keyring/freesh-archive-keyring_1.1_all.deb
$ sudo dpkg -i freesh-archive-keyring_1.1_all.deb
$ sudo apt update
$ sudo apt install linux-libre-lts
I was shocked to see some of my favorite “GPL” software listed by the Gnome app store as proprietary
I believe GNOME Software itself does not categorize the applications, that the categorization is given to it, by APT or Flathub or...
I guess we should not take a surprising classification at face value. It may be based on a redefinition of free/proprietary. For example, the Hyperbola project calls many pieces of software nonfree, although they entirely satisfy the definition of free software maintained by the FSF.
(Note: of course, the Hyperbola project is entitled to accept/reject whatever it wants; however, claiming an application suffers from freedom issues when it entirely satisfies the FSF definition confuses everybody.)
Upon digging online, users have complained of non free “plugins” and “demos” that get installed automatically without the user’s consent.
It indeed appears as a real freedom issue. Distributions may be able to fix that problem (using a package helper in Trisquel). Could you give some links that present the problem(s)?
About vrms: it uses the Debian Free Software Guidelines, which differ from the GNU Free System Distribution Guidelines and RMS' views. For instance, vrms reports documentation under the GNU FDL with invariant sections as nonfree! This has been discussed many times on this forum. Here is the last occurrence: https://trisquel.info/forum/are-check-dfsg-status-and-vrms-effective-programs
Is there a reason the community might be struggling to get fully FOSS firmware like libreboot, or even operating systems like Trisquel, to work on modern, "main" devices?
As far as I understand (less than many people here), Libreboot actually supports more recent hardware, but at the cost of accepting binary blobs for things like memory controller initialisation: https://libreboot.org/news/policy.html
What could possibly be non-free about Thunar? That seems like a mistake on Gnome's part.
wireshark lmms, thunar, ardour, warzone2100 are not proprietary as far as I know.
thunar might have annoying unshakable dependencies, but its fine otherwise.
But yeah, I don't think there is a problem with those, unless I am missing something.
Anywho, as an aside, I don't think non-free artwork is a problem, I differ with Hyperbola on this.
So all those games you listed are no doubt fine.
I think gnome has made some errors in judgment with their app store. I don't know what others thoughts are, but its not a huge issue imo.
This coming from someone who uses Hyperbola. ;)
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