On Thu, 24 Nov 2022 20:11:15 -0500 Greg Wooledge <g...@wooledge.org> wrote:
> On Thu, Nov 24, 2022 at 06:17:23PM -0500, pa...@quillandmouse.com > wrote: > > On Thu, 24 Nov 2022 16:05:31 -0500 > > Jeremy Hendricks <jwh1...@gmail.com> wrote: > > > > > I have no idea what you mean. It’s open source and you can analyze > > > the code line by line. > > > > Does that include the blobs we're forced to run to make Nvidia cards > > run really well? > > No. > [snip] > > > I also have to wonder why Ubuntu (a Debian derivative) seems to be > > better at working on random hardware than straight Debian. > > Ubuntu and Debian have different policies regarding non-free firmware > and microcode. Debian does not include these in the official > installer, because they're not Free by Debian's definition. Ubuntu > has a more relaxed policy, and *does* include non-free firmware in its > installer. > [snip] This was sort of my point. Jeremy objected that open source was completely analyzable. And while this is true, it does require a certain expertise to do so. We trust our "experts" (as in, not me) to do that for us. However, my point was that, while FOSS is transparent, some or much of the code you're running may be closed source, like Nvidia's drivers and the graphics code for Broadcom Raspberry Pi chips. I don't object to Debian's stance on this; it's principled. But Ubuntu's policy points up that in order to live in the world of current hardware, it is sometimes necessary to use proprietary blobs, which are definitely *not* transparent. Not ideal, but there you have it. Paul -- Paul M. Foster Personal Blog: http://noferblatz.com Company Site: http://quillandmouse.com Software Projects: https://gitlab.com/paulmfoster
