Parabola: An Arch, totally based in freedom.

gtklocker · 2010-10-12 19:48:43

I've been using this for a while but my IRC-mates proposed me to post it, so here you take it.

These guys are working an a totally free Arch. Nothing patented or non-free sits on their repos.

They have an awesome presentation here. Read it if you have time, it's worth it!

Last edited by gtklocker (2010-10-12 19:49:02)

Army · 2010-10-12 20:05:25

That's really nice! I guess I might give it a try sometime.

Pierre · 2010-10-12 20:06:36

Maybe I don't get it but why forking to just remove some packages. With Arch you are free to use proprietary software like the nvidia drivers or not. Also note that free software might violate patents in some countries...but it's still free software and there is probably no way to tell if some software uses some patented feature or not.

ZKDLBNHX · 2010-10-12 20:08:57

Because Arch has a proprietary kernel, and also it can be difficult to know which packages are free or not.

gtklocker · 2010-10-12 20:10:12

Pierre wrote:

Maybe I don't get it but why forking to just remove some packages. With Arch you are free to use proprietary software like the nvidia drivers or not. Also note that free software might violate patents in some countries...but it's still free software and there is probably no way to tell if some software uses some patented feature or not.

It's not a fork, it's just a repository, libre from proprietary packages and drivers. It also delivers a libre kernel and modules. There are also isos of it, libre isos.

Last edited by gtklocker (2010-10-12 20:10:56)

Pierre · 2010-10-12 20:22:15

Removing some firmware files from your kernel package might break your wireless network or for whatever its used but does not increase your freedom in any way. In fact forcing people to not being able to use these drivers makes it less free in some sense.

Don't get me wrong, I am all for free software but removing firmware if there is no open alternative does not make much sense. Afaik it's not possible to buy really open hardware atm.

gtklocker · 2010-10-12 20:25:19

Well, it's an option. If people see that their hardware is compatible and want that freedom they'll go. If they don't, they'll stay with the stock Arch repos. I see no problems with that.

ZKDLBNHX · 2010-10-12 20:40:48

Pierre wrote:

Removing some firmware files from your kernel package might break your wireless network or for whatever its used but does not increase your freedom in any way. In fact forcing people to not being able to use these drivers makes it less free in some sense.
Don't get me wrong, I am all for free software but removing firmware if there is no open alternative does not make much sense. Afaik it's not possible to buy really open hardware atm.

I don't mean to be rude but IMO that is FUD. My mobile broadband dongle works fine in Parabola. Although I see what you are saying and I respect your opinion.

Last edited by ZKDLBNHX (2010-10-12 20:44:46)

Pierre · 2010-10-12 20:56:37

Please watch your words. It's not my intention to setup a flame war but to understand the motivation behind this distribution.

Any our broadband adapter works without an external firmware because it's most likely programmed into a rom chip instead of being loaded into the ram by the driver. Either way you are using closed software/hardware. Same is truw for most parts of your hardware including your mainboard bios and even the cpu has some kind of firmware.

My point is, if you want to have a complete open system you have to choose your hardware carefully and work on replacements for closed parts like the bios (see coreboot for example).

However as you already called my arguments FUD I don't see any way to go from there.

gtklocker · 2010-10-12 20:58:43

Pierre wrote:

Please watch your words. It's not my intention to setup a flame war but to understand the motivation behind this distribution.

It's *not* a distribution. Just get it and everything will be ok.

cesura · 2010-10-12 21:26:18

Pierre wrote:

Either way you are using closed software/hardware. Same is truw for most parts of your hardware including your mainboard bios and even the cpu has some kind of firmware.

There's really no way to get around that besides either soldering all of your chips by hand with loose parts and writing your own firmware for it (good luck with that one) or buying all of your parts from a company that provides full source for all of its firmware.

Still, you're obviously just trying to be extremely literal and it's not cute. I'm going to assume that Parabola's goal is not to completely and entirely open up every waking part of the system, but to get as close to it as possible on the kernel/software level (just as OpenBSD avoids blobs and attempts to keep its repos completely clean).

EDIT: Seriously though. Let's not spoil this thread.

Last edited by cesura (2010-10-12 21:28:38)

olvar · 2010-10-12 21:34:33

Great initiative. I was thinking in how to achieve something like that.
How does it work? does it mirror a whole repo? in this case does it include stuff in testing? or is it just some packages and for the rest the usual repos are used?

Maybe is possible to write a local blacklist of packages, so you can get your normal stuff from regular repos, and in case of requesting some blacklisted package, an alternative one is fetched from the parabola repo (if an alternative exists, otherwise just signal an error). That way you reduce duplication by just keeping the blacklist up to date.

Also you could build in the wiki a page with the hardware known to work without the kernel blobs, so we can prefer the supported stuff.

fauno_ · 2010-10-12 22:14:33

Hi there, I'm one of Parabola's devs.

Pierre wrote:

Any our broadband adapter works without an external firmware because it's most likely programmed into a rom chip instead of being loaded into the ram by the driver. Either way you are using closed software/hardware. Same is truw for most parts of your hardware including your mainboard bios and even the cpu has some kind of firmware.
My point is, if you want to have a complete open system you have to choose your hardware carefully and work on replacements for closed parts like the bios (see coreboot for example).

That's true, and that's why free hardware is very much needed. AFAIK the only truly free hardware is Lemote's, a chinese brand using MIPS architecture.

But now Linux kernel comes with proprietary blobs, dressed up as source code, which isn't nice. And some other packages aren't free or are free but have proprietary stuff inside. So, for people who loves Arch but also loves his freedom, we came up with libre ISOs and repos. I also think there's no need to start a flame war

itsbrad212 wrote:

Still, you're obviously just trying to be extremely literal and it's not cute. neutral I'm going to assume that Parabola's goal is not to completely and entirely open up every waking part of the system, but to get as close to it as possible on the kernel/software level (just as OpenBSD avoids blobs and attempts to keep its repos completely clean).

That's right

olvar wrote:

Great initiative. I was thinking in how to achieve something like that.
How does it work? does it mirror a whole repo? in this case does it include stuff in testing? or is it just some packages and for the rest the usual repos are used?
Maybe is possible to write a local blacklist of packages, so you can get your normal stuff from regular repos, and in case of requesting some blacklisted package, an alternative one is fetched from the parabola repo (if an alternative exists, otherwise just signal an error). That way you reduce duplication by just keeping the blacklist up to date.
Also you could build in the wiki a page with the hardware known to work without the kernel blobs, so we can prefer the supported stuff.

We mirror from mirrors.kernel.org and maintain a list of {black,white}listed packages. That way we avoid to re-do the great work that Arch Devs are doing, just by filtering nonfree software. We also have some libre replacements, such as kernel26-libre, icecat and gnu-ghostscript. This packages replace their non-free counterparts, so if you change Arch repos for Parabola's, you'll get noticed by pacman itself.

Package lists are public text files, so you can build your own blacklist using pacman.conf, if you want. But you won't get our updates, though.

About the hardware known to work with linux-libre, there's a site called www.h-node.com which aims to build a database of hardware known to work with free software

I think we forget to invite you people, you can find us on #parabola (freenode). You're invited to help, idle or troll!

skottish · 2010-10-13 01:51:22

This is not intended as an attack, so please don't take it that way.

You mentioned that Parabola won't have patented software. Does this include software like Theora and VP8? Both are very much patentend. How about FAAC and FAAD that have code directly lifted from the 3GP reference encoder/decoder? Again, I'm not doing this as an attack post, but I'm curious on how you intend to handle multimedia when some of it is either is known to be patented, non-free software, or in limbo somewhere.

fauno_ · 2010-10-13 12:46:21

skottish wrote:

This is not intended as an attack, so please don't take it that way.
You mentioned that Parabola won't have patented software. Does this include software like Theora and VP8? Both are very much patentend. How about FAAC and FAAD that have code directly lifted from the 3GP reference encoder/decoder? Again, I'm not doing this as an attack post, but I'm curious on how you intend to handle multimedia when some of it is either is known to be patented, non-free software, or in limbo somewhere.

FAAC/D aren't there, but codecs with libre implementations are.

angvp · 2010-10-13 13:32:15

I agree with the idea of using `software libre` as much as possible, BUT IMHO not everybody (not me and not other ppl) can do that today, we need to use some privative software or firmware or many of these things because it doesn't exist a `libre` version of this (this is the truth .. it's bitter but that's it).

And I think is very extremist to don't use features of the hardware, or don't use applications and make your OS not completely usable, just because `I want to be like Stallman`, I think these kind of people (`software libre` extremists) instead to just wear the shirt of "I'm free" they should DO something on those controllers/codecs/other-software to replace the privative version with functional and `libre` versions, in other words, these kind of distros should have a goal, not about quantity of users, not about quantity of non-used software because it's not free, just they should concentrate in work in those `libre` versions existent but without some support until improve them, I don't think users of Parabola are like that, but in the world of `software libre` there are many people who wear a shirt but do nothing.

And about what I think of Parabola, Parabola is a fork of Arch (and I'm proud to get Arch forked) who eventually will bring us (Arch, and other distros too) many patches on free controlers which are unstable or are in development, offering free alternatives with the same quality, not another `you won't install this and I will block you of install this because it's not free and I am a dictator who speak about freedom but don't let you use what you want` distro.

So said that, good for Parabola guys! we will be waiting for your improvements on the Linux community and `software libre`community.

P.S: Stop with that stupid shit of say GNU/Linux and forces other people to say GNU/Linux, we both know about what we are talking about, .. so peace.

.:B:. · 2010-10-13 14:01:53

I think each opinion has been very well represented by now in this thread, so let's keep it civil, let's not start calling names, and keep in mind, first and foremost, that everyone is entitled to their opinion.

If the Parabola team wants to follow Stallman's philosophy, that is their right. I also trust they won't be selling their project to new Linux users pretending it will be fully functional with whatever hardware they have (as widespread as Broadcom and Intel wireless is nowadays).

With that in mind, a lot of the statements in this topic are redundant. No, those guys don't pretend you can run it on whatever system you can buy out there. They know what limitations they impose on themselves and the users of their product, and what's even more important: the people that use such a product willingly are 99% of the time very well aware of the choices it will make them face. They're not an evil company promising you heaven while actually selling you hell.

fauno_ · 2010-10-13 15:41:04

.:B:. wrote:

I think each opinion has been very well represented by now in this thread, so let's keep it civil, let's not start calling names, and keep in mind, first and foremost, that everyone is entitled to their opinion.

You're right. The purpose of this thread is to announce that the project is going and working, and that we need help, so everyone is welcome

Barrucadu · 2010-10-13 16:38:41

I switched to Parabola a little while ago after removing all nonfree packages from my computers. I have my desktop, server, and netbook (including wireless) working just fine. In fact, the only difference I really notice is the lack of testing and community-testing.

skottish · 2010-10-14 00:42:41

fauno_ wrote:

skottish wrote:
This is not intended as an attack, so please don't take it that way.
You mentioned that Parabola won't have patented software. Does this include software like Theora and VP8? Both are very much patentend. How about FAAC and FAAD that have code directly lifted from the 3GP reference encoder/decoder? Again, I'm not doing this as an attack post, but I'm curious on how you intend to handle multimedia when some of it is either is known to be patented, non-free software, or in limbo somewhere.
FAAC/D aren't there, but codecs with libre implementations are.

Thanks for the response. I would stick only to that definition. It's much more clear and well defined.

Arch Linux

#1 2010-10-12 19:48:43

Parabola: An Arch, totally based in freedom.

#2 2010-10-12 20:05:25

Re: Parabola: An Arch, totally based in freedom.

#3 2010-10-12 20:06:36

Re: Parabola: An Arch, totally based in freedom.

#4 2010-10-12 20:08:57

Re: Parabola: An Arch, totally based in freedom.

#5 2010-10-12 20:10:12

Re: Parabola: An Arch, totally based in freedom.

#6 2010-10-12 20:22:15

Re: Parabola: An Arch, totally based in freedom.

#7 2010-10-12 20:25:19

Re: Parabola: An Arch, totally based in freedom.

#8 2010-10-12 20:40:48

Re: Parabola: An Arch, totally based in freedom.

#9 2010-10-12 20:56:37

Re: Parabola: An Arch, totally based in freedom.

#10 2010-10-12 20:58:43

Re: Parabola: An Arch, totally based in freedom.

#11 2010-10-12 21:26:18

Re: Parabola: An Arch, totally based in freedom.

#12 2010-10-12 21:34:33

Re: Parabola: An Arch, totally based in freedom.

#13 2010-10-12 22:14:33

Re: Parabola: An Arch, totally based in freedom.

#14 2010-10-13 01:51:22

Re: Parabola: An Arch, totally based in freedom.

#15 2010-10-13 12:46:21

Re: Parabola: An Arch, totally based in freedom.

#16 2010-10-13 13:32:15

Re: Parabola: An Arch, totally based in freedom.

#17 2010-10-13 14:01:53

Re: Parabola: An Arch, totally based in freedom.

#18 2010-10-13 15:41:04

Re: Parabola: An Arch, totally based in freedom.

#19 2010-10-13 16:38:41

Re: Parabola: An Arch, totally based in freedom.

#20 2010-10-14 00:42:41

Re: Parabola: An Arch, totally based in freedom.

Board footer