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Debian Prepares To Vote On Non-Free Software

Posted by timothy on from the definitional dept.

DJFelix writes "Manoj Srivastava, Debian Project Secretary, has posted a proposed General Resolution regarding the handling of the non-free section of Debian. This is very important to me, as I am a Debian maintainer who only maintains non-free packages. If you are a Debian non-free maintainer or Debian non-free user who does not want to see the non-free section disappear from Debian, I highly suggest you get involved."

9 of 98 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Not that bad by gl4ss · · Score: 4, Informative

    *Amendment Text The actual text of the amendment is:
    Propose that the Debian project resolve that:

    Acknowledging that some of our users continue to require the use of
    programs that don't conform to the Debian Free Software Guidelines, we
    reaffirm our commitment to providing the contrib and non-free areas in
    our archive for packaged versions of such software, and to providing the
    use of our infrastructure (such as our bug-tracking system and mailing
    lists) to help with the maintenance of non-free software packages.*

    seems to me that it's about using debians resources on making them packages available.

    whats the easiest way to vote that "hell yes, It's good to have them?"

    --
    world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.
  2. Voting by Blue+Meanie · · Score: 3, Informative

    Voting begins on Sunday, March 7 at 23:59:59 UTC.

    Voting ends on Sunday, March 21 at 23:59:59 UTC.

    Link: http://www.debian.org/vote/2004/vote_002

    How to Vote: http://www.debian.org/vote/howto_vote

    --
    -- [mf] BM
  3. more than that by Xtifr · · Score: 3, Informative

    The proposal is also to drop support for the non-free section. What, exactly, this entails is not completely clear to me (and I'm a Debian developer), but at the least, I think it means no guarantees of security updates or even bug fixes.

    Also, the non-free repository is currently mentioned by the Debian Social Contract, which is part of the Debian Constitution, so it has to be there. This proposal removes it from the Social Contract, clearly opening the door for the repository to be removed entirely in the future. (Which may be just as well if there are no security updates.)

  4. Voting is open to Debian Developers by Xtifr · · Score: 2, Informative

    But if your public key isn't in the Debian keyring, this information will not be very useful to you.

    1. Re:Voting is open to Debian Developers by runswithd6s · · Score: 2, Informative
      ...and your public key doesn't enter the Debian keyring unless you're a Debian Developer. Regardless, it is still an interesting topic for the end-user to keep tabs on. It will eventually affect how they use Debian.

      Things to keep in mind:

      Even if Debian stops supporting (distributing binaries and bug-tracking) non-free software, a new non-free repository will likely spring up quickly. Bruce Perens has already reserved the domain name nonfree.org (check 'whois nonfree') for this very purpose. It only needs a project team to implement the site/mirror/lists.
      --
      assert(expired(knowledge)); /* core dump */
  5. The last time I did an install of Debian.... by Dark+Nexus · · Score: 2, Informative

    The installer ASKED if you wanted to use non-free.

    Frankly, if they remove that OPTION, I think I'll be switching to another distribution the next time I upgrade.

    --
    Dark Nexus
    "Sanity is calming, but madness is more interesting."
  6. Re:Freedom by Narchie+Troll · · Score: 2, Informative

    No, they're just going to make it less easy. You can install whatever the hell you want.

  7. Re:votes is for devs only? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Informative

    Become a DD and do the work yourself. That's the only way.

  8. Re:No big deal by debian4life · · Score: 2, Informative

    I concur. If people want to get "non-free" software, they can just get it somewhere else. That being said, I would leave it up to the software originator. If they don't mind having their software GPL'd, then they just put it in the regular repositories. If they do mind, then it does not go in there.

    The only non-free thing I have ever used is unrar. There are so many other places to get it that I am not going to stop using Debian because I have to go to more than one place to get Linux software. I don't see the big deal.

    But then again, I don't use much non-free, so I am not the world's biggest expert.