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FSF Adds PureOS To List of Endorsed GNU/Linux Distributions (fsf.org)

Posted by EditorDavid on from the come-along-and-share-the-OS dept.

Long-time Slashdot reader donaldrobertson writes: The Free Software Foundation on Thursday announced PureOS as an endorsed GNU/Linux distro. PureOS is an operating system focused on privacy, security and ease of use. Endorsement means the system meets the FSF's Free System Distribution Guidelines by providing and promoting only free software, with a dedication to making sure the system always remains free.

46 comments

  1. Moot by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    At this point what we need Is freedom respecting hardware. Having Intel/NSA controlled hardware makes purity distros moot.

    1. Re:Moot by Anonymous+Brave+Guy · · Score: 1

      PureOS is what Purism use on their laptops, which are clearly intended to be freedom-respecting.

      --
      If you disagree, post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like.
    2. Re: Moot by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Clearly.

  2. Promoting? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

    I understand the Free Software Foundation's focus. I understand their principled stand on free software.
    But it's very easy to run a mainstream GNU/Linux distribution with only free software; these endorsements seem to imply that Debian and other normal distros are non-free.

    1. Re:Promoting? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You're right. They shouldn't endorse any other distro because doing so takes focus away from your faves. You hear that people? The GnuLinux ferry is full, we're pulling up the gangplank and heading out.

    2. Re:Promoting? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

      The Debian project maintains a list of non-free software titles that users are able to install onto their Debian system. This is unacceptable to the FSF. It doesn't matter that the non-free titles in question are cleanly segregated from the rest of Debian, the fact of the matter is that the Debian project is endorsing these non-free software titles. In order to get the FSF's approval for the recommendations, the Debian project would have to completely disavow maintaining the list of titles and they should not endorse users towards these titles. If the list of non-free titles acted as a blacklist that actively prevented users from installing such titles, I would suspect that the FSF would condone such acts.

    3. Re: Promoting? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      We need to rethink what 'free software' means. Typically it has referred to the source code being openly available, freely redistributable by all, and with no monetary cost. But at this point I think that's insufficient. The 'free' in now needs to include the freedom of choice, too. You mention Debian, which is actually a good example of where we need more choice. When I last installed Debian I do not remember being given the option to choose which init system I wanted to use. Systemd was forced on me, against my will. It's not like there aren't other capable non-systemd init systems out there; there are several of them! It's not like we can even switch to another major Linux distro. They pretty much all force systemd on their users these days! We're stuck trying to rip systemd out of our installation, likely causin breakage. Or we're stuck using an immature, questionable hobbyist distro like Devuan, or more realistically, we just move to a non-Linux OS like macOS or even Windows. I don't think we should consider Debian, for example, to be 'free software' until it lets us choose which init system we want to use, instead of forcing systemd on us. Choice is becoming one of the most critical aspects of 'free' software.

    4. Re: Promoting? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Two things you need to understand about the Free Software Foundation is the definition of free software and the fact that they encourage everybody to profit by selling free software.

    5. Re: Promoting? by Dog-Cow · · Score: 0

      You need to rethink why you bother living. Clearly life is a torment to you. Just end it.

    6. Re: Promoting? by Anonymous+Brave+Guy · · Score: 4, Insightful

      You mention Debian, which is actually a good example of where we need more choice. When I last installed Debian I do not remember being given the option to choose which init system I wanted to use. Systemd was forced on me, against my will.

      No, it wasn't. You can replace systemd with whatever alternative you want. Debian doesn't stop you. As you're clearly aware, Devuan do it routinely.

      I am as sceptical of systemd as the next guy, but there is nothing infringing your freedom here. Well, not unless you think people maintaining a large, complicated software ecosystem that they make available to you for free should be compelled to customise it to whatever degree you personally wish out of the box, in which case I'd like to introduce you to a new adventure called living in the real world.

      --
      If you disagree, post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like.
    7. Re: Promoting? by drinkypoo · · Score: 2

      You can replace systemd with whatever alternative you want. Debian doesn't stop you. As you're clearly aware, Devuan do it routinely.

      You can, but you can't reasonably do it without non-Debian repos at this time. So yeah, if you're running vanilla Debian, you're forced to run systemd.

      Luckily, nobody is forcing most of us (any of us, perhaps) to run vanilla Debian. Still, it was a questionable decision at best.

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    8. Re: Promoting? by lister+king+of+smeg · · Score: 1

      Two things you need to understand about the Free Software Foundation is the definition of free software and the fact that they encourage everybody to profit by selling free software.

      BSD takes issue with how restrictive a the FSF GNU license is.

      --
      ---Saying gnome 3 is better than windows 8 not so much a compliment as it is damning with light praise.
    9. Re: Promoting? by Wootery · · Score: 1

      Do we have to continue pretending that 'selling' applies to Free software in the same way it applies to payware?

      If you're not required to pay in order to get access to the product, that's not what people normally mean by 'selling' your product.

      With the Internet, distributing software is trivial. Does anyone make money selling FOSS? (And no, that doesn't count support contracts.)

    10. Re: Promoting? by Wootery · · Score: 1

      That's the spirit! Light up the flame war and let's all gather round. 'tis the season!

    11. Re: Promoting? by fred6666 · · Score: 1

      You can switch after installation and remove systemd

    12. Re: Promoting? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      If you believe that you cannot profit as a software distributor, then don't build a business model as being a software distributor! You'll have to change your business model. Three ways of profiting with free software that is also endorsed by the FSF is as follows.

      • Donation - write your software, publish it, then beg people to pay you for it
      • Consulting Support - People come to you to ask advice about operating the software, you sell them your time in providing that advice. People can also come to you for support in extending the function of the software to add new features or improve the performance of the software, you sell them that time in writing that software. People can also come to you for support in fixing software bugs that they found, you sell them that time in writing that software.
      • Hardware - bundle your software with some hardware and sell the bundle. Hopefully that hardware isn't locked away from the user via Tivoization

      These are morally acceptable ways of selling free software. If you can't build a business model around them, you should not be running a business around software.

    13. Re: Promoting? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      That's their prerogative on the part of the BSD developers. The fact of the matter is, the way the FSF defines free software is directed towards the users of the software; the user freedom is more important than the power of distributors who wish to restrict user freedom.

    14. Re: Promoting? by Wootery · · Score: 1

      You were going pretty strong up to the last line. (I happen to disagree that proprietary software is inherently immoral, but that's not the point here.)

      Those business models are legitimate and I completely support making money from FOSS that way, but it's not right to call it 'selling free software'.

  3. FSF needs to take a stand against systemd. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

    The FSF needs to take a stand against systemd, and any GNU/Linux distros that use it. Systemd is, in my view, essentially a form of proprietary software, even if the source happens to be publicly accessible. It's a product created by and directed by corporate software developers, from what I can see, rather than being a community effort. In fact, much of the GNU/Linux user community wants nothing to do with it. Systemd has caused severe problems for many of us. We can't trust newer versions of the major GNU/Linux distros to work properly. We also can't trust niche or hobbyist non-systemd distros like Devuan. So we unfortunately have no choice but to stop using GNU/Linux and move to FreeBSD or some other non-GNU/Linux OS instead. If the FSF cares at all about the viability of GNU/Linux, they should launch an all-out defense against systemd. Removing systemd from the major distros is the only way to save GNU/Linux.

    1. Re:FSF needs to take a stand against systemd. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I agree that systemd is horrible and that it should not be the default of most of the major distros and, more importantly, all arbitrary dependencies on systemd should be abolished.

      However, there is nothing "niche" nor "hobbyist" about Devuan nor about many of the other non-systemd distros. Most of us don't want systemd for numerous valid reasons, but there is no reason to slight the very good existing non-systemd distros.

    2. Re:FSF needs to take a stand against systemd. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

      If you ask Stallman, he doesn't consider Systemd to be proprietary software because the source is available and is also licensed with a free software license. Simply put, he doesn't care about Systemd's technical matters and is amoral to the fact that that it is directed by corporate software interests by virtue of the licensing terms of Systemd.

    3. Re:FSF needs to take a stand against systemd. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Different AC here.

      A few years ago I was managing many Debian VMs. We wanted to upgrade them to a newer release of Debian, which would involve systemd being used. We weren't against this at first, but our test migrations were total disasters. We repeatedly encountered problems with systemd, some of which were extraordinarily stupid.

      So we decided to not upgrade to a newer version of Debian. After some research, we opted for OpenBSD instead. It took a little bit more work, but in the end we think it was worth it. OpenBSD has worked very well for us.

      We do keep up to date with Linux, however, in case we ever need to switch back. We evaluate various distros periodically, including the few that don't use systemd.

      At this point, Gentoo, Slackware and Devuan are the only distros of any note that don't use systemd. Yes, there are some other, smaller projects out there, but we don't think they can be used seriously because of a lack of community or backing.

      Slackware isn't really an option for most users. It's much too archaic. Just because we don't want systemd it doesn't mean that we want to revert back to 1995-era Linux, either. We need a modern Linux distro, just one without systemd. So Slackware is not an option.

      Gentoo is perhaps the most viable of the distros that don't force systemd. But it's still too hands-on for those of us who have to manage a large number of servers, and we aren't convinced it as long-term (say 10 or more years) potential.

      We've been monitoring Devuan since the very start of its existence. Let's just say that the beginning of the project was amateurish, at best. We witnessed numerous displays of incivility and childishness, including false accusations of "trolling" against people who weren't completely against systemd. While the project hasn't been as big of a disaster as we expected it to be, it clearly isn't a replacement for what Debian was just prior to the systemd debacle.

      When somebody says that Devuan is a replacement for pre-systemd Debian, we can't take them seriously. Devuan is only slightly above a joke, in our opinions. It's not something that will likely ever run on our servers or VMs, except perhaps as a quick trial to remind us that we don't want to be using it.

    4. Re:FSF needs to take a stand against systemd. by gweihir · · Score: 1

      Well said.

      --
      Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
    5. Re:FSF needs to take a stand against systemd. by Athanasius · · Score: 2

      Indeed, my experience of Devuan is that it's just too slow to get updates, even critical security updates. So I've stayed with Debian + sysvinit on servers and "let it do what it wants" Debian with systemd on my home desktop so I can have some experience of it. Applying security updates is more important to me than avoiding systemd at this point, and I detest systemd from the little I've used it.

    6. Re:FSF needs to take a stand against systemd. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I've been using Debian on a bunch of my systems since "slink" (version 2.1). A few years ago, I noticed that my pilot testing machine, which was set up to automatically synchronize itself with "sid", booted weirdly, and this was my first glimpse of systemd. I instantly disliked it, and when the time came for my production machines to be upgraded, I discovered that I still had the option to retain the old init system, and use systemd-shim to fool the software depending on systemd that I have it. Now, at this moment, my machines still use Debian, and still use the old SysV init, not the systemd. No need to go BSD.

    7. Re:FSF needs to take a stand against systemd. by tramp · · Score: 1

      Devuan is making a lot of progress but lacks the resources of which Debian prior to the systemd debacle had available. Devuan Jessie works perfectly 24/7 on about half of my servers and security updates are available same day they arrive at Debian. About the other half of my servers are running FreeBSD. I do not like to bet on one horse after Debian went systemd.

  4. security? by tero · · Score: 4, Insightful

    So yet another random distribution that is telling us it's taking OSS security seriously... and then promptly goes on to confuse privacy and security.

    So does anyone know how they're going to do the "security" part of it? Do they pay people to audit code? Is it hardened from the start? Do they compile grsecurity in?

    I checked their website - not a word about any security features, but plenty of privacy touting.

    1. Re:security? by therealspacebug · · Score: 1

      This is not really a "random distribution".
      It's really debian with some small customizations.

      The company behind it makes secure FOSS laptops (and soon phone).

      Check out https://puri.sm/

    2. Re:security? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      By default, it has Apparmor enabled, but I don't if its in enforcement or reporting mode. Other than that, I don't think it has much more hardening that what Debian already supplies.

    3. Re: security? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      They don't actually make anything. You should research them a bit more.

    4. Re:security? by AmiMoJo · · Score: 0

      It certainly doesn't have anything like Qubes' isolation or Tor built in like Tails.

      It does have GNOME...

      --
      const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
      SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
    5. Re:security? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Mandrake used MAC (Tomoyo) long before SELinux or AppArmor was created. So I think Gael probably knows what he is doing.

  5. Uses systemd by gweihir · · Score: 1

    Hence it is just another distro backdoored by corporate interests.

    --
    Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
  6. hardware compat by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Without bundling firmware blobs for a host of network and graphics hardware like most of the big distributions do (including Debian), I'm wondering if PureOS is only meant to be run on the laptops the parent company ships.

  7. ethically pure, pragmatically limited. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Not sure how useful PureOS is as a distribution for hardware platforms other than the laptops that the parent company, Purism, sells, since they don't make any firmware binary blobs available to allow certain hardware components to work. But maybe that's the point. And I guess if all your media files are encoded with free, patent unencumbered codecs, you'll be all right, but otherwise you won't be able to play your stuff. I wonder if WINE is available since that allows you to run proprietary Windows programs. Surely the FSF wouldn't approve of that.

    1. Re:ethically pure, pragmatically limited. by fph+il+quozientatore · · Score: 1

      You can run proprietary programs in Linux, too, you know.

      --
      My first program:

      Hell Segmentation fault

    2. Re:ethically pure, pragmatically limited. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Sure you can, but you won't get FSF approval as a "free" distribution if you make it possible run non-free software on users' systems.

      From the FSF's free systems guidelines page:

      A free system distribution must not steer users towards obtaining any nonfree information for practical use, or encourage them to do so. The system should have no repositories for nonfree software and no specific recipes for installation of particular nonfree programs. Nor should the distribution refer to third-party repositories that are not committed to only including free software; even if they only have free software today, that may not be true tomorrow. Programs in the system should not suggest installing nonfree plugins, documentation, and so on.

      So would including Wine in the PureOS repository violate those guidelines since the purpose of Wine is to ostensibly allow Linux users to run on their systems Windows programs which the vast majority are non-free.

  8. EXACTLY WHAT IS WRONG WITH SYSTEMD? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Can we get some links to pro & con systemd information.
    As a user, I don't understand what all the fuss is about.
    If there is something that is going to effect me, what is it?

    I wish you guys would stop yelling at each other long enough to explain what the argument is all about.

    1. Re:EXACTLY WHAT IS WRONG WITH SYSTEMD? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      There are many reasons to love systemd. Start here:
      https://www.freedesktop.org/wiki/Software/systemd/

      When someone complains and complains and complains, and never explains what they are complaining about .....
      It is because they just love to complain.
      And that has been crippling Linux for years.
      Good luck.

  9. FSF is like Dodgson: nobody cares by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    With their ridiculously-unrealistic standards that exclude even Debian, they have relegated themselves to perpetual irrelevance. Canonical has done so much more for FOSS than the FSF ever has.

    We got FSF!
    We got FSF, here!
    See, nobody cares.

  10. More information to know. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    What does it happen about propietary formats (someones patented) as from H.265, Flash, Adobe, WebAssembly, etc.?

    1. Re:More information to know. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Won't run them. Can't even load firmware blobs to support your hardware if it needs it because support isn't enable in the kernel. You'd have to compile your own kernel and manually install the drivers/firmware yourself all due to getting FSF approved as a "free" distribution. The reason why there is only 9 other distros that most linux users have never heard of - much less use - that's approved on the FSF list is because their ridiculous guidelines to qualify as a free system. About the only system that PureOS will likely run on without a hitch is parent company Purism's laptops. That, in itself isn't bad, unless you want to add some hardware that requires proprietary drivers, or want to play some media that's in the formats you listed. Then you'll have a difficult time getting it to work.

  11. Uses systemd now? by CrAlt · · Score: 2

    Well in to the trash it goes.

    --
    I have to return some videotapes...
  12. focused on privacy, security and ease of use by war4peace · · Score: 2

    " focused on privacy, security and ease of use" - oh, nice.
    I got the latest ISO, fired up VirtualBOX, created a new "Other Linux x64" machine, mounted the ISO and started it up in live mode.
    Got this:
    https://imgur.com/lzRMgga

    I'm sorry but if the bloody thing doesn't even manage to start in live mode, then "ease of use" isn't really a feature, is it?

    Installing it on a virtual HDD worked though, so I'll play with it but already found out that sound doesn't work - there's no audio output.

    --
    ...gis sdrawkcab (usually not responding to ACs; don't bother posting as AC)
  13. Re:So what? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I'm very glad that you're concerned enough about the FSF to give us your opinion that the FSF is useless. Bravo my good sir.