[haiku] Re: Haiku as the easy-to-use, free, open, secure OS

  • From: Adrien Destugues <pulkomandy@xxxxxxxxx>
  • To: haiku@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
  • Date: Sat, 07 Sep 2013 10:38:19 +0200

On 2013-09-07 at 09:40:09 [+0200], gs@xxxxxxxxxxx wrote:
> Ryan Leavengood <leavengood@xxxxxxxxx> writes:
> 
> > I agree, but that discussion isn't necessarily relevant to Haiku. I do
> > think we have strived to create Haiku to serve the user and the user
> > alone.
> Yes. The reason I like to bring it up from time to time is that it
> really shouldn't be taken for granted. Examples of things that happen
> when we put ethics in the back seat are practices such as Tivoization,
> or the proliferation of peripherals that require non-free firmware to
> work. Speaking of which, what might the FSF be referring to when they
> say Haiku includes software that you're not allowed to modify?
> (https://gnu.org/distros/common-distros.html)
> 
> I think the issue should be clarified, and if incorrect, to notify the
> FSF. I know FSF endorsement might not be a realistic short-term goal,
> but I think Haiku should receive recognition for what it does.

I guess this includes the "Be Sample Code" licenced stuff 
(https://www.ohloh.net/licenses/be-sample-code). This is a 3-clause BSD, 
which is not compatible with the GPL. We also include binay "blob" firmware 
drivers and we are not actually trying to provide a 100%-free software 
system, our package manager will allow distribution of proprietary software.

Notice how the FSF doesn't endorse any of the popular GNU/Linux or BSD 
distributions, this is because complying to their very strict rules would 
mean a lot of lacking functionality, in areas where no suitable free 
software replacement for proprietary software is available. While it is a 
good thing that the FSF tries to see what are the missing parts and finding 
a way to solve the problem, we decided to get things working first, and 
look about that later.

-- 
Adrien.

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