[Fwd: Re: Fedora free software?]

[Alexandre Oliva]

On Mar 21, 2007, Thorsten Leemhuis <fedora at leemhuis.info> wrote:

> On 21.03.2007 07:47, Alexandre Oliva wrote:
>> What if Fedora were to split the non-Free firmware into a separate
>> repository and separate bootable media [...]

> My take: split firmware files into separate packages (the kernel
> includes a lot currently IIRC) as a middle-term goal to make a
> "firmware-less Fedora spin" easily possible.

I was not talking about the firmware embedded in the kernel when I
made the suggestion, I was talking about add-on firmware.

That said, your suggestion is a good one in as much as it's doable.
Unfortunately, in-kernel firmware is a far more difficult issue
because the non-free firmware is not only in easily-separatable blobs
that could be shipped separately, but rather embedded and disguised as
source code.

-- 
Alexandre Oliva         http://www.lsd.ic.unicamp.br/~oliva/
FSF Latin America Board Member         http://www.fsfla.org/
Red Hat Compiler Engineer   aoliva@{redhat.com, gcc.gnu.org}
Free Software Evangelist  oliva@{lsd.ic.unicamp.br, gnu.org}