PureOS: Freedom, Privacy, and Security
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Re: PureOS: Freedom, Privacy, and Security
#2I've been using Ubuntu as my primary OS for three years. I'm largely happy with the user experience.
Should I switch to PureOS?
Re: PureOS: Freedom, Privacy, and Security
#3I've been using Ubuntu as my primary OS for three years. I'm largely happy with the user experience. Should I switch to PureOS?
It may depend on your hardware. If it wasn’t made to support Free software it likely doesn’t — particularly for firmware for WiFi cards or Nvidia graphics, which PureOS should not have packages for.
Would appreciate an explanation from whoever was downvoting you before.
Re: PureOS: Freedom, Privacy, and Security
#4I've been using Ubuntu as my primary OS for three years. I'm largely happy with the user experience. Should I switch to PureOS?
It may depend on your hardware. If it wasn’t made to support Free software it likely doesn’t — particularly for firmware for WiFi cards or Nvidia graphics, which PureOS should not have packages for. Would appreciate an explanation from whoever was downvoting you before.
Thanks. I'm currently on a Thinkpad T490s. Intel WiFi and Intel graphics unless I'm mistaken.
Re: PureOS: Freedom, Privacy, and Security
#5Earlier quoted context omitted.
It may depend on your hardware. If it wasn’t made to support Free software it likely doesn’t — particularly for firmware for WiFi cards or Nvidia graphics, which PureOS should not have packages for. Would appreciate an explanation from whoever was downvoting you before.
Thanks. I'm currently on a Thinkpad T490s. Intel WiFi and Intel graphics unless I'm mistaken.
No problem. I’d recommend trying it out live, you can get it at https://www.pureos.net/download/ and then follow the installation instructions (https://tracker.pureos.net/w/installation_guide/live_system_...) from there if it works well (make sure to copy your /home directory/partition first if you want to keep it), or not install (and maybe try purifying Ubuntu or Debian a bit with the `vrms` package’s assistance) if it doesn’t.
Re: PureOS: Freedom, Privacy, and Security
#6Earlier quoted context omitted.
It may depend on your hardware. If it wasn’t made to support Free software it likely doesn’t — particularly for firmware for WiFi cards or Nvidia graphics, which PureOS should not have packages for. Would appreciate an explanation from whoever was downvoting you before.
Thanks. I'm currently on a Thinkpad T490s. Intel WiFi and Intel graphics unless I'm mistaken.
There are no laptops in the market which support free firmware for WiFi, except those from Purism. So PureOS (without installing additional non-free software) will not work for you.
Alternatively one could use this: https://tehnoetic.com/tehnoetic-wireless-adapter-gnu-linux-l....
Re: PureOS: Freedom, Privacy, and Security
#7libreboot as well is interesting for your lower level stuff.
Re: PureOS: Freedom, Privacy, and Security
#8Earlier quoted context omitted.
Thanks. I'm currently on a Thinkpad T490s. Intel WiFi and Intel graphics unless I'm mistaken.
There are no laptops in the market which support free firmware for WiFi, except those from Purism. So PureOS (without installing additional non-free software) will not work for you. Alternatively one could use this: https://tehnoetic.com/tehnoetic-wireless-adapter-gnu-linux-l... .
> There are no laptops in the market which support free firmware for WiFi, except those from Purism.
There are at least the handful the FSF RYF certifies.¹
Unfortunately you do appear correct about Intel WiFi not having Free software support² (though that adapter certainly should).
¹https://ryf.fsf.org/categories/laptops
²https://h-node.org/wifi/catalogue/en/1/1/Intel-Corporation/u...
Re: PureOS: Freedom, Privacy, and Security
#9Being unable to connect to the Internet or any network due to a lack of WiFi support is a strong privacy and security protection mechanism indeed.
And the freedom is provided by removing your choice to use nonfree WiFi drivers. Leaving that decision to you with a warning of its implications (ala Debian) is not really freedom because you'll make the wrong choice.
Don't get me wrong, I'm a big fan of FOSS, but not of doublespeak.
Re: PureOS: Freedom, Privacy, and Security
#10Being unable to connect to the Internet or any network due to a lack of WiFi support is a strong privacy and security protection mechanism indeed. And the freedom is provided by removing your choice to use nonfree WiFi drivers. Leaving that decision to you with a warning of its implications (ala Debian) is not really freedom because you'll make the wrong choice. Don't get me wrong, I'm a big fan of FOSS, but not of d…
> Leaving that decision to you with a warning of its implications (ala Debian) is not really freedom because you'll make the wrong choice.
This is context dependent.
Suppose I'm changing an existing laptop from Windows 10 to Debian for a user. Suppose I must install WiFi to convince the user the machine it as all useful. Suppose if I fail to get the machine to work, the user will eventually go out and get another Windows 10 machine.
In this case the right choice is to install from nonfree. It's a compromise, sure, but it's clearly less bad than the alternatives and leads to significantly more freedom than the user had before.
To not leave room in your philosophy for these cases-- and there are many-- is to create unnecessary rifts among allies. You're doing it right now by implying that Debian proponents aren't True Scotsman due to the existence of nonfree.