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Hurd is never going to be more than at best a research project, more likely a hobby project. All semi-modern hardware requires proprietary blobs to function pro

Hurd is never going to be more than at best a research project, more likely a hobby project. All semi-modern hardware requires proprietary blobs to function properly. It would be great if all firmware and drivers was open source, but that's not going to happen anytime soon. FSF is largely a joke in the way they certify RYF hardware. Proprietary blobs are all good as long as they're loaded from a separate flash that can't be updated by the main CPU, but if you load exactly the same firmware from the filesystem it's not okay.

mattl 3y ago
I thought proprietary blobs were only "okay" if they were burned into ROMs and thus presented as hardware and not software?
janneke 3y ago
What I don't understand is why people are so willing to install and run opaque binary blobs, even is it's from/supporting free software-hostile Evil Corp. I've been running GNU Guix, which uses Linux-Libre--i.e., no blobs-- on my Dell XPS-13 and Lenovo x270. The only change I needed to make to buy my freedom was install an atheros wifi card (yeah, proprietary bios sucks, buy puri.sm). And while Guix/Hurd isn't there yet as a daily driver (Debian/Hurd is much more polished), progress has been pretty exciting lately and it now runs on my IBM x60 -- https://todon.nl/@janneke/110451493405777898 https://todon.nl/@janneke/110451493405777898