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Is it just me or is there a conspiracy not to determinedly and aggressively seek alternatives to closed firmware in the so called open source world? Theo de Raa

Is it just me or is there a conspiracy not to determinedly and aggressively seek alternatives to closed firmware in the so called open source world? Theo de Raadt's response makes me feel that some people who claim to be committed to open source are happy to violate the principles by giving hardware providers who are not committed to the principles an easy ride. I mean how many leading Linux/Open Source developers are ready to say 'we don't really like it, but if you want to use their hardware you will have to use their blobs' How hard is it for open source designers to design their own hardware and open the firmware for it? How difficult is it for hardware developers to release the specs for dated hardware to allow software improvements, and keep the firmware for new more performant hardware closed. The complainer has a point. It is disingenious for Linux to claim commitment to open source and neglect be virtually silent on the threat closed firmware blobs pose in this era of security issues.

cypher543 11y ago
The OpenBSD developers are concerned with working on OpenBSD, not leading some crusade against closed-source firmware. If it bothers you that much, then do as Theo says and don't use hardware that requires the blobs. If there are no open alternatives, why is that OpenBSD's problem?
- vezzy-fnord 11y ago
  Not to mention the implication that the BSD and Linux communities don't care about software freedom is patently false. The two communities have very much been willing to fork or reimplement things from scratch because of licensing reasons all the time, even when the result ends up worse (e.g. Debian's cdrkit forked from cdrtools).
- vfclists 11y ago
  It comes down to how important freedom is in software development, and whether freedom is an opportunity for hardware developers to piggy back on the efforts of enthusiasts and volunteer developers or involves something more fundamental than that.
brynet 11y ago
> How hard is it for open source designers to design their own hardware and open the firmware for it? If you have to ask, you are not qualified to comment on the issue. Modern devices are complex, and the firmware often comprises the majority of the functionality of the devices and implements the interfaces exposed to OS drivers. It would not be an exaggeration to suggest companies spend just as much or more on development of firmware, than on the hardware. Who are you to make such demands of them, and the people working on creating open drivers for such devices?
- madez 11y ago
  Who are you to make such demands of them The client. Since I realized that money is the driving factor in this world - it's way more powerful than any other vote you have - I buy devices as open as possible, like the libreboots from http://shop.gluglug.org.uk/ http://shop.gluglug.org.uk/ . I don't mind if they are more expensive and slower than other devices. If enough people think like that, eventually the open products will become better because there'd be a commercial incentive for the manufacturers.
detaro 11y ago
No, there is no conspiracy. It's just a battle few are willing and able to fight. All major systems will gladly support open hardware, there are distros that avoid shipping blobs, but right now most people simply aren't willing to accept the compromises necessary to run blob-free or purely open hardware. If they didn't care, there wouldn't be open-source drivers for GPUs, projects like coreboot, ...
vfclists 11y ago
Principles are principles. If hardware designers have no competition for their hardware then there is no reason for them not to make the firmware source available. The only commercial reason for firmware to be secret is the fear that competitors will create alternative hardware designs based which may be compatible with the firmware or even improve on it, or that the firmware can be enhanced to extend the working life of the hardware. As more and more functions are being baked into software this issue is going to become more critical, and all talk about tackling the planting of secret backdoors into software becomes moot, as it can all be done in firmware without detection. This does not even deal with the issue of unintended bugs which are just as exploitable.
hannob 11y ago
I think it's not that people don't care and there are some projects (most relevant is probably coreboot) that try to replace firmware with free alternatives. It's just that this is a very hard problem. Basically everything these days can be its own computer, sd cards, hard discs, network controllers, ... Their inner working is usually not documented and often two revisions of the same product are different internally. And the lifetime of these devices is short. Projects that try to replace firmware on consumer hardware often have this problem that they spend a fair amount of work on something and once they have reasonable support the device is no longer sold (e.g. the rockbox project constantly strugles with this). I think the only possibility to have widespread free firmwares would be if this could be made a selling point for vendors. However to do that you'd need a widespread demand for these things, much larger than the open source / free software / hacker community is able to create right now. If it'd be considered "cool" to release the code of your firmware that could change things.
pgeorgi 11y ago
See lowrisc.org It's also quite disingenious to rant about the rant without noticing that it has nothing to do with Linux (except for the last sentence where Theo points to That Other Community)
seba_dos1 11y ago
> How hard is it for open source designers to design their own hardware and open the firmware for it? Depending on the type of hardware we're talking about, it's either: already done, hard or very hard. If you want to go open with hardware, you either: - decide that you can go with some obsolete specs. Then you only reach the small niche really interested in freedom and openness and pretty much nobody else. The costs and prices skyrocket, because you cannot rely on economy of scale. - device that you want to provide competitive hardware to what's already on the market, but free. In most of the fields, you will have a hard time to catch up to competitors, as you most likely won't be able to get any funding in the way they did. You'll have to resort to crowdfunding and probably fail anyway, as a very small fraction of projects like that manages to do anything at all - and they're usually the smaller and easier ones anyway. Also, closed firmware blobs don't pose any threats - any additional ones that you already have even when not using them, that is. If you have a device that doesn't need a firmware to be loaded in order to run, then most likely it already has a non-free firmware integrated on board. For instance: HDD, SSD, SD cards, some cameras, most of controllers like USB or RAID... virtually anything. By calling people like Theo de Raadt conspirators, you only hurt the cause you think you are fighting for. You won't change the world by that. You can only change it with small steps, by supporting niche projects like Neo900, even if they had to go for some compromises. What differentiates them from others is that their compromise lies far further than what's common in mainstream devices, and only if this iteration succeeds, a new one could in the future, moving that compromise even further towards the ideal state. Having been involved in Openmoko and related communities for quite a long time exactly for the reasons of hardware freedoms and openness, I really don't see any other way.
- madez 11y ago
  Has the development of the Neo900 halted or run into serious issues? I wanted to decide whether I buy one when it is finished, but it is already taking quite long.
  - seba_dos1 11y ago
    It hasn't halted and it didn't run into "serious issues" (blockers). It just needs its time. It's a small project, so when for instance it has to provide a webshop so people can make their orders, the R&D is pretty much halted from lack of resources as everyone is focused on that. We haven't taken all such non-technical issues properly into account when estimating needed time and it backfires. However, I think it's not that bad overall - there is slow, but steady progress all the time. See the last news from a week ago: http://neo900.org/news/the-neo900-shop-grand-opening-for-pre-orders http://neo900.org/news/the-neo900-shop-grand-opening-for-pre... Also, just so you're aware: you cannot "wait to decide", as it's basically built to order and financed almost completely that way. The moment it goes to production you will have to find at least another 200-300 people interested in buying it, so the second production batch will be possible to happen.

cypher543 11y ago

The OpenBSD developers are concerned with working on OpenBSD, not leading some crusade against closed-source firmware. If it bothers you that much, then do as Theo says and don't use hardware that requires the blobs. If there are no open alternatives, why is that OpenBSD's problem?

vezzy-fnord 11y ago
Not to mention the implication that the BSD and Linux communities don't care about software freedom is patently false. The two communities have very much been willing to fork or reimplement things from scratch because of licensing reasons all the time, even when the result ends up worse (e.g. Debian's cdrkit forked from cdrtools).
vfclists 11y ago
It comes down to how important freedom is in software development, and whether freedom is an opportunity for hardware developers to piggy back on the efforts of enthusiasts and volunteer developers or involves something more fundamental than that.

brynet 11y ago

> How hard is it for open source designers to design their own hardware and open the firmware for it? If you have to ask, you are not qualified to comment on the issue. Modern devices are complex, and the firmware often comprises the majority of the functionality of the devices and implements the interfaces exposed to OS drivers. It would not be an exaggeration to suggest companies spend just as much or more on development of firmware, than on the hardware. Who are you to make such demands of them, and the people working on creating open drivers for such devices?

madez 11y ago
Who are you to make such demands of them The client. Since I realized that money is the driving factor in this world - it's way more powerful than any other vote you have - I buy devices as open as possible, like the libreboots from http://shop.gluglug.org.uk/ http://shop.gluglug.org.uk/ . I don't mind if they are more expensive and slower than other devices. If enough people think like that, eventually the open products will become better because there'd be a commercial incentive for the manufacturers.

detaro 11y ago

No, there is no conspiracy. It's just a battle few are willing and able to fight. All major systems will gladly support open hardware, there are distros that avoid shipping blobs, but right now most people simply aren't willing to accept the compromises necessary to run blob-free or purely open hardware. If they didn't care, there wouldn't be open-source drivers for GPUs, projects like coreboot, ...

vfclists 11y ago

Principles are principles. If hardware designers have no competition for their hardware then there is no reason for them not to make the firmware source available. The only commercial reason for firmware to be secret is the fear that competitors will create alternative hardware designs based which may be compatible with the firmware or even improve on it, or that the firmware can be enhanced to extend the working life of the hardware. As more and more functions are being baked into software this issue is going to become more critical, and all talk about tackling the planting of secret backdoors into software becomes moot, as it can all be done in firmware without detection. This does not even deal with the issue of unintended bugs which are just as exploitable.

hannob 11y ago

I think it's not that people don't care and there are some projects (most relevant is probably coreboot) that try to replace firmware with free alternatives. It's just that this is a very hard problem. Basically everything these days can be its own computer, sd cards, hard discs, network controllers, ... Their inner working is usually not documented and often two revisions of the same product are different internally. And the lifetime of these devices is short. Projects that try to replace firmware on consumer hardware often have this problem that they spend a fair amount of work on something and once they have reasonable support the device is no longer sold (e.g. the rockbox project constantly strugles with this). I think the only possibility to have widespread free firmwares would be if this could be made a selling point for vendors. However to do that you'd need a widespread demand for these things, much larger than the open source / free software / hacker community is able to create right now. If it'd be considered "cool" to release the code of your firmware that could change things.

pgeorgi 11y ago

See lowrisc.org It's also quite disingenious to rant about the rant without noticing that it has nothing to do with Linux (except for the last sentence where Theo points to That Other Community)

seba_dos1 11y ago

> How hard is it for open source designers to design their own hardware and open the firmware for it? Depending on the type of hardware we're talking about, it's either: already done, hard or very hard. If you want to go open with hardware, you either: - decide that you can go with some obsolete specs. Then you only reach the small niche really interested in freedom and openness and pretty much nobody else. The costs and prices skyrocket, because you cannot rely on economy of scale. - device that you want to provide competitive hardware to what's already on the market, but free. In most of the fields, you will have a hard time to catch up to competitors, as you most likely won't be able to get any funding in the way they did. You'll have to resort to crowdfunding and probably fail anyway, as a very small fraction of projects like that manages to do anything at all - and they're usually the smaller and easier ones anyway. Also, closed firmware blobs don't pose any threats - any additional ones that you already have even when not using them, that is. If you have a device that doesn't need a firmware to be loaded in order to run, then most likely it already has a non-free firmware integrated on board. For instance: HDD, SSD, SD cards, some cameras, most of controllers like USB or RAID... virtually anything. By calling people like Theo de Raadt conspirators, you only hurt the cause you think you are fighting for. You won't change the world by that. You can only change it with small steps, by supporting niche projects like Neo900, even if they had to go for some compromises. What differentiates them from others is that their compromise lies far further than what's common in mainstream devices, and only if this iteration succeeds, a new one could in the future, moving that compromise even further towards the ideal state. Having been involved in Openmoko and related communities for quite a long time exactly for the reasons of hardware freedoms and openness, I really don't see any other way.

madez 11y ago
Has the development of the Neo900 halted or run into serious issues? I wanted to decide whether I buy one when it is finished, but it is already taking quite long.
- seba_dos1 11y ago
  It hasn't halted and it didn't run into "serious issues" (blockers). It just needs its time. It's a small project, so when for instance it has to provide a webshop so people can make their orders, the R&D is pretty much halted from lack of resources as everyone is focused on that. We haven't taken all such non-technical issues properly into account when estimating needed time and it backfires. However, I think it's not that bad overall - there is slow, but steady progress all the time. See the last news from a week ago: http://neo900.org/news/the-neo900-shop-grand-opening-for-pre-orders http://neo900.org/news/the-neo900-shop-grand-opening-for-pre... Also, just so you're aware: you cannot "wait to decide", as it's basically built to order and financed almost completely that way. The moment it goes to production you will have to find at least another 200-300 people interested in buying it, so the second production batch will be possible to happen.