• No my last point was different. At no point is Debian forcing you to use these non-Free firmwares. They are a purely optional inclusion in their installer for those people that do need to use them to get a functional system. Thus your digital rights are not negatively impacted at all.

    • First of all, thank you for the clarification.

      Related to the inclusion of the installer, that is not what they meant AFAIK. The idea is loading and executing it when applicable, even if it is not needed (RTL 8188EE is an example) as was discussed previously in other voting or mailing list which I need to check.

      Edited: it is also supported because, in offers to load the firmware, you must do it at boot time for the initialization of the hardware.

      • Granted there are some rare edge cases where both options exist, but after installing Debian you are free to revert any such non-Free firmware on your actual system.

        • you are free to revert any such non-Free firmware

          That is not how granting a right works. Damage of it is already made and no, there is no such thing as rare cases.

          Additionally, the big part of the hardware in H-Node has non-free firmware available in the respective package, also embedded on boot.

          • I think you somehow maneuvered yourself into a illogical position without realizing it?

            Including some optional firmwares in the install boot-medium infringes zero rights of yours and none of the 4 software freedoms are impacted by this.

            Complain with the hardware vendors for making these firmwares a requirement if you will, but better not buy such hardware in the first place. But Debian absolutely did the right thing here to their current and future users by optionally including these non-free firmwares regardless of what some ideological demagogues say.

            • regardless of what some ideological demagogues say

              I never pointed to you with ad hominems. Refrain to do that next time.

              It is not my fault that you think that I am backed or not by some people like that, nor I should be the victim for such a case.

            • Including some optional firmwares in the install boot-medium infringes zero rights of yours and none of the 4 software freedoms are impacted by this.

              Loading at boot time the firmware involves execution in applied hardware of software I have no power in.

              Complain with the hardware vendors for making these firmwares a requirement if you will, but better not buy such hardware in the first place.

              Doesn’t exclude that Debian did the worse thing. Options existed as I introduced before, and very obvious ones. If they needed help, I have no issues to provide it.

                • poVoq, I already explained how that works. Almost all the hardware can load it and it is done automatically, not based on an H-Node list to know if it works without it or not, which could be an option. If it is available, will be loaded and executed with compatible hardware.

                  Debian doesn’t have the fault for what the hardware vendors do, but has the fault for enforcing the situation when other options existed.

                  • The majority of the hardware either requires it, or it doesn’t. It is the rare edge case that it can also work in a degraded mode using only Free software, and you are free to not use such firmwares on your system after installing Debian on it. But yes in the 30 minutes or so that you use the installer it will be auto-loaded helping a lot of users actually install an running system and inflicting no damage to you at all.

                  • Rewording this:

                    A proposal I would accept is loading based in H-Node list to know if it works with it or not (a similar thing has been done with Linux-Libre but for enforcing not loading it). I would accept that, and I would give the option at boot time itself.