Open OEM - Forums - Which linux distro should we use?

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Author	Message
rkamens Members 87 posts Location: Syria Occupation: Age:	#159 2007-01-12 12:26 GMT-5 hours
	This post was edited by rkamens (2010-05-17 15:16 GMT-5 hours, 116 days ago)

Lorian Members 45 posts http://lorian.selfip.com/ Location: United Kingdom Dorset Occupation: Student Age: 20	#162 2007-01-12 12:37 GMT-5 hours
	As a Gentoo user, vote packaging system vote obviously goes with Portage, it is a very powerful system, but there is no GUI frontend (AFAIK), and everything is compiled from source. Failing that, I only have other experience with the Debian system, so my second vote goes to that.

musbou Members 36 posts Location: Netherlands Occupation: Student Age:	#164 2007-01-12 12:53 GMT-5 hours
	I Think we should endorse the most user-friendly linux distribution, i'm guessing ubuntu (just guessing). Using a distribution that would require basic/decent technical knowledge would only limit OpenOEMs scope.

guyjohnston Members 46 posts Location: United Kingdom Nottingham Occupation: Student Age:	#185 2007-01-12 18:04 GMT-5 hours
	Definitely gNewSense (http://www.gnewsense.org) I think. It's 100% free (as in freedom) software. It's based on Ubuntu, just with all the proprietary software removed (there are proprietary drivers included at the moment, and binary-only firmware in the Linux kernel). Therefore it's just as user-friendly (apart from hardware support for devices that only run with proprietary/closed source software) and even more 'hackable' (completely as opposed to almost completely). I'm not sure what's meant by "No non-GPL or public domain parts allowed" in the original post. gNewSense has some stuff under other licences like X11 and BSD-style, but it's all free/open source as defined by the Free Software Foundation and the Open Source Initiative.
	-- GNU - free as in freedom
guyjohnston Members 46 posts Location: United Kingdom Nottingham Occupation: Student Age:	#186 2007-01-12 18:06 GMT-5 hours
	By the way, my preferred packaging system is Debian, which gNewSense uses.
	-- GNU - free as in freedom
Lorian Members 45 posts http://lorian.selfip.com/ Location: United Kingdom Dorset Occupation: Student Age: 20	#244 2007-01-13 11:23 GMT-5 hours
	Ok, a couple of potential problems: 1. From Wikipedia: "gNewSense is available only for the Intel 386 platform," thus ruling out OpenSparc if we were to use gNewSense. 2. Also from Wikipedia: "The removal of non-free firmware from the kernel means that some devices such as certain wifi cards will not work as there are no Free Software alternatives available," this means that wireless networking is impossible with all distributions, unless we were to build out own wireless router. My main concern is that gNewSense only supports i386. This means to use OpenSparc we cannot use gNewSense, which means we are out of distros. What are peoples thoughts on creating our own distro?

guyjohnston Members 46 posts Location: United Kingdom Nottingham Occupation: Student Age:	#246 2007-01-13 12:19 GMT-5 hours
	I think the best plan will be to start with gNewSense and modify it for the needs of the project, but keeping everything free as in freedom. It's true that it only supports i386/x86 at the moment, but it's still early days for the project, and it doesn't have a particularly large following yet. I expect it wouldn't be very hard to make a version for an architecture that Ubuntu supports, by just doing the same thing for the Ubuntu packages for that architecture that has been done for the x86 packages so far. I think it's much more important to use software that's completely free/open source than to worry about some wireless cards not working. Usually this is because the manufacturer of the wireless chipset won't release a free driver or the specifications for others to write one. The Free Software Foundation has a list of wireless cards that work well with fully free systems, including gNewSense, at http://www.fsf.org/resources/hw/net/wireless/cards.html . We should encourage people to use these cards rather than using proprietary software to get other cards working. Is the plan to use OpenSparc? I don't know much about the different architectures, but from the poll, x86 is by far the most popular choice. I also don't understand what you meant by "unless we were to build out own wireless router". Did you mean we'd have to build our own wireless card? By the way, gNewSense isn't actually a project by the FSF, they just endorse it and help it financially. This post was edited by guyjohnston (2007-01-13 12:31 GMT-5 hours, ago)
	-- GNU - free as in freedom
Erkokite Members 57 posts Location: United States Occupation: Age:	#248 2007-01-13 14:18 GMT-5 hours
	I know Ubuntu can run on the SPARC S1, and AFAIK, gNewSense is just Ubuntu without any proprietary components. There may not be a pre-made SPARC distro, but AFAIK, it would probably be fairly simple to get gNewSense running on SPARC.

Lorian Members 45 posts http://lorian.selfip.com/ Location: United Kingdom Dorset Occupation: Student Age: 20	#249 2007-01-13 14:54 GMT-5 hours
	I just looked on the gNewSense website and found this page, they have built what is basically a distribution generator, so should theoretically work on SPARC processors.

ijm51000 Members 8 posts Location: Yemen Occupation: Age:	#260 2007-01-13 17:47 GMT-5 hours
	Ok, me again, we are going for the openoem, so why do we worry about a hardware manufacture that provides a wifi card that does not work with openoem OS? If the whole sheebang is to be open, then, no network, video, south bridge, north bridge or any other type of chip will meet the spec, if it is not open enought for the "TEAM" to write a driver, discount the manufacturer of this chip, they dont fit the profile! As for OS I would vote Linux kernel(open), GNU (open), desktop only open source, and as the biggest restrictions on open source is drivers for certain chip sets; see first paragraph. Sorry all, have said a lot in a short time, up to about my $5.00 worth All the best Ian

musbou Members 36 posts Location: Netherlands Occupation: Student Age:	#269 2007-01-13 19:03 GMT-5 hours
	Since Ubuntu is not really an option now, i think we should start our own distribution. We can tailor it to our needs so that we can assure the best quality to the users.

vrrivaro Members 199 posts Location: Paraguay Asuncion Occupation: Age: 37	#291 2007-01-13 22:51 GMT-5 hours
	I do not understand, why are we going to worry about making any distro at all? If we made a hardware that was trully open, shouldn't all distros work on it? Why settle on tht x86? I beleive that (if any such machine has that honor), it should be the world's first Open Hardware.
	Jesus bless you all, Victor Rafael Rivarola
vrrivaro Members 199 posts Location: Paraguay Asuncion Occupation: Age: 37	#308 2007-01-14 07:23 GMT-5 hours
	Ok, now I understand the reason. Thank you.
	Jesus bless you all, Victor Rafael Rivarola
musbou Members 36 posts Location: Netherlands Occupation: Student Age:	#370 2007-01-16 07:43 GMT-5 hours
	I'm sorry for changing my mind so many times, arguments of some members are sometimes very persuading. I think we need to try and negotiate with ubuntu for a specialized version with minor changes, so that it doesn't conflict with our goals. Ubuntu partially strifes for the same things as we do (usability wise), so why should we work around them and use an obscure distribution. Ubuntu has alot of resources to their disposal and they have a large userbase. Consistency is important for non technical users.

Lorian Members 45 posts http://lorian.selfip.com/ Location: United Kingdom Dorset Occupation: Student Age: 20	#374 2007-01-16 11:29 GMT-5 hours
	While gNewSense is fairly obscure, (AFAIK) it is basically Ubuntu with the non-free stuff removed, so I don't really see it as being much of a problem consistency-wise.

musbou Members 36 posts Location: Netherlands Occupation: Student Age:	#375 2007-01-16 11:34 GMT-5 hours
	You're right about that, but what about the name?

guyjohnston Members 46 posts Location: United Kingdom Nottingham Occupation: Student Age:	#377 2007-01-16 12:39 GMT-5 hours
	Yeah there's no difference between gNewSense and Ubuntu, except the non-free bits have been removed (including binary-only firmware in the Linux kernel), so there's no problem with it being too obscure. A more appealing name could easily be chosen for a version customised for this project.
	-- GNU - free as in freedom
musbou Members 36 posts Location: Netherlands Occupation: Student Age:	#381 2007-01-16 12:51 GMT-5 hours
	I still think we should communicate with ubuntu for a specialized version (if needed). Here's a scenario: We use Gnewsense, but change the name to "<enter OS name here>" End user boots up the operating system and starts using the system. He/She gets confused about something and goes to the website of the operating system looking for help (Which is us). So in other words, we do not only make the hardware, we also take care of software development and software support. Just because ubuntu has some closed source firmware that we don't even use, it doesn't make enough sense. In conclusion, i think we need ubuntu's name, support resources, etcetera. This post was edited by musbou (2007-01-16 13:29 GMT-5 hours, ago)

chuck Members 38 posts Location: United States Occupation: IT Consultant / Student Age: 27	#400 2007-01-17 18:14 GMT-5 hours
	Ubuntu may be handling apt repositories but we have no guarantees that gnewsense will keep theirs up to date. Also, gnewsense is x86 only. If we want SPARC, we cannot use it. That is especially true if we wish to use their repositories.

dale Members 156 posts Location: Ireland Occupation: Engineer Age: 37	#425 2007-01-18 17:16 GMT-5 hours
	I feel I have to disagree here, we are building the OpenComputer, and our eventual objective is to build and develop Open Hardware. There is a real danger we will lose our momentum if we get deeply involved in building a new Linux distribution. There are now hundreds of Linux distributions and I don't think we need to expend all that group energy on replicating existing software. If we are going to use OpenSparc we move into the realm of having to develop and support our own distro. I think this is the wrong direction to go in and presents a real danger to our resources. I feel we need to select a mainstream Linux distribution which has good mindshare and also has good support. We can work with any of the main linux vendors and build a relationship going forwards. It is in their interests to work with us since we will be providing the 21st century platform for Open and Free Software. We can always remove any code which causes problems, but we must not prevent users from installing whatever they want. That's the choice of the OpenOEM. Dale.

vrrivaro Members 199 posts Location: Paraguay Asuncion Occupation: Age: 37	#431 2007-01-18 18:03 GMT-5 hours
	dale There is a real danger we will lose our momentum if we get deeply involved in building a new Linux distribution. Not really. We need a proof-of-concept distro, that's all. Once we have our concept proved, I bet thee FSF will grant us a lot of energy, specially with Vista. dale I feel we need to select a mainstream Linux distribution which has good mindshare and also has good support. All mainstream Linux distro's that have mindshare have made major investments on non-free hardware. Therefore, they are all unfit to our needs. Besides, free software has been dealt a deadly blow, Vista's DRM requisites impose all hardware makers thee burden of making closed source drivers. That means we lost any posible cost advantage in relation to x86 cpu's. Therefore, it will be best if we abandon it completly.
	Jesus bless you all, Victor Rafael Rivarola
guyjohnston Members 46 posts Location: United Kingdom Nottingham Occupation: Student Age:	#436 2007-01-18 19:25 GMT-5 hours
	vrrivaro I bet thee FSF will grant us a lot of energy, specially with Vista. I agree. The FSF often provide decent promotion and funding for this kind of thing. They help gNewSense financially, and they pledged quite a lot of money for the Free Ryzom Campaign recently. Has anyone contacted them about this project? I think they'd be very interested, as hardware support is a major problem for free (as in freedom) software. This project is particularly helpful because there's a risk that after a while, all the new Treacherous/Trusted Computing-enabled computers being made by the other manufacturers will only let you install Windows Vista.
	-- GNU - free as in freedom
guyjohnston Members 46 posts Location: United Kingdom Nottingham Occupation: Student Age:	#482 2007-01-21 15:21 GMT-5 hours
	rkamens I'm sure gnewsense will make a sparc version once they get ubuntu and kubuntu gnewsense for x86 straightened out. Yep, they're working on making versions for all the architectures Ubuntu supports after that. One problem there might be is that Ubuntu only seems to have a server installation CD for SPARC, rather than a desktop one, so someone might have to make a gNewSense desktop CD for SPARC.
	-- GNU - free as in freedom
guyjohnston Members 46 posts Location: United Kingdom Nottingham Occupation: Student Age:	#497 2007-01-22 17:57 GMT-5 hours
	By the way, gNewSense version 1.1 has been released, if anyone wants to try it out. There's a KDE version now, but it's still only for x86 as of yet.
	-- GNU - free as in freedom
merethan Members 5 posts http://Zapruder.nl/ Location: Netherlands Zoetermeer Occupation: Student Age: 22	#1084 2007-10-06 06:02 GMT-5 hours
	Quote We will also be using the x86 architechture. You gotta be kidding me? x86 is one big dirty hack. We're starting something new here but we take the biggest mistake in today's computer hardware with us Sun open-source'd their UltraSPARC design wich resulted in the OpenSPARC project. Then there's OpenRISC, also cool design. Both by Opencores.org. These chips perform a lot better then x86. Not to mention we have to pay Intel for this joke if we really want it. But back on topic: Debian, Mandrake, Suse, Slackware (SPLACK), Rock and Gentoo all have a SPARC distro or manual to install/build it. There's even a SPARC-only distro: Aurora SPARC Linux, wich is based uppon Fedora. So, finally getting rid of Intel should not be limmited or stopped by distro's being available or not. This post was edited by merethan (2007-10-06 06:18 GMT-5 hours, 1070 days ago)

letrafe Members 3 posts Location: Italy Occupation: electronic engineer Age: 31	#1090 2007-10-08 17:58 GMT-5 hours
	In my opinion Debian is the best... It run on more architecture than other linux-distro, It's kernel independent (support LINUX and BSD kernel), it's the distro used for project Gnu Hurd (Operating System based on a microKernel)

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