Free Software with a Female touch


Archive for June, 2006

Free as in “Mark Shuttleworth”??!?!?!?!?!?!

Tuesday, June 20th, 2006

During FISL, David "Novalis" Turner and Georg Greve showed me that I was completly wrong about Ubuntu and that it indeed contains proprietary software.

 Well, i checked whether I had the package they found in the CD, and since I was not using that package, I thought I was free (as in freedom).

 After that, I started to pay more attention to the Ubuntu Policies, what that restricted session means, etc.

 Today, when I received my really nice and new computer, I decided to try again Ubuntu, and then, after the installation completes, I removed the packages that has this description:

 Non-free Linux 2.6.15 modules on PPro/Celeron/PII/PIII/PIV

and

Restricted Linux modules on PPro/Celeron/PII/PIII/PIV

 Guess what???

 Bingo! The dependencies of those packages removed also the kernel. Who needs a kernel, after all?

So, I am not wondering whether there is an easy way to install Ubuntu without the proprietary package, or if the lies in the CD are not only about incuding non-free software, but also about not having even the option to delete them!!!

I am feeling free as in Mark Shuttleworth…whatever it means….