[HN Gopher] Debian 12 "Bookworm"
       ___________________________________________________________________
        
       Debian 12 "Bookworm"
        
       Author : Chatting
       Score  : 479 points
       Date   : 2023-06-10 12:32 UTC (10 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (www.debian.org)
 (TXT) w3m dump (www.debian.org)
        
       | oftenwrong wrote:
       | The amount of effort put into Debian is truly impressive. I have
       | used it for decades and it has been remarkably stable. Use the
       | stable release with unattended-upgrades and it's almost zero-
       | maintenance.
       | 
       | Also, an estimated 96.3% of packages are built reproducibly for
       | amd64.
       | 
       | https://tests.reproducible-builds.org/debian/bookworm/index_...
        
       | swayvil wrote:
       | Heck yes. Best distro of the best OS on the planet. I look
       | forward to upgrading.
        
       | jlpcsl wrote:
       | Wow, and it even comes with the very latest KDE Plasma 5.27.5.
       | Quite rare for a stable Debian and makes it more up to date than
       | PopOS. Awesome.
        
         | noisy_boy wrote:
         | Having used Ubuntu and then Pop!_OS, I have been thinking of
         | going back to the roots and just sticking with Debian. But I
         | also like to get the new stuff (not bleeding edge because I
         | don't want things breaking all the time) and I have heard that
         | stable is, well, old stuff (hence stable). Which makes me
         | wonder how unstable is "unstable" in reality? I have a very
         | strong preference for sticking to .deb packages due to their
         | wide availability so not really looking at cool distros like
         | Arch.
        
           | pessimizer wrote:
           | "Unstable" is actually unstable. What you want is "Testing,"
           | or if you're a little more conservative, you want Stable +
           | backports: https://backports.debian.org/
           | 
           | > You are running Debian stable, because you prefer the
           | Debian stable tree. It runs great, there is just one problem:
           | the software is a little bit outdated compared to other
           | distributions. This is where backports come in.
           | 
           | > Backports are packages taken from the next Debian release
           | (called "testing"), adjusted and recompiled for usage on
           | Debian stable. Because the package is also present in the
           | next Debian release, you can easily upgrade your
           | stable+backports system once the next Debian release comes
           | out. (In a few cases, usually for security updates, backports
           | are also created from the Debian unstable distribution.)
        
       | nntwozz wrote:
       | The gift that keeps on giving, runs perfect on my headless
       | 10-year old gaming-PC turned server in the basement.
        
         | themoonisachees wrote:
         | I highly recommend installing proxmox and running debian VMs.
         | It's really easy and the returns are great.
        
           | cf100clunk wrote:
           | In the parent comment to yours, ''runs perfect'' means runs
           | perfect. No need for an insertion of an additional layer of
           | stuff to just get back to ''runs perfect''.
        
       | drumhead wrote:
       | I've was an inveterate distro hopper, but finally settled on
       | Debian because of its stability. Its not the most user friendly
       | but when you get it up and running "it just works". Debian really
       | is fantastic achievement in software.
        
         | DrJohanson wrote:
         | [dead]
        
       | jfhr wrote:
       | > The new systemd-resolved package will not be installed
       | automatically on upgrades as it has been split into a separate
       | package. If using the systemd-resolved system service, please
       | install the new package manually after the upgrade, and note that
       | until it has been installed, DNS resolution may no longer work as
       | the service will not be present on the system.
       | 
       | will installing over the internet work without DNS resolution?
        
         | pas wrote:
         | yes, as the script adds/replaces the sources.list lines, then
         | apt i downloads the packages, only then it starts the
         | installation of them
        
       | thanatos519 wrote:
       | I installed -rc4 on a new work laptop and it's super nice.
       | 
       | I have some gripes about the installer's partitioning tool but I
       | suspect that it would have been fine if I was willing to reboot a
       | couple more times. The laptop was locked down and I needed
       | someone to type the BIOS password every time I wanted to boot off
       | the USB stick.
       | 
       | I wanted 4k blocks all the way down but got stuck with 512b
       | sectors.
        
       | kramerger wrote:
       | Do you recommend switching from Ubuntu TLS to this one? Even to a
       | heavy LXC and multipass user?
       | 
       | What had kept me on Ubuntu so far has been their out of box
       | laptop support (I.e. WiFi drivers).
        
         | marcrosoft wrote:
         | I switched away from Ubuntu when they started putting
         | advertisements in the motd and login screens.
        
           | kramerger wrote:
           | That didn't bother me much as it is "advertisement" about
           | things related to my system.
           | 
           | What I did not like was Firefox taking 20s to start.
        
             | marcrosoft wrote:
             | No I'm not talking about useful things like last login,
             | average cpu, etc. they were advertising their cloud
             | products.
        
             | themoonisachees wrote:
             | Ubuntu has (used to at least) ads as apps in the app
             | launcher, served by canonical and not at all related to the
             | software you're using.
        
         | 28304283409234 wrote:
         | Moved back to Debian because of lxc on Ubuntu requiring snaps.
         | Turns out same problem on Debian. Snapd consumes 100% cpu. All.
         | The. Time. Hoping Bookworm will solve it. Else I will be moving
         | to Archlinux, which has lxc without snapd.
        
           | yrro wrote:
           | I don't think lxc on Debian has ever needed snapd?
           | 
           | https://packages.debian.org/bullseye/lxc
        
             | aragilar wrote:
             | They're probably running lxd (which is only packaged for
             | snap as far as I know), lxd is controlled by the "lxc"
             | command (which isn't part of lxc...).
        
               | yrro wrote:
               | Ah. This questionable decision is why I abandoned LXC for
               | Docker (initially) and eventually Podman/k8s.
        
             | sm1ch wrote:
             | lxd (not just lxc) is now also available as a deb package
             | in debian:
             | 
             | https://wiki.debian.org/LXD
             | 
             | https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=768073
        
           | aragilar wrote:
           | The "lxc" command runs lxd, you need to run "lxc-'command'"
           | for actual lxc.
        
           | yokem55 wrote:
           | Bookworm now has lxd as natively packaged deb's in the main
           | repository. It's very nice to setup.
        
       | lairv wrote:
       | Had to reinstall ubuntu 3 times already since the beginning of
       | this year and thus switched to debian, hopefully I'll be able to
       | settle in for a while
        
         | botanical wrote:
         | For me Ubuntu has been the most stable distro. I probably won't
         | move, since I want an up-to-date system that stays out of my
         | way
        
           | Spooky23 wrote:
           | Lol. Enjoy relearning the hot new way to configure DNS every
           | release.
        
             | suprjami wrote:
             | Netplan is garbage. I remove all that and use
             | NetworkManager. It's good and just works.
        
             | jacooper wrote:
             | Through gnome network settings, the same way it has always
             | been(I think GP meant Desktop).
        
         | profwalkstr wrote:
         | What happened?
        
           | lairv wrote:
           | - Tried 23.04 and found too many bugs (I guess this doesn't
           | count)
           | 
           | - Some day 22.04 randomly started without GUI and I couldn't
           | get it back either with ubuntu-desktop and startx
           | 
           | - I installed a Python package without a virtual environment
           | and it somehow interfered with system Python, bootloader
           | broke
           | 
           | It's possible that those errors were recoverable but I'm not
           | a linux expert and I couldn't repair it after ~2h of
           | stackoverflow
        
             | jacquesm wrote:
             | Since I disabled auto-update most of such issues have gone
             | away and what works stays working. I suspect the second was
             | due to an auto-update if you had that enabled and don't get
             | me started on python versioning and the way that can impact
             | a system.
        
             | zekrioca wrote:
             | Never go through odd versions (19.xy, 21.xy, 23.xy,...).
        
       | krylon wrote:
       | One thing I really appreciate about Debian is that when a new
       | stable release comes around, I can just upgrade and be reasonably
       | sure nothing bad will happen.
       | 
       | It's not exciting, but a fair amount of the time, this is what
       | people expect from their operating system. Support my hardware,
       | give me the software I need, and stay out of my way otherwise.
       | And that is what Debian does very well.
        
         | mikae1 wrote:
         | _> One thing I really appreciate about Debian is that when a
         | new stable release comes around, I can just upgrade and be
         | reasonably sure nothing bad will happen._
         | 
         | That's good feedback and I've heard it from other people.
         | Personally I've never been able to dist-upgrade Rapbian or
         | Ubuntu without breaking the OS.
        
           | krylon wrote:
           | It's been a long time since I have used Ubuntu. In the
           | ~2009-2013 era, my desktop ran Ubuntu, and I repeatedly
           | upgraded it from 2008.04 -> 2010.04 -> 2012.04. There were a
           | few issues, but nothing that made the system unusable. But
           | that was over ten years ago, I have no idea how Ubuntu has
           | evolved since.
           | 
           | Raspbian has been problematic for me. I tried upgrading from
           | Buster to Bullseye, and it went so badly I ended up
           | reinstalling from scratch. (To be fair, the docs were clear
           | that was a likely outcome.)
           | 
           | OTOH, my ThinkPad x220 has been running Debian since 2016, I
           | installed Jessie back then and upgraded as new stable
           | versions were released. The upgrade to bookworm has finished
           | by now, and it's been entirely unexciting. :-)
        
         | jacooper wrote:
         | Its baffling that RHEL-based distros still don't support in
         | place upgrades.
        
           | yjftsjthsd-h wrote:
           | Strange; I would have assumed that `dnf system-upgrade` would
           | have made it from Fedora to RHEL by now.
           | 
           | Actually searching turns up
           | https://access.redhat.com/documentation/en-
           | us/red_hat_enterp... , which... appears to use a totally
           | different tool? I don't really know what's going on there,
           | but it does looks like they have some sort of support for in-
           | place upgrades now.
        
         | arcanemachiner wrote:
         | I heard when Bullseye came out that I should wait a bit as the
         | initial bugs were found. I'm wondering if that was true then or
         | now.
        
       | bacchusracine wrote:
       | Does anyone know if Bookworm includes the Ubuntu-Mate version of
       | the Mate desktop?
        
         | ech0plex88 wrote:
         | Unfortunately no, the panel layouts aren't there by default.
         | However, I've written some guides that can help close the
         | appearance & capabilities gap.
         | 
         | https://www.reddit.com/r/debian/comments/12gyjpg/debian_mate...
         | 
         | https://www.reddit.com/r/debian/comments/13ueaub/debian_12_m...
        
         | bikenaga wrote:
         | I'm on testing, which just released as Debian 12. mate-desktop
         | is 1.26.0, but a few things (like mate-applets) are 1.26.1 and
         | a few (like mate-panel) show up as 1.27.0. I don't use Ubuntu,
         | so I don't know how these compare to whatever Ubuntu uses.
        
       | guiambros wrote:
       | What a weird announcement. It says " _To install Debian 12
       | bookworm ... you can choose from a variety of installation media
       | types to Download..._ " and " _If you simply want to try Debian
       | 12 bookworm... you can use one of the available live images_ " as
       | if it were all available, but in fact the Debian 12 images are
       | _not_ ready.
       | 
       | It feels like the blog post was written before images were
       | created, but they forgot to add a comment saying _when_ it 'll be
       | available for download and published anyway.
       | 
       | I understand by the comments that the apt repos were already
       | updated, so you could install bullseye 11.7 and upgrade to 12 in
       | the OS, but seems a convoluted way to do it. I guess I won't be
       | trying out 12 this weekend.
        
         | [deleted]
        
         | pja wrote:
         | The CD images should be downloadable towards the end of the day
         | if previous releases are anything to go by.
         | 
         | This HN post jumped the gun a little with the Debian Wiki page:
         | the final official release happens when https://debian.org/
         | gets updated to point to the new installation media.
        
           | yjftsjthsd-h wrote:
           | We seem to have this conversation for every release; I wish
           | Debian would make it very explicit when exactly a new release
           | is "released", perhaps by sticking a banner at the top of the
           | relevant pages that says something like "Debian 12 'Bookworm'
           | has NOT been formally released but is expected to ship at
           | $TIME/$DATE"
        
       | denysonique wrote:
       | I see this old-package argument over and over again and I think
       | it is inaccurate, considering that an estimated 95% of Ubuntu
       | users use the LTS version, the below table demonstrates that
       | Debian 12 (stable) packages are newer than those of of Ubuntu
       | 22.04. Both Debian 12 and Ubuntu 22.04 are LTS versions with 5
       | years of support.                   Ubuntu 22.04
       | Kernel 5.19 (new installs only, existing installs 5.15)
       | systemd 249             KDE Plasma 5.24             Gnome 42
       | Debian 12             Kernel 6.1             systemd 252
       | KDE Plasma 5.27             Gnome 43
        
         | dima55 wrote:
         | This is true by definition. Ubuntu releases are forked from
         | Debian at the time of their release, so Ubuntu 22.04 is where
         | Debian was in April 2022.
        
         | kijin wrote:
         | Debian Stable and Ubuntu LTS tend to alternate with respect to
         | who has newer packages, because Debian ships on odd years and
         | Ubuntu LTS on even years.
         | 
         | For most purposes, though, I find that I increasingly don't
         | care about 1 or 2 years of difference in the base OS. Most of
         | the toolchain is stable and well established. There are only a
         | small handful of things I want to pin to a specific version
         | (like node.js or Python), but these can usually be installed
         | side by side with default packages. If not, I can always
         | install it in a container. :)
        
         | suprjami wrote:
         | I realised this myself recently. I have used Ubuntu LTS for a
         | long time, I don't use the in-between releases. They have about
         | the same release cadence as Debian (2ish years) so I'm usually
         | not losing anything much by moving to Debian.
         | 
         | Ubuntu probably do the HWE kernel better than stable backports
         | kernel, the HWE kernel has a release schedule.
         | 
         | There's been more community support for Ubuntu in the form of
         | PPAs but Flatpak has mostly solved that problem for the things
         | I care about.
         | 
         | As such, I've already switched all my laptops to Debian, and
         | will switch my desktop and work computer when I can be
         | bothered.
        
         | _joel wrote:
         | Whilst I'm no longer an Ubuntu user due to their snap debacle,
         | I don't think this is all that fair, they released over a year
         | apart and LTS is LTS for a reason :)
        
         | forty wrote:
         | I have always used stable on my servers and testing on my
         | laptop but I recently switched to stable on the laptop with
         | kernel from backports (I have fairly recent hardware). I have
         | never been happier :) (to be fair, staging was fairly stable
         | too, but still broke small stuff occasionally, and I feel I'm
         | too old to deal with this ^^)
        
       | fb03 wrote:
       | Testing this out in a VM. I want to move away from Ubuntu
       | (honestly, from SNAPs)
        
         | troad wrote:
         | I'm also considering this, but I'm a little afraid of being
         | stuck in the slow lane when it comes to software updates. I'm
         | aware of Backports, but I'm led to believe it has a somewhat
         | limited selection.
         | 
         | Perhaps this is a good opportunity to try a combination of
         | Debian, for general system stability, and Nix, for specific
         | tools where I need newer releases? Has anyone tried this
         | combination before? If so, how did you find it?
        
           | vorpalhex wrote:
           | I run a mix of Debian and Arch/Manjaro.
           | 
           | Debian is fine right up until you have to build something and
           | find that the dep you need is too old so you have to build
           | that from source, and that dep has a dep that's too old so
           | you have to... basically build hell.
           | 
           | Arch seems to not have these problems but is a hair buggier
           | on occasion.
        
             | malkia wrote:
             | backports?
        
           | Tuna-Fish wrote:
           | If you want to run a desktop system, I'd recommend Pop! OS.
           | Right now, they seem to be the distro that cares the most
           | about desktop experience.
        
           | aragilar wrote:
           | Is this a desktop/laptop? You can always run unstable if you
           | think stable is too old (I run unstable on my dev systems,
           | and stable on servers/anything I want to setup and let run).
           | FYI, if you use a Ubuntu LTS release, then unless you always
           | run the latest LTS, the majority of the packages (being in
           | universe) will actually be older than Debian stable (and will
           | always be older then Debian unstable).
        
             | pja wrote:
             | I'd suggest testing over unstable as very occasionally
             | broken packages get pushed to unstable. Testing has a week
             | or two delay, which usually catches such problems.
        
               | sillystuff wrote:
               | If you decide to run testing, be aware that while testing
               | does get updates that address security issues after those
               | updates work their way into testing from unstable, it
               | does not explicitly get security updates.
               | 
               | Pinning some security sensitive packages to stable or
               | unstable might be worth considering. E.g., if running
               | testing on a client, pin firefox and extensions to stable
               | + stable-security (note, globbing works too):
               | /etc/apt/preferences.d/firefox:       Package: firefox-
               | esr       Pin: release a=stable       Pin-Priority: 999
               | Package: firefox-esr       Pin: release a=stable-security
               | Pin-Priority: 999            Package:  webext-ublock-
               | origin-firefox       Pin: release a=stable       Pin-
               | Priority: 999       Package:  webext-ublock-origin-
               | firefox       Pin: release a=stable-security       Pin-
               | Priority: 999
               | 
               | The above priorities will not downgrade to stable from
               | testing if the packages are already installed. To
               | downgrade priority needs to be >= 1000. See 'man 5
               | apt_preferences'. If priority >= 1000, probably best to
               | only do that temporarily, then adjust to lower to prevent
               | setting a landmine for your future-self.
               | 
               | If there are only a couple things you want to update to
               | newer versions that are not in backports, you can just
               | run stable, and pin those packages to versions in testing
               | or unstable (but only if those packages pull in no / only
               | a few dependencies not used by other packages). If you
               | add e.g., testing/unstable sources to a stable system,
               | add a catchall pin to force those packages to a low
               | priority by default to prevent accidentally updating your
               | entire system e.g., for sid:
               | /etc/apt/preferences.d/sid:       Package: *       Pin:
               | release a=unstable       Pin-Priority: 10
               | 
               | Pinning without thinking can result in a broken system.
               | But, I'm typing this on a box running testing (I guess
               | stable, as of today) with packages pinned from Bullseye,
               | Sid, and experimental and I've never had worse issues
               | than an update being blocked due to dependency version
               | conflict which was easily worked-around by pinning
               | another package/removing or downgrading a pinned package;
               | I run unattended-upgrades on all my boxes too. But, my
               | hard rule is no scary deps e.g., a diff version of libc
               | being pulled in, no deps shared with other packages that
               | I would not want to have to pin to the same release
               | (e.g., shared with any package with tons of deps itself),
               | and no package that wants to pull in a lot of deps
               | regardless of how benign they appear.
        
               | pja wrote:
               | Personally I use the official Mozilla releases of firefox
               | & thunderbird & drop them in /opt so that they get
               | updated as soon as an update is released.
               | 
               | Otherwise this is good advice.
        
           | [deleted]
        
           | cardanome wrote:
           | Why not use Linux Mint?
           | 
           | It is Ubuntu-based but without the bad parts like snap. So
           | you get to keep access to all the Ubuntu packages but also
           | your sanity.
        
             | leesalminen wrote:
             | I've been maintaining a machine deployed to my mother-in-
             | law's house for ~4 years with Mint.
             | 
             | She went from needing tech support every time I was at her
             | house to never overnight.
             | 
             | I highly recommend Mint for this scenario.
        
           | chungy wrote:
           | Combining Debian with Nix or Guix is a fairly excellent way
           | to go. Stable OS base, selective bleeding-edge apps (or hell,
           | multiple runtime versions that would otherwise conflict).
           | Win-win.
        
           | blihp wrote:
           | You can run a reasonably current Debian install by just
           | switching to the testing repos after you install a stable
           | release. This _mostly_ works pretty well but occasionally[1]
           | you 'll have an issue. While you could get absolutely up to
           | the minute software (from a Debian standpoint) using the sid
           | (i.e. unstable) repos, I wouldn't recommend it as breakage is
           | quite common there as they are working through various
           | packing issues and that repo lives up to its name.
           | 
           | [1] every couple of years in my experience... typically as
           | they're getting closer to a new release and package breaking
           | changes are needed/slip through.
        
         | secondcoming wrote:
         | I tried the same move but I couldn't find any reason to
         | permanently move to Debian. The biggest problem is that some of
         | the package versions are quite old. Ubuntu is far better when
         | it comes to software updates. The snap stuff is crap though.
        
           | [deleted]
        
           | denysonique wrote:
           | I see this old-package argument over and over again and I
           | think it is inaccurate, considering that an estimated 95% of
           | Ubuntu users use the LTS version, the below table
           | demonstrates that Debian 12 (stable) packages are newer than
           | those of of Ubuntu 22.04. Both Debian 12 and Ubuntu 22.04 are
           | LTS versions with 5 years of support.
           | Ubuntu 22.04             Kernel 5.19 (new installs only,
           | existing installs 5.15)             systemd 249
           | KDE Plasma 5.24             Gnome 42                   Debian
           | 12             Kernel 6.1             systemd 252
           | KDE Plasma 5.27             Gnome 43
        
           | samtheprogram wrote:
           | Just use Debian testing. I've essentially been running
           | Bookworm for about year now (that's actually the version name
           | used in my apt conf). Ubuntu is pretty close to Debian
           | testing version-wise.
        
           | Kwpolska wrote:
           | Were you trying out Sid, or stable/testing? Stable tends to
           | contain ancient software, but sid should be recent enough.
        
             | pessimizer wrote:
             | I suspect that a lot of people who are saying that Debian
             | is behind don't understand Debian.
             | 
             | for them: Whatever you download is going to be "Debian
             | Stable." Debian Stable is as fresh and up-to-date as it's
             | ever going to be at this moment, but it will not change
             | significantly in the future, because its goal is
             | _stability._ You throw it on something you want to run for
             | years and not crash.
             | 
             | If you don't mind your system crashing every once an a
             | while because you like new stuff, you use "Debian Testing."
             | There is no place to download this directly from Debian,
             | although some third-parties (like Canonical with Ubuntu)
             | distribute customized versions of it. The way you get a
             | non-customized version is by installing _Debian Stable_ ,
             | changing sources.list to point at Testing (which you can do
             | as "testing" or by its nickname), then dist-upgrading.
             | Debian Testing is being _tested_ to be the next Stable.
             | 
             | "Debian Unstable" afaict is where individual pieces of
             | software are being tested to go into Testing. Nobody should
             | be running it unless they are contributing to Debian,
             | although there are apt-get masters who know exactly what
             | they're doing who will pull bleeding edge packages from
             | unstable _individually._
             | 
             | About the nicknames: Stable, Testing, and Unstable aren't
             | releases, they're an indication of the current status of a
             | release. Each release has its own goofy name. "Bookworm"
             | has just moved from Testing to Stable. "Bullseye," which
             | until just now was Stable, has now become "Oldstable."
             | 
             | Also important is the "[yourrelease]-backports" repo, which
             | Stable users can add to take newer packages from Testing
             | that are 99% certain not to mess with the stability of
             | Stable. Stable + backports is a compromise between Stable
             | and Testing for people who want new stuff that doesn't
             | break things.
             | 
             | I'm sure most people know all of that, but 1) when it comes
             | to things like this people are often afraid to ask because
             | they're afraid they'll look stupid, and 2) the Debian
             | website is very utilitarian and not marketing oriented, so
             | there's no clear entry point for people who don't already
             | know what they're looking for.
        
               | tomatocracy wrote:
               | Just to add - I think the backports repositories don't
               | get enough attention when this occasionally comes up.
               | 
               | Trying to run a mix of stable and testing packages can be
               | a pain as occasionally a package you want to bring in
               | from testing will try to bring with it new system
               | libraries, which in turn often conflict with the "stable"
               | versions of packages (so you are forced to move a lot
               | more of your system to "testing" packages than you
               | originally wanted to fix this).
               | 
               | The key advantage (at least for me) of using the
               | "backports" repositories is that it avoids this -
               | packages are compiled against the "[yourrelease]" system
               | libraries.
        
               | still_grokking wrote:
               | Just to correct the most glaring mistakes:
               | 
               | Ubuntu is based on Sid (Debian Unstable).
               | 
               | You can download Debian installers for Testing.
               | 
               | Usually nothing on Testing crashes, as such severe bugs
               | are considered blockers to move a package form Unstable
               | to Testing. (Of course once in a few years something
               | slips through the testing period in Unstable. But it's
               | than usually repaired within a few hours.)
               | 
               | People are running Sid. (Even I personally wouldn't
               | recommend it.)
               | 
               | But one point of the parent I strongly support:
               | 
               | Debian's web page is a mess. I'm using this system for
               | decades but still don't find anything on the Debian page
               | without the help of some search engine. Also, when I need
               | Linux related documentation I go to the Arch Wiki (and
               | sometimes to the Gentoo docs), even as a Debian user.
               | OTOH, you only seldom need docu, because Debian "just
               | works" for the most part.
        
       | butz wrote:
       | > The overall disk usage for "bookworm" is 365,016,420 kB (365
       | GB)
       | 
       | Time to flex new SSD drive and install ALL the packages. Of
       | course, I'll do it a bit later, when downloads will get back to
       | normal levels.
        
       | ErneX wrote:
       | All my VMs are Debian. Thanks a lot to everyone involved.
        
       | tuomosipola wrote:
       | Finally. I migrated from the snap-cursed Ubuntu to Debian. I have
       | been running Bookworm since last summer, and now I can stay in
       | the stable distribution until I really need a new version of some
       | software. Should not happen too soon.
        
       | BaudouinVH wrote:
       | https://i.imgur.com/X9B5kFb.png <-- 365 Go (or should that read
       | 365 Mo?)
        
       | haunter wrote:
       | Congrats! Been using it on a 2017 Thinkpad X270 with MATE.
       | Everything works perfectly. Honestly might not be the "flashiest"
       | distro but does the job perfectly well. And personally I always
       | recommend it to people new to Linux.
        
       | ctippett wrote:
       | Just upgraded my Debian WSL distro and the experience couldn't
       | have been more anti-climatic - I had to double-check lsb_release
       | to make sure I'd actually upgraded, it was that seamless.
        
       | nairboon wrote:
       | Nice! Debian just works, since decades. Except when you break it
       | yourselves or update Nvidia drivers.
        
       | unpopularopp wrote:
       | A bit offtopic... are there any distros besides PoPOS that comes
       | with the proprietary Nvidia drivers preinstalled? I tried to use
       | (live image) Debian on an RTX 4070 PC and nothing worked just
       | black screen after GRUB. PoPOS works out of the box but honestly
       | I'd prefer something more simple as Debian.
        
         | noisy_boy wrote:
         | I have been thinking of switching to Debian from Pop!_OS and
         | have a Thinkpad X1 Extreme Gen 2 with Nvidia GeForce GTX 1650 -
         | if graphics drivers are an issue, then my wish is dead in
         | water.
        
           | paines wrote:
           | Why preinstalled? They are not even preinstalled on PoPOS. If
           | you choose nvidia via powermanagement and they aren't
           | installed, only then they will be downloaded and
           | installed..... If you think of the hazzle because of
           | offloading (intel by default and nvidia by demand) just purge
           | bumblebee(at least that was the issue before boowkworm) and
           | you have mostly the same experience.
        
           | winrid wrote:
           | I would play with the livecd for a while first. Even straight
           | ubuntu gave me problems on my gen1 (wifi, sleep,
           | graphics...). I switched it back to win10 and have a Carbon
           | for Linux now.
        
         | m463 wrote:
         | A lot of times you can fix boot issues like this by adding
         | "nomodeset" to the boot command line
         | 
         | I always had trouble booting proxmox the first time, because
         | even though it is a server os with no graphics, the installer
         | is graphical. I would get black screen at boot.
         | 
         | I would just interrupt hte boot use 'e' to edit the command
         | line, add 'nomodeset' and it would boot.
        
         | yrro wrote:
         | How does PoPOS accomplish this without violating the license of
         | the kernel and the NVIDIA drivers?
        
           | dezgeg wrote:
           | The sad truth is the license of non-GPL Linux kernel modules
           | is very rarely cared about nor enforced. There are ton of
           | embedded devices that don't bother with the NVIDIA shim
           | scheme but ship with straight proprietary .ko:s on the
           | device.
        
           | chungy wrote:
           | Since it is a distribution by a hardware vendor that ships
           | NVIDIA GPUs, I'll assume that they got a licensed from NVIDIA
           | to ship their operating system with the proprietary drivers.
        
             | yrro wrote:
             | Possibly, but what about the license of Linux? Surely
             | nvidia.ko (being a derived work of both the GPL-licensed
             | Linux kernel and the proprietary NVIDIA kernel object
             | files) is non-distributable? Otherwise why does every other
             | distribution faff around with akmods/DKMS, etc?
        
       | janzer wrote:
       | For those wanting to try this out note that the download links in
       | this post are still giving the previous Bullseye (11.7) release
       | at the moment.
        
       | encom wrote:
       | But it's /not/ released though. Their own news section mentions
       | that cd images are still being built, which seems like something
       | that should have happened already. There's nothing but 11.7
       | available for download.
        
         | OfSanguineFire wrote:
         | The bookworm apt repository is in the final state, so Bookworm
         | is released for those with existing Debian installations who
         | can just do a search/replace of "bullseye" to "bookworm" in
         | their apt.sources file, and run apt dist-upgrade.
        
           | encom wrote:
           | Sure, but the announcement mentions and links to Bookworm
           | media downloads which are old 11.7 media. It's confusing,
           | annoying and honestly kind of amateurish. I like Debian, but
           | this is a screw-up. 20:00 in mainland Europe and it's still
           | not out. My work laptop is in a sad state of semi-brokenness
           | (self-inflicted), and I had been looking forward to giving it
           | a fresh start over the weekend. Now I'll have to wait another
           | week.
        
       | jedisct1 wrote:
       | The dnscrypt-proxy package doesn't exist any more?
        
       | ThinkBeat wrote:
       | It is amazing how this group of volunteers create the foundation
       | for many more commercial Linux ventures and use by billion-dollar
       | companies.
       | 
       | A lot of end users of different distros do not even know that
       | Debian is the foundation. I will as go as far as to say Debian
       | had solved a lot of the hard issues and then other sprinkle it.
       | (Probably not a popular view)
       | 
       | Anyways thanks to all the Debian team members. Your work ought to
       | be better known.
        
       | kayson wrote:
       | This is great news! I really like Debian as a docker host for
       | self hosting since it doesn't have a lot of fluff. The old
       | package versions do cause occasional problems though...
        
       | guerby wrote:
       | And first beta of proxmox 8.0 based on debian 12:
       | 
       | https://pve.proxmox.com/wiki/Roadmap#Proxmox_VE_8.0_beta1
        
       | lockhouse wrote:
       | If any of the Debian team is here, congratulations and thank you
       | for putting together such a solid, consistently high quality
       | Linux distro.
        
       | _joel wrote:
       | Have they released netinst images yet, can only see 11.7
        
       | hosteur wrote:
       | Fantastic! Can't wait to upgrade my servers and desktop. Debian
       | is an absolute marvel.
        
       | sylware wrote:
       | Finally with init system alternatives or do they still shove
       | systemd down our throat (if so I'll stick to devuan gnu/linux
       | instead)?
        
         | yrro wrote:
         | Finally? Debian has always shipped sysvinit and a bunch of
         | other less-used init systems.
        
           | sylware wrote:
           | I cannot find install images without systemd and with
           | sysvinit.
           | 
           | Do I miss something?
        
             | biorach wrote:
             | That's because systemd is the default. You can choose
             | sysvinit during installation
             | 
             | https://wiki.debian.org/Init#Changing_the_init_system_-
             | _at_i...
        
               | sylware wrote:
               | Allright, I may not need devuan gnu/linux in the future
               | since I can choose at installation time the init system
               | on debian.
               | 
               | But it seems the efforts to actually restore the
               | compatibility of some components with sysvinit is from
               | devuan, not debian. May be wrong again.
               | 
               | Those are steps in the right direction. But I stay alert:
               | I know that sysvinit experience could be actually
               | desastrous on debian compared to devuan. Not to mention
               | the debian "default" is systemd: we all know how critical
               | is the choice of the "default" on the long run, that's
               | why I may still go to devuan.
        
               | yrro wrote:
               | > But it seems the efforts to actually restore the
               | compatibility of some components with sysvinit is from
               | devuan, not debian.
               | 
               | Don't blame Debian if the Debuan contributors fail to
               | send their patches upstream.
        
               | sylware wrote:
               | This is not what I recall which was strong resistance to
               | raw blockade.
               | 
               | Well, it seems it did not last.
        
               | probably_wrong wrote:
               | One one hand I am thankful for the fact that this guide
               | exist. On the other hand, I am getting strong HHGTTG
               | vibes [1] from them: "you can choose sysvinit as long as
               | you follow a complex set of steps that's likely to go
               | wrong detailed inside a hard-to-find package".
               | 
               | Maybe I'm asking too much, but for me "official" support
               | would mean that I can do it from the installer directly,
               | no terminals and chroots required.
               | 
               | [1] https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/40705-but-the-plans-
               | were-on...
        
               | zh3 wrote:
               | Or post-installation. Basically install sysvinit-core,
               | copy inittab to /etc and reboot (systemd can then be
               | removed/autoremoved/purged according to taste).
        
         | vbezhenar wrote:
         | That's one of the reasons I don't like Debian. All this old
         | cruft for compatibility with stuff nobody should be using. Just
         | embrace systemd, jesus.
        
           | sylware wrote:
           | Actually, on my custom elf/linux distro, I have neither
           | systemd nor sysvinit.
           | 
           | But one is grotesquely and absurdely bigger and kludgier than
           | the other one, so this is more about choosing the lesser
           | evil...
        
         | shawnz wrote:
         | You have it backwards: Devuan shoves sysvinit down your throat,
         | whereas Debian is the one that supports alternatives
        
           | cf100clunk wrote:
           | Devuan does exactly what it says on the tin. If that suits
           | you, use it, otherwise you are free to not use it. It follows
           | that since nobody forces anyone to use Devuan, nothing is
           | being shoved down throats.
        
             | shawnz wrote:
             | Yes, I was only copying the hyperbolic language of the
             | parent commenter.
        
         | gsich wrote:
         | systemd is the superior init system.
        
           | stracer wrote:
           | How did you came to that conclusion? In my experience,
           | sysvinit comes with less bloat, and hangs randomly much less
           | than systemd. I've worked with both old debian (sysvinit) and
           | current centos (systemd) systems, and if I had a problem with
           | init, it was always with systemd. If something related to
           | disks or user login sessions fails, with sysvinit most of the
           | time things proceed promptly, while with systemd, you're in
           | for a waitfest/eternal hang.
           | 
           | Systemd seems to be propelled by distro packagers and
           | developers, but for admins/users, it's not that great.
        
           | sylware wrote:
           | Its superiority in kludge and bloat is not a matter of
           | discussion, we all know that.
        
             | ycombin23918 wrote:
             | [flagged]
        
       | troad wrote:
       | Congratulations to the Debian team!
       | 
       | An important change appears to be the inclusion of non-free
       | firmware by default in the official install image for the first
       | time, as a result of this vote:
       | https://www.debian.org/vote/2022/vote_003
       | 
       | Intriguing. I feel a little torn on this. One the one hand, I
       | appreciate being able to install Debian from an official image
       | onto a bothersome device. On the other, I can't help but feel
       | we're losing something when even a purist distribution like
       | Debian is forced to concede in the fight against proprietary
       | blobs.
       | 
       | Edit: dropped the word 'kernel' from 'proprietary blobs', as
       | rightly picked up by kind commenters below.
        
         | bayindirh wrote:
         | I was involved in the discussion, and I'm also torn on that
         | issue, but at least you can disable installation of non-free
         | firmware and install Debian without any non-free software.
         | 
         | On the other hand, firmware is a convoluted issue. It was
         | always present, but became increasingly visible over the years.
         | While I'm a strong Free Software supporter, firmware is one of
         | the hardest parts to convert, because of the IP it entails and
         | trade secrets it embodies.
        
           | jacquesm wrote:
           | That and the simple fact that without it the hardware you've
           | invested in won't work. So this is very much an individual
           | choice, if you don't have such hardware you are fine but
           | shouldn't be voting on whether or not someone who _does_ have
           | hardware that won 't work without proprietary blobs has to go
           | out to buy new gear. There are all kinds of considerations
           | that go in to this decision (for instance: environmental
           | impact) and I'm all for compromise when it helps out others.
           | 
           | At the same time, you have a good point, these decisions are
           | difficult and need to be very carefully weighted. Debian and
           | RedHat are the two distributions that everybody else always
           | ends up following so a major departure from established
           | policy there has potentially huge impact downstream.
        
             | enriquto wrote:
             | > the simple fact that without it the hardware you've
             | invested in won't work
             | 
             | How is that different from the "if you want to run linux
             | don't buy a winmodem" that we said convincingly twenty
             | years ago ? Would you have approved that linux 2.0 added
             | binary blobs to the kernel in order to correctly work with
             | the hardware that you had invested in (some random
             | winmodem) ?
        
               | boricj wrote:
               | Usually, people first buy a computer and then hear about
               | Linux later, not the other way around.
        
               | 5e92cb50239222b wrote:
               | It's also close to impossible to choose fully Linux-
               | compatible hardware for some of us. Whatever decent
               | Thinkpads there are left are practically unavailable in
               | my country, unless you're willing to buy from foreign
               | sellers without any warranty and pay hundreds of dollars
               | for shipping. Things like Framework are completely
               | unavailable and probably will be for the foreseeable
               | future. I use desktops exclusively so I can pick and
               | choose, but I am in the minority of a minority.
        
               | jacquesm wrote:
               | Winmodems had plenty of alternatives, for PCs the choice
               | is usually limited to 'what you were given' or 'what you
               | recycled from a dumpster'. Linux is typically not the
               | first OS to be installed on any given piece of hardware
               | (even if brand new plenty of people pay either the MS or
               | the Apple tax). And because those are exactly the people
               | that benefit from having a working PC I'm all for
               | maximizing their chances. Choice is a luxury.
        
               | Karellen wrote:
               | > Linux is typically not the first OS to be installed on
               | any given piece of hardware. And because those are
               | exactly the people that benefit from having a working PC
               | I'm all for maximizing their chances. Choice is a luxury.
               | 
               | But they don't have to choose Debian.
               | 
               | If Debian had maintained a strict "Free" stance, people
               | could still use their troublesome hardware out-of-the-box
               | simply by picking another distro that did include non-
               | Free firmware in the installer. There are plenty of them.
               | Like, 99% of all other distros.
               | 
               | Not all distros have to be everything to everyone. It's
               | OK to have a niche.
        
               | jacquesm wrote:
               | Fortunately Debian recognized that being a 'niche' would
               | sooner or later spell the end of Debian and that would be
               | a loss.
        
               | bayindirh wrote:
               | When you are one of the biggest "root" distributions, and
               | the template of countless big and small time derivatives,
               | you don't have the luxury to have niche.
               | 
               | When thought with a clear and unbiased mind, Debian did
               | the absolute best they can do.
               | 
               | Add firmware, be open about it, install only when
               | necessary, allow people to opt out when they know what
               | they are doing.
        
               | nunesvn wrote:
               | We're on the laptop age, most people can't pick and
               | choose the components of their computers.
        
           | blihp wrote:
           | While I'm glad to see proprietary firmware both included and
           | segregated in its own repo, I'm wondering why RISC-V wasn't
           | added as a supported architecture in Debian 12? It seems like
           | that supporting at least an open ISA would move closer to the
           | possibility of what Debian wants to see happen... so why
           | isn't it as a distro helping to make it happen?
        
             | [deleted]
        
             | teddyh wrote:
             | https://wiki.debian.org/RISC-V
        
               | blihp wrote:
               | That doesn't answer the question. It's still 'unofficial'
               | per https://wiki.debian.org/SupportedArchitectures
               | 
               | If you want the maintain the status quo you support the
               | hardware that has the most users, if you want to change
               | it you also support the hardware you want them to use.
        
               | teddyh wrote:
               | Who is the actor in this scenario who wants to change the
               | status quo and therefore support the RISC-V platform in
               | Debian? I.e. who are the people with the motivation to do
               | that?
        
               | bayindirh wrote:
               | In Debian, there's no single entity which decides on
               | things. There are rules, and processes.
               | 
               | The relevant documentation is here:
               | https://wiki.debian.org/PortsDocs/New
               | 
               | Also, the rules for becoming an official port is here:
               | https://ftp-master.debian.org/archive-criteria.html
               | 
               | When RISC-V satisfies the relevant criteria, they can
               | become official.
               | 
               | Also, maintaining a port is tremendous amount of work.
               | Debian users only see the tip of the iceberg. There's so
               | much beneath that.
        
           | mikae1 wrote:
           | _> you can disable installation of non-free firmware and
           | install Debian without any non-free software._
           | 
           | Including but making it optional was an excellent decision.
           | Those who need will get what they want, those who don't will
           | have the same result as with Bullseye.
        
           | arp242 wrote:
           | As I understand it "firmware" is essentially just the same as
           | an EEPROM, except that using volatile memory is cheaper and
           | easier to upgrade. No one seems to have great issues with
           | EEPROMs (FSF doesn't anyway), but uploading that same code to
           | the device when it starts is a huge problem? I never
           | understood this, and especially given the huge practical
           | trade-offs the entire thing seems fighting windmills.
           | 
           | The Linux-libre people even removed the warning that the CPU
           | is vulnerable to spectre/meltdown if you don't update the
           | microcode. But ... your CPU already comes with that microcode
           | out of the factory, just a different version of it. How is
           | running an older known to be buggy microcode better?
        
             | jasomill wrote:
             | Debian distributes firmware stored in volatile RAM because
             | it is either required to use the hardware, or, as is the
             | case for CPU microcode updates, highly recommended for most
             | users.
             | 
             | As far as I know, Debian does not distribute proprietary
             | EEPROM firmware updates at all, as these are generally not
             | required to use the hardware (and, depending on the device
             | and update in question, may or may not be recommended for
             | most users).
             | 
             | In other words, the difference is practical, not
             | ideological.
        
               | arp242 wrote:
               | Organisations like the FSF recommend that you don't use
               | devices that require "non-free firmware" at all. They
               | _don 't_ recommend anything like this for devices with
               | "non-free EEPROMs at all". Stallman himself has stated he
               | has no problem with such devices (I can't find a direct
               | quote on this right now, but I'm 100% sure I've seen
               | Stallman write or say this at time point).
               | 
               | My point was that the entire position just doesn't make
               | any sense: either you reject all non-free software no
               | matter how it's loaded (which means there are very few
               | computers you can actually use), or you just use your
               | hardware with "non-free firmware" that would be baked in
               | anyway and stop worrying about the entire thing.
        
         | yakubin wrote:
         | I've never had a computer which would work with the official
         | ideologically-pure installer. Always had to use the non-free
         | one. I'm glad this vote turned out the way it did.
        
           | cesarb wrote:
           | > I've never had a computer which would work with the
           | official ideologically-pure installer.
           | 
           | I had more than once, back when I first installed Debian in
           | the late 1900s and early 2000s, and I believe my experience
           | wasn't unique.
           | 
           | Back then, not requiring any loadable firmware was common;
           | the hardware either didn't require firmware, or came with the
           | full firmware in a ROM chip in the device itself. And that
           | explains the issue: Debian is an _old_ distribution, coming
           | from these times when not having non-free firmware (or even
           | any firmware at all) in the distribution was viable, and
           | often fully usable.
        
             | NikkiA wrote:
             | Same, and I used to keep a little cache of 'known working
             | without firmware issues' wlan cards (pcmcia), I probably
             | still have some somewhere; though I don't think I have any
             | pcmcia capable laptops anymore
        
         | progval wrote:
         | For devices which have firmware, does it matter whether the
         | firmware is loaded by the OS rather than hardcoded inside the
         | device? The former at least gives an opportunity to fix bugs.
         | 
         | And if I'm not mistaken, this isn't about kernel blobs (which
         | run on the CPU as kernel code), only code that gets loaded on
         | devices (including CPU microcode).
        
           | zajio1am wrote:
           | There is a difference from legal point. If the firmware is
           | hardcoded in device, you do not need to accept any license
           | contract with IP holder. You do not need to copy it, and your
           | right to run it is implied from ownership of the device. If
           | the firmware is independent part bundled with OS, then anyone
           | who wants to run it or even just distribute the OS must
           | accept the license.
        
             | iudqnolq wrote:
             | Are you guessing what sounds logical to you or do you
             | actually know the answer here?
             | 
             | The legal system sometimes has definitions of copying that
             | aren't that straightforward. I've seen in a copyright
             | context judges talk about a computer loading software into
             | RAM being copying.
             | 
             | Intel microcode comes with a license:
             | https://bugs.gentoo.org/664134
        
               | zajio1am wrote:
               | > Are you guessing what sounds logical to you or do you
               | actually know the answer here?
               | 
               | IANAL, but this is a general concept of exhaustion of IP
               | rights when the IP is sold as a part of physical medium,
               | see (28) and article 4 of EU copyright directive 2001/29.
               | 
               | > The legal system sometimes has definitions of copying
               | that aren't that straightforward. I've seen in a
               | copyright context judges talk about a computer loading
               | software into RAM being copying
               | 
               | This is handled in (33) of the directive:
               | 
               | "The exclusive right of reproduction should be subject to
               | an exception to allow certain acts of temporary
               | reproduction, which are transient or incidental
               | reproductions, forming an integral and essential part of
               | a technological process and carried out for the sole
               | purpose of enabling either efficient transmission in a
               | network between third parties by an intermediary, or a
               | lawful use of a work or other subject-matter to be made."
        
               | ThePowerOfFuet wrote:
               | The term you're looking for regarding the numbers you
               | have in parentheses is _recital_.
        
           | roenxi wrote:
           | There is a little ritual we do here from time to time where
           | someone writes a comment that starts something like "Well, I
           | didn't expect Stallman would be right about [issue now being
           | reported on] but he predicted this years ago".
           | 
           | If it can go wrong it will, and if software isn't free then
           | its owners will do things that the users really do not like.
           | In this case, if they can fix bugs they can reduce
           | functionality post-hoc. That is consequential. It is better
           | to have freedom or certainty as to what a device does.
        
             | dezgeg wrote:
             | How can you ever really be sure that there is no way to
             | change the code running on the hardware, either
             | unintentionally via some exploit, or intentionally via a
             | deliberate backdoor or a debugging interface enabled in
             | production?
             | 
             | As a practical example, I have never heard anyone
             | considering the freedomness of firmware in eMMC flash
             | memory chips. But the talk "eMMC hacking, or: how I fixed
             | long-dead Galaxy S3 phones" from CCC reveals that actually,
             | Samsung eMMC chips have an undocumented debug interface to
             | read/write the RAM of the firmware running on the ARM core
             | inside the eMMC chip.
        
         | vbezhenar wrote:
         | Firmware is not kernel blob. It's executed on separate device
         | and has nothing to do with Linux. It's about open hardware, not
         | open software. I don't think that it's worth to pursue this
         | direction for Debian.
        
         | hahhahanananana wrote:
         | > when even a purist distribution like Debian is forced to
         | concede in the fight against proprietary blobs.
         | 
         | As far as I'm aware, nothing has recently changed in this
         | regard. It's more of a reflection on the mentality of young
         | members, those who tend to treat software as if it's in a
         | vacuum, separate from all the social and moral concerns of the
         | meatspace.
        
         | rollcat wrote:
         | > On the other, I can't help but feel we're losing something
         | when even a purist distribution like Debian is forced to
         | concede in the fight against proprietary firmware blobs.
         | 
         | The software needs hardware to run, and the whole point of the
         | software is to make the hardware useful. If you can't use the
         | hardware, what's the point of the software?
         | 
         | In my book, freedom is a function of usefulness. No amount of
         | redistributable source code has any value to me if I can't run
         | it.
         | 
         | Enabling the use of hardware I already own is not a compromise,
         | it's a solution. It's what operating systems exist for. Debian
         | is fulfilling its primary function. I'm glad that this
         | necessity was finally recognised.
        
           | still_grokking wrote:
           | I disagree. I'm very disappointed that this "necessity" came
           | into existence in the first place.
           | 
           | By being forced to install non-free BLOBs to be able to use
           | "our" devices we actually admit that we're not the ones who
           | actually control "our" computers. That's admitting full
           | defeat! You're not the owner of "your" devices.
           | 
           | Given that computers are now kind of "brain extensions" this
           | means you're not in control of a substantial part of
           | yourself.
           | 
           | This has quite some implications! And I'm not even thinking
           | about such things like future computer devices connected
           | directly to human brains...
        
             | arp242 wrote:
             | You don't control the hardware in the first place. Can you
             | modify the microchips on your hardware? Can you modify the
             | printed circuits? Can you modify a ROM in hardware? In all
             | those cases the answer is "not really", short of some
             | spectacular reverse engineering effort and specialized
             | hardware and skills that even most technical users don't
             | have (you can modify anything with enough effort). All this
             | focus on firmware seems rather misplaced.
        
               | 5e92cb50239222b wrote:
               | Let's not conflate hardware with software. The first one
               | is practically impossible to modify for a completely
               | different reason than the second one (physical
               | limitations and the need for specialized hardware that
               | costs serious money vs artificial limitations imposed by
               | developers). You can at least repair it (unless you
               | bought into the Apple ecosystem -- you knew what you were
               | getting into then), and a relative of mine makes good
               | living doing just that.
        
               | arp242 wrote:
               | Firmware is inextricable tied to hardware; you could
               | pretty much say it _is_ hardware. Hardware has had
               | "software" in it for decades and no one complains about
               | it either, except when this software is loaded in a
               | particular fashion.
        
             | rollcat wrote:
             | Then don't buy hardware that requires non-free firmware.
        
         | labawi wrote:
         | While I don't like proprietary firmware, I'm not sure if the
         | line is drawn at a useful place.
         | 
         | If you have firmware/software/whatever in a device, which is
         | _updateable_ (as opposed to mask-rom or hard logic), I 'd much
         | rather have it transparently managed by an OS I can control,
         | than some EEPROM with often proprietary, inscrutable, I-ask-
         | you-nicely-please-update-your-firmware update mechanism.
         | 
         | IMO, the difference is:
         | 
         | - with OS provided firmware (and preferably no writable
         | storage), I can be sure my device is running the same SW as the
         | rest of the world
         | 
         | - with dozens of EEPROMs in my device, I can never be sure what
         | is running on it.
         | 
         | Firmware that is legally not redistributable is a non-trivial,
         | though perhaps less bothersome issue. Firmware that requires
         | manufaturer's signature is bothersome but I would still prefer
         | it over inscrutable hidden firmware.
        
         | yrro wrote:
         | Debian was never a purist distribution. If it was then there
         | wouldn't have been a non-free section in the archive in the
         | first place.
         | 
         | The sad truth is that the Linux distributions recommended by
         | the FSF have approximately zero users.
        
           | Kwpolska wrote:
           | Is it sad? Actually working Linux on real hardware is far
           | more important than purity IMO.
        
             | nvy wrote:
             | >Actually working Linux on real hardware is far more
             | important than purity IMO.
             | 
             | I agree, but I also think this depends heavily on who you
             | ask. Stallman for example would rather have poorer
             | functionality than compromise his personal (extremist)
             | ethical principles.
             | 
             | There are a lot of folks who use laptops without wifi
             | because the blobs are non free, so they're using ancient
             | ThinkPads plugged into Ethernet.
             | 
             | Much depends on your personal computing needs.
        
               | amiga386 wrote:
               | > Stallman for example would rather have poorer
               | functionality than compromise his personal (extremist)
               | ethical principles.
               | 
               | Stallman is open to pragmatism now and again. For
               | example, on this very topic:
               | 
               | https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-hardware-
               | designs.en.html
               | 
               | > We can envision a future in which our personal
               | fabricators can make chips, and our robots can assemble
               | and solder them together with transformers, switches,
               | keys, displays, fans and so on. In that future we will
               | all make our own computers (and fabricators and robots),
               | and we will all be able to take advantage of modified
               | designs made by those who know hardware. The arguments
               | for rejecting nonfree software will then apply to nonfree
               | hardware designs too.
               | 
               | > That future is years away, at least. In the meantime,
               | there is no need to reject hardware with nonfree designs
               | on principle.
        
             | m463 wrote:
             | Ubuntu is based on debian and is pretty pragmatic in that
             | respect.
             | 
             | it makes it easy to get working
             | 
             | ...and it also carefully attempts to lock you in using
             | packages that can't1 be disabled.
             | 
             | just saying it is a slippery slope.
             | 
             | [1] well with effort you can
             | 
             | https://www.baeldung.com/linux/snap-remove-disable
             | 
             | https://gist.github.com/jfeilbach/f4d0b19df82e04bea8f10cdd5
             | 9...
        
             | Arnavion wrote:
             | It's sad for the people who don't share YO.
             | 
             | Eg I intentionally got an old ath9k PCI-E wifi card for my
             | Debian 11 router because it works without proprietary
             | firmware, unlike newer ath10k etc cards.
        
             | yrro wrote:
             | Sad in that I'd love to purge all non-free software from my
             | life, but that has proven to be impossible and increasingly
             | more so as the years go by.
        
           | mistrial9 wrote:
           | at those great (FSF) heights, the light is bright but the air
           | is thin!
        
       | kmos17 wrote:
       | Congrats and major props to the Debian community! Running Debian
       | in vm's is such a pleasure, very fast boot times, rock solid,
       | easy install. In contrast recent ubuntu installs have only given
       | me problems.
        
       | igtztorrero wrote:
       | This is a Real Hacker News
       | 
       | Yeeei My favorite Fast Linux distro keep going !!!
       | 
       | Congratulations
        
       | juujian wrote:
       | Didn't expect for shiny-server to be mentioned so prominently. I
       | might actually give Debian a shot for my personal machine. The
       | five years of updatea sounds great, the LTS option is the main
       | reason why I went with Ubuntu so far.
        
       | 28304283409234 wrote:
       | Never ceases to amaze me. There is all kinds of things wrong with
       | Debian I am sure. But at the end of the day, what that community
       | does is mindblowingly impressive.
       | 
       | Much gratitude from a Slink-and-a-half user, back in the day.
        
         | whatwhaaaaat wrote:
         | All kinds of things wrong? It's the base for half the Linux
         | distros. What could you possibly mean?
        
           | still_grokking wrote:
           | Half the Linux distris? I've once counted on Distrowatch.
           | When you go by number of distris there it's more like 80% are
           | Debian based.
           | 
           | If you go also by how much those distris are used it's even
           | like 9x% of the stuff running out there is Debian based.
           | 
           | There are almost no independent distris. You have Arch, you
           | have SUSE, you have RedHat and a few clones, you have Gentoo.
           | But more or less _everything else_ is Debian based.
        
             | gwhl wrote:
             | And Slackware!
        
               | still_grokking wrote:
               | There are of course some niche distris that aren't based
               | on the "big ones".
               | 
               | But I'm not sure Slackware is still at this point
               | relevant enough to be named in a row with the others I've
               | mentioned.
               | 
               | Of course the sampling was subjective, and I didn't
               | intended to marginalize any not mentioned distris. I just
               | thought the others are too niche to be included in such
               | kind of pick.
        
             | mongol wrote:
             | Do I get it right that you mean > 90 percent of distro use
             | is Debian-based? Because that can hardly be the case
        
               | tuukkah wrote:
               | Ubuntu and its derivatives are included.
        
               | guerrilla wrote:
               | Is Ubuntu still Debian based? What's the criterion for
               | that anyway? Just using debs?
        
               | tuukkah wrote:
               | I wouldn't call Ubuntu a flavor of Debian as they have so
               | big differences, but ultimately it's still mostly Debian.
               | You can see a numerical comparison of packages here:
               | http://qa.ubuntuwire.com/mdt/all.html
        
               | chungy wrote:
               | Ubuntu releases are, effectively, snapshots of Debian sid
               | every 6 months. That's a pretty strong basis.
        
               | eikenberry wrote:
               | Yes, Ubuntu is still Debian based with just a little
               | added on top.
        
           | marpstar wrote:
           | I think they were referring to the fact that _everything_ has
           | _something_ "wrong" with it, but that those things don't
           | invalidate the value of the greater whole.
        
             | pietro72ohboy wrote:
             | Seems to be an extremely charitable interpretation of the
             | parent comment. I also read it as -- "Despite the plethora
             | of issues with Debian, it manages to surprise". Like the
             | second-level commenter, I'm also curious to hear more about
             | these "issues".
        
               | 28304283409234 wrote:
               | You poor person, reading malice where none was intended.
               | 
               | marpstar was correct.
               | 
               | I am a Debian fanboi since Slink. Since it was drilled
               | into me by rvdm, ssmeenk, miquels, jdassen and dth.
               | 
               | And have seen Debian survive and thrive a lot of
               | critisism. "Too slow release cycle, not Free(Dom) enough,
               | Too free, systemd, too much politics, too many
               | architectures, etc....etc....etc.."
               | 
               | Yes, any large community will be flawed and deliver
               | flawed solutions. And I for one celebrate those flaws and
               | features, and appreciate the sheer magnitude and
               | accomplishment of this enormous, complex, great project.
        
               | whatwhaaaaat wrote:
               | Gross
        
               | 28304283409234 wrote:
               | Reddit refugee? Grow up.
        
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