Free Gnu/Linux Distributions

[feeef]

I think that if we want to promote this computer as "respects your freedom" we should be able to run one of these distributions : http://www.gnu.org/distros/free-distros.html
Unfortunately none of them is available on PPC yet.
We may try to contact them.

[markos]

No offence, but 3 out of those are based on Debian (well, Knoppix/Ubuntu but in the end it comes down to Debian support). Others on fedora (which does not have ppc as a prime arch anymore), and arch (which I have no idea about). I'd rather spend the time with distros that actually care about the arch (like Debian) and still have it as a prime architecture. With enough interest it might retrigger other distros to follow suit, but we certainly can't support more than a couple -speaking for myself, I intend to work only on Debian, not even Ubuntu.

[nemesis]

Which distro will it be shipped with?

[feeef]

I agree with you Markos! It would be too hard for us to work on many distributions. My point here was to ask the guys who make those distributions to do the work to support our platform. Maybe one of them would be OK to do that. I will contact them anyway!

However, they may just be able to do so as soon as we have a stable common distribution like Debian to support our platform.

The point for me was to have at least one distribution on our platform that cares about protecting the end user against spyware and other kind of malicious bits of software. But it would just be a bonus you know. I would never want to prevent other distributions to run on that computer. Especially Debian as I am myself a Debian user!

Anyway, if we can ship the hardware with a Debian distribution at the start, I totally agree with that!

[feeef]

I have been playing with Trisquel (Ubuntu based FSF certified) and I have to admit it is a pretty good OS! They have 2 versions (Gnome and LXDE). I tried both of them and they worked perfectly. they both give you access to the latest Ubuntu packages. As an FSF certified distro, only non-free software and drivers are not included.

I think that this distribution on our laptop would be perfect for those who care about free software philosophy.

It is quite difficult to install linux on today's (UEFI) laptops and the hardware that can fully support free drivers is pretty rare, I think our laptop would be very interesting for those who care about free software.

[vox]

I think that if we want to promote this computer as "respects your freedom" we should be able to run one of these distributions : http://www.gnu.org/distros/free-distros.html
Unfortunately none of them is available on PPC yet.
We may try to contact them.

Depends what free is. I don`t find Debian or Ubuntu "unfree", even there are some teams and entities behind.

Well, getting it work on Debian is good enough. Some nice add ons would be welcomed.

On by-specs similar PPC64 home computer (A1 X1000) I really liked MINT PPC concept (backport of Mint LXDE to Debian - fast and usable OS)
http://mintppc.org/about

Sadly, it has no releases for 4 years now.

Besides Debian and classic Ubuntu -  OpenSUSE, Fedora and Lubuntu exist in PPC32/PPC64 versions.

Surprisingly, they all have options to add (if not included) quite latest Firefox, Chromium, Libre Office, GIMP ... GUIs (LXDE/GNOME ...)
with recent addition of MATE. So, the state of Linux for PPC is not perfect, but is still good and very usable.