<html><head><style type="text/css"><!-- DIV {margin:0px;} --></style></head><body><div style="font-family:arial, helvetica, sans-serif;font-size:10pt"><DIV>Check out Debian for an absolutely free distribution. It has more distributions based on it than any other core compilation, IIRC. It has the advantage that it doesn't inhiibit the installation of non-free software if the user so chooses.</DIV>
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<DIV>I wonder wat gNewSense is up to if instructions don't exist to include non-free software.</DIV>
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<DIV>========Keith<BR></DIV>
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<B><SPAN style="FONT-WEIGHT: bold">From:</SPAN></B> Peter Kuykendall <peterkuykendall@gmail.com><BR><B><SPAN style="FONT-WEIGHT: bold">To:</SPAN></B> 990287.25071245592975910.JavaMail.root@zimbra.thegeek.nu; CLUE tech <clue-tech@cluedenver.org><BR><B><SPAN style="FONT-WEIGHT: bold">Sent:</SPAN></B> Sunday, June 21, 2009 2:45:35 PM<BR><B><SPAN style="FONT-WEIGHT: bold">Subject:</SPAN></B> [clue-tech] Fedora 11 released<BR></FONT><BR>><TT><FONT color=#1a1a1a>Fedora is among the purest, the most committed to Freedom of all the popular distributions.</FONT></TT><BR><BR>I'm very glad to see this; thanks for posting it. I was amazed to find out that the kernel is chock full of nonfree code, in direct violation of the GPL, and there doesn't seem to be a lot of interest in fixing this upstream. So I downloaded a Gnewsense VM (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gnewsense) and have been pretty impressed. Of course, the VM works well
despite being crippled by lack of nonfree wireless, etc. because it depends on those services being available in the host, which in my case is a very nonfree corporate XP laptop. But it's refreshing to see that there are real efforts to create truly free distros, even to the point of excising nonfree code from the kernel. And it is possible to buy wireless cards and dongles that can be driven by free code.<BR><BR>>From Wikipedia:<BR><BR>"<B>gNewSense</B> is a <A href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GNU/Linux" target=_blank rel=nofollow>GNU/Linux</A> <A href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operating_system" target=_blank rel=nofollow>operating system</A> that uses <A href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_software" target=_blank rel=nofollow>free software</A>.<A href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gnewsense#cite_note-faq-1" target=_blank rel=nofollow>[</A><A href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gnewsense#cite_note-faq-1" target=_blank
rel=nofollow>2</A><A href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gnewsense#cite_note-faq-1" target=_blank rel=nofollow>]</A> gNewSense is based on <A href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ubuntu" target=_blank rel=nofollow>Ubuntu</A>.<A href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gnewsense#cite_note-faq-1" target=_blank rel=nofollow>[</A><A href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gnewsense#cite_note-faq-1" target=_blank rel=nofollow>2</A><A href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gnewsense#cite_note-faq-1" target=_blank rel=nofollow>]</A> It tries to maintain the user-friendliness of Ubuntu but with the <A href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proprietary_software" target=_blank rel=nofollow>non-free</A> software and <A href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Binary_blob" target=_blank rel=nofollow>binary blobs</A> removed. The <A href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_Software_Foundation" target=_blank rel=nofollow>Free Software Foundation</A> considers gNewSense to be a free operating
system.<A href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gnewsense#cite_note-2" target=_blank rel=nofollow>[</A><A href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gnewsense#cite_note-2" target=_blank rel=nofollow>3</A><A href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gnewsense#cite_note-2" target=_blank rel=nofollow>]</A><BR><BR>gNewSense takes a strict stance against non-free software. For example, any documentation that gives instructions on installing non-free software is excluded.<A href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gnewsense#cite_note-3" target=_blank rel=nofollow>[</A><A href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gnewsense#cite_note-3" target=_blank rel=nofollow>4</A><A href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gnewsense#cite_note-3" target=_blank rel=nofollow>]</A><BR><BR>The project was launched by Brian Brazil and Paul O'Malley in 2006. In October 2006, after the 0.85 release,<A href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gnewsense#cite_note-4" target=_blank rel=nofollow>[</A><A
href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gnewsense#cite_note-4" target=_blank rel=nofollow>5</A><A href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gnewsense#cite_note-4" target=_blank rel=nofollow>]</A> it was given assistance by the <A href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_Software_Foundation" target=_blank rel=nofollow>Free Software Foundation</A>.<A href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gnewsense#cite_note-5" target=_blank rel=nofollow>[</A><A href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gnewsense#cite_note-5" target=_blank rel=nofollow>6</A><A href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gnewsense#cite_note-5" target=_blank rel=nofollow>]</A>"<BR><BR>- Pete </DIV></DIV></div></body></html>