this post was submitted on 26 Feb 2024
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Linux

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Linux is a family of open source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991 by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically packaged in a Linux distribution (or distro for short).

Distributions include the Linux kernel and supporting system software and libraries, many of which are provided by the GNU Project. Many Linux distributions use the word "Linux" in their name, but the Free Software Foundation uses the name GNU/Linux to emphasize the importance of GNU software, causing some controversy.

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[–] Valmond@lemmy.mindoki.com 25 points 8 months ago (2 children)

I imagine open source boot software being better than closed source (a real no brainer) but whats the difficulties with the open one? I'm not very versed in those very low level things.

[–] ___@lemm.ee 42 points 8 months ago

The difficulty is getting closed source hardware manufacturers to adopt it.

[–] Pantherina@feddit.de 27 points 8 months ago (1 children)

All those blobs in there need to be reverse engineered. As there are not that many people doing it, this hardware is often a decade old

[–] AlexJD@feddit.uk 19 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Not entirely the case anymore. Libreboot switched to a blob reduction policy in order to support more hardware. Hopefully this will bring things forward quite a bit over the next year.

[–] MigratingtoLemmy@lemmy.world 2 points 8 months ago

Unless they support the newer platforms, it will remain a niche product. I've come to accept a compromise between binary blobs and FOSS bootloader, and the path that Libreboot has chosen is great for the community, so we'll wait and watch