Irregular status update about reproducible Debian live ISO images

[Marc Haber]

On Thu, Mar 27, 2025 at 01:52:47AM -0400, Ian Kelling wrote:
>Unfortunately, this isn't quite right. Currently, bookworm live images
>contain 10 nonreproducible packages. The problem is that Debian
>distributes binaries that it didn't build, and afaik it doesn't have a
>copy of the source code required to build them. They are in the
>non-free-firmware component of the Debian archive and are:
>
>amd64-microcode
>atmel-firmware
>bluez-firmware
>dahdi-firmware
>firmware-ast
>firmware-nonfree
>firmware-sof
>intel-microcode
>rtl8723bt-firmware
>zd1211-firmware
>
>The obvious final step in order to create some 100% reproducible live
>images is for Debian to build some live-images which don't include those
>packages. It would also be worth contacting the original developers of
>those binaries and asking for the source code on behalf of Debian.

I think that Debian should not let itself be pulled into that argument 
twice a month. We have decided that our users are the priority and that 
we want Debian to run on modern hardware without forcing our users to 
find the firmware needed to run their hardware themselves. This applies 
specifically to our installer images but also of course to our live 
images. If we did remove that firmware from our live images that would 
cause especially new users to shrug it off like "oh, Debian doesn't 
work" and move on to an even less free operating system.

I move that Debian classifies such crossfire from the FSF, Trisquel etc 
as trolling and not discuss that any more. We just had that argument two 
weeks ago for the most recent time. It is a waste of time. We are never 
going to do everything right from the FSF's point of view.

Just curious, do Ubuntu and Mint get the same amount of "it's not free!" 
whining than Debian does?

Greetings
Marc

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