Gregory's Server@dthompson went through a similar exercise when deciding between guix and nixos (also for a thinkpad x1) … and I was really hoping guix would pull out in front because I much prefer Guille over the Nix language. But, having to hack around the culture of “don’t talk or ask about non-free things” just to get mainstream hardware support was a bit of a non-starter and turned me off of the ecosystem so ultimately nixos won it for me (for now).
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@dthompson oh yeah I have a fully working guix config for the thinkpad out of the nonguix channel as well as a custom channel for my own packages and all that … and I keep parity with my nixos config just in case I do want to switch. It was more frustration with the core culture of “I have to go do this hidden thing that’s treated as less-than by the maintainers”, than any technical barrier to adoption. It’s probably just my own subjective interpretation though :)  @anticomputer I think there's a nonzero number of maintainers that want to revisit being tied to the GNU FSDG (pure speculation, though)  @dthompson @anticomputer anywhere in particular that someone (or a number of someones) might offer some encouragement to move forward with this idea? @daviwil @dthompson @anticomputer Second the FSDG. I would revisit even the whole attachment to gnu but maybe im too extreme on that regard. Certainly keeps me from contributing as much as i would like though the whole FSDG/Gnu thing. @msavoritias @daviwil @anticomputer I don't think that guix should provide steam or anything else like that. a separate channel is perfect for those. I think guix should make 2 changes: @dthompson @daviwil @anticomputer Completely agree. I just would like the development to support said software to be done it tne open. And as you said non free kernel would be nice. Because guix is too restricted by it at this point. @daviwil @anticomputer not sure, honestly! I edited my post to say it's speculation. there's a lot of discontent for the current state of GNU amongst the Guix devs so I'd be shocked if none of the maintainers were frustrated by the FSDG. @dthompson @daviwil @anticomputer is there a reasonable place I can catch up on the main arguments against? I’ve long been unimpressed with the strict stance of the GNU project, primarily for practical reasons. Only recently have I come to recognize the value of the position. I can’t avoid using proprietary solutions at work, but I definitely would require the guarantees of the GPL before I would accept certain types of tech solutions @IPmonger @dthompson @anticomputer The main argument against FSDG is that the kernel firmware blob restriction just isn't practical because many users own laptops that are not compatible with Linux Libre. If the vast majority of your potential users have hardware that doesn't work with the distro and the guidelines forbid them to ask about it on official channels, it places a huge barrier. In an ideal world, we wouldn't need the proprietary blobs. I'd prefer it!  @daviwil @IPmonger @dthompson @anticomputer I am encouraged by the changes to Debian--maybe this will help shift things. The fact that one can't have access to mainstream hardware supported by Libre software is frustrating, compounded by the "don't ask, don't tell" policy of the Guix distribution. Thanks for the installation guide. |
@anticomputer well hopefully this post showed how it's pretty easy to work around! I've been running guix as a distro since it first became available but this was my first time using nonguix and it was pretty easy! I thought it might be a lot more difficult. pleasantly surprised.