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GNU is Not Unix

Video Purism Offers Free (as in Freedom) Laptops (Video) 77

Posted by Roblimo from the free-at-last dept.
Video no longer available.
Purism uses its own OS, PureOS, which is a Debian derivative by way of Ubuntu and other members of the Debian-derivative family, but with no taint of proprietary code. Now imagine all the binaries stripped out of the Linux kernel, making it closer to the FSF ideal of a 100% free operating system than the Linux kernel in use almost everywhere else.

They're still using a proprietary BIOS, but have people working on a Free one. The main thing, though, is that Purism is working to give you all the privacy and freedom they can -- with more coming as they keep working to replace proprietary bits of the OS, BIOS, and hardware drivers with Free Software. Best of all, even if you don't need a new laptop right now, you can download PureOS and run it on any compatible hardware you already own.

Timothy Lord for Slashdot: Todd, tell us about the Purism laptop, you’ve got a couple of different examples here one of which is the produced version and another that you are running a Kickstarter for right now?

Todd: Yes, that's right. So actually what we're doing is, we have the Purism Librem 15 laptop which is a 15-inch version, and we actually just launched a Purism Librem 13 laptop. These are actually prototype versions which are a lighter grey, and we're going to manufacture them with an anodized dark grey aluminum when we're actually doing the final run. And the 15-inch version has a crowdfunding campaign on Crowd Supply that already is closing on about a $0.5 million. And then we have a 13-inch version we just started. It's also available on Crowd Supply. The 15-inch is going to be shipping in September timeframe, and the 13-inch is also going to be shipping in September or maybe October.

Slashdot: Talk about the philosophy, what’s behind these?

Todd: Well, we actually wanted to build the first high-end privacy and freedom respecting laptop. So to do that we actually had to start at the hardware level because we had to select chips that actually will only run with completely free software where the source code is available, so in that case, we have to source chips and manufacture the motherboard which is what we're doing and then we source the component parts from all over the world bring them to South San Francisco where we assemble them and ship them out.

Slashdot: What sort of software do you put on top of that because hardware is obviously a big part.

Todd: So, we are actually

Slashdot: Running Windows on it might be a different experience than if you’re running something else.

Todd: So we run our own operating system called PureOS, which is a great grandchild of Debian one of my favorite distributions. So it's Debian which Ubuntuis based off of in Trisquel which is a Free Software Foundation endorsed distribution, it’s a fantastic distribution that strips all of binaries out of the Linux kernel. Then we are a derivative of Trisquel where we add some privacy respecting features such as Privacy Badger, EFF HTTPS Everywhere, Random Agent Spoofer, and we also install Tor browser by default and a few other things so when somebody opens up the machine for the first time that they know that their rights are fully respected.

Slashdot: Now,if there are security problems that come up, since you’re based on a Debian distribution it’s a similar process of updating and getting notifications?

Todd: Yes, it’s a very similar process so we actually – we borrow directly from that which is we have security packages and then it alerts the user that there is security release instead of just as common software update release.

Slashdot: How updated is the software, does it make you a little bit behind in order to make sure you have secured versions of things, you run security audits on the other software that comes along with a typical Linux distribution, or it does not include that?

Todd: So one of the great things about being a GNU operating system is that we benefit from the entire community. So for us we are – well, we are a great grandchild of Debian. We can pick up from Debian Ubuntu as well as Trisquel that is very, very active in the freeing of the entire operating system. So for us the lagging behind is a very small window of time for our operating system as opposed to something where we're not actively concerned about that. So it is very much we're concerned about privacy, we're concerned about security, but most importantly, we're concerned about freedom for the users.

Slashdot: Now the hardware too – it seems there are some very high end piece of hardware that might not come with an open source version, even low end for that matter, what limitations does looking only for open source backed hardware impose on the resultant laptop?

Todd: So a couple things with, when we're sourcing the hardware chips as an example, let's say, the wireless card when we negotiate for the hardware chips the first thing we're negotiating for is users’ rights. Then we negotiate for quality and then price, the meantime to failure. Whereas you know anybody else sourcing chips is going to clearly negotiate for quality or price first, meantime to failure etc. So first thing we negotiate for is users’ rights. So therefore as an example we go to Qualcomm we say, hey, we want wireless chips and we go to Intel and we say, we want wireless chips. The number one thing we look for is that the source code is available, that can be either the source code available from the manufacturer or the source code is available from the free software community.

So in the case of Qualcomm we know we can't get a 802.11 AC chip, because there's no free software that powers them. So we actually have to use an 802.11N chip which is a Qualcomm Atheros. So then we can run it with free software that the community has already freed, so for us we really want to make sure that all the chips that are in the computer run completely free software, but it's an important caveat, we run completely free software from the bootloader the entire kernel is stripped from binary thanks to Trisquel and then we moved to a GNU operating system that is completely free, and all the software that you can install is also completely free. So what that means is that at the lowest level we have two pieces that still remain which is an issue that started around 2005 is that the BIOS is a free BIOS meaning its core boot, however we do use an Intel FSP binary that is the memory engine. So we initiate the BIOS by using a binary.

We're looking to free that. We have three developers that are dedicated to freeing that and we are welcoming more, right. Anybody who's interested in actually freeing that BIOS would be great, but we also can push with Intel to free that BIOS. And then below that at that point, we would actually get Free Software Foundation that respects your freedom certification, and we should go a level below that and we also want to free the firmware that are in SSDs and hard drives that are at the lowest level of things.

Slashdot: So the companies that are involved here as hardware makers are they pretty receptive when you say we want something that is backed by free software?

Todd: Well, they are receptive. However because when we first negotiate we say that's our number one requirement. So what that does is that it sometimes puts them on their heels right, then they need to figure out what that means and then we provide them the education of either, let's say, tools like H-node which allow for easy searching of hardware that is supported by the free software community. So we haven't received all the source code. But we are actually getting to where we're getting NDA documentation for, let’s say, like the trackpad driver, so we can improve the gesture of the trackpad from what is currently available as a free driver.

So what's nice is that as we're growing we start to educate that that is our number one negotiating tactic is that we need to have completely free software where the source code is available, and then we move on to quantity and quality and price.

Slashdot: Can you talk a little bit about the hardware itself, explain some of the actual chips and things that are inside the box?

Todd: Sure. So these are Intel based chips which again we have to run Intel FSP in the BIOS. And it's a 5th generation, so Intel i5 in this version and Intel i7 in the 15-inch version. The 15-inch allows us to go up to 32 gig of RAM in the machine, and the 13-inch allows us to go to 16 gig. They do support SSD as well as a HDD, and then we also offer NGFF solid-state drives as well in both.

Slashdot: What about the graphics?

Todd: So the graphics are Intel in both because Intel does at least provide the source code for their video driver.

Slashdot: Besides laptops are there plans do you think ahead of things besides laptops?

Todd: Yes, absolutely. So we started with a 15-inch we ran a crowdfunding campaign on Crowd Supply which raised a $0.5 million. We just launched the 13-inch the next will be a tablet and then we’re actually going to crack the nut of the phone, and then after that we're taking some user polls on should we move to desktop, which if we free the Intel FSP Binary then we will move to desktop primarily because part of that is we actually have to fuse CPU to run unsigned BIOS binaries. So we actually are breaking that full privacy and full security of trusting Intel, but not being able to verify it.

Slashdot: Speaking of verifying what sort of processes do you have ongoing that makes sure that the hardware you got remains secure and free I know you mentioned before we started filming that Jake Appelbaum is now one of your advisers?

Todd: Yes, right. So there are some great advances we've made, so first of all we have the model of trust and verify where everybody else is just a trust only, and you can't actually verify. So in the hardware world we just brought on an advisor, Jake Applebaum, who's been fantastic already in the short bit of time he's been helping us make sure that the choices that we're making at the hardware level are good choices, right, that are going to be choices that respect users' freedoms. So we're building a team and the more people that are interested in helping create a laptop as well as additional hardware in the future, we welcome those individuals who have the same belief system we have.

Slashdot: And finally, if somebody wants to experience the kind of system you’ve built with a lot of built-in security tools, privacy tools, can they do so without actually buying the same hardware?

Todd: Yes, absolutely. So first of all we do explain the few improvements we make today and the more improvements we make over Trisquel’s distribution specifically towards privacy related because Trisquel is great as it is. But then we also released those packages and then we're going to within the next few days actually be releasing the PureOS iSO image and then working with Free Software Foundation to have our operating system endorsed through Free Software Foundation.

Slashdot: That’s great. At least by the time anybody watches this, it should already have been released.

Todd: That's right. Absolutely.

Slashdot: Anything else people should know about this?

Todd: If you want to support the cause you can go to Crowd Supply and you can back our 13-inch to be able to cross over the crowdfunding to manufacture the motherboard or you can also back the 15-inch if you want to receive the 15-inch version.

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Purism Offers Free (as in Freedom) Laptops (Video) More

Purism Offers Free (as in Freedom) Laptops (Video)

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  • Flash video?? Too bad... am I wrong or does Slashdot really not support HTML5 video yet?

  • Yet another Wi-Fi-won't-work distro (Score:4, Insightful)

    by xenoc_1 ( 140817 ) on Thursday July 30, 2015 @04:44PM (#50218423)

    Don't we already have Trisquel for those who want a "free as in freedom, free as in free from working" distro?

    I know, buy a different laptop. Buy an otherwise totally unnecessary and port-wasting, marginal-power-use-increasing, external adaptor with politically correct firmware, because, freedom.

    Sticking with politically incorrect, it-just-works, Linux Mint.

    Gnu can bite me.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by Anonymous Coward

      The wireless card in the laptop is Atheros. The entire lower mac is in hardware in this card, so binary blobs are not needed. Wifi should work fine. Obviously the card can DMA over PCIe to the main memory so it could still compromise the machine.

      • I'm referring to the distro rather than the brand of machine. Alert mentions both. I question why yet another distro is needed when there already are "free as in freedom" ones that are better known and also of the Debian-via-Ubuntu base.

        Given they have this new PureOS distro, I would expect it'll be used on other magic, because freedom. With the usual freedom from Wi-Fi results if the card needs proprietary drivers. We already have enough of those politically correct distros.

      • Re: (Score:3)

        by tlhIngan ( 30335 )

        The wireless card in the laptop is Atheros. The entire lower mac is in hardware in this card, so binary blobs are not needed. Wifi should work fine. Obviously the card can DMA over PCIe to the main memory so it could still compromise the machine.

        Which really makes the whole "freedom" thing kind of a cheat.

        I mean, if I stick RAM on my hardware, and have the driver load that RAM with firmware, it's seen as "non-free" because there's this binary blob on there.

        Yet, if I stick some flash on it, pre-load that at

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by Anonymous Coward

      This is wrong. All wrong. It's the other way around. The laptops that are depending on the proprietary bits are problematic. The companies behind the drivers eventually discontinue these pieces and you lose support. Often they don't have proper support to begin with because they can't interoperate properly with the mainline kernel. Compare that to Trisquel which makes it abundantly clear what components are likely to be problematic. While that doesn't in and of itself mean there can't be problems it's a goo

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by KGIII ( 973947 )

      I like Mint. It is my favorite current distro. I call it Linux for Retards because, well, it is. You can just install and be done with it on every single configuration I have tried. There is something to be said for that. I also like CentOS lately, but that is a bit bloated.

  • Not even a 'free' BIOS can prevent compromised microcode.

  • So besides the mild irony of a Flash Video (and I'm sure Flash is not allowed on PureOS) the URL for the OS has both a typo AND a missing period. It's https://puri.sm/pureos/ [puri.sm]

    And people have shown over and over that Free as in Speech takes a back seat to actually getting things done. I'm glad for the people releasing this, I hope they have fun, but it will be a small circle of people patting each other on the back as everyone else goes to mobile.

  • Stop promoting this fraudster! (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 30, 2015 @04:57PM (#50218561)

    Todd, the founder of Purism, had defrauded hundreds of people out of hard earned money. He's pulled numerous scams and is STILL bilking people who don't know better out of money. Despite the fact that numerous respectable developers and other leaders in the Linux and free software community pointing this out the message hasn't gotten through. He's a fraud! His claims are nothing more than nonsensical and contradictory. He's a back-peddling thief.

    Todd is what you would call a confidence king. This is where someone convinces you there doing something good and takes your money without delivering on there promises. Purism does not have the Free Software Foundation's endorsement, nor can he get it. There are critical proprietary pieces that can't be freed in modern Intel/AMD computers. Intel is licensing pieces from a third party which it does not have the rights to free.

    The 500 or so computers Todd has arranged to have manufactured is nowhere near enough to get Intel to cooperate. A sales rep does not have the authority to release code and this is the extent of Todds talks with Intel. Google with its millions of Chromebooks has been unable to get this code released. The Coreboot developers have stated this much numerous times:

    http://blogs.coreboot.org/blog/2015/02/23/the-truth-about-purism-why-librem-is-not-the-same-as-libre/

    Despite the claims Todd did not ship the Librem 15 with CoreBoot (which itself isn't free) and if he had it would not have made the laptop any more free as it would merely have been a payload. The reality is the Librem 15 shipped with a stock proprietary AMI BIOS. If it were even possible to free the BIOS Todd would have needed to use LibreBoot. Not CoreBoot.

    He's badmouthing other companies who actually have pushed things forward, specifically ThinkPenguin, Gluglug, and others who have worked with companies to free chipsets, free coreboot, actually begin to design laptops, and not just building off stock reference designs. These companies have actual products out the door which are Respect Your Freedom certified. Something that Todds laptop will never be. It was originally so badly designed that he was including chipsets that only had proprietary graphics driver support. The NVIDIA graphics chip he was including had zero (not even rudimentary) support from the free nouveau driver, not even had he gone with the prior version of the chip!

    Here are some of the stories from leading coreboot developers and other free software activists:

    Purism Librem Laptops Remain Blobbed Up, Less Than Interesting
    http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=Purism-Librem-Still-Blobbed

    Libreboot exposes the purism librem as fraud
    http://www.reddit.com/r/linux/comments/3ew6pz/libreboot_exposes_the_purism_librem_as_fraud/

    The truth about Purism: Why Librem is not the same as libre
    http://blogs.coreboot.org/blog/2015/02/23/the-truth-about-purism-why-librem-is-not-the-same-as-libre/

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by Anonymous Coward

      Ah, that explain why they would claim a 32 GB max memory support on a chip (i7-5557U) which only supports 16 GB.
      Oh well.

      • I dont care all that much about the claims of the laptop being fully "libre" and I understand that a compromised microcode or FSP can compromise the entire PC, I do believe though that the less binary and closed components their are, the less attack vectors are available.
        It may not be perfect but its better than every thing else which is available and it is a step in the right direction. Showing that some buyers DO care about such things demonstrates that a market exists for such machines even at a higher p

    • Todd, the founder of Purism, had defrauded hundreds of people out of hard earned money. He's pulled numerous scams and is STILL bilking people who don't know better out of money.

      Seems like quite a personal rant you have there - which might be all true, but how would we know its not just a smear... Any supporting links about his numerous scams?

    • He feeds idiots who think having an all 'libre' laptop is important. I'm not really seeing a problem with that. He's a poacher of fanboys who can't think critically.

      Both sides win in that deal. The fanboy get to rant on about their Stallman fetishes and Todd gets to part them of their money.

      The way I see it, its a match made in heaven, they deserve each other.

  • Not a very informed submission (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward

    There are a number of distros that eschew everything non-free. The FSF keeps a list: https://www.gnu.org/distros/free-distros.html. They also have a "Respects Your Freedom" certification (https://www.fsf.org/resources/hw/endorsement/respects-your-freedom), given to Gluglug (http://shop.gluglug.org.uk/), which uses Libreboot (http://libreboot.org/) to replace the proprietary BIOS.

  • Laptop for Ideologues (Score:3)

    by Crashmarik ( 635988 ) on Thursday July 30, 2015 @05:22PM (#50218723)

    Your views may differ but people that insist on ideological purity in the real world give me the heebeegeebees. They usually produce little aside from atrocities, and nearly 2k for a somewhat lowend laptop sure sounds like that.

  • Ahh, brushed aluminum laptops. Copying Macs is such a waste of tiem and effort. Almost everybody does this badly. I'm amazed that no one bothers to copy the older, popular Thinkpads, which are no longer available new.

    • ...and the thinkpad keyboards. And the thinkpad clitmice, with the hard buttons (goodness, that last almost makes me want to use one of the more polite forms of the name...) I looked at this briefly the last time I went shopping, but lack of input options made it seem awfully unattractive for some of my 3d modelling work.

      (So I have two Thinkpads, a w-series for when I'm doing serious simulations and don't mind the weight, and a yoga12 for running around with.)

  • PureOS just a re-off of Trisquel (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 30, 2015 @08:04PM (#50219721)

    I'm sick of these bastards ripping us off. Rubén Rodríguez has spent significant amount of time over the years to produce a distribution for which he's gotten little to no credit for and Todd comes in, grabs all this publicity, and it's nothing more than a re-compile with slightly different logos. Just cut it out.

  • I.e. the integrated backdoor and control system desired by the NSA and others?

  • It's been a while since I used Debian but I remember stock debian installs already pretty much fitting this description. You had to turn on the contrib and non-free apt sources to get anything proprietary. Has this changed?

  • We are working hard to free the lower level, here is our roadmap: https://puri.sm/road-to-fsf-ry... [puri.sm] Thanks for all the support so far! You can email me, and I will respond: todd@puri.sm Thanks!

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