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extreme ditto 

Signed-off-by: Leah Rowe <info@minifree.org>
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Leah Rowe 2024-05-07 17:38:45 +01:00
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@ -240,8 +240,7 @@ installers even easier to boot from Libreboot.
Libreboot's GRUB configuration is unique. Even with coreboot's earlier work,
nothing quite like Libreboot's GRUB config exists that pre-dated it. The way
Libreboot configures GRUB is extremely unique. Several other projects now exist
inspired by it, such as [Canoeboot](https://canoeboot.org/). GRUB also has
Libreboot configures GRUB is extremely unique. GRUB also has
several flaws, but it mostly *Just Works*. Libreboot made it work *well*, for
the casual coreboot user.
@ -661,11 +660,6 @@ maintaining a full coreboot repository, merging and overseeing a lot more
patches from upstream, and diverging heavily. The way Libreboot's deblobbing
worked was that it just deleted the blobs, and (by way of configuration) avoided
all boards except those that could be booted entirely blob-free in the flash.
This method required far less maintenance - the original blob-free policy of
Libreboot has been continued, as of 2023, in a new project I maintain
called [Canoeboot](https://canoeboot.org/) - I'll have more to say about this,
and Libreboot's newer [Binary Blob Reduction Policy](policy.md), later in the
article.
2017-2021: Post-GNU years
=========================
@ -1251,265 +1245,15 @@ became a side hobby at that point. OSBoot was my primary focus.
This was a resounding success. It was done in a day. Caleb adapted the
documentation, while I worked on the build system. *We did it in a day*.
My efforts in osboot and my extensive research revealed to me that almost
everyone supported this move. Sure enough, I saw a relative lack of opposition
to it; though, some of the more dogmatic members of the FSF were quite upset.
This level of upset later caused.... well, that's what I'm going to cover next.
GNU Boot
========
The purpose of today's article has been to write a rigorous history section for
the Libreboot project, because a lot of earlier history for the project wasn't
available. Many of Libreboot's early years were turbulent, and I never expected
then that the project would last 5 years, let alone 10.
Anyway: I actually don't need to go into detail about GNU Boot, because I
already wrote about it on the [Canoeboot vs GNU
Boot](https://canoeboot.org/gnuboot.html) article. I will summarise it here, and
perhaps share additional details:
Initial hostile fork
--------------------
During Libreplanet 2023, which is the FSF's annual conference, the FSF, through
Denis Carikli who is part of their inner circle, announced a *hostile fork* of
Libreboot. I anticipated a fork of Libreboot by the FSF, as a result of the
osboot merger, and I was OK with it, but:
They tried to steal the name *Libreboot*, and sell themselves as the real
Libreboot project. This, I could not tolerate. I already knew of their effort
in December 2022, because its existence was leaked to me; they asked all of the
people I'd worked with to that point, asking them to betray me and work for them
instead. None were interested, and one of them leaked it to me.
So I was prepared. I expected they'd announce it during Libreplanet and I was
right; Denis had a talk scheduled for 19 March 2023, a Sunday, about boot
firmware, though the fork wasn't announced until he spoke, in the talk. But I
knew. So I prepared.
I released [Libreboot 20230319](libreboot20230319.md), several hours before
his talk, and I started an aggressive *countercoup*, whereby Libreboot was
developed much more aggressively than ever before, to completely outcompete them
in every way. It worked. What's more, I did the unthinkable: I got them to back
down. That almost never happens, as the FSF tends to be extremely dogmatic, too
drunk on their own prestige; set in their ways.
They initially hosted their project on the official sourcehut instance run by
Drew DeVault. I simply asked Drew to terminate their hosting. He complied. He
gave them two weeks to rename their project, or be deleted, and they did not
rename. Their website was hosted on sourcehut at the time, so their website
went offline for a day; on that same day, I announced the [Libreboot
20230423 release](libreboot20230423.md). Drew's assessment, matching my own,
was that it would be inappropriate to host a hostile same-named fork of an
active project. *I* now own access to <https://sr.ht/~libreboot/>, at least
on 12 December 2023, and I even pay for it, though it is currently empty - I may
very well use at a later date, to provide *mailing lists* for Libreboot.
If you run `whois` on libreboot.at (the domain name of their original fork site),
you will see that it says *GNU Hostmaster*. Owned by the FSF. Same config as
used for several other domains used by GNU projects - they were going to make
another *GNU Libreboot*, against my will. This, in spite of the truce established
in 2017.
I don't feel bad about what I did. What they did is widely considered to be
a *dick move* in the free software movement; it is widely considered impolite
to fork an active project and use the same name. The unwritten rule is always
that you use a new name. It's more than that though: in their initial fork, and
also in GNU Boot, they didn't just say: this is what we are, what we do and why
you should use our product. No. They put a paragraph in their documentation,
urging people to *delete* links to libreboot.org, and link to them. *They were
out for blood*.
Fork attempt 2: GNU Boot
------------------------
So I've responded in kind, ever since. Regardless of whether they succeed or
whether they are competent, a thought exists in their head. A dream, you could
say. Their dream is a world in which Leah Rowe and Libreboot no longer exist.
They wanted to destroy me. It's evident in Denis's LP2023 talk, where he said
he wanted to "continue" the Libreboot project. In his mind, there is no room for
disagreement over policy; it's FSDG or nothing. I had to play by their rules,
or go home.
During that time, and subsequently, I and others had repeatedly put pressure
on them to rename. I personally came up with the name *GNU Boot* - and suggested
that they use it. It's a name that I myself came up with several years prior,
when I was considering whether to work for GNU again *myself*, but as an actual
fork of coreboot. The name just works.
They did rename, to GNU Boot. You can learn more about GNU Boot on a technical
level, by reading the [GNU Boot vs Canoeboot page](https://canoeboot.org/gnuboot.html).
The points raised in the GNU Boot article are *still valid* on today, 12
December 2023. GNU Boot 0.1 RC3 is imminent for release, on this day, and it
is still based largely on Libreboot 20220710, with only superficial changes on
top of it. it still has all the old, obsolete revisions for all projects,
including coreboot. It still has all of the same bugs, that Libreboot has since
fixed, especially during 2023.
Unlike with their first attempt, GNU Boot is fully hosted on the GNU Savannah
infrastructure, as any proper GNU project should be. I *respect* the GNU Boot
project more, because it is its own thing, that doesn't try to ride off of my
coattails. However, my perception of them is permanently coloured by their
initial hostile actions; and the only reason they ceased such actions was
because I made it clear that they would not be allowed. The fact that they even
tried, means they thought I would roll over, or otherwise fail to counteract it
meaningfully. They still want to damage Libreboot.
So, my strategy has been to constantly develop Libreboot from now on, much
more aggressively, and generally stay on top of my game. And I made no secret
of this strategy; I've been pretty open about everything, throughout 2023.
Countercoup
-----------
My countercoup has essentially consisted of a single strategy: be the best, on
a technical level. During all of 2023, roughly 5x as much work has gone into
Libreboot compared to any other average development year (2017-2021
notwithstanding). Essentially, the *FSF's* strategy was to overwhelm Libreboot;
they wanted to make a big splash about their fork, and get devs on board as
quickly as possible, before Libreboot could develop much further under the new
policy, because Libreboot had not yet fully asserted itself in this regard, at
least so far as public recognition was concerned. So I doubled, tripled
and quadrupled down, and maintained absolute laser focus from 19 March 2023
onward, a focus that I still maintain to this day - I have many plans for
Libreboot. If you think 2023 has been crazy, 2024 will be even better. 2024
will be Libreboot's biggest development year yet. 2023 was only a warmup.
I've done *three* major audits to the Libreboot build system, during 2023.
The build system has been *re-engineered*, 3 times, each time becoming
infinitely more efficient.
Many new boards have been added. Many new features. *Non-coreboot* firmware
is now supported; for example, the (libre) stm32-vserprog and pico-serprog
code is now used by Libreboot, to provide serprog firmware on many STM32-
and RP2040-based microcontroller boards; we use them as SPI flashers, but you
can use them for many other purposes. They're quite handy little machines. The
serprog firmware integration was done by Riku Viitanen, who also added many
HP EliteBook machines to Libreboot during 2023.
Thanks to the work done by Nicholas Chin, several Dell Latitude laptops are now
supported in Libreboot, which can be flashed without disassembly. We support
GM45 and Ivy Bridge models, and we're adding many more (we have identified
about 20 of them).
You can actually just read the Libreboot release announcements from 2023, if
you want to know about all of the rapid progress made in Libreboot this year.
It is quite simply impossible to adequately describe, in only a short few
paragraphs, just how much Libreboot has improved during 2023. The development
pace during all of 2023 has been completely insane. Here are all of the
Libreboot release announcements from 2023:
* [Libreboot 20230319](libreboot20230319.md)
* [Libreboot 20230413](libreboot20230413.md)
* [Libreboot 20230423](libreboot20230423.md)
* [Libreboot 20230625](libreboot20230625.md)
* [Libreboot 20231021](libreboot20231021.md)
* [Libreboot 20231101](libreboot20231101.md)
* [Libreboot 20231106](libreboot20231106.md)
I also previously wrote about each of the three audits during 2023:
* [Libreboot Build System Audit 1](audit.md)
* [Libreboot Build System Audit 2](audit2.md)
* [Libreboot Build System Audit 3](audit3.md)
and now:
Canoeboot
---------
Purely for my own entertainment, I decided to re-create FSDG Libreboot *myself*.
FSDG is the policy that GNU Boot uses, that Libreboot previously used, before
it adopted the modern [Binary Blob Reduction Policy](policy.md) - GNU Boot
started, specifically because it opposed the new policy in Libreboot.
Well, GNU Boot seemed to be going nowhere fast. I monitor their Git activity
daily, and their development pace is much slower than mine; slower than mine,
even when I'm going slow. I thought to myself: what if a *competently*
engineered solution existed, like GNU Boot but not?
And thus, [Canoeboot](https://canoeboot.org/) was born. I still mainly develop
Libreboot, but I spend a few hours after each release, bringing Canoeboot up
to date and running the deblob scripts, to update the `blob.list` files in
its build system.
Canoeboot is even listed on the FSF's
[Free Software Directory](https://directory.fsf.org/wiki/Canoeboot) - Craig
Topham approved it, he's the FSF's current licensing and compliance manager,
at least on 12 December 2023.
The purpose of Canoeboot is to simply exist, complying with GNU Boot policy
while being superior to it in every way, outcompeting it so fast that the
GNU Boot project is constantly behind - it's done, specifically to demonstrate
the superiority of Libreboot policy, by showing what Libreboot *would have
been*, if it didn't adopt the new policy.
There is even a [Canoeboot vs GNU Boot page](https://canoeboot.org/gnuboot.html)
which you can read. I keep it up to date, comparing the latest releases of
both projects with each other.
The FSF failed in its coup. My countercoup was a success. I madly beat them at
their own game. The FSF's strategy *might* have worked, if I hadn't been so
vigilant; Libreboot's development pace was much more conservative at that point,
and most of the works that have now been completed or are now underway, were
not even started. Libreboot was very young into its existence, relative to
the merging of the osboot project. They probably didn't expect any of the
actions that I've taken, or the massive leapfrog year of development this has
been for Libreboot. As far as I'm concerned, Libreboot has *won* 2023 - 2024
is the next battle.
And I *will* maintain Canoeboot. It is currently completely in sync with the
latest Libreboot release, and it will *keep* staying in sync, relative to each
new Libreboot release. I actually *describe* how this syncing is done, in great
detail, on Canoeboot's [about page](https://canoeboot.org/about.html) - and
the first Canoeboot release was done, based on the latest Libreboot release at
that time, in only 2 days, with all of Libreboot's vast improvements in it
compared to GNU Boot. As of this day, 12 December 2023, Canoeboot is about 1
year ahead of GNU Boot in terms of code development, and 2 years ahead on the
writing of documentation. Conversely, GNU Boot is 1 year and 2 years out of
date, in terms of code and documentation respectively.
2024 reconciliation intentions
==============================
The *FSF* started the coldboot war. Libreboot merely won it.
From 2024 onward, unless more hostilities develop from FSF/GNU's side, I intend
to adopt a more conciliatory approach toward GNU Boot. I won the battle of 2023.
I won the *cold boot war*, but the real battle is this: how do we get free boot
firmware to non-technical end users, efficiently and reliably? The answer to
that question is projects such as Libreboot, or indeed others like GNU Boot,
Heads, Skulls, MrChromebox... you name it. Distros, designed similarly to
Linux distros, but for building boot firmware instead.
Much of 2023 was spent counteracting the FSF's coup, because they were hostile
to the Libreboot project, but I decided that I will avoid any such counter
action from now on. I will stil develop Canoeboot, but my main focus is
Libreboot. My conclusion is that, so long as my own efforts exist, and I keep
working on everything, the GNU Boot project is no threat to Libreboot whatsoever.
Towards the end of 2023, there *was* in fact cooperation, between the GNU Boot
and Libreboot projects, in the form of small patches; Denis Carikli sent a few
patches and reports to Canoeboot and the Untitled Static Site Generator, and I
did similar for the GNU boot project. The FSF themselves even decided to
accept Canoeboot, on their Free Software Directory. See:
<https://directory.fsf.org/wiki/Canoeboot>
My only issue with GNU Boot at the start of 2023 was that they wanted
to *replace* the Libreboot project, by using the same name. They *did* try to
destroy the Libreboot project, and take it for themselves. Things pretty much
calmed towards the end of 2023, and now the two projects/communities operate
to their own ends, not taking much stock of the other. If they don't bother me
from now on, I won't pay any attention to them.
They are welcome to send me patches, and I *may* help them if I feel like it.
A relative minority opposed this move, and tried to create their own project
which ultimately went nowhere; how can you possibly go on, with 15-year-old
hardware and no chance of supporting newer hardware? Such was the question
posed to me, and solution is modern Libreboot as we know it today.
Last remarks
============
I've pretty much gone through the entire history, to the best of my ability.
I've pretty much gone through the entire history, as much as I wish to say.
I probably did forget a few things, but these are the broad strokes. If you
managed to read this far, I salute you. In any case, this article describes
both the history and nature of the Libreboot project up to this day, 12