On 01/09/2018 10:26 AM, David Hedlund wrote:
See the "Replacement for" column at
https://www.gnu.org/software/for-windows.html (eg IceCat replaces Firefox).
the problem with that list is that it is disjunct from the software
directory and curated to feature only the most popular windows
applications for the benefit of windows users who are not prepared to
change their OS - the question raised by the OP is one that i have been
recommending for parabola, namely: that all blacklisted packages be
accompanied by a clear description of the reasons why it is not
FSDG-compliant - parabola already has a metadata field for a single line
description of the blacklisting reasons but, in many cases, the packager
has neglected to fill it - in order for this to work, it needs to be
required or at least specified as part of the formal package maintenance
procedure - this would, of course, be helpful for inquisitive users; but
the best reason for doing so would be so that, at any later time, anyone
interested in patching that software to be compliant would have some
indicator as to the amount of work would be involved and where to start
- without such a description reduces the chance that anyone will ever
patch it and therefore increasing the chance that it will remain
blacklisted forever - for this reason alone, adding such a field to the
FSD is a very good idea - in many cases that would make a hyper-link to
the relevant FSD page itself appropriate metadata for the parabola blacklist
On 01/09/2018 10:26 AM, David Hedlund wrote:
I have asked the FSF to add "Iridium" as a specific replacement for
"Chrome".
these problem areas that may or may not exist in the chromium and it's
derivatives are yet to be identified definitively - these problem areas,
whatever they may be, need to be identified before it can be determined
if any existing derivatives qualify as a proper replacements - until
that happens then all chromium derivatives must be considered as equally
affected and it would be irresponsible to simply recommend that chromium
be replaced with iridium or any other
even if it could be shown that iridium actually solves the core issues
with chromium, simply recommending that chromium be replaced with
iridium would not at all solve the core issue - that would be a stop-gap
solution at best - it would, however, go a long way toward a real
solution, namely: patching chromium itself, along with qtwebengine and
electron or at least blacklisting them for verifiable reasons