In this post I contemplate the construction of the Mexican Chapter of Free Software (CMXSL, in Spanish), a delirium of the naivety of the person writing this or a project worth working on, time will tell, for now here you can hear my “considerations” that aim to be the basis of this project in Mexico. This is not as such a launch announcement, but rather a “cold” presentation elaborating and detailing the characteristics that it seeks to develop.
Warning, this recording format is a very relaxed conversation with a high content of ramblings and possible inaccuracies, I appreciate your patience. :’)
We are back here with an experiment in changing the content format.
The idea is to be able to present in a more dynamic way the ramblings that I go through in publications and in this way I hope to be able to make it easier to present a topic and thus prevent those ideas from being left in the pipeline.
This will have a negative effect, while in text it is relatively easy to carry out a translation process having the majority of the entries in both languages, the truth is that I do not think I have the time to do the same content in 2 languages.
Which is unfortunate, however, as I have mentioned on several occasions, my greatest interest is in the Latin American community having greater access to this type of talks, content and even discussions.
This is an experiment, so in advance I’m sorry for the lack of use of high quality standards of professional podcasts.
By the way, today is March 16, and we are still partying,
Happy Birthday to GNU Chief: Richard Stallman
RMS – Libre Planet 2019
I want to use the opportunity of this entry to comment that, hand in hand with this change in format, I have begun to open a small space on Fridays, generally starting at 8:30 pm to have talks with free software users, collaborators, and enthusiasts.
I find it very interesting for me to know the history behind my country, how we got to where we are as well as those personalities who changed the course of our history as a country and society.
Great personalities such as Miguel Hidalgo, Morelos, the Flores Magón brothers, Madero, Lazaro Cardenas among many other great leaders who shaped this great nation.
Today, after listening to the president’s morning conferences, I met an actor in our history that I knew little about and I am surprised by the vision that this president had, who for a long time was in historical anonymity for me.
We are talking about Adolfo López Mateos and his letter addressed to the people of Mexico once the Nationalization of the Electrical Industry was concluded in 1960, during the month of September, one of the most patriotic months in Latin America.
His achievement as well as his vision for the future gives us new generations a point of reference to be able to understand the challenges and dangers that we face in the face of a policy of privatization at a global level and in which it only makes inequality more marked and oppresses the many for the benefit of the few.
Without further ado, here is the text, a translation of it actually:
“People of México.
I give you back the electricity, which is the exclusive property of the Nation, but do not trust because in future years some bad Mexicans identified with the worst causes of the country will try by subtle means to hand over the oil and our resources to foreign investors.
Not a step back, was the speech of Don Lázaro Cárdenas del Río, when nationalizing our oil. Today it was fortunately its turn to electric energy. People of Mexico, I excuse you from all obedience to your future rulers who intend to hand over our energy resources to interests outside the Nation that we make up.
One obvious thing is that Mexico requires several years of technological evolution and administrative efficiency to achieve our energy independence; It would be foolish to affirm that Mexico does not require technological training in electrical and oil matters. But to do this, no foreigner needs to become a shareholder in public companies to support us. Only a traitor gives his country to foreigners; We Mexicans can do everything better than any other country.
When a foreign ruler asks me if there is a possibility of entering the energy or electricity business, I answer that we are just becoming independent from the foreign invasions that emptied our country.
But in the meantime, we Mexicans do want to invest in American oil or in its electric energy production, in case they want a foreign partner. In Mexico, the Constitution is very clear: energy resources and oil fields are in perpetuity the sole and exclusive property of the Mexican people. The rest of the speculations in this regard are treason.
Industrializing the country does not imply a public auction of our natural resources, nor the indiscriminate delivery of the country’s heritage.”
Adolfo Lopez Mateos – September 27, 1960
With the current government, control of the energy industry has been regained, which was in a rapid trend of disappearing in favor of foreign, as well as national, private initiative, and the issue is that energy sovereignty is too important to be handed over to a private sector.
In the Free Software topics that I like to comment on so much, I think we can easily make the parallel, the freedom of the software we use in an era that increasingly depends on digital interaction is too important to give it up with our eyes closed to private industries.
In 1991 we were given the GNU system with the Linux kernel, the first complete free software operating system. And over time with subtle means little by little the integration of more and more proprietary software has been granted in the main GNU/Linux distributions throughout the world, with only a handful that continue to strive to maintain complete freedom of the software they distribute , Trisquel being one of them.
Hence, it is important to know and support the vision of the GNU project through support for the FSF and sister organizations such as the FSFLA, to defend digital freedom, sovereignty and human rights in this new era, over the subtle trends that attempt to convert users into dependents/servants of their will or of the “invisible hand of the Market“.
Today is the time to take action and be responsible for our freedom!
The more people resist, the more people will be Free, and the more people will be free to be Free. For your own good, and in solidarity to all, choose freedom.
The National Polytechnic Institute (IPN), or Politécnico, as it is also known, is one of the largest educational institutions in Mexico, along with UNAM, the National Autonomous University of Mexico, this being the highest house of studies.
The Politécnico specializes in areas of Engineering, it was founded in 1936 under the government of General Lazaro Cardenas del Río, president of Mexico, institutionalizing various higher schools under the same entity. In order to promote the technical knowledge that the country required in those moments of need in the country’s industrial growth.
Despite wanting to study at said university, this was not possible due to financial limitations. It was not until I was finishing my degree at the ITSPR that I had the opportunity to go to the Politécnico to do my professional internship in the Postgraduate and Research area.
My cousin Alfonso was already studying at the Politécnico and he was the one who gave me a tour of that university environment. We both lived together during those 7 months in Mexico City, very close to the ESIME Zacatenco,Higher School of Mechanical and Electrical Engineering (ESIME in Spanish); Zacatenco Unit, where I was doing my professional internship.
It was a very enriching experience to be there, living in Mexico City and going to one of the largest universities in the country that was founded with a social conscience is a great experience.
I remember listening to the IPN Decalogue and feeling a deep call, an energy that resonated from deep within, something that definitely moved me, without further ado here is the IPN Decalogue.
I AM A POLYTECHNICIAN, because I aspire to be a man.
I am a Polytechnician, because I value my responsibilities over my rights.
I am a Polytechnician, by conviction rather than circumstance.
I am a Polytechnician, To achieve universal conquests and offer them to my people.
I am a Polytechnician, Because I suffer in my innards for the Fatherland and aim to alleviate its ills.
I am a Polytechnician, Because I burn with the desire to rouse the sleeping brother.
I am a Polytechnician, to light a torch on the Fatherland’s altar.
I am a Polytechnician, because I respect myself and feel obligated to respect my institution.
I am a Polytechnician, because my respected independence as a young man and student forces me to respect this confinement.
I am a Polytechnician, because I translate my flag’s trichrome as work, duty, and honor.
Almost 15 years after that experience, I see those moments with some nostalgia, but with hope that a good direction for our youth will be the constant change that future generations need.
Last week I was listening to the morning conference of President AMLO, who had just returned from his 3rd COVID infection with all the attitude and brought up a poem by Bertolt Brecht that seemed so true to me in Mexico not long ago, but that seems gradually fall behind
“The worst illiterate is the political illiterate, he doesn’t hear, doesn’t speak, nor participates in the political events. He doesn’t know the cost of life, the price of the bean, of the fish, of the flour, of the rent, of the shoes and of the medicine, all depends on political decisions.
The political illiterate is so stupid
that he is proud and swells his chest
saying that he hates politics.
The imbecile doesn’t know that,
from his political ignorance
is born the prostitute,
the abandoned child,
and the worst thieves of all,
the bad politician,
corrupted and flunky of
the national and
multinational companies.”
That man who cannot touch his soul for another in disgrace should not be in politics, because it is public policies that can systematically fade the worst stories of pain and suffering in the most vulnerable people, victims of a history of inequality, corruption and selfishness.
That is why I say that Mexico is one of the countries with the least political illiteracy in the world, and that is what we have achieved.
AMLO
I am sorry to see how many politicians and citizens with wounded egos are capable of turning their backs on the truth and on the people of their own country, fortunately, although they are not few, there are more Mexicans who are leaving behind that political illiteracy, and will give rise to the social changes that have been postponed for so long in favor of the people who suffered for so many years from a corrupt government.
I have recently read news about the Debian project, one of the largest and most important distribution projects of the GNU system with the Linux kernel, and in the case of Debian specifically with other kernels, being one of the “original” distributions and father of all the debian offspring and its powerful APT package system.
For a long time Debian GNU/Linux could boast of being a completely free system, which by maintaining a non-free repository earned it not to obtain the recommendation of the FSF. However as long as only the main repository was used, then you could have a free system, now with this change, Debian will start including proprietary firmware within its installation disks and will use that firmware at will.
Similarly, projects like Fredoombox, based mainly on Debian, will now include the non-free repository enabled by default.
This shows that over time the principles that are not pursued end up yielding, Debian despite being a massive institution in the development and distribution of free software and one of the largest variants of the GNU system with Linux/Hurd/etc. in the world, still maintaining a high standard of ethics and social commitment to its users, is losing traction on the principles that once put it above the vast majority of distributions ethically and technologically.
I wonder if this is the first step in a spiral that is forcing decisions related to the path Debian will take, just as Firefox has fallen by integrating more and more anti-features, gradually diluting the last drops of “Free Software” and falling completely into the rhetoric of Open Source seeking to retain a share of users compared to other browsers.
It seems to me that Canonical could bear a bit of responsibility for this change, since Debian is used as the seedbed for Ubuntu distributions, and having developers vote on Debian development is a good thing for Canonical, I could be wrong, or maybe not.
Regardless of the above, I believe that this is a clear indicator of the continuous ethical and social erosion in the face of technology, of the culture of consumerism as well as of the “success at all costs” promoted around the world, where the interests of a few can overcome the well-being of the many, in the same way the lack of recognition of the truly important things in the world.
A quick exercise, in the following situation,
If you were granted access to an all you can eat buffet, hypothetically with all the healthiest salads in the world, the best vegetables, as well as the best cuts of most succulently prepared meats from the world’s most exotic regions, all kinds of fruit waters, soft drinks/sodas and alcoholic beverages as well from anywhere in the world unlimited.
The questions that this situation generates could be,
Would that be a nourishing experience for your body? Or would we end up hurting one self?
would we have touched the salad table?
come on, would we get out walking?
conscious?
I don’t buy the lies that any negative result is “human nature”, that’s complacency and mediocrity speaking.
Deep down, when everything stops, we know what is best for us, what suits us as the complex organism that we are, and although we can make mistakes, it is important to see the long term and teach us to make the best decisions for us, as individuals and eventually as a collective.
The principles and ethical discussion that the Free Software movement promotes could be far ahead of the social reality in our regions, cities, prefectures, states, departments, even countries, but if it is in your hands, talk about Free Software, put the weight of freedom over functionality, since the latter can eventually be resolved as long as the former is present,
Choose more lettuce over meat, take care of yourself and others in the process.
I could not condemn the Debian project for these changes, it seems sad to me that this happens and I hope that better times will come for the project, where they can recover the shine of the principles that they defended for many years.
I would like to conclude by citing the campaign Be Free! of the FSFLA that I consider is very ad hoc,
The more people resist, the more people will be Free, and the more people will be free to be Free.
For your own good, and in solidarity to all, choose freedom. Be Free!
A little late, but I would like to join in the celebration of the 39th anniversary of the GNU project which officially kicks off the Free Software movement.
Beginning with the publication of The GNU Manifesto on September 27, 1985, by the Richard Matthew Stallman founder of the GNU Project and the Free Software Foundation (FSF).
As a celebration, here is one of the most distributed RMS talks,
Introduction to Free Software and the Liberation of Cyberspace – Spanish subtitles.
Our best wishes and for another 39 years.
Let us have the fortune to be here for another year and celebrate 40 years in a big way.
I continue to collaborate in the development and maintenance of Trisquel GNU/Linux, one of the most popular completely free distributions with a long history.
Trisquel GNU/Linux, trisquel for short, is based on the popular Ubuntu distribution, developed by Canonical and which in turn is based on Debian GNU/Linux, currently trisquel is only following the LTS versions also known as extended support.
Trisquel GNU/Linux Installer 10.0
With more than 12 years as a trisquel user, I have come to appreciate the work that the developers began in 2007, and now that I am collaborating on a more regular basis, I have had the opportunity to understand the challenges and objectives pursued in development, from the release of Etiona (9.0) I began to get involved little by little from the point of view that a developer has and this involvement has grown in the last versions, 10.0 and now version 11.0.
With the movement of the project development meetings from Friday to Wednesday and in order to take up a little more activism that a few years ago was something more normal in this blog (or its previous version), I am thinking of taking advantage of the time used in development meetings to open a space for trisquel users and free software users in general who would like to resolve any doubts, find out about news related to trisquel or have a pleasant talk related to free software.
These meetings will take place in my Jitsi Meet instance, which for complete transparency is sponsored by my IT business, where it will only be necessary to have a microphone since they will be mainly conversations, video is not required.
We continue with the development of Trisquel 11.0, codenamed Aramo, as I mentioned there are many new challenges with Aramo which makes Trisquel a more design independent distribution from its upstream, Ubuntu.
Aramo is an ambitious release as it makes a number of key changes,
Keep Abrowser web browser as DEB package
Restore installation via netinstaller based on debian-installer, deprecated as of Ubuntu 22.04
Add support for arm64 and ppc64el
It is planned to bring back support for i386 (32 bits)
among the most important
It seems incredible to me everything that has been achieved since the official announcement of the start of development in February,
The infrastructure has been redesigned and expanded with support from the FSF as far as ppc64el is concerned, while the continuous integration (CI) system through Jenkins makes better use of resources through package build nodes and this has speeded up and facilitated the work to a great extent.
From my personal perspective, I consider that the first phase of building “conventional” repositories and packages is virtually ready, which allows to start with alpha tests of updates¹ from nabia to aramo on amd64, known bugs that generate a minimum lack of packages can be consulted in the issues section: package-helpers issues.
The testing stage will identify the aesthetic changes, functionality and possible errors between the different versions of the different desktop environments available for Trisquel GNU/Linux, which refers to a second phase of testing the repository and packages..
Detailed reports of errors or incidents are invited in advance, and thanks to all users who have already done so, through the system Trisquel Gitlab.
¹Warning: Aramo, at the time of writing this post , should not be used on production computers, due to its early development stage.
I believe that the next stage will focus on restoring the installation system through netinstaller, and the restoration of the udeb packages necessary for this process, which will allow having a light and practical installation medium for automated installations.
Fortunately, we can rely on the development that the great Debian community carries out, where many of its original packages will be essential to achieve this goal.
If all the above points were resolved, it would be virtually possible that we would have a release very similar to Nabia, but as I mentioned Aramo intends / plans to bring back support for 32 bits (i386), which from the first weeks of development remains Of course it will be “an uphill battle”.
There are still many development and planning decisions pending on i386, so this should be taken with reservation and not ahead of the eve.
So even though it might seem static, like Galileo Galilei, I can say, Trisquel GNU/Linux 11.0, Aramo, “eppur si muove” (and yet it moves .).
Wow, the situation has become complicated with Ubuntu 22.04
Since February, the development of Trisquel 11.0, code name Aramo, began officially, and to tell the truth, since we were developing version 10.0, we were already beginning to see the future challenges that Jammy would bring.
In the case of Firefox, Canonical, the company behind the commercial development of Ubuntu, is betting more and more on the use of its snap packages, in the same way I assume that Mozilla is trying to unify the distribution of its browser: Firefox due to the great loss of market share, and I assume they’d rather save themselves the trouble of maintaining debian binary compatibility in all versions of Ubuntu and derivatives, so when hunger meets the urge to eat, well this happens, we lose support for debian binaries from Firefox on Ubuntu 22.04
And well, the release of Ubuntu 22.04 made the threat valid, now in 22.04 we only have support for the snap version.
Despite several advantages that a unified package system can have, snap is a system that gives little control over the sources and packages that are distributed, this makes autonomous community development difficult, to say the least, I think Flatpak has a better future in this type of categories, however returning to the subject.
I have currently started working on compiling Firefox ESR on Ubuntu as a base for our Abrowser, however boy has this gotten messy. Debian and Trisquel have a second-degree relationship, which even though they are very similar, both the versions and the structure of some packages change evidently.
This has been a bit of a headache, as it would be the first time that I take the development of a helper from scratch from a package of this size, just to put in context Firefox ESR weighs around 450MB and its compilation can take several hours using multiple cores before crashing and finding the bug where it might be crashing.
After a couple of weeks, this project has helped me to learn little by little the different factors that come into play in the compilation of this browser and why not, meet the developers behind Firefox in Debian and some alternative projects such as LibreWolf is, for which I have learned a couple of things in those projects.
And despite all the headaches that Firefox has given me these weeks, as well as the understanding that I need a more powerful machine to compile large packages, it is not time to give up since there are other more interesting challenges to solve with all the changes Ubuntu has made to Jammy, such as the development of the debian installer for Trisquel.
There is a long and challenging stage of development ahead on the way to Trisquel 11.0, Aramo.
By the way, the ISOs of the first maintenance revision of Trisquel 10 will be published soon, version: 10.0.1
Impatient? Before reaching the official repositories, it can be downloaded here:
![[ Celebrate 40 years of GNU! ]](https://ark.switnet.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/GNU40_badge.png){kind=icon}
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