ARMHF - Mediaplayer software?

[Rüdiger Leibrandt]

Having heard a lot about the Raspberry Pi I got myself a pair.
They're very nice things, but one thing drives me mad:
They suck for Video playback.
Having tried mplayer, vlc, XMMS and basically everything I get with
apt-cache search video | grep player
I am out of ideas.

A static picture with stuttering sound is not exactly what I consider useful,
especially not from such lowly formats as a VCD compliant MPEG1 or
a DVD compliant MPEG2 stream.

Is there any player that makes proper use of the hardware?
I read its capable of doing HD playback, but maybe it needs some very low
compressed video format for that?

I'm using Raspian with armhf kernel, which I think should do the job better
than a softfloat armel kernel.

Any help most warmly welcome!
--
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[Andreas Rönnquist]

On Sat, 6 Apr 2013 20:17:32 +0200,
Rüdiger Leibrandt<rleib...@uni-bremen.de> wrote:

>Having heard a lot about the Raspberry Pi I got myself a pair.
>They're very nice things, but one thing drives me mad:
>They suck for Video playback.
>Having tried mplayer, vlc, XMMS and basically everything I get with
>apt-cache search video | grep player
>I am out of ideas.
>
>A static picture with stuttering sound is not exactly what I consider
>useful, especially not from such lowly formats as a VCD compliant
>MPEG1 or a DVD compliant MPEG2 stream.
>
>Is there any player that makes proper use of the hardware?
>I read its capable of doing HD playback, but maybe it needs some very
>low compressed video format for that?
>
>I'm using Raspian with armhf kernel, which I think should do the job
>better than a softfloat armel kernel.

http://elinux.org/Omxplayer
I have no idea why this wasn't reported by your apt-cache command
though...

best regards
-- Andreas Rönnquist
mailin...@gusnan.se
gus...@gusnan.se

[Peter Bauer]

Hello from Vienna,

On Raspbian the application omxplayer will do the job from the command
line. This player is pre installed with Raspbian.
If you want to play MPEG-2 or VC1 video you need to buy codecs.

Peter Bauer
http://bitkistl.blogspot.com

Archive: http://lists.debian.org/1365274207.2543.11.camel@peter-laptop

[Paul Wise]

On Sun, Apr 7, 2013 at 2:48 AM, Andreas Rönnquist wrote:

> On Sat, 6 Apr 2013 20:17:32 +0200 Rüdiger Leibrandt wrote:
>>I'm using Raspian with armhf kernel, which I think should do the job
>>better than a softfloat armel kernel.
>
> http://elinux.org/Omxplayer
> I have no idea why this wasn't reported by your apt-cache command
> though...

omxplayer doesn't appear to be available in Debian or Raspbian yet. If
you or anyone else want to package it, please check out this page:

http://mentors.debian.net/intro-maintainers

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pabs

http://wiki.debian.org/PaulWise

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[Paul Wise]

On Sun, Apr 7, 2013 at 7:44 AM, peter green wrote:

> It's not in raspbian itself but it is in the raspberry pi foundation repo
> which most raspbian users will have. I think they also include it in their image
> but i'm not sure on that.

Would it be a good idea to include that repo by default in Raspbian
images/installs?

In any case, it would be great if someone could work with the RPi
folks to get their packages back into Debian/Raspbian.

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pabs

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[peter green]

Paul Wise wrote:
> omxplayer doesn't appear to be available in Debian or Raspbian yet. If
> you or anyone else want to package it, please check out this page:
>
> http://mentors.debian.net/intro-maintainers
>

It's not in raspbian itself but it is in the raspberry pi foundation
repo which
most raspbian users will have. I think they also include it in their
image but
i'm not sure on that.

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[Luke Kenneth Casson Leighton]

On Sat, Apr 6, 2013 at 7:17 PM, Rüdiger Leibrandt
<rleib...@uni-bremen.de> wrote:
> Having heard a lot about the Raspberry Pi I got myself a pair.
> They're very nice things, but one thing drives me mad:
> They suck for Video playback.
> Having tried mplayer, vlc, XMMS and basically everything I get with
> apt-cache search video | grep player
> I am out of ideas.

send the fucking things back. please. and get a single cubieboard,
or a wandaboard or *anything* for less than the cost of the 2
waste-of-time boards you just bought. at least with the A10 you a)
get a real SATA interface b) as it's a chinese company, despite the
fact that the VPU is still proprietary they at least don't give a
stuff about paying MPEG royalties (leaving that up to you) and at
least libcedarx provides VP8 acceleration.

alternatively you can help support proprietary business practices and
help endorse and software patents by paying the fuckwits at Broadcom
for the privilege of access to their proprietary CODECs.

now you *hopefully* have learned the hard way what Software Freedom
is really about, by having your hard-earned money and time wasted on a
pile of shit with insidious and hidden proprietary lock-in that
*wasn't* in the small print [*1], taking advantage of and masquerading
"in the name of" education [*1]

l.

[*1] giving you a *genuine* reason to return the devices, under the UK
Trade Descriptions Act and the illegal practice of "mis-selling"
[*2] http://whitequark.org/blog/2012/09/25/why-raspberry-pi-is-unsuitable-for-education/

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[Luke Kenneth Casson Leighton]

On Sun, Apr 7, 2013 at 12:49 AM, Paul Wise <pa...@debian.org> wrote:
> On Sun, Apr 7, 2013 at 7:44 AM, peter green wrote:
>
>> It's not in raspbian itself but it is in the raspberry pi foundation repo
>> which most raspbian users will have. I think they also include it in their image
>> but i'm not sure on that.
>
> Would it be a good idea to include that repo by default in Raspbian
> images/installs?

if it includes or requires the proprietary CODECs, then clearly and
obviously the answer is no, under the Debian Charter. if however
those CODECs are dlopen'd in a similar trick to libdvdcss then it
*might* qualify for inclusion under the non-free section, but to be
honest you're probably better off petitioning mr marrilat of
debian-multimedia to see if he would be willing to host them there.

l.

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[Paul Wise]

On Sun, 2013-04-07 at 01:49 +0100, Luke Kenneth Casson Leighton wrote:

> if it includes or requires the proprietary CODECs, then clearly and
> obviously the answer is no, under the Debian Charter.

I was talking about Raspbian, not Debian.

> if however those CODECs are dlopen'd in a similar trick to libdvdcss
> then it *might* qualify for inclusion under the non-free section, but
> to be honest you're probably better off petitioning mr marrilat of
> debian-multimedia to see if he would be willing to host them there.

They are already being distributed by the RPi folks, no need to host
them elsewhere.

My question was if the standard Raspbian (not Debian) sources.list (and
images containing that sources.list) should include the RPi repository
so that Raspbian users can install them easily. I was in no way
suggesting that these packages be included in the default Raspbian
images, just that they be easily accessible to Raspbian users so that
those users don't have a worse experience than the official install.

PS: I'm subscribed, no need to CC:

http://www.debian.org/MailingLists/#codeofconduct

[peter green]

Paul Wise wrote:
> My question was if the standard Raspbian (not Debian) sources.list (and
> images containing that sources.list) should include the RPi repository
> so that Raspbian users can install them easily. I was in no way
> suggesting that these packages be included in the default Raspbian
> images, just that they be easily accessible to Raspbian users so that
> those users don't have a worse experience than the official install.
>

Currently the raspbian project doesn't build images, (mpthompson has
built a few in the past and I'm considering building them in the future
but we don't right now).

I'd imagine the majority of raspbian images out there do have the
raspberry pi foundation repository in their sources.list (after all they
will need the firmware if they want the thing to boot) but it's
ultimately up to whoever creates the image to decide what goes in their
sources.list. Also note that while raspbian is primerally targetted at
the Pi I do not intend it to be exclusive to the Pi, raspbian images for
other devices would obviously not want to include the raspberry pi
foundation repostory. We did look at (and succeed in) running raspbian
on the via APC, we just gave up due to horrible software support (iirc
you need binary only kernel modules to make even dumb framebuffer
graphics work)

I did intend to have an area in the raspbian repository for pi specific
packages (and it exists, it's just empty right now). I was hoping to
work with the raspberry pi foundation to make an orderly transition from
their monolithic kernel/firmware package to a more debian like approach
but the trouble is that everyone over there has other things higher up
their priority list right now.

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[Andrei POPESCU]

On Sb, 06 apr 13, 20:17:32, Rüdiger Leibrandt wrote:
> Having heard a lot about the Raspberry Pi I got myself a pair.
> They're very nice things, but one thing drives me mad:
> They suck for Video playback.
> Having tried mplayer, vlc, XMMS and basically everything I get with
> apt-cache search video | grep player
> I am out of ideas.

I'm using Xbian for my player. It's based on Raspbian and it includes a
custom build of XBMC that takes advantage of the hardware acceleration.
I don't like it too much (it contains some ugly hacks / customizations)
but I'm too lazy to figure out how to compile XBMC myself and run a pure
Raspbian.

Kind regards,
Andrei
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[Rüdiger Leibrandt]

First of all:
Thanks alot!

I thought that there was a library missing or it'd be some setting i'd need or
forgot, but, okay.
Omxplayer does not show up in my apt-cache search output. Then again I modified
the sources list to use my apt-cacher on my homeserver. Maybe there something
blew up.
That I have to pay extra to use the hardware i paid for ( buying licenses for
the decoder to be activated ) is making me think of "defective by design" and
thus I'll take part of Luke's recommendation to heart ( buying a cubieboard
next ), but I won't send them back. I'll just use them to replace my old NSLU
2. As a webserver with USB plug-drives they work nicely.

I'll try to see where in Germany I can get a cubieboard. With it's SATA
connector and its pricetag it looks most like what I want.

Sincerely

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[Peter Bauer]

You can get the Cubieboard here:

http://www.exp-tech.de/Mainboards/Cubieboard-A10-ARM-Board.html

Regards,
Peter

Archive: http://lists.debian.org/1365347696.2534.8.camel@peter-laptop

[Lennart Sorensen]

On Sun, Apr 07, 2013 at 05:14:56PM +0200, Peter Bauer wrote:
> You can get the Cubieboard here:
>
> http://www.exp-tech.de/Mainboards/Cubieboard-A10-ARM-Board.html

Very nice.

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[Luke Kenneth Casson Leighton]

On Sun, Apr 7, 2013 at 2:36 AM, peter green <plug...@p10link.net> wrote:

> Currently the raspbian project doesn't build images, (mpthompson has built a
> few in the past and I'm considering building them in the future but we don't
> right now).

why, when this is a debian list, should i care about that? i don't
wish to hear about it.

could you please kindly stop discussing matters which relate to a
very insidious shitty little company called broadcom which is
exploiting people, taking advantage of people "in the name of
education"?

if you wish to discuss matters which do not directly relate to the
debian project for ARM devices please do so elsewhere.

is that a reasonable request, on account of this being debian-arm and
you are discussing that freedom-disrespecting and exploitational
device called "the raspberry pi", which has a distribution called
"raspbian", not "debian"?

if you do not have a mailing list on which to discuss that
exploitational device, please do create one - especially so that i
personally do not have to be on it.

greatly appreciated.

l.

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[Luke Kenneth Casson Leighton]

On Sun, Apr 7, 2013 at 3:48 PM, Rüdiger Leibrandt
<rleib...@uni-bremen.de> wrote:
> First of all:
> Thanks alot!
>
> I thought that there was a library missing or it'd be some setting i'd need or
> forgot, but, okay.
> Omxplayer does not show up in my apt-cache search output. Then again I modified
> the sources list to use my apt-cacher on my homeserver. Maybe there something
> blew up.
> That I have to pay extra to use the hardware i paid for ( buying licenses for
> the decoder to be activated ) is making me think of "defective by design"

defective by design: yes, but it's actually mis-selling, pure and
simple. were you advised, when you bought this product, that you
would be forced to purchase proprietary video CODECs in order to do
something as simple as watch a film? if the answer is "no", that's
mis-selling, which is a serious criminal offense.

> and
> thus I'll take part of Luke's recommendation to heart ( buying a cubieboard
> next ), but I won't send them back. I'll just use them to replace my old NSLU
> 2. As a webserver with USB plug-drives they work nicely.
>
> I'll try to see where in Germany

ah you're in germany - you *definitely* have 14 days, legally, in
which to return product without question and obtain a full refund.

> I can get a cubieboard.

cubieboard [*1], hackberry [*2], hmmm, maybe cpcinc's A10 COM module
isn't what you need [*3] but i mention it for completeness. actually
just look at the main page of the linux-sunxi community there's a ton
more [*4]. pcduino doesn't have SATA, so wouldn't suit you. the
marsboard [*5] does. love the way those guys can't spell :) but,
they released schematics at least [*6]. a10-olixino doesn't look like
it's ready yet. [*7].

overall i'd say the cubieboard is your best bet - the marsboard guys
i think they've cloned the cubieboard and haven't really engaged with
the sunxi community, whereas tom (cubieboard) has been working with
them since the early days.

> With it's SATA
> connector and its pricetag it looks most like what I want.

yeah. tom and his team have done really well to get that board out,
and they picked a damn good chip too. it's getting a little long in
the tooth, but even so it's still price-performance-wise f*****g good
value, i haven't yet come across anything that has as big a community
behind it [*4] despite it being a china-based SoC.

so, yeah, cubieboard will run debian armhf [cortex a8], the sunxi
community will be able to get you set up, there's plenty of pre-built
images, oodles of instructions... you can't go wrong with it, really.

l.

[*1] https://www.miniand.com/products/Cubieboard%20Developer%20Board
[*2] https://www.miniand.com/products/Hackberry%20A10%20Developer%20Board
[*3] http://lists.phcomp.co.uk/pipermail/arm-netbook/2013-February/006802.html
[*4] http://linux-sunxi.org/Main_Page
[*5] http://www.marsboard.com/
[*6] http://linux-sunxi.org/File:MarsBoard_Schematic_V1.3.pdf
[*7] http://olimex.wordpress.com/tag/a10/

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[Paul Wise]

On Tue, Apr 9, 2013 at 4:47 AM, Luke Kenneth Casson Leighton wrote:

> which has a distribution called "raspbian", not "debian"?

As the initiator of the Debian derivatives census, I strongly object
to your dismissal of Raspbian in particular and Debian derivatives in
general. Debian needs our derivatives as much as they need us. We
should embrace derivatives, cultivate them, bring them closer to
Debian and encourage their developers to get involved in Debian. We
should not be hostile and antagonistic toward them, reject them and
alienate them, that is very counter-productive and especially bad for
Debian.

http://wiki.debian.org/Derivatives/Census

On the other hand I very much understand and share your frustration
with Broadcom and the Raspberry Pi.

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[Steve McIntyre]

On Mon, Apr 08, 2013 at 09:47:43PM +0100, Luke Kenneth Casson Leighton wrote:
>On Sun, Apr 7, 2013 at 2:36 AM, peter green <plug...@p10link.net> wrote:
>
>> Currently the raspbian project doesn't build images, (mpthompson has built a
>> few in the past and I'm considering building them in the future but we don't
>> right now).
>
> why, when this is a debian list, should i care about that? i don't
>wish to hear about it.

<snip more, and much worse along the same lines>

Luke, you are utterly out of order here. Calm down. You may have some
(justified) dislike of the Pi, but there is absolutely no need nor
justification to abuse others in the Debian community because of that.

--
Steve McIntyre, Cambridge, UK. st...@einval.com
"Further comment on how I feel about IBM will appear once I've worked out
whether they're being malicious or incompetent. Capital letters are forecast."
Matthew Garrett, http://www.livejournal.com/users/mjg59/30675.html

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[David Given]

On 09/04/13 10:42, Steve McIntyre wrote:
[...]

> Luke, you are utterly out of order here. Calm down. You may have some
> (justified) dislike of the Pi, but there is absolutely no need nor
> justification to abuse others in the Debian community because of that.

Hear, hear.

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[Luke Kenneth Casson Leighton]

On Tue, Apr 9, 2013 at 10:42 AM, Steve McIntyre <st...@einval.com> wrote:
> On Mon, Apr 08, 2013 at 09:47:43PM +0100, Luke Kenneth Casson Leighton wrote:
>>On Sun, Apr 7, 2013 at 2:36 AM, peter green <plug...@p10link.net> wrote:
>>
>>> Currently the raspbian project doesn't build images, (mpthompson has built a
>>> few in the past and I'm considering building them in the future but we don't
>>> right now).
>>
>> why, when this is a debian list, should i care about that? i don't
>>wish to hear about it.
>
> <snip more, and much worse along the same lines>
>
> Luke, you are utterly out of order here.

i'm sorry to hear you say that, steve.

> Calm down.

i'm perfectly calm. i apologise for giving the impression that i'm
not. you may have mistaken the strength of the words for my emotional
state. i can assure you that the two are not linked.

> You may have some
> (justified) dislike of the Pi, but there is absolutely no need nor
> justification to abuse others in the Debian community because of that.

it's not abuse: i'm asking - reasonably i believe - that discussion
of a device which has nothing to do with debian-arm software not be
discussed on debian-arm [and using strong words to emphasise that].

is that an unreasonable request, steve?

would you be willing to help out here in a positive way by helping to
assess whether there should be a list named e.g.
rasp...@lists.debian.org?

or - and this is an important consideration for debian - would such a
move be seen as endorsement of insidious proprietary practices and the
endorsement by the debian community of software patents and
endorsement of the practice of forcing people to choose between
"purchase of non-free software" and "not having the functionality they
thought they were paying for"?

etc. etc.

l.

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[Luke Kenneth Casson Leighton]

On Tue, Apr 9, 2013 at 3:24 AM, Paul Wise <pa...@debian.org> wrote:
> On Tue, Apr 9, 2013 at 4:47 AM, Luke Kenneth Casson Leighton wrote:
>
>> which has a distribution called "raspbian", not "debian"?
>
> As the initiator of the Debian derivatives census, I strongly object
> to your dismissal of Raspbian in particular and Debian derivatives in
> general.

that's fine... but please really, create a separate mailing list for
that derivative. i'm really not interested in hearing about

> Debian needs our derivatives as much as they need us. We
> should embrace derivatives, cultivate them, bring them closer to
> Debian and encourage their developers to get involved in Debian. We
> should not be hostile and antagonistic toward them, reject them and
> alienate them, that is very counter-productive and especially bad for
> Debian.

well, this is a rare instance - a very rare one - where a product
that has such incredible promise and success also comes with some
highly insiduous business practices attached, that, unfortunately,
pretty much zero percent of individuals who actually purchase that
product are aware of those insidious practices.

so there's a couple of choices here, and unfortunately they're
diametrically opposed. a) tolerate insidious business practices that
include illegal and unlawful mis-selling amongst other things b) don't
tolerate such practices.

those are the two diametrically-opposed options but you have to be
*aware* of those options, and so there is a third category into which
almost 100% of people who purchase this product fall: total ignorance
of the insidious business practices.

would you agree with that assessment?

my feeling is that debian needs to support and be associated with
illegal and insidious business practices like it needs a hole in the
head.

would you agree with that assessment?

you may not. you may feel that it is perfectly acceptable, and, that
like many people who have purchased this insidious product, feel that
the "gains" outweigh the "down-sides". the price is amazing: gain.
the large community support is amazing: gain. you may even feel that
being forced to pay for proprietary CODECs is also a gain! you may
also feel that broadcom has a perfect right to "protect its
intellectual enslavement rights", and if you are such a person you may
therefore be wondering why the hell i am even raising this issue.

as someone who is working REALLY HARD and spending considerable time
and PERSONAL FUNDS to bring people on this list some hardware and even
processors that are unencumbered by DRM and have full free software
stacks for *ALL* hardware components right down to the boot loader i'm
a little disappointed to be receiving criticism for software freedom
advocacy.

for the person who raised the issue here initially, i spent about 3/4
of an hour doing some research for them to find them alternative
hardware that has good community support, that would better meet their
needs....

... and i'm being criticised for then saying to the people who
*continued* the discussion and implicit advocacy and support of
insidious business practices, to please take their discussion
elsewhere??

definite "wtf" moment going on here.

so does that make things any clearer? does this need to be discussed
further, or cleared up in any way?

l.

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[Paul Wise]

On Wed, Apr 10, 2013 at 8:20 AM, Luke Kenneth Casson Leighton wrote:

> On Tue, Apr 9, 2013 at 3:24 AM, Paul Wise wrote:
> that's fine... but please really, create a separate mailing list for
> that derivative. i'm really not interested in hearing about

I suggest that you add some filtering to your email in that case, it
is unfortunately inevitable that Raspbian and the RPi are going to
come up again.

>> Debian needs our derivatives as much as they need us. We
>> should embrace derivatives, cultivate them, bring them closer to
>> Debian and encourage their developers to get involved in Debian. We
>> should not be hostile and antagonistic toward them, reject them and
>> alienate them, that is very counter-productive and especially bad for
>> Debian.
>
> well, this is a rare instance - a very rare one - where a product
> that has such incredible promise and success also comes with some
> highly insiduous business practices attached, that, unfortunately,
> pretty much zero percent of individuals who actually purchase that
> product are aware of those insidious practices.

My mail had nothing to do with Broadcom or the Raspberry Pi, but
rather your hostility towards and abuse of members of the Debian
community (Peter Green is a DD) and toward a Debian derivative trying
to make the best of a pretty bad situation that everyone on this list
is well aware of.

I'd encourage you to read the mailing lists code of conduct,
especially the second and third last items and the item on CCs. In
addition, you might like to read the Debian Community Guidelines for
some tips on constructive communication.

http://www.debian.org/MailingLists/#codeofconduct
http://people.debian.org/~enrico/dcg/

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[Luke Kenneth Casson Leighton]

On Wed, Apr 10, 2013 at 5:00 AM, Paul Wise <pa...@debian.org> wrote:

> I'd encourage you to read the mailing lists code of conduct,
> especially the second and third last items and the item on CCs. In
> addition, you might like to read the Debian Community Guidelines for
> some tips on constructive communication.

well... i have another idea. there's actually two failures here, i
believe you'll agree once i outline them. the first is that i
responded in a manner which, if anyone is familiar with my
limitations, people will know that it is commonly misunderstood, taken
the wrong way, etc. etc. i often find that i cannot clearly get
concepts across, this results in substitution of expletives as a means
to express the strength of feeling *behind* the concept, etc. etc.

the second is this: there may be people in the debian community
*better suited* to tackle these thorny issues.... *but none of them
did*.

so when i responded, although i identified the issues, the responses
left people saying "i wouldn't have tackled it that way because that
makes us all look bad" but the point is they *didn't* tackle it.

so my suggestion is, therefore, that we - collaboratively - work on a
suitable response that *is* suitable. from this, several things would
be achieved:

a) i'll learn by example and by doing so effing well learn to
communicate effectively
b) the people who felt like they were being shat on won't feel that way
c) the people who perhaps should have been paying closer attention
will know to do so in future and have a template to work from should
something similar arise.
d) we get to resolve and clarify something that's bugging a lot of people [*1]

thoughts anyone?

l.

[*1] there's quite a few people who don't like the situation wrt
software freedom that the rbpi brings up: they just don't talk about
it publicly because they might get shouted down as haters-of-education
or something ridiculous by those people who don't understand the
importance or implications of software freedom.

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[mick]

On Wed, 10 Apr 2013 10:15:27 +0100
Luke Kenneth Casson Leighton <lk...@lkcl.net> allegedly wrote:

> so my suggestion is, therefore, that we - collaboratively - work on a
> suitable response that *is* suitable. from this, several things would
> be achieved:
>
> a) i'll learn by example and by doing so effing well learn to
> communicate effectively

Luke

Personally I have never felt that effective communication is one of
your failings. Tact, yes, effectiveness, no.

Best

Mick


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[Steve McIntyre]

On Wed, Apr 10, 2013 at 01:02:17AM +0100, Luke Kenneth Casson Leighton wrote:
>On Tue, Apr 9, 2013 at 10:42 AM, Steve McIntyre <st...@einval.com> wrote:
>
>> Calm down.
>
> i'm perfectly calm. i apologise for giving the impression that i'm
>not. you may have mistaken the strength of the words for my emotional
>state. i can assure you that the two are not linked.

I was giving you the benefit of the doubt, assuming you had lost your
temper and therefore self control. Oh well.

>> You may have some
>> (justified) dislike of the Pi, but there is absolutely no need nor
>> justification to abuse others in the Debian community because of that.
>
> it's not abuse: i'm asking - reasonably i believe - that discussion
>of a device which has nothing to do with debian-arm software not be
>discussed on debian-arm [and using strong words to emphasise that].
>
> is that an unreasonable request, steve?

I believe so, yes. The Raspbian folks are valued members of the Debian
community. They're working on a derived distro that better supports
hardware that you (and a number of other folks) don't like, as we all
know. But dislike of that hardware and the companies involved in
producing it is no excuse for ranting and raving here, at them. These
guys are working on a Debian-derived (in fact, basically just
Debian-*rebuilt*) distro for a particular piece of ARM-powered
hardware. I personally think that's just fine and on-topic here, just
as much as discussions about running Debian on other ARM-based
hardware or discusssions about developing new hardware options for
running Debian and other Free Software.

I might feel differently if they were swamping the list with dozens of
posts per day; that would then justify a separate list purely for the
sake of traffic. But they're not.

If you are so against reading anything about Raspbian etc., then I
must echo Paul Wise's response: you will need to filter your
mail. Raspbian and Pi stuff *will* continue to show up here, I
guarantee it. Invective from you isn't going to change that, instead
it makes you look bad. I hope you don't want that.

--
Steve McIntyre, Cambridge, UK. st...@einval.com

You raise the blade, you make the change... You re-arrange me 'til I'm sane...

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[Lennart Sorensen]

On Wed, Apr 10, 2013 at 01:02:17AM +0100, Luke Kenneth Casson Leighton wrote:
> it's not abuse: i'm asking - reasonably i believe - that discussion
> of a device which has nothing to do with debian-arm software not be
> discussed on debian-arm [and using strong words to emphasise that].
>
> is that an unreasonable request, steve?

Can debian armel not run on the pi? I don't see why it couldn't.
armel is part of this list.

> would you be willing to help out here in a positive way by helping to
> assess whether there should be a list named e.g.
> rasp...@lists.debian.org?

Why? arm, armel, armeb and armhf have all worked on this list so far.

> or - and this is an important consideration for debian - would such a
> move be seen as endorsement of insidious proprietary practices and the
> endorsement by the debian community of software patents and
> endorsement of the practice of forcing people to choose between
> "purchase of non-free software" and "not having the functionality they
> thought they were paying for"?

I am sure plenty of x86 machines have those issues too, but that doesn't
stop people from being allowed to discuss such machines running Debian.

Personally I consider the pi a useless device to me. I have a number of
armv7 devices though and will probably get more when I see interesting
ones.

Had the pi existed when armhf started, it is possible the choice to only
support armv7 as a base would have turned out differently. But since it
didn't, and the choice was made to support armv7+ only, then the raspian
unofficial port got started. A number of us gave advice on how to go
about getting armhf rebuilt for the pi, because we are nice people,
even if we don't personally have any interest in using the pi.

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[Mike Thompson]

On Wed, Apr 10, 2013 at 6:19 AM, Steve McIntyre <st...@einval.com> wrote:

> is that an unreasonable request, steve?

I believe so, yes. The Raspbian folks are valued members of the Debian
community. They're working on a derived distro that better supports
hardware that you (and a number of other folks) don't like, as we all
know. But dislike of that hardware and the companies involved in
producing it is no excuse for ranting and raving here, at them. These
guys are working on a Debian-derived (in fact, basically just
Debian-*rebuilt*) distro for a particular piece of ARM-powered
hardware. I personally think that's just fine and on-topic here, just
as much as discussions about running Debian on other ARM-based
hardware or discusssions about developing new hardware options for
running Debian and other Free Software.

I've been following this conversation and I'm pleased that Raspbian is welcomed as a valuable contribution to the Debian community, although I certainly understand and sympathize with Luke's position regarding the platform not being completely open.  Hopefully the commercial success of the Raspberry Pi will encourage other platform vendors to enter the market with similar devices at similar price points, but with fully open hardware.  The Raspberry Pi, if anything else, demonstrated the market demand for such devices at the sub-$40 price point.

As Steve pointed out, Raspbian is indeed a more of a rebuild of Debian armhf than it is anything else.  I don't think that we've ever presented it as anything else and I hope that every user of the Raspberry Pi with Raspbian knows that they are essentially using "Debian".  If this isn't the case, please let us know how we can better communicate this important fact.   The reason it's called Raspbian is to help clarify that it's not an official Debian supported release which could confuse people if they attempted to download binaries from the Debian repositories.

It is my sincere hope that with Raspbian being the officially supported distribution for the Raspberry Pi, the end result will be millions of more new users introduced to Debian.  As they move beyond the Pi, hopefully they'll then choose to use Debian on future hardware because it works just like the "Raspberry Pi" they cut their teeth on.  Also, users do often run into issues with the closed aspects of the Pi.  This becomes an excellent opportunity to discuss with people why such limitations exist, the negative impact of such limitations on their freedom, and what the user can about the issue -- lobbying hardware vendors to open their devices and ultimately voting with their feet and their money if other choices exist.

Finally, I would really like for Raspbian to be folded back into Debian and become a supported release by the Debian Foundation.  However, I understand and appreciate the reasons why this is extremely unlikely.  With that being case, hopefully Raspbian can be seen as Debian's younger sibling that is standing upon the shoulders of the giants that created Debian armhf to begin with.

Again, I would like to thank the community on this list for being very helpful a year ago with encouragement and advice that helped make Raspbian possible. 

Mike Thompson

[Paul Wise]

On Wed, Apr 10, 2013 at 5:15 PM, Luke Kenneth Casson Leighton wrote:

> the second is this: there may be people in the debian community
> *better suited* to tackle these thorny issues.... *but none of them
> did*.

You have a good point here. There have been some responses along the
lines of "please buy something else" but only on IRC.

> so my suggestion is, therefore, that we - collaboratively - work on a
> suitable response that *is* suitable.

Here is a first pass, thoughts?

http://wiki.debian.org/RaspberryPi

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[Rüdiger Leibrandt]

I never expected that my request for advice regarding a mediaplayer could have
such.. .explosive results.

I agree fully with Luke in so far as the marketing of the Raspberry Pi is ...
Mis-Selling.

Then again I know from personal experience that many companies selling
computer components don't have a clue what the stuff they sell actually do.
Traditional joke here is that a Pentium 4 makes ones surfing experience faster.
Even my Amiga back in 2001 was overtaxing my 33k modem with ease, no Pentium 4
would have made filetransfers faster or a text on the net appear faster on my
screen than my 50MHz 68060 did.
Or remember AMD's "The first 64Bit PC" joke? Somehow, SGI's O² were also
personal computers, standing at the individual workplace, and they were 64Bit
untis, too.

So, I never would have thought that mis-selling is considered a fraudulent
act, and accordingly, though understanding Luke's reaction, I didn't expect it
and it felt ... Scary. Positively, so, but still, scary.

After going over the layout and informations of the cubieboard I
wholeheartedly agree that it has a LOT more value for education, permitting
easy access both on software side ( Linux ) as well as the hardware side (
clear access to various signals and buses ) thus providing more value for
education on the proframming side by reinforcing it through support for
education on the hardware side ( electronics, soldering, signal interfacing ,
... ) .

I got my cubieboard yesterday, but I didn't manage to get a debian system
running on it. Yet. It's Hardware is really great and the documented pinout
has me drooling.
When the Cubieboard has no negative legalities attached, then Paul might wish
to add it to his list at http://wiki.debian.org/RaspberryPi

Personally I think that "problematic" Hardware should be mentioned, stating
exactly why it is problematic. It helps makign an educated decision to buy.
When the Raspberry Pi would be sold as cheap, Linux compatible computing
platform there would be nothing I would complain about. I would in that case
have bought only one to act as server module, not two, though.

A product not properly documented IS a problem - but when the company adhered
strictly to some existing and well documented open standards, the product
might be recommendable despite the companies policy being not.



As an operating system, Debian makes a lot of otherwise "unusable devices"
usable, so I think that uncomfortable hardware will often appear in the debian
lists. It's sad that uncomfortable hardware exists.. but I'd rate it very
positive that Linux and Debian support them, though.
Recently I got a Tablet for example - Wacom doesn't support Linux officially,
but their tablets are the best-supported ones. I got a Walport, and they had a
download area for Linux ( thus giving obvious some kind of support at least
) but the particular tablet just gives me 3 left mousebuttons with its stylus.

Hard for me to judge which would have been the better way to go.
I'm mostly what you might call a "normal end user" of Linux.
But building a lot of electronics modules and tinkering in general I need
access to functions and capabilites which I expected of the Raspberry Pi ( and
now found in plenty on the cubieboard ) and which either only work with Linux
anyway or are a lot safer, simpler and more reliably to implement in Linux.
Aside of the fact that a lot of the hardware I use is incompatible with
Windows anyway and thus, even if I wanted to, would have to stick with Linux
and Debian in particular ( thanks to many supported architectures ).

> a) i'll learn by example and by doing so effing well learn to
> communicate effectively

You communicated VERY effectively. Just maybe the M16 style of approach is not
the most, call it, favourable one.

> b) the people who felt like they were being shat on won't feel that way

That's a human nature issue. Understanding WHY you reacted as you did,
learning about the reasons and background informations, helps a lot.

> c) the people who perhaps should have been paying closer attention
> will know to do so in future and have a template to work from should
> something similar arise.

As a Layman in regards to the various fine points of "Free Beer" vs "Free
Speech" respectively the corporate attitudes and manners which express
themselves in their products , I'll have to watch more closely, but still
expect a lot of details to slip my scrutiny.

> d) we get to resolve and clarify something that's bugging a lot of people
> [*1]
>
> thoughts anyone?
>
> l.
>
> [*1] there's quite a few people who don't like the situation wrt
> software freedom that the rbpi brings up: they just don't talk about
> it publicly because they might get shouted down as haters-of-education
> or something ridiculous by those people who don't understand the
> importance or implications of software freedom.

Thanking you all for a .. very.. educational thread,
I remain
with kind regards
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[Lennart Sorensen]

On Thu, Apr 11, 2013 at 11:18:33AM +0200, Rüdiger Leibrandt wrote:
> I never expected that my request for advice regarding a mediaplayer could have
> such.. .explosive results.
>
> I agree fully with Luke in so far as the marketing of the Raspberry Pi is ...
> Mis-Selling.
>
> Then again I know from personal experience that many companies selling
> computer components don't have a clue what the stuff they sell actually do.
> Traditional joke here is that a Pentium 4 makes ones surfing experience faster.
> Even my Amiga back in 2001 was overtaxing my 33k modem with ease, no Pentium 4
> would have made filetransfers faster or a text on the net appear faster on my
> screen than my 50MHz 68060 did.
> Or remember AMD's "The first 64Bit PC" joke? Somehow, SGI's O² were also
> personal computers, standing at the individual workplace, and they were 64Bit
> untis, too.

Plenty of Alpha systems too, including some very cute tiny desktop units.
Those were of course also 64bit. :)

> So, I never would have thought that mis-selling is considered a fraudulent
> act, and accordingly, though understanding Luke's reaction, I didn't expect it
> and it felt ... Scary. Positively, so, but still, scary.
>
> After going over the layout and informations of the cubieboard I
> wholeheartedly agree that it has a LOT more value for education, permitting
> easy access both on software side ( Linux ) as well as the hardware side (
> clear access to various signals and buses ) thus providing more value for
> education on the proframming side by reinforcing it through support for
> education on the hardware side ( electronics, soldering, signal interfacing ,
> ... ) .

I am tempted to get one. Looks nice.

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[Paul Wise]

On Thu, Apr 11, 2013 at 7:26 AM, Paul Wise wrote:

> Here is a first pass, thoughts?
>
> http://wiki.debian.org/RaspberryPi

My first pass has been rewritten by wookey, it is now quite a bit
better. I plan to start linking to it when people ask RPi related
questions, hopefully everyone is ok with that.

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[u7l...@mail.lrz-muenchen.de]

Am 2013-04-15 18:27, schrieb Paul Wise:
>> http://wiki.debian.org/RaspberryPi
>
> My first pass has been rewritten by wookey, it is now quite a bit
> better. I plan to start linking to it when people ask RPi related
> questions, hopefully everyone is ok with that.

Great article. Apart from the IMHO rather fundamentalist discussion
about "openness",
the crippling issues with the USB implementation on the RPi might be
well worth mentioning
in that article. While being worked on, they are still far away from a
resolution, which
might never come for isochronous devices.

Regards, Richard

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[Paul Wise]

On Tue, Apr 16, 2013 at 3:22 PM, Richard wrote:

> the crippling issues with the USB implementation on the RPi might be well
> worth mentioning in that article.

I'm not aware of the details regarding that, could you add them to the
page? You'll need to register an account to edit the page if you don't
have one already.

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