Comment 382 for bug 1

Ubuntu is both a popular distribution and one that is relatively purist about Free Software.

Despite that, i couldn't find an *easy* way on any Ubuntu-related website, or anywhere on the web, to test whether a computer will work with Ubuntu without the need to use restricted drivers and firmware *before* i buy the computer.

Until now everything was an afterthought - for years i installed Linux after i bought the computer and all the time i ran into problems because there were no drivers at all or because there were no free drivers.

Now i want to test that a computer will be completely usable with only Free Software without binary blobs and proprietary firmware - but i couldn't find any sane way to do it without being a hardware guru, kernel hacker and master lspci decryptor.

I already looked at the gNewSense webpage ( http://wiki.gnewsense.org/Main/RecommendedHardware ) and FSF's Hardware compatibility page ( http://www.fsf.org/resources/hw/ ). Still too hard to decypher. I looked at a few "linux laptop compatibility" sites that i found on Google, but it didn't help - they are all a mess. I know that it is all a volunteer community effort, but i think that it is a problem.

I asked about it on some forums and mailing lists several times. Some people say "buy a Dell/System76" - well, at least some Dells and System76's use NVidia drivers, which are either non-Free or technically crippled. Some say "Google is your friend" - but no, in this case it is not: It is damn hard to check every single device and be sure that it has a free driver.

Some people say that i worry too much and that this matter is just not too important. I understand a few things about software, but i really don't claim to understand ALL of the technical implications of non-free drivers and firmware, so one could say that i listen to Richard Stallman's preaching about freedom too zealously; but i believe that this might be important to Ubuntu considering Mark Shuttleworth's announcement of the extra-free Gutsy Gibbon edition. Who will bother to try to install it, if it's too damn hard to find a properly free computer which can run it?

I know that this sounds very pretentious and i am not even close to being a notable member of the Ubuntu community, but i think that this is a bit of a meta-bug in itself and that the famous "Bug #1" cannot be fixed before this issue is addressed somehow.

Any ideas how can that be made easier?