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0 pointsmiki12321123d ago0 comments

There's at least:

source available - whether you can read the code

open source - whether you can run (a modified version of) the code on some piece of hardware you own

open hardware - whether the hardware they sell you lets you run modified versions of their code

open contribution - whether they want your modifications

free software - whether your modifications have to be open source too

If it's at least source available, it can have any combination of these.

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3 comments · 3 top-level

yencabulator23d ago

Your definition of free software conflicts with the FSF's:

https://www.gnu.org/licenses/license-list.html#SoftwareLicen...

https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html

nwah123d ago

open hardware to me means that you have access to all of the specifications for building the hardware. Things like when the laptop company Framework posts github repos full of CAD models. Or, initiatives like RISC V.

And, alongside that, there's also open firmware.

Unlocked hardware is maybe what I would call hardware that enables swapping out the software. Although, historically, we didn't even need a term for that, because that was the default aside from outliers like Apple.

JacobKfromIRC23d ago

I think your definition of "free software" is too strict, otherwise public domain software would not be free software

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