Linux-libre

Linux-libre (/ˈlɪnəks ˈliːbrə/) is an operating system kernel and a GNU package that is maintained from modified versions of the Linux kernel. The aim of the project is to remove from the Linux kernel any software that does not include its source code, has its source code obfuscated, or is released under proprietary licenses.

The parts that have no source code are called binary blobs and are mostly proprietary firmware which, while generally redistributable, do not give the user the freedom to audit, modify or thus redistribute modified versions of them.

History

The Linux kernel started to include binary blobs in 1996. The work to clear out the binary blobs began in 2006 with gNewSense's find-firmware and gen-kernel. This work was taken further by the BLAG Linux distribution in 2007 with deblob and Linux-libre was born.

Linux-libre was first released by the Free Software Foundation Latin America (FSFLA), then endorsed by the Free Software Foundation (FSF) as a valuable component for the totally free Linux distributions. It became a GNU package on March 2012.Alexandre Oliva is the project maintainer.