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A comment on Do I really need to get out the soldering-iron again?. Parent comment

Re:Do I really need to get out the soldering-iron again? by icebraining on Sunday December 09, 2018 @11:31AM (#18641642)
So if I make a proprietary application that only runs on, say, Ubuntu, does that mean GNU/Linux is no longer really free, since you can't replace your distro with Arch without losing access to my application?
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Re:Do I really need to get out the soldering-iron again? by jstanley on Sunday December 09, 2018 @11:33AM (#18641669)
If your application is an intrinsic part of pretty much every GNU/Linux system, then yeah, pretty much.

It's not GNU/Linux that's not free, but it makes it hard to use a GNU/Linux system that is free.

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Re:Do I really need to get out the soldering-iron again? by jjeaff on Sunday December 09, 2018 @02:35PM (#18642769)
Play store is not a requirement. You can use f-droid or something similar and it has most everything you might need.
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Re:Do I really need to get out the soldering-iron again? by jstanley on Sunday December 09, 2018 @02:50PM (#18642861)
I know, and I do. In fact I don't have play services installed at all.

Unfortunately most people consider the play store to be a necessity, so its non-free nature is a problem.

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Re:Do I really need to get out the soldering-iron again? by notacoward on Sunday December 09, 2018 @11:41AM (#18641719)
> does that mean GNU/Linux is no longer really free

I'd say it's a bit of a different situation, since the two are not being designed to work together and aren't even being developed by the same people. If the Ubuntu developers made your proprietary app key to the useful running of the system, which is the more exact analogy, then I'd say yeah, they would have made it non-free.

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Re:Do I really need to get out the soldering-iron again? by icebraining on Sunday December 09, 2018 @11:43AM (#18641727)
What app is key to the useful running of Android and that refuses to run on a modified system?
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