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posted by Fnord666 on Monday March 08 2021, @10:36PM   Printer-friendly
from the same-old-M$ dept.

Developer Gavin L Rebeiro has posted[*see note below] a five-part article series at Techrights on how to deal with the ongoing Raspberry Pi fiasco by salvaging existing hardware with a replacement operating system.

He covers the background, the technical principles, some methods for mitigation, proposes using NetBSD in place of the GNU/Linux, Raspberry Pi OS. Finally, he walks through installation of NetBSD.

We don't want to be spied on; what happens when we're faced with an operating system that spies on people? We throw it in the trash where it belongs! I am boycotting the Raspberry Spy myself (you're free to join me in doing so) but I don't want people to waste hardware that they already have. So we're going to walk through an interesting path of installing a different operating system on the Raspberry Spy; I want to show you a few things that will empower you to take greater control over your computing.

We'll gently walk through and explore the following: how to install an operating system on an embedded device (a Raspberry Spy, in this case) over a USB-to-UART bridge (UTUB). This is the main project we've got on our hands. Don't worry if you've never touched embedded systems before; everything here is accessible to people with a modest set of prerequisite knowledge and some basic apparatus.

We'll delve into things with more depth as we move forward with our project; if you don't understand something when you first encounter it, just keep reading.

NetBSD might be a bit of a leap for some, so it should be noted that there are other GNU/Linux distros for the Raspberry Pi which do not include the problems addressed above.

The focus of the series is on individual privacy, but a parallel threat exists for institutions because, after the recent changes, any use of Raspberrry Pi OS will show up at their most hostile competitor, Microsoft. The company has had a do-not-lose-to-Linux-at-any-cost attitude for decades and has various slush funds available to fund attacks. EDGI was one such program which did a lot of damage around the world and has been described in fair detail in the Comes v Microsoft case.

[* Ed's Note (2021-03-12): The author has let us know that his original article is available as a PDF, as techrights' version wasn't faithful. -- FP]

Previously:
(2021) Raspberry Pi Users Mortified as Microsoft Repository that Phones Home is Added to Pi OS


Original Submission

 
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  • (Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 09 2021, @01:25AM (4 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 09 2021, @01:25AM (#1121578)

    That makes you as stupid as the author of the article, in that you're conflating the hardware with the software they supply to go with it. You've always had the opportunity to run an alternate OS, and still do. The author even acknowledges this, as the article is about *running an alternate OS*. I used raspian for about 10 minutes before realising it was worse than debian, so ditched it instantly. And when debian became worse than prior debian, I ditched that for devuan, which runs fine on all my Pis now.

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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 09 2021, @02:31AM (2 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 09 2021, @02:31AM (#1121602)

    You've always had the opportunity to run an alternate OS, and still do.

    Until Microsoft finds the one Ring, the one to gather them all, and in the darkness bind them.
    In the land of Redmond, where the shadows lie.

    We have the opportunity, but it is not from a lack of effort by the aspiring software monopoly that is Microsoft. FUD? Assimiliation? OEM exclusive contracts? Why can I not, at this late stage, buy a "naked" laptop, and why do I have go through hoops just to disable UEFI, so my other OS will even boot? Microsoft has earned my undying hatred, forever.

    • (Score: 2) by hendrikboom on Tuesday March 09 2021, @02:48AM (1 child)

      by hendrikboom (1125) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday March 09 2021, @02:48AM (#1121605) Homepage Journal

      Purism laptops are pretty close to naked.
      They even have the Intel Management Engine disabled by default.

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 10 2021, @03:45AM

        by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 10 2021, @03:45AM (#1122131)

        The mention security but use Intel processors. That's a big 'nope' right there.

  • (Score: 2) by VLM on Wednesday March 10 2021, @01:08PM

    by VLM (445) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday March 10 2021, @01:08PM (#1122241)

    I ditched that for devuan, which runs fine on all my Pis now.

    Its not super well documented; actually thats sarcastic, its barely documented it all. You can't toss that kind of quote out there without more details, sounds pretty interesting.

    FreeBSD on Pi is pretty well documented and worked for me.