Topic: Evil plans or not?

[Nemesis]

Link to full article

Is Microsoft using a next-generation computing boot-loading technology to lock out the use of Linux and other OSEs on certain computers? While Microsoft has denied malicious intent, one Red Hat developer maintains that this may be the case.

With Windows 8, Microsoft will require hardware manufacturers (those wishing to display the Windows logo on their units) to ship their machines with secure boot enabled. Each machine would then require a digital key from Microsoft, the hardware manufacturer or, if it uses another OS, a secure key for that OS.

Responding to the controversy on Thursday, Microsoft has denied that the intent was to shut out Linux. Although he did not mention Linux by name, Steven Sinofsky, president of the Windows and Windows Live Division, noted in a blog post that some of those commenting have used details of the new plan to "synthesize scenarios that are not the case."

"Microsoft's rebuttal is entirely factually accurate. But it's also misleading," Garrett responded in a follow-up blog item, posted Friday. Under the licensing agreement, the equipment manufacturer is under no obligation to provide users with the ability to disable the secure boot capability.

[Bonk]

That's OK. The 1000MHz PIII system I built in 1999 running QNX or Slackware still outperforms anything produced since. Even these multi-core monsters cannot compete under the weight of Vista+ Windows operating systems.

Alternatively: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_open_source_hardware_projects#CPU

What Microsoft does now is irrelevant. It has been for some time actually. They design their OS for 4 year olds. You'd think that would be Fisher Price's department, but Microsoft has decided to go down that road, and therefore are of little if any commercial or scientific use.

Evil? Maybe. Irrelevant? Definitely.

[Nemesis]

I did come upon this quote on the topic:

Boot Options:

"Secure Boot" allows you to boot a signed but insecure Operating System.

"Insecure Boot" allows you to boot an unsigned but secure OS.

[Nemesis]

Link to full article

Journalist Glyn Moody dug around Microsoft’s Windows Hardware Certification Requirements for Windows 8 client and server systems and found on page 116 that will Windows 8 Secure Boot can be disabled: on Intel systems, “Disabling Secure [Boot] must not be possible on ARM systems.”

What does that mean? According to Aaron Williamson, a lawyer with the Software Freedom Law Center an organization that provides pro-bono legal services to developers of Free and open-source software, Microsoft has wasted no time in effectively banning most alternative operating systems on ARM-based devices that ship with Windows 8.

[Nemesis]

I just came upon a 6 year old posting of mine that matches this topic:

The other is getting all the major motherboard makers to change the BIOS in a way that requires an "signed and authorized" OS to boot.  Only a commercial Linux could have the signature and the open development model would be screwed over.

I was pointing out two ways to stop Linux.