Microsoft tries to block Linux off Windows 8 PCs

[Lennart Sorensen]

On Wed, Sep 21, 2011 at 06:13:46PM -0400, Ted wrote:
> i didn't realize that UEFI would mean that vendors would have to
> have signatures.

UEFI version 2.3 has an optional feature called 'secure boot'.
Microsoft says that to get a 'Windows 8 Compatible' logo on your box,
it must have UEFI and support secure boot.

UEFI has been around for years without this new feature.  It's just a
new optional feature that Microsoft would like to see made standard.

> Well seems to me if linux distro signatures can't be introduced to
> allow linux to dual boot,
> the HW manufactures would essentially be closing the HW off to only
> new windows,
> which is highly illegal, so why would MS do something like that?
> There isn't even your standard very corrupt (corporate) court in US
> that would allow it.

If they give you a "BIOS" option (well UEFI option) to disable the
optional secure boot, then you can just turn it off and not worry about
binaries being signed or not.  Better yet if it DOES support the end
user somehow adding there own key (and the secure boot spec certainly
has a method for doing that as long as you have the original key that
is added to the machine first), then you can actually use it to prevent
booting a bootloader you didn't personally sign, or at least one not
signed by a key you chose to add to the secure boot key list.

> It would be like saying you buy a ford, they only allow Goodyear
> tires on it,
> yet other tires are all proven acceptable.
> I would think the only way this is going to fly is if the HW vendors
> also , through what ever process,
> allow linux, sun, ESX, etc, to run via some security signing.
> Even if US courts allowed it , MS would be finished in Europe, 0 new
> sales, doesn't sound like a good idea to me (for MS).

I suspect lack of implementation details so far is what is making this
sensational.

-- 
Len Sorensen
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