Deleting existing non-`linux-firmware` firmware (`rsync --delete`) could mess everything up

[q3aql]

Deleting existing non-`linux-firmware` firmware (`rsync --delete`) could mess everything up

[q3aql]

When you use symbolic links, if the files are named the same as another package, it conflicts and cannot be installed (that is the conflict you are referring to). For that reason, you cannot use symbolic links.

If you add any extra firmware, you must copy it to "/opt/drivers-linux-firmware/" as indicated in the README. You also don't have to use this package if you don't want to. You can simply download the linux-firmware files yourself, put them in manually and check that they are not overwritten with a system update 😉 😘

[Rongronggg9]

Thanks for your effort.

Still, I think solving the installation problem by using a postinst to override all existing firmware later is more like "acting as an ostrich that buries its head in the sand" rather than "not to conflict with other packages".

If you have to remove all existing firmware, writing Conflicts in the control file at least let users know "oh, my existing firmware will be gone!" But current behavior just doing this silently, without any warning or informing. README said, "If you want to add new modules, firmwares or drivers, they should ...", but please, my existing firmware is not something new to add! It also said, "all files will be synced to the /lib/firmware/ directory", "syncing files" does not equal "syncing their parent folder", right? Thus, even after reading the README carefully, one can hardly understand the fact that their existing non-conflict firmware will be gone after installing those packages from this repo.

Searching for source packages of non-free firmware in the Debian Bullseye repository, you will get 8 results, in which one is firmware-nonfree (linux-firmware). The remaining 7 source packages, which are non-linux-firmware, build 8 binary packages. That is to say, at least those firmware from the 8 packages will be unnecessarily deleted by your package. The reason why I use firmware-sof-signed as an example is that almost all recent notebooks with Intel processors and digital microphones need it to make their sound cards fully work (ref: https://thesofproject.github.io/latest/getting_started/intel_debug/introduction.html).

I am not complaining about this project and of course I know how to use the upstream repository. But I sincerely suggest you, to be more responsible, either not delete existing non-conflict firmware (still I don't understand why deleting them is a must), or give users enough warning both in the README and preinst.