If the screenshot at https://pureos.net/ is to be believed, the web browser uses duckduckgo.com as its search engine serves proprietary JavaScripts.
It is possible to replace this with https://duckduckgo.com/lite/, or a different search engine or program altogether.
NB! This issue is not about promoted search engine tracking its users (see T156) nor about server-executed code being non-free (see T110).
| Status | Assigned | Task | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Open | None | T673 firefox-esr - default search engine is not perfect | ||
| Open | None | T609 firefox-esr - links to search engine which loads non-free JavaScript |
https://tracker.pureos.net/T156
Inside it, click on the yellow or orange box to see older changes...
PureOS does not contain the web pages of duckduckgo.com but do indeed currently link to that website.
It seems this is a duplicate of issue T110 - please check and if not then please clarify in what way you consider this different
It seems to me that the issue here is the question of the licensing status of JavaScript loaded by DuckDuckGo.
To my knowledge, there is no privacy-respecting search engine that has 100% free and available code after FindX died, and I don't expect any of the respectable search providers (DDG, Qwant, Startpage/Ixquick) to have LibreJS labels for whatever code is free, any time soon at least.
What I would favor is an approach where we have a trusted partner with privacy-respecting search, and try to work with them to make sure we don't execute non-free code in the browser on Librem devices (it likely means DuckDuckGo or Qwant "lite" versions). If we can get those LibreJS labels, that would be great, but will likely require diplomacy.
If there are other search alternatives, feel free to let us know about them and we can consider them. Please don't consider Searx... there are likely possibilities there for the future, but as of right now it is not a viable option (far too nascent of a project and results are not very good yet).
After giving the opportunity for some more discussion here, I think this should be marked "Wontfix" or "Invalid".
Ah, right.
Even if this was meant (also) as a duplicate of T110, we can reuse it to track (only) the related issue of avoiding Javascript not Free licensed.
This issue is now about PureBrowser linking to DuckDuckGo non-free JavaScript.
For related issues (no matter if those were previously discussed as part of this issue) please discuss those in other issues already reported (e.g. T110 and T156) or file new issues if you cannot locate the issue as already reported.
NB! Please when filing issues describe as topic the *issue* (not the proposed fix for it).
@sean.obrien I now clarified scopes of issues T110 and T156, and here.
Please feel free to elaborate on your opinions on switching to a different search engine at the issue you consider more appropriate - or create a new issue if the _reason_ for such change is not privacy nor server-side licensing nor JavaScript licensing.