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Bringing the Android kernel back to the mainline

lwn.net

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Re: Bringing the Android kernel back to the mainline

#11

Post by izacus »

rsre wrote: post #9
craftyguy wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not clear what you are curious about. You can run GNU/Linux with out of tree modules (e.g. proprietary nvidia graphics driver). That doesn't change the fact that you're running a (now probably tainted) Linux kernel. I don't think anyone is thinking of a GNU/Linux desktop environment when they think "Android runs Linux!", they are quite literally thinking "Android uses the Linux kernel." They are not wrong.

Of course. I wasn't talking about the population of HN, I mean it in a broader sense, people who know GNU/Linux is a thing but don't know or care enough to realise the differences. I'm curious about what is there to celebrate in some huge corp using some free software in a completely cornered use that gives little to no freedom to its users. I'm sorry if my points are not clear. As it has been evidenced english is no…

> I'm curious about what is there to celebrate in some huge corp using some free software in a completely cornered use that gives little to no freedom to its users.

Huge amount of money poured into development of said opensource software - including the patches in the article you're commenting on.

Major opensource projects are (and have for years) receiving most contributions from developers in Microsoft, Google, Intel, RedHat, Pivotal, and many others.

Re: Bringing the Android kernel back to the mainline

#12

Post by pedrocr »

When I buy a laptop I install whatever is the latest version of Ubuntu on it and am done. When I buy an access point I install whatever is the latest version of OpenWrt on it and am done. I've tried to do the same thing with phones using LineageOS but it's hopeless. Devices are often half broken and are never guaranteed to continue being supported because of this kernel mess. It seems there's slow progress being made which is nice. I was hoping Android One phones would at least guarantee monthly security updates but it's still up to the manufacturer if that happens or not.

Re: Bringing the Android kernel back to the mainline

#13

Post by craftyguy »

rsre wrote: post #9
craftyguy wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not clear what you are curious about. You can run GNU/Linux with out of tree modules (e.g. proprietary nvidia graphics driver). That doesn't change the fact that you're running a (now probably tainted) Linux kernel. I don't think anyone is thinking of a GNU/Linux desktop environment when they think "Android runs Linux!", they are quite literally thinking "Android uses the Linux kernel." They are not wrong.

Of course. I wasn't talking about the population of HN, I mean it in a broader sense, people who know GNU/Linux is a thing but don't know or care enough to realise the differences. I'm curious about what is there to celebrate in some huge corp using some free software in a completely cornered use that gives little to no freedom to its users. I'm sorry if my points are not clear. As it has been evidenced english is no…

Ah, I see your point. I suppose there are folks who know GNU/Linux is a thing, but don't understand the distinction between "it uses a Linux kernel" and "it uses a Linux kernel and gnu-friendly environment." In which case they would wrongly equate Android == Linux == GNU/Linux.

> As it has been evidenced english is not my first language.

No problem, I'd say that your English seems great, better than some native English speakers I know. English is my first language and it's easy for me to be unclear :D

Re: Bringing the Android kernel back to the mainline

#15

Post by bubblethink »

craftyguy wrote: post #7
yjftsjthsd-h wrote: post #3

Nice to see that progress is being made on upstreaming the Android patches. Hopefully this will make it easier for ex. postmarketOS to work using a vanilla kernel, or at least to update the version used.

While hacking on postmarketOS off and on for the last year, the #1 issue was always dealing with crappy old kernels from manufacturers with out of tree patches that would no longer apply to the current mainline. Unfortunately this problem will still exist with the proposal in the article, manufacturers will still be allowed to ship out of tree code. Being able to boot a mainline kernel on your device is practically u…

There was some other news about the display side of things. https://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=Pixel-3-...

Re: Bringing the Android kernel back to the mainline

#16

Post by ChristianBundy »

craftyguy wrote: post #7
yjftsjthsd-h wrote: post #3

Nice to see that progress is being made on upstreaming the Android patches. Hopefully this will make it easier for ex. postmarketOS to work using a vanilla kernel, or at least to update the version used.

While hacking on postmarketOS off and on for the last year, the #1 issue was always dealing with crappy old kernels from manufacturers with out of tree patches that would no longer apply to the current mainline. Unfortunately this problem will still exist with the proposal in the article, manufacturers will still be allowed to ship out of tree code. Being able to boot a mainline kernel on your device is practically u…

This is even an issue with Chromebooks from Google (e.g. Chromebook Pixel 2015). Sure, it "runs Linux", but how useful is that if you can't put any other distro on it? After a few years we finally got all of the Chromebook-specific patches pushed to mainline Linux, but Google doesn't seem to care about mainline at all.

Re: Bringing the Android kernel back to the mainline

#17

Post by corbet »

bubblethink wrote: post #14

I'll believe that real progress has been made when google updates the major kernel version for a phone. No OEM (AFAIK) has ever done a kernel (major version) bump.

The Galaxy S and Galaxy Nexus both got major version bumps. Old history at this point, but it does show that this can happen... (https://lwn.net/Articles/738225/)

Re: Bringing the Android kernel back to the mainline

#19

Post by qubex »

As soon as I read the title I started to wonder what (if anything) this means for Fuchsia. At first I thought “oh, they’re doubling down on Linux-powered Android and that in turn means they’ll be setting Fuchsia aside” to “ah, adding a HAL to the Linux kernel and reproducing it’s interfaces elsewhere is a great way to enable proprietary devices to switch OSes”. Does anybody more knowledgeable in the matter have other thoughts?

Re: Bringing the Android kernel back to the mainline

#20

Post by fffrantz »

bubblethink wrote: post #14

I'll believe that real progress has been made when google updates the major kernel version for a phone. No OEM (AFAIK) has ever done a kernel (major version) bump.

Honestly, it's extremely difficult to update the kernel since it's usually tied to the BSP the SoC vendor is providing. Also, you gotta keep in mind the difficulties associated with the lazy 3rd parties providing drivers for a single kernel version, making updates almost impossible. -- Disclosure : I work for an OEM as a system architect, and it's been one of my goals to try and get newer kernel versions running. (Suffice to say I failed so far)
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