Linux on ESP32 • Hacker News Board

Re: Linux on ESP32

#51

Post by yjftsjthsd-h » Sun, Aug 02, 2026, 9:58 PM UTC

grieferpig wrote: post #42

yjftsjthsd-h wrote: post #4

> In mainline linux, XIP support on RISC-V was removed, so 6.12 was used instead which has proper XIP support. Doesn't that put it in an awkward position relying on a dead end feature?

There are other ports that uses newer kernels (iirc annoyedmilk/esp32-s31-linux used 7.1). XIP saves me RAM, and on a device with 16mib ram I need to squeeze as much ram as possible. Besides I couldn't think of any use cases where you really need a newer kernel

I absolutely see the appeal for XIP here! I just have been sufficiently traumatized by Android devices that anything that breaks the ability to follow upstream makes me nervous. I'm sure it's workable here, both because this is a recent enough version that it'll be supported for a long time and because I expect it can be ported forward if really needed. (And of course, at this point it's not like this is a real production thing so as an experiment who cares.)

Re: Linux on ESP32

#52

Post by jagged-chisel » Mon, Aug 03, 2026, 1:49 AM UTC

NooneAtAll3 wrote: post #45

jagged-chisel wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is that a critical correction? Is a gender neutral pronoun somehow unacceptable?

it's plural

their, pronoun

2) a form of the possessive case of singular they used as an attributive adjective, before a noun.

a) (used to refer to a generic or unspecified person previously mentioned, about to be mentioned, or present in the immediate context): A parent should read to their child.

Re: Linux on ESP32

#53

Post by nunobrito » Mon, Aug 03, 2026, 7:12 AM UTC

Aurornis wrote: post #32

tyingq wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I also think an LLM isn't going to just spit this all out and viola, it boots. I imagine there were many rounds of jtag debug, copy/paste into the LLM prompt, with enough human knowledge/context to say the right thing, suggest some existing implementation snippet, etc.

> I imagine there were many rounds of jtag debug, copy/paste into the LLM prompt You may not be familiar with modern LLM tools. You don’t need to copy/paste anything. You can easily instruct your agent to access the serial port and JTAG debugger and it will easily handle it through subsessions. The tools have moved rapidly this year. Something like this is entirely doable by attaching the right cables, telling the ag…

I've been writing code by hand for 30 years and nowadays use LLM too for embedded and Android development among other stuff. It saves a lot of time and is amazing that it can debug multiple embedded devices connected to the computer far better than my doing it by myself.

There is certainly slop but it was always like this in software engineering, just that now is far easier for anyone to write code that runs on ESP32 which in my opinion was already quite easy in the past but frankly bothersome to get any complex project running.

I'm old enough to remember when other developers criticized heavily the usage of Turbo Pascal in the 90s because "it wasn't a real compiler" but reality is that it made software writing far easier and fun for a whole new generation of kids. It seems we are going through a similar wave, it will take time until this settles as a new tool.