While most people don't hack kernel code themselves, there is still value in promoting open source operating systems. A future in which Windows becomes popular on mobile/embedded devices is likely a future with more binary blobs, more OS-locked hardware, and fewer opportunities for those people who do want to hack on kernel code.
Windows 10 for Raspberry Pi 2
41–50 of 390 posts
Re: Windows 10 for Raspberry Pi 2
#42I would love to here the inside story here.
Based on my experience with Win7 and Win8, I expect that Win10 would have crawled (or not at all worked) with the slower CPU and smaller memory.
My guess would be that the Raspberry Pi 2 is, in fact, a Microsoft initiative rather than an RPi Foundation initiative - and that Microsoft have actually contributed significant funds to make this possible. Either way, that is good for the community - I don't have a problem with Microsoft financing my stuff as long as it does not come with any strings attached (which, I trust the RPi foundation to have insisted on).
Pure speculation, of course - but I'm sure we'll hear a lot more about this deal.
Re: Windows 10 for Raspberry Pi 2
#43I am usually not the one to blow the free software horn (being a staunch believer of non-copyleft licenses such as the Apache License) and the geek in me likes this announcement. I also don't hold a grudge against Windows, I think it is a fine system for most people. However, Windows seems very much contrary to the goal of the Raspberry Pi: providing a device for children to tinker with and educate themselves. Althou…
"Windows seems very much contrary to the goal of the Raspberry Pi: providing a device for children to tinker with and educate themselves" "Windows is closed as ever" Are these kids hacking on the Linux kernel or something? Of course not. They will be using some app/language running on the OS. They don't need access to the OS source to do that. Seems to me Windows is a perfectly open enough OS to act as a platform for…
There have been quite a few projects that did hack the kernel and drivers directly.
The majority of users are actually running XBMC on the Pi, and they don't care if it's linux or windows. But the early adopters do care, and they are all Linux people.
Re: Windows 10 for Raspberry Pi 2
#44I am usually not the one to blow the free software horn (being a staunch believer of non-copyleft licenses such as the Apache License) and the geek in me likes this announcement. I also don't hold a grudge against Windows, I think it is a fine system for most people. However, Windows seems very much contrary to the goal of the Raspberry Pi: providing a device for children to tinker with and educate themselves. Althou…
"Windows seems very much contrary to the goal of the Raspberry Pi: providing a device for children to tinker with and educate themselves" "Windows is closed as ever" Are these kids hacking on the Linux kernel or something? Of course not. They will be using some app/language running on the OS. They don't need access to the OS source to do that. Seems to me Windows is a perfectly open enough OS to act as a platform for…
Are these kids hacking on the Linux kernel or something? Of course not. They will be using some app/language running on the OS. They don't need access to the OS source to do that.
I even mentioned libc. There is more to an operating system than a kernel.
In fact, this was an important part of my early computer education: when I was 12 (1994) I bought a copy of Slackware Linux because it had a free compiler (even Turbo Pascal was expensive for a 12 year-old).
At the beginning I just typed some small C snippets that I could find in books in the library. Then I started reading shell scripts and found out that a lot of the system is controlled through shell scripts and started writing my own. Then I started reading through the source code of libraries to find out how things were implemented.
At some point I got a Minix book (I was probably 16) at a discount at a book store. I started comparing the theory I read there and tried to find out how e.g. the Linux VMM differed from Minix.
Don't underestimate how important it is for a kid to have access to such information. Only a small subset dive deeply into the system, but they will be the hackers of the future. But you have to awaken the interest by making easy to dive in.
They will be using some app/language running on the OS. They don't need access to the OS source to do that.
I think you underestimate how important access to the OS (in the widest sense) has been to the success of everyone from Google, Dropbox, and Facebook to the newest of startups.
Re: Windows 10 for Raspberry Pi 2
#45I am usually not the one to blow the free software horn (being a staunch believer of non-copyleft licenses such as the Apache License) and the geek in me likes this announcement. I also don't hold a grudge against Windows, I think it is a fine system for most people. However, Windows seems very much contrary to the goal of the Raspberry Pi: providing a device for children to tinker with and educate themselves. Althou…
They will surely open up their core as well when they see how much good open source is doing to dot net. Satya is a smart man.
Re: Windows 10 for Raspberry Pi 2
#46It's nice to see Microsoft cares. OTOH part of the attraction of the RPi for me is that people freely share their knowledge, code and cool hacks. Adding a humongous blob of unmodifiable software doesn't really align with any of that. In the best case people will shun this, in the worst case it could harm the culture.
I could be wrong, but doesn't the raspberry pi require a humongous blob of unmodifiable binaries to run even linux? From what I understood, a number of hardware components are have closed source drivers and such, that made many dislike the entire platform
The Raspberry Pi requires nonfree software to start up. It can't reach the point of executing free software unless this nonfree program is part of the installed system software: https://www.fsf.org/resources/hw/single-board-computers
Re: Windows 10 for Raspberry Pi 2
#47I am usually not the one to blow the free software horn (being a staunch believer of non-copyleft licenses such as the Apache License) and the geek in me likes this announcement. I also don't hold a grudge against Windows, I think it is a fine system for most people. However, Windows seems very much contrary to the goal of the Raspberry Pi: providing a device for children to tinker with and educate themselves. Althou…
"Windows seems very much contrary to the goal of the Raspberry Pi: providing a device for children to tinker with and educate themselves" "Windows is closed as ever" Are these kids hacking on the Linux kernel or something? Of course not. They will be using some app/language running on the OS. They don't need access to the OS source to do that. Seems to me Windows is a perfectly open enough OS to act as a platform for…
Plus, it's just another _option_. How can this possibly be a bad thing? You can of course still run Linux.
Re: Windows 10 for Raspberry Pi 2
#48Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm fairly sure that most RPi users neither modify the OS that their device is running or even look at the source code. The community-led innovation mainly happens higher up the stack, and in the hardware add-on space, and I don't see how Windows on RPi would change that. Windows on RPi is unlikely to ever be mainstream, so anyone using Windows-specific features on software would have to accept that their code would…
> Meta: Why all the anti-MS cynicism on the threads for this topic? Isn't it kind of old now? I feel bad when I have the "anti-MS" feeling. I truly do; I feel like I'm being over-simplistic, I feel that I'm being prejudiced... Well, you get the point. However, you can't really say this is "kind of old". "Embrace, extend and extinguish" practices are recent, even considering the short "horizons" in IT. And, after the…
"finding these MS initiatives a lot like "hangin' with the cool kids" or "sounding hip"."
This announcement is undoubtedly partly publicity-driven. But its also about keeping Windows visible and relevant to groups who may not use PCs much. And if the RPi does become the standard IoT hardware platform, then Microsoft will want a bit of that too.
And embrace, extend, extinguish makes no sense in a community-driven ecosystem. MS knows that.
Re: Windows 10 for Raspberry Pi 2
#49Earlier quoted context omitted.
Because Embrace, Extend, Extinguish is older than dirt. Microsoft had a long habit of adopting public standards, adding proprietary extensions, and then smothering the standard by making their extensions intentionally obtuse and hard to interoperate with. I don't honestly see how they could do such with the Pi, but I'm honestly not awful enough to see all the nasty possibilities. From a different perspective: As some…
> From a different perspective: As someone who until recently lived in Washington, Microsoft's management stack hasn't changed. It is still a very Sales-driven organization, with very little leeway given to Engineering to drive things that are useful, interesting, or innovative. You say you lived in Washington, are you implying you were a Microsoft employee? Seems from everyone I'm hearing from that they've been maki…
No, my reasons for leaving WA are completely unrelated to Microsoft's layoffs. And, despite being in the Seattle area for nearly 10 years, I never did work for them. I just knew a bunch of people who did. Sure, it's getting stirred up there, but most of the layoffs were low-level, contract, vendor, and new-hire employees. From what I have heard, the management structure has had a power struggle, but it was between two camps of the good old boys, and the new boss is the same as the old boss.
Re: Windows 10 for Raspberry Pi 2
#50Earlier quoted context omitted.
"Windows seems very much contrary to the goal of the Raspberry Pi: providing a device for children to tinker with and educate themselves" "Windows is closed as ever" Are these kids hacking on the Linux kernel or something? Of course not. They will be using some app/language running on the OS. They don't need access to the OS source to do that. Seems to me Windows is a perfectly open enough OS to act as a platform for…
Plus, it's just another _option_. How can this possibly be a bad thing? You can of course still run Linux.
I think this was answered. It's bad because teachers would push for a platform they presumably know more about -- Windows.