Apple Open Sources iOS Kernel

#1

Post by tray5 » Sat, Sep 30, 2017, 3:48 AM UTC

Apple Open Sources iOS Kernel
github.com

Re: Apple Open Sources iOS Kernel

#2

Post by hardwaresofton » Sat, Sep 30, 2017, 4:02 AM UTC

How long has this been a thing? This seems huge, but I don't spend enough time in the iOS ecosystem to tell if this is just how it's been for months/years

Re: Apple Open Sources iOS Kernel

#3

Post by nemothekid » Sat, Sep 30, 2017, 4:04 AM UTC

hardwaresofton wrote: post #2

How long has this been a thing? This seems huge, but I don't spend enough time in the iOS ecosystem to tell if this is just how it's been for months/years

I'm pretty sure Darwin has been open source since forever - at least since 2003 according to Wiki. This is the first time I've seen it on GitHub rather than Apple's internal open source microsite (https://opensource.apple.com/)

Re: Apple Open Sources iOS Kernel

#4

Post by shams93 » Sat, Sep 30, 2017, 4:06 AM UTC

hardwaresofton wrote: post #2

How long has this been a thing? This seems huge, but I don't spend enough time in the iOS ecosystem to tell if this is just how it's been for months/years

This only dropped 2 days ago

Re: Apple Open Sources iOS Kernel

#5

Post by xenadu02 » Sat, Sep 30, 2017, 4:08 AM UTC

nemothekid wrote: post #3

hardwaresofton wrote: post #2

How long has this been a thing? This seems huge, but I don't spend enough time in the iOS ecosystem to tell if this is just how it's been for months/years

I'm pretty sure Darwin has been open source since forever - at least since 2003 according to Wiki. This is the first time I've seen it on GitHub rather than Apple's internal open source microsite ( https://opensource.apple.com/ )

This is correct. xnu/Darwin, libDispatch, the Objective-C runtime, and many other components have been on opensource.apple.com for years.

Re: Apple Open Sources iOS Kernel

#6

Post by dvogel » Sat, Sep 30, 2017, 4:09 AM UTC

hardwaresofton wrote: post #2

How long has this been a thing? This seems huge, but I don't spend enough time in the iOS ecosystem to tell if this is just how it's been for months/years

The Mach kernel has been open source since it's inception IIRC. The Apple extensions are real, but not the majority of the functionality.

Re: Apple Open Sources iOS Kernel

#7

Post by hardwaresofton » Sat, Sep 30, 2017, 4:11 AM UTC

shams93 wrote: post #4

hardwaresofton wrote: post #2

How long has this been a thing? This seems huge, but I don't spend enough time in the iOS ecosystem to tell if this is just how it's been for months/years

This only dropped 2 days ago

Hey so that was my first reaction, and then I thought better of it -- there's no way something this big could happen and not send ripples through the hacker (not cracker, hacker)/programmer/tech community.

Re: Apple Open Sources iOS Kernel

#8

Post by LeoNatan25 » Sat, Sep 30, 2017, 4:15 AM UTC

XNU has always been open source, but not the iOS specific changes. There have been private efforts to compile it for ARM, but this is now officially supported in the public Apple source code.

Re: Apple Open Sources iOS Kernel

#9

Post by kbumsik » Sat, Sep 30, 2017, 4:24 AM UTC

I think this title is misleading. Apple has open XNU for more than 10 years. And AFAIK this kernel does not include ARM compiling option, as the very first paragraph in the README:

> XNU runs on I386, X86_64

Re: Apple Open Sources iOS Kernel

#10

Post by nodesocket » Sat, Sep 30, 2017, 4:34 AM UTC

If they start taking PR's and merging in, that would be awesome. I'm sure there's lots to be optimized and improved.