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Warning: 2016 MacBook Pro is not compatible with Linux

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Re: Warning: 2016 MacBook Pro is not compatible with Linux

#111

Post by dogma1138 »

_0w8t wrote: post #93
cookiecaper wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Several Linux kernel committers use a MacBook as their primary device. I've run Linux on a MacBook for years at a time and it worked fine. There may be some extra complication involved in getting Linux working well on a MacBook (and typically this is only true for the first several months until drivers are updated and integrated upstream), but it's certainly not a "laughably naive" endeavor. It works fine after some…

Presently one can use MacBook 2015-2016 on Linux only with an external keyboard/mouse. The progress with driver has been made, but it is far from there.

Doesn't the 2015 mac comes with a USB mode for the keyboard for the UEFI interface?

Re: Warning: 2016 MacBook Pro is not compatible with Linux

#112

Post by ndesaulniers »

mjg59 wrote: post #97

The three primary issues here are: 1) The input devices are on SPI, not USB. Apple's ACPI tables don't provide the GPIO mappings for these things via the standard mechanisms, so the chipset driver won't bind. You then still need another driver for the SPI controller, and there's an out of tree one at https://github.com/cb22/macbook12-spi-driver/ . Longer term, the kernel needs to be able to parse Apple's ACPI tables…

Thanks for the link to the WIP driver. Since you have a lot of experience in this area, I'm curious:

1. What's the __1e6 alignment? [0] I've never heard of that.

2. How is the driver author going about writing that driver? Some of the comments seem to allude to analyzing what the Windows driver is doing. Do you think they're disassembling the Windows driver and trying to re-implement a Linux compatible driver in C? I don't see how anyone could implement a driver like this off the bat without some data sheet or existing code to look at.

Edit: thanks to people pointing out it's __le16, not __1e6. I need to change my font; even now I can barely tell the 1 and l apart.

[0] https://github.com/cb22/macbook12-spi-driver/blob/master/app...

Re: Warning: 2016 MacBook Pro is not compatible with Linux

#113

Post by DannyBee »

ndesaulniers wrote: post #112
mjg59 wrote: post #97

The three primary issues here are: 1) The input devices are on SPI, not USB. Apple's ACPI tables don't provide the GPIO mappings for these things via the standard mechanisms, so the chipset driver won't bind. You then still need another driver for the SPI controller, and there's an out of tree one at https://github.com/cb22/macbook12-spi-driver/ . Longer term, the kernel needs to be able to parse Apple's ACPI tables…

Thanks for the link to the WIP driver. Since you have a lot of experience in this area, I'm curious: 1. What's the __1e6 alignment? [0] I've never heard of that. 2. How is the driver author going about writing that driver? Some of the comments seem to allude to analyzing what the Windows driver is doing. Do you think they're disassembling the Windows driver and trying to re-implement a Linux compatible driver in C? I…

it's not 1e6, it's le16

Little endian 16 bit

As for the driver itself, the spi interfaces are not too hard to understand. It's unlikely anyone is disassembling anything.

The normal way to figure out the packets the touchpad uses are to look at the datasheets/etc you can find on whoever made the touchpad.

In this case, it's a bcm5974, and if you look at that driver, you'll see the packet format is the same.

Otherwise, you write a packet dumper and start pushing things

Re: Warning: 2016 MacBook Pro is not compatible with Linux

#114

Post by Figs »

voidlogic wrote: post #89
vardump wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Operating system doesn't matter much when the malware is in BIOS or firmware code.

>Operating system doesn't matter much when the malware is in BIOS or firmware code. Are you insinuating that was the case here? Source please, I'd be interested to read about that.

Here are three news articles on what happened:

http://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2015/08/lenovo...

http://www.techrepublic.com/article/windows-and-uefi-anti-th...

http://www.pcworld.com/article/2969365/security/lenovos-serv...

This should really only affect Windows systems as far as I know -- Windows is running an executable stored in the firmware at boot (a rather dubious feature, in my opinion, but it's intended as an anti-theft measure). Lenovo used that feature to try to circumvent removal of their crapware when someone reinstalls the OS.

Re: Warning: 2016 MacBook Pro is not compatible with Linux

#115

Post by mwambua »

mjg59 wrote: post #97

The three primary issues here are: 1) The input devices are on SPI, not USB. Apple's ACPI tables don't provide the GPIO mappings for these things via the standard mechanisms, so the chipset driver won't bind. You then still need another driver for the SPI controller, and there's an out of tree one at https://github.com/cb22/macbook12-spi-driver/ . Longer term, the kernel needs to be able to parse Apple's ACPI tables…

Tangential Question: Would you say that Thinkpads are still the safest bet if you're looking for good RHEL/Fedora support & updates?

Re: Warning: 2016 MacBook Pro is not compatible with Linux

#116

Post by nikatwork »

cpncrunch wrote: post #64

To be honest I'm not sure why you'd really want to do that. For a developer OS X gives you everything that linux offers that you would need, with the advantage of a better GUI. I only ever use linux on servers these days. OS X is a much more usable client-side OS for a variety of reasons.

> gives you everything that linux offers that you would need

Homebrew is dope, but it's still a bolted-on package manager. I also hate hate hate that Apple have removed the ability to theme the OSX UI (RIP Flavours). If I'm going to stare at my dev screen all day it should look how I want it to.

Re: Warning: 2016 MacBook Pro is not compatible with Linux

#117

Post by jonknee »

givinguflac wrote: post #34
micaksica wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While Macs have fantastic build quality, there are now premium-level PCs that are catching up to it. The new EliteBook Folio is a Core M-powered, Thunderbolt-containing replacement for the 12" MacBook (not Pro); the Razer series appear to be built just as well as Macs from my time with them hands-on as well. Personally, I don't care so much about "build quality" in terms of materials used. If the hardware works I'm h…

It may be fine, but the disk speeds on the latest Macs are amazing. There is no laptop that matches that I'm aware of.

Umm, they're using PCIe SSDs so you can just go get another laptop with one. Like this ASUS: http://amzn.to/2eGg2KM

> 512GB SSD with transfer speeds of 1400MB/s and 16GB DDR4 RAM

Re: Warning: 2016 MacBook Pro is not compatible with Linux

#118

Post by detaro »

ndesaulniers wrote: post #112
mjg59 wrote: post #97

The three primary issues here are: 1) The input devices are on SPI, not USB. Apple's ACPI tables don't provide the GPIO mappings for these things via the standard mechanisms, so the chipset driver won't bind. You then still need another driver for the SPI controller, and there's an out of tree one at https://github.com/cb22/macbook12-spi-driver/ . Longer term, the kernel needs to be able to parse Apple's ACPI tables…

Thanks for the link to the WIP driver. Since you have a lot of experience in this area, I'm curious: 1. What's the __1e6 alignment? [0] I've never heard of that. 2. How is the driver author going about writing that driver? Some of the comments seem to allude to analyzing what the Windows driver is doing. Do you think they're disassembling the Windows driver and trying to re-implement a Linux compatible driver in C? I…

1.) It is __le16 with an L, not __1e16, and it means that it is a little endian field for bitflags, the tooling makes sure it is properly handled (not mixed with numbers or fields in the wrong endianess). See this Stack Overflow post and especially the links in the accepted answer: https://stackoverflow.com/questions/9680399/what-does-typede...

Re: Warning: 2016 MacBook Pro is not compatible with Linux

#119

Post by diamondo25 »

notadoc wrote: post #74
diamondo25 wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I didn't know this issue happened on the 2015 model as well... I've got the mid 2014 model and it has the exact same issue. They call it staingate [0], and it seems that they've replaced screens with the issue (for free). I have yet to request that, however... [0] http://www.staingate.org/

I was very disappointed to find it on a 2015 model as well. The "staingate" name is odd, it's definitely not staining, the laminate just wipes right off with little effort.

They chose for 'staingate' as it looks like regular stains (like the ones you get with dirty hands on your screen). One of my colleague had the same issue (of course, same serie macbooks) but his was just in the middle of his screen. He tried everything to get it away (he said it randomly appeared; he used cleaning wipes daily)... I wonder how many people are still walking around with damaged screens...

Re: Warning: 2016 MacBook Pro is not compatible with Linux

#120

Post by tinus_hn »

loopbit wrote: post #85
eridius wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It blocks or impedes the installation of software that it has unilaterally decided is against its interests What software are you thinking of? Apple maintains editorial control over what's in the App Store, but I can't think of any case where Apple has blocked software distributed outside the app store. The closest I can think of is the fact that the default settings of the computer require apps to be codesigned wi…

> by changing the security settings on the computer Sierra has disabled the "install from any source" option (although you can re-enable it with some terminal magic). How long until they disable the identified developers option too and leave a system like the iphone?

If the user cannot be trusted to make reasonable choices because he doesn't understand or want to read security popups, you have to make the choice for them. That's what Apple is doing and so is Microsoft. It's the only way to go if you want a secure system. And guess what: people appreciate a stable, secure system that makes it difficult to distribute malware. They appreciate it more than fear-mongering about theoretical issues.

Apple is never going to completely lock down the Mac because it can't be a development platform if it is locked down. Besides, why would they even want to?

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