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Gnome Shell on the Apple M1, bare metal

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Re: Gnome Shell on the Apple M1, bare metal

#41

Post by distances »

watermelon0 wrote: post #34
nixpulvis wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder why we even bother trying to support these hardware vendors sometimes. I have been trying really hard to simply not deal with them for my own sanity. Are we not simply letting the leash out further for what we will accept and buy? Are we truly that powerless against the market forces which drive HW/OS sales?

For some people it's a nice challenge to tackle. Additionally, M1 is currently best? platform when comparing performance with power usage, and (at least MBA) comes in a great form factor. AFAIK there is no comparable device that has decent support for Linux.

Ryzen mobile is of course still faster in multi-core tasks, although with a higher power demand.

Re: Gnome Shell on the Apple M1, bare metal

#42

Post by jbverschoor »

nixpulvis wrote: post #26
pkulak wrote: post #24

I’m so worried this project will get 95% of the way there, and then all the fun issues will run out and the M1 will be just another MacBook with WiFi, Bluetooth and sleep issues. The obvious issue is to pay someone to do the work, and I am, but I still can’t shake the fear.

I wonder why we even bother trying to support these hardware vendors sometimes. I have been trying really hard to simply not deal with them for my own sanity. Are we not simply letting the leash out further for what we will accept and buy? Are we truly that powerless against the market forces which drive HW/OS sales?

It's a strategic move from Apple to allow other OSses. They could've gone the iOS route, requiring jailbreaking.

They know very well how they became so big. It was in the early 2000's, because they had the support of many developers.

Re: Gnome Shell on the Apple M1, bare metal

#43

Post by p4bl0 »

diragon wrote: post #36
nixpulvis wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder why we even bother trying to support these hardware vendors sometimes. I have been trying really hard to simply not deal with them for my own sanity. Are we not simply letting the leash out further for what we will accept and buy? Are we truly that powerless against the market forces which drive HW/OS sales?

Currently probably because M1 is absurdly better than the competition. They will certainly draw users away from Linux unless either this porting effort gets done, or unless other ARM options that support Linux better become available.

> They will certainly draw users away from Linux

And the beauty of non commercial software is that we don't actually have to care about that. If people choose performance increase over freedom, you can't really chose for them.

Now I'm not saying that we should not port free software to the M1. I'm saying that the good reason to do so is because the people porting it want to have it there, rather than thinking in term of user retention.

Re: Gnome Shell on the Apple M1, bare metal

#44

Post by mrweasel »

_ZeD_ wrote: post #28
jeppesen-io wrote: post #21

I know a pipedream, but if apple provided the docs and drivers for Linux on m1, it would really cement the current defacto standard of a MacBook as the development laptop of choice Amazing progress - but I wonder if getting accelerated gui is 10x the current effort No skin in the game, but can't wait to see how this progresses

> the current defacto standard of a MacBook as the development laptop of choice the problem with that is that the macbook hardware sucks. a lot.

Maybe it sucks, but still much less than anything else that I can buy for the same price. I can even buy two different MacBooks and be sure that the hardware is identical, even the screen.

Re: Gnome Shell on the Apple M1, bare metal

#45

Post by nixpulvis »

p4bl0 wrote: post #43
diragon wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Currently probably because M1 is absurdly better than the competition. They will certainly draw users away from Linux unless either this porting effort gets done, or unless other ARM options that support Linux better become available.

> They will certainly draw users away from Linux And the beauty of non commercial software is that we don't actually have to care about that. If people choose performance increase over freedom, you can't really chose for them. Now I'm not saying that we should not port free software to the M1. I'm saying that the good reason to do so is because the people porting it want to have it there, rather than thinking in term…

The problem, as I see it, is that "free software" becomes unfree when you have to pay to port it.

Back in the glory of more universal general computers this was perhaps a lesser spoken requirement of the system.

Today, it's clear to me that we are slipping back into chaos.

EDIT: Seems like FSF's "freedom to run" might fit the definitional benchmark for me. I'm not really sure how people are going to react to that though ;)

Re: Gnome Shell on the Apple M1, bare metal

#46

Post by heavyset_go »

diragon wrote: post #36
nixpulvis wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder why we even bother trying to support these hardware vendors sometimes. I have been trying really hard to simply not deal with them for my own sanity. Are we not simply letting the leash out further for what we will accept and buy? Are we truly that powerless against the market forces which drive HW/OS sales?

Currently probably because M1 is absurdly better than the competition. They will certainly draw users away from Linux unless either this porting effort gets done, or unless other ARM options that support Linux better become available.

Recent Ryzen chips perform better than M1 chips.

Re: Gnome Shell on the Apple M1, bare metal

#47

Post by nixpulvis »

watermelon0 wrote: post #34
nixpulvis wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder why we even bother trying to support these hardware vendors sometimes. I have been trying really hard to simply not deal with them for my own sanity. Are we not simply letting the leash out further for what we will accept and buy? Are we truly that powerless against the market forces which drive HW/OS sales?

For some people it's a nice challenge to tackle. Additionally, M1 is currently best? platform when comparing performance with power usage, and (at least MBA) comes in a great form factor. AFAIK there is no comparable device that has decent support for Linux.

> For some people it's a nice challenge to tackle.

So is killing a tiger, but you don't see any stripes on my wall.

Re: Gnome Shell on the Apple M1, bare metal

#48

Post by johan_felisaz »

heavyset_go wrote: post #46
diragon wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Currently probably because M1 is absurdly better than the competition. They will certainly draw users away from Linux unless either this porting effort gets done, or unless other ARM options that support Linux better become available.

Recent Ryzen chips perform better than M1 chips.

I'm curious, sources ?

Re: Gnome Shell on the Apple M1, bare metal

#49

Post by phonon »

distances wrote: post #41
watermelon0 wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For some people it's a nice challenge to tackle. Additionally, M1 is currently best? platform when comparing performance with power usage, and (at least MBA) comes in a great form factor. AFAIK there is no comparable device that has decent support for Linux.

Ryzen mobile is of course still faster in multi-core tasks, although with a higher power demand.

Actually not--a 5900HX is about 1400/7500 (ST/MT GB5)

An M1 is about 1700/7600.

So call that a tie for MT, and 20% faster in ST...with a chip using about a third the power.

Re: Gnome Shell on the Apple M1, bare metal

#50

Post by flomo »

jbverschoor wrote: post #42
nixpulvis wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder why we even bother trying to support these hardware vendors sometimes. I have been trying really hard to simply not deal with them for my own sanity. Are we not simply letting the leash out further for what we will accept and buy? Are we truly that powerless against the market forces which drive HW/OS sales?

It's a strategic move from Apple to allow other OSses. They could've gone the iOS route, requiring jailbreaking. They know very well how they became so big. It was in the early 2000's, because they had the support of many developers.

Yes and no. Specifically, Mac was lifesupport marketshare until Intel. Bootcamping or VMing Windows was a huge selling point at the time. (But maybe in the long-run, it turned out that UNIX was more valuable after all.)

With apple silcon, Apple is dropping what was a huge feature -- Windows. Ability to run Linux distros on Mac hardware is like rounding error hacker stuff.

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