Too late to do this for PCs. You already have Linux laptop providers and Linux distros supported by corporations. Most of the components have multiple providers. You will be able to source “unlocked” hardware from somewhere.
The problem with mobile is that the hardware is too complicated for open source projects to handle. Many have tried, all have failed. So far. Hopefully we will finally see something usable come out of projects like PinePhone and PostmarketOS.
let me tell you about this little thing called windows 11.
I know for a fact that this is exactly where compute is going, just look at the aggressive moves that MS has been making over the last 15-25 years.
it starts with requiring an always on connection, and ends with hardware lockout like Mac has.
sure Linux will be an option… but for how much longer? all the old devs are retiring and the new ones…god help us. they want to rewrite it like any greenhorn, and they want to use…rust??!
I give it 10-15 years before hardware locks out Linux, and Linux is dying.
I’m a Linux user btw, so don’t think I’m a MS or Mac fan.
I definitely am not getting this impression, especially with the recent boost in popularity, but this isn’t my field of expertise. Any reading you can recommend to get an old man up to speed?
It’s a long history lesson. But the gist is that IBM made an architecture that allowed for modular LEGO style construction of computers. They were assholes and tried to make it lock down by keeping software secret and proprietary, but it was so popular that everyone else copied it and IBM/PC clones were born. Then the architecture became the standard, and everyone could make components for a PC with (more or less) assurance that any component made would be compatible and fit into (almost) any other computer.
Phones, on the other hand were born out of the necessity of being the smallest and most portable device possible. This meant bespoke solutions. The people who were chasing that format chose an architecture, ARM, that at the time required everything to be on a single chip. Memory, storage, CPU, CMOS, everything has to be on the chip. Which means exchanging parts is not possible. System on chip became the smart phone standard. Now, technically ARM doesn’t have to always be SOC. But it means two things, first is that every phone model is an unique and bespoke production that will never exist again once out of print. Second, it is a Titanic task to reverse engineer certain parts of it, firmware for sensor input is always unique, for example.
This means that FOSS is at a disadvantage. To make free open software for a phone means that, either a manufacturer is magnanimous and gives you all the firmware, or after a major effort to reverse engineer lots of pieces of software, it will be useless for the next model of phone. You either make your own open standard phone, which is a several billion dollar r&d endeavor. Or you’re constantly shooting at a fast moving target.
No one has created an open standard that allows small component manufacturing of mutually interchangeable parts for phones. Risc-v is close but not yet terribly financially viable.
Too late to do this for PCs. You already have Linux laptop providers and Linux distros supported by corporations. Most of the components have multiple providers. You will be able to source “unlocked” hardware from somewhere.
The problem with mobile is that the hardware is too complicated for open source projects to handle. Many have tried, all have failed. So far. Hopefully we will finally see something usable come out of projects like PinePhone and PostmarketOS.
let me tell you about this little thing called windows 11.
I know for a fact that this is exactly where compute is going, just look at the aggressive moves that MS has been making over the last 15-25 years.
it starts with requiring an always on connection, and ends with hardware lockout like Mac has.
sure Linux will be an option… but for how much longer? all the old devs are retiring and the new ones…god help us. they want to rewrite it like any greenhorn, and they want to use…rust??!
I give it 10-15 years before hardware locks out Linux, and Linux is dying.
I’m a Linux user btw, so don’t think I’m a MS or Mac fan.
I definitely am not getting this impression, especially with the recent boost in popularity, but this isn’t my field of expertise. Any reading you can recommend to get an old man up to speed?
Has Fairphone failed in this regard, in your opinion?
Fairphone devs contribute drives to linux. Their phones are among the best supported devices for postmarketos and ubuntu touch and so on.
What makes mobile hardware more complicated than desktop hardware?
It’s a long history lesson. But the gist is that IBM made an architecture that allowed for modular LEGO style construction of computers. They were assholes and tried to make it lock down by keeping software secret and proprietary, but it was so popular that everyone else copied it and IBM/PC clones were born. Then the architecture became the standard, and everyone could make components for a PC with (more or less) assurance that any component made would be compatible and fit into (almost) any other computer.
Phones, on the other hand were born out of the necessity of being the smallest and most portable device possible. This meant bespoke solutions. The people who were chasing that format chose an architecture, ARM, that at the time required everything to be on a single chip. Memory, storage, CPU, CMOS, everything has to be on the chip. Which means exchanging parts is not possible. System on chip became the smart phone standard. Now, technically ARM doesn’t have to always be SOC. But it means two things, first is that every phone model is an unique and bespoke production that will never exist again once out of print. Second, it is a Titanic task to reverse engineer certain parts of it, firmware for sensor input is always unique, for example.
This means that FOSS is at a disadvantage. To make free open software for a phone means that, either a manufacturer is magnanimous and gives you all the firmware, or after a major effort to reverse engineer lots of pieces of software, it will be useless for the next model of phone. You either make your own open standard phone, which is a several billion dollar r&d endeavor. Or you’re constantly shooting at a fast moving target.
No one has created an open standard that allows small component manufacturing of mutually interchangeable parts for phones. Risc-v is close but not yet terribly financially viable.