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Fair point! I guess what I'm getting at is the fact that, even though Darwin isn't great, we know that it's building and running on all production M1 macs, can

by jd3 6y ago

Fair point! I guess what I'm getting at is the fact that, even though Darwin isn't great, we know that it's building and running on all production M1 macs, can run X11, etc. which generally seems like what this project is attempting to do. I'm not a systems software engineer[0], so I'm not positive where the new drivers live for the M1 (are they in Darwin? proprietary/exclusive to macOS?), but if those drivers are available for use already (either legally through Darwin or through copying files from macOS into Darwin or something), it seems like it might make sense to look into making a Darwin distribution rather than reserve engineering the new M1 hardware in order to add some drivers and userland programs to what is essentially another Arch Linux distribution (from what I've read about Asahi thus far). I think the Asahi project definitely makes sense if the primary goal is to run Linux on M1 macs for its robust server/enterprise capabilities, but if the goal is to just have a dual-bootable open source desktop operating system, I feel like Darwin might actually be the easier choice here. [0]: http://doc.cat-v.org/bell_labs/utah2000/utah2000.pdf http://doc.cat-v.org/bell_labs/utah2000/utah2000.pdf

wmf 6y ago
I'm pretty sure people want Linux specifically, not any open-source OS. As for Darwin source code, I'm reminded of the saying that if an economist sees a $100 bill on the sidewalk he says "if it was real someone would have already picked it up".
saagarjha 6y ago
The drivers are proprietary.
mtrower 6y ago
This is actually a really good point; I tend to forget about Darwin. If I was in a situation where I owned Apple Silicon, I'd definitely want to look into this. While I have my own flavor preferences, I'm generally happy to work in whatever Unix environment is available to me. Thanks for bringing this up; it may become important to me in the future. But wmf is right; a critical mass of people want Linux and accept no substitutes. To a lot of people, especially younger folks, "Unix" means Linux, and that's that.

by jd3 6y ago

wmf 6y ago

I'm pretty sure people want Linux specifically, not any open-source OS. As for Darwin source code, I'm reminded of the saying that if an economist sees a $100 bill on the sidewalk he says "if it was real someone would have already picked it up".

saagarjha 6y ago

The drivers are proprietary.

mtrower 6y ago

This is actually a really good point; I tend to forget about Darwin. If I was in a situation where I owned Apple Silicon, I'd definitely want to look into this. While I have my own flavor preferences, I'm generally happy to work in whatever Unix environment is available to me. Thanks for bringing this up; it may become important to me in the future. But wmf is right; a critical mass of people want Linux and accept no substitutes. To a lot of people, especially younger folks, "Unix" means Linux, and that's that.