5 ms·

You truly expect every IP in the SoC to require GPU level complexity? That's a far out assumption imo. The speed of progress made on getting Linux to run is ext

You truly expect every IP in the SoC to require GPU level complexity? That's a far out assumption imo. The speed of progress made on getting Linux to run is extremely high and once the GPU runs they will focus on power management. I think you are over way over estimating the impossibility of this task.

amelius 5y ago
You missed the point. Apple may decide to make it more difficult to reverse-engineer their hardware. For now, we (the Linux/BSD community) are allowed to use their hardware, but this may not always be the case, e.g. when M1's successor hits the market.
- rowanG077 5y ago
  So we are now speculating about future hardware? Apple macs were never locked down. Why would they now suddenly start being locked down? If Apple wanted to lock them down there would not have been a better moment then with the M1. They already have all the tech ready to go. But they obviously decided not do to that. Assuming a product line that has been not locked down for decades to suddenly start being locked down AFTER the best moment to do it is the wrong assumption.
  - amelius 5y ago
    https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23640746 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23640746 I will believe Apple if they say they officially support booting of other OSes, and will keep doing so in the future.
    - rowanG077 5y ago
      You mean like they supported bootcamp "officially" and then just took it away suddenly with M1? I don't see how that is different then having unofficial support and apple then locking down a new Mac. In either case you lost support with a new hardware platform.
      - mlyle 5y ago
        > In either case you lost support with a new hardware platform. If we're talking about "new hardware platforms" --- yes, any vendor or vendor ecosystem may drop support for anything at any time in future products. If ARM Ltd's next core is a mechanical abacus, it will not run Linux.
        rowanG077 5y ago
        Right! So whether there's unofficial or official support. It doesn't buy you anything.
        mlyle 5y ago
        Unofficial support: you may get locked out at any time, even within that product's lifecycle. Official support: if you get locked out within this product's lifecycle, they will have to compensate you.
        rowanG077 5y ago
        Can you give a single example of a product being locked out without user intervention?
      - zozbot234 5y ago
        Boot Camp was always Intel-specific. There was no Boot Camp on Power Macs, and they couldn't run Windows either. MS has not made available a version of Windows on ARM for the M1 platform, either.
        rowanG077 5y ago
        There is no "Windows for mac" for Intel either. Apple just added some drivers. That could be done for the M1 as well.
        wpm 5y ago
  - webmobdev 5y ago
    > If Apple wanted to lock them down there would not have been a better moment then with the M1. ... But they obviously decided not do to that. That's a laugh - what other OS can you run on the M1 today apart from macOS? It is as good as locked down already! Apple understands very well that this is a very lacking feature of the M1, and that is why Apple is very cleverly using those reverse engineering effort as part of its online marketing to mislead some into beliveing that Linux or xBSD OSes will be available on the M1 in the very near future. The sad reality is that even if the reverse engineering is successful all you are going to get are buggy versions of other OSes, with features missing, which will make you regret purchasing the M1 if you hoped to run other OSes on it.
    - rowanG077 5y ago
      You can run linux TODAY, you can run netBSD TODAY. it's not fully featured yet but you can run it. Locked down has a clear meaning and macs aren't locked down. Ipads are locked down, Iphones are locked down. It's impossible to boot a different OS on those. Linux has ran for years fine on macs. I don't see any reason why it won't run fine on the M1 macs.
      - webmobdev 5y ago
        > You can run linux TODAY, you can run netBSD TODAY. it's not fully featured yet but you can run it. Apple understands very well that this is a very lacking feature of the M1, and that is why Apple is very cleverly using those reverse engineering effort as part of its online marketing to mislead some into beliveing that Linux or xBSD OSes will be available on the M1 in the very near future. I can run a fully featured gui based Linux / xBSD / Windows XP on my 15+ year old single core Pentium machine even today ... that highlights how useless and crippled the M1 is in supporting alternative OSes. And that is simply because the M1 is as good as a locked down machine.
        rowanG077 5y ago
        Can you point me towards marketing from Apple that highlights the ability to run linux or BSD? The reverse engineering effort has only been in full swing for 6-7 months, that's nothing. And yet it's already quite usable with the main thing not working being hardware acceleration.
- dev_tty01 5y ago
  I don't think Apple cares about the relatively tiny number of people who want to boot an alternate OS vs the markets they sell into. It is just not financially important. It has always been possible to boot alternate OSes on the Mac and Apple did specific work to make sure that was still true on the M1 Mac. No one can predict the future of course and it is possible for this to change, but I think the status quo of mostly indifference will continue. However, even if Apple does make it harder later, I think the people who are working on boot systems are doing it mostly for the joy of the challenge. If we end up with a nice alternate OS all the better. I think it is incredibly cool work.

amelius 5y ago

You missed the point. Apple may decide to make it more difficult to reverse-engineer their hardware. For now, we (the Linux/BSD community) are allowed to use their hardware, but this may not always be the case, e.g. when M1's successor hits the market.

rowanG077 5y ago
So we are now speculating about future hardware? Apple macs were never locked down. Why would they now suddenly start being locked down? If Apple wanted to lock them down there would not have been a better moment then with the M1. They already have all the tech ready to go. But they obviously decided not do to that. Assuming a product line that has been not locked down for decades to suddenly start being locked down AFTER the best moment to do it is the wrong assumption.
- amelius 5y ago
  https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23640746 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23640746 I will believe Apple if they say they officially support booting of other OSes, and will keep doing so in the future.
  - rowanG077 5y ago
    You mean like they supported bootcamp "officially" and then just took it away suddenly with M1? I don't see how that is different then having unofficial support and apple then locking down a new Mac. In either case you lost support with a new hardware platform.
    - mlyle 5y ago
      > In either case you lost support with a new hardware platform. If we're talking about "new hardware platforms" --- yes, any vendor or vendor ecosystem may drop support for anything at any time in future products. If ARM Ltd's next core is a mechanical abacus, it will not run Linux.
      - rowanG077 5y ago
        Right! So whether there's unofficial or official support. It doesn't buy you anything.
        mlyle 5y ago
        Unofficial support: you may get locked out at any time, even within that product's lifecycle. Official support: if you get locked out within this product's lifecycle, they will have to compensate you.
        rowanG077 5y ago
        Can you give a single example of a product being locked out without user intervention?
    - zozbot234 5y ago
      Boot Camp was always Intel-specific. There was no Boot Camp on Power Macs, and they couldn't run Windows either. MS has not made available a version of Windows on ARM for the M1 platform, either.
      - rowanG077 5y ago
        There is no "Windows for mac" for Intel either. Apple just added some drivers. That could be done for the M1 as well.
        wpm 5y ago
- webmobdev 5y ago
  > If Apple wanted to lock them down there would not have been a better moment then with the M1. ... But they obviously decided not do to that. That's a laugh - what other OS can you run on the M1 today apart from macOS? It is as good as locked down already! Apple understands very well that this is a very lacking feature of the M1, and that is why Apple is very cleverly using those reverse engineering effort as part of its online marketing to mislead some into beliveing that Linux or xBSD OSes will be available on the M1 in the very near future. The sad reality is that even if the reverse engineering is successful all you are going to get are buggy versions of other OSes, with features missing, which will make you regret purchasing the M1 if you hoped to run other OSes on it.
  - rowanG077 5y ago
    You can run linux TODAY, you can run netBSD TODAY. it's not fully featured yet but you can run it. Locked down has a clear meaning and macs aren't locked down. Ipads are locked down, Iphones are locked down. It's impossible to boot a different OS on those. Linux has ran for years fine on macs. I don't see any reason why it won't run fine on the M1 macs.
    - webmobdev 5y ago
      > You can run linux TODAY, you can run netBSD TODAY. it's not fully featured yet but you can run it. Apple understands very well that this is a very lacking feature of the M1, and that is why Apple is very cleverly using those reverse engineering effort as part of its online marketing to mislead some into beliveing that Linux or xBSD OSes will be available on the M1 in the very near future. I can run a fully featured gui based Linux / xBSD / Windows XP on my 15+ year old single core Pentium machine even today ... that highlights how useless and crippled the M1 is in supporting alternative OSes. And that is simply because the M1 is as good as a locked down machine.
      - rowanG077 5y ago
        Can you point me towards marketing from Apple that highlights the ability to run linux or BSD? The reverse engineering effort has only been in full swing for 6-7 months, that's nothing. And yet it's already quite usable with the main thing not working being hardware acceleration.
dev_tty01 5y ago
I don't think Apple cares about the relatively tiny number of people who want to boot an alternate OS vs the markets they sell into. It is just not financially important. It has always been possible to boot alternate OSes on the Mac and Apple did specific work to make sure that was still true on the M1 Mac. No one can predict the future of course and it is possible for this to change, but I think the status quo of mostly indifference will continue. However, even if Apple does make it harder later, I think the people who are working on boot systems are doing it mostly for the joy of the challenge. If we end up with a nice alternate OS all the better. I think it is incredibly cool work.