5 ms·

It's probably because linux on arm has been around longer than the Pi, but a lot of people seem to hold this idea it was pioneering. It was pioneering in how l

by Nursie 5y ago

It's probably because linux on arm has been around longer than the Pi, but a lot of people seem to hold this idea it was pioneering. It was pioneering in how low-cost and mass market it was at launch, but before the Pi there was plug computing, largely based around Marvell Kirkwood processors. There were also a variety of hackable NAS devices, I used some with Orion5x CPUS in. Then before plug computing there was the linksys NSLU2 with its Intel Xscale IXP chip, and all the hackable linksys routers going back to 2002, and that's just some of the stuff I've played with over the years. Before that I imagine there were previous generations of linux ARM support. The Pi and other hobby boards are really great, don't get me wrong, but there's a tendency to credit them with a bit too much.

mschuster91 5y ago
> Then before plug computing there was the linksys NSLU2 with its Intel Xscale IXP chip Whoa, haven't heard that one in a looong time. Still have mine sitting in a storage closet, I think...
- Nursie 5y ago
  They were great little machines! I used to run my own mail server on one and use another as a media server. I even did a small hardware mod and soldered a wifi card to one of the internal USB headers on one of them. Much fun! I don't imagine the processing power stands up to modern devices though :)
selfhoster11 5y ago
Plug computing and Linksys routers weren't cheap, and the Pi was. That's the entire difference when your target audience is kids with a couple of dollars worth of allowance or broke college kids.
- bityard 5y ago
  > Plug computing and Linksys routers weren't cheap, and the Pi was. For their time (20 years ago), they certainly were cheap. $100 or so for a small power efficient box that could run almost a whole Linux distribution was an amazing bargain. Before that, you needed a good-sized desktop or server to do anything involving a Unix-like OS, or paid dearly for the convenience of a laptop. And it wasn't much before that, that running Unix on any microcomputer was just a dream. It's hard to comprend just how amazingly affordable computing has become in such a short amount of time.
  - selfhoster11 5y ago
    Do you realise that a $100 is a fortune to the demographic that I specified? For that price, those devices are so out of reach that they might as well just not exist. I remember that time in my life very well. I literally had around $50 in my local currency in the coin box, and that was it. Hand me down computers were unavailable where I was.
    - GhettoComputers 5y ago
      Everyone had one anyway because they needed a router. It was "free". Used ones were common too.
- Nursie 5y ago
  Ok, but that doesn’t mean that the Pi was important in getting most Linux or BSD tools working under ARM, as was the claim above. Yes, it reached a wide audience, they did a lot of great stuff getting capable dev boards out to a lot of people. But fully functional Linux on ARM pre-dates the Pi significantly. (I’d argue the NSLU2 and sheevaplug were both pretty affordable, at sub-$100 too, but the Pi definitely upped the game there)
  - b112 5y ago
    Indeed. Debian had full ARM support for years before the Pi, very mature, and was really the only reason the Pi project could even choose ARM. If not for Debian's work, which the Pi relies upon, they'd have never been able to bootstrap.
    - selfhoster11 5y ago
      Debian project also deserves some credit - so let's credit them. There's enough credit to go around got everyone who helped to bring this about.
  - selfhoster11 5y ago
    In the chicken and egg problem of getting support for ARM software, the Raspberry Pi Foundation was the one that unilaterally plopped a ready-to-go (if very weak), low cost chicken in front of everyone. For that, I think they deserve some credit. Sure they built in top of the work of others - so let's acknowledge everyone involved in the process rather than pretend that one party deserves fame exclusively. It was a community effort :)
    - Nursie 5y ago
      > getting support for ARM software It is my contention that this support was largely already present. That's all. Pi did great work getting cheap boards out to people, and put a lot of effort into education and community building. They exposed a huge number of people to the possibilities of non-x86 computing that otherwise might not have been. So indeed let's credit them with that, it's all great stuff! But it's quite revisionist to say they helped get linux or BSD or their tools onto the platform, IMHO.

by Nursie 5y ago

mschuster91 5y ago

> Then before plug computing there was the linksys NSLU2 with its Intel Xscale IXP chip Whoa, haven't heard that one in a looong time. Still have mine sitting in a storage closet, I think...

Nursie 5y ago
They were great little machines! I used to run my own mail server on one and use another as a media server. I even did a small hardware mod and soldered a wifi card to one of the internal USB headers on one of them. Much fun! I don't imagine the processing power stands up to modern devices though :)

selfhoster11 5y ago

Plug computing and Linksys routers weren't cheap, and the Pi was. That's the entire difference when your target audience is kids with a couple of dollars worth of allowance or broke college kids.

bityard 5y ago
> Plug computing and Linksys routers weren't cheap, and the Pi was. For their time (20 years ago), they certainly were cheap. $100 or so for a small power efficient box that could run almost a whole Linux distribution was an amazing bargain. Before that, you needed a good-sized desktop or server to do anything involving a Unix-like OS, or paid dearly for the convenience of a laptop. And it wasn't much before that, that running Unix on any microcomputer was just a dream. It's hard to comprend just how amazingly affordable computing has become in such a short amount of time.
- selfhoster11 5y ago
  Do you realise that a $100 is a fortune to the demographic that I specified? For that price, those devices are so out of reach that they might as well just not exist. I remember that time in my life very well. I literally had around $50 in my local currency in the coin box, and that was it. Hand me down computers were unavailable where I was.
  - GhettoComputers 5y ago
    Everyone had one anyway because they needed a router. It was "free". Used ones were common too.
Nursie 5y ago
Ok, but that doesn’t mean that the Pi was important in getting most Linux or BSD tools working under ARM, as was the claim above. Yes, it reached a wide audience, they did a lot of great stuff getting capable dev boards out to a lot of people. But fully functional Linux on ARM pre-dates the Pi significantly. (I’d argue the NSLU2 and sheevaplug were both pretty affordable, at sub-$100 too, but the Pi definitely upped the game there)
- b112 5y ago
  Indeed. Debian had full ARM support for years before the Pi, very mature, and was really the only reason the Pi project could even choose ARM. If not for Debian's work, which the Pi relies upon, they'd have never been able to bootstrap.
  - selfhoster11 5y ago
    Debian project also deserves some credit - so let's credit them. There's enough credit to go around got everyone who helped to bring this about.
- selfhoster11 5y ago
  In the chicken and egg problem of getting support for ARM software, the Raspberry Pi Foundation was the one that unilaterally plopped a ready-to-go (if very weak), low cost chicken in front of everyone. For that, I think they deserve some credit. Sure they built in top of the work of others - so let's acknowledge everyone involved in the process rather than pretend that one party deserves fame exclusively. It was a community effort :)
  - Nursie 5y ago
    > getting support for ARM software It is my contention that this support was largely already present. That's all. Pi did great work getting cheap boards out to people, and put a lot of effort into education and community building. They exposed a huge number of people to the possibilities of non-x86 computing that otherwise might not have been. So indeed let's credit them with that, it's all great stuff! But it's quite revisionist to say they helped get linux or BSD or their tools onto the platform, IMHO.