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I thought Google would no longer follow the idea to replace Android with Fuchsia. Do you have a source for this statement?

pjmlp 5y ago
Yes, check the AOSP Gerrit commits related to Fuchsia, quite a few of them there. You can start with this one, https://android-review.googlesource.com/c/platform/manifest/+/847437 https://android-review.googlesource.com/c/platform/manifest/...
mhoad 5y ago
There is no compelling reason to keep Android running as some legacy option when they are making Android and more generally Linux compatibility as a goal. It would just be a slower, less secure option with years of cruft and a huge dependency base they don’t control.
- pjmlp 5y ago
  Project Treble and Project Mainline where Linux drivers are considered "legacy", and already Rust's adoption even with nightly features, don't really show that. They are only upstreaming to decrease the development efforts in Linux kernel itself, tomorrow that kernel can be Zirkon instead.
  - mhoad 5y ago
    I don’t know I disagree with anything you said other than the end goal. But yes, I agree, I think getting the Linux kernel out of Android is an obvious next step. Does Android just become another Fuschia “product” at that point the same way the workstation and a stripped down IoT one are? I’d argue it goes further than that but my reasoning kind of gets pretty deep into how Fuschia for example handles things like app delivery etc… I think Android will continue to exist as a supported interop style solution for years but ultimately you will end up seeing a total transition to 100% Fuschia across all Google platforms (server, IoT, Workstations, mobile devices etc).
    - pjmlp 5y ago
      I would say that the facts speak for me, it is the Project Treble HAL documentation call refers to Linux drivers as "legacy". https://source.android.com/devices/architecture/hal-types https://source.android.com/devices/architecture/hal-types > "HALs expressed in HAL interface definition language (HIDL) or Android interface definition language (AIDL). These HALs replace both conventional and legacy HALs used in earlier versions of Android. In a Binderized HAL, the Android framework and HALs communicate with each other using binder inter-process communication (IPC) calls. All devices launching with Android 8.0 or later must support binderized HALs only." While Linux folks are still arguing if Rust makes sense to be adopted in the kernel and what features still need to be stabilized, https://source.android.com/setup/build/rust/building-rust-modules/android-rust-modules https://source.android.com/setup/build/rust/building-rust-mo... And as I pointed out in another comment, here are the ART commits supporting Fuchsia, https://android-review.googlesource.com/q/fuchsia https://android-review.googlesource.com/q/fuchsia I should also note that while people pat themselves on the back, because Android uses the Linux kernel, from Google's point of view that is an implementation detail, not supported as public API for NDK code. https://developer.android.com/ndk/guides/stable_apis https://developer.android.com/ndk/guides/stable_apis From NDK point of view for app developers, the underlying OS is a generic OS, with ISO C, ISO C++ standard libraries plus a couple of additional stuff. Something that Termux guys have a hard time to swallow.
      - Xunjin 5y ago
        Wow, that's good to know thank you, you brought a lot of good info.

pjmlp 5y ago

Yes, check the AOSP Gerrit commits related to Fuchsia, quite a few of them there. You can start with this one, https://android-review.googlesource.com/c/platform/manifest/+/847437 https://android-review.googlesource.com/c/platform/manifest/...

mhoad 5y ago

There is no compelling reason to keep Android running as some legacy option when they are making Android and more generally Linux compatibility as a goal. It would just be a slower, less secure option with years of cruft and a huge dependency base they don’t control.

pjmlp 5y ago
Project Treble and Project Mainline where Linux drivers are considered "legacy", and already Rust's adoption even with nightly features, don't really show that. They are only upstreaming to decrease the development efforts in Linux kernel itself, tomorrow that kernel can be Zirkon instead.
- mhoad 5y ago
  I don’t know I disagree with anything you said other than the end goal. But yes, I agree, I think getting the Linux kernel out of Android is an obvious next step. Does Android just become another Fuschia “product” at that point the same way the workstation and a stripped down IoT one are? I’d argue it goes further than that but my reasoning kind of gets pretty deep into how Fuschia for example handles things like app delivery etc… I think Android will continue to exist as a supported interop style solution for years but ultimately you will end up seeing a total transition to 100% Fuschia across all Google platforms (server, IoT, Workstations, mobile devices etc).
  - pjmlp 5y ago
    I would say that the facts speak for me, it is the Project Treble HAL documentation call refers to Linux drivers as "legacy". https://source.android.com/devices/architecture/hal-types https://source.android.com/devices/architecture/hal-types > "HALs expressed in HAL interface definition language (HIDL) or Android interface definition language (AIDL). These HALs replace both conventional and legacy HALs used in earlier versions of Android. In a Binderized HAL, the Android framework and HALs communicate with each other using binder inter-process communication (IPC) calls. All devices launching with Android 8.0 or later must support binderized HALs only." While Linux folks are still arguing if Rust makes sense to be adopted in the kernel and what features still need to be stabilized, https://source.android.com/setup/build/rust/building-rust-modules/android-rust-modules https://source.android.com/setup/build/rust/building-rust-mo... And as I pointed out in another comment, here are the ART commits supporting Fuchsia, https://android-review.googlesource.com/q/fuchsia https://android-review.googlesource.com/q/fuchsia I should also note that while people pat themselves on the back, because Android uses the Linux kernel, from Google's point of view that is an implementation detail, not supported as public API for NDK code. https://developer.android.com/ndk/guides/stable_apis https://developer.android.com/ndk/guides/stable_apis From NDK point of view for app developers, the underlying OS is a generic OS, with ISO C, ISO C++ standard libraries plus a couple of additional stuff. Something that Termux guys have a hard time to swallow.
    - Xunjin 5y ago
      Wow, that's good to know thank you, you brought a lot of good info.