40 ms·

We got Linux on the iPhone, iPad and other idevices

426 points by zetaposter 4y ago

ngcc_hk 4y ago
Sadly my old one (4) up to A6 and the latest 3 is A10. No A7-A8x required for this test.
woolion 4y ago
Although it's always good news to have Linux on more device, in the case of Apple I find it a bit problematic. That means you encourage Apple getting a huge cut on device sale. Or further justify the high prices of second-hand device because now you can 'give them a second-life' (to counter Apple's in-house planned obsolescence program). It's not just about freedom. Apple's walled-garden means you need in every company some "Apple guy" that owns an iPhone, iPad, etc to test Safari quirks. It really feels like an under-handed racket.
- usrn 4y ago
  What? These devices would be running Firefox not Safari.
- tmikaeld 4y ago
  There will be millions of no-longer-supported Apple units out there, it makes sense to give them a second life with Linux rather than throwing them in a landfill. And linux on it would not run Apple apps, it would run Firefox or Chromium.
  - rtpg 4y ago
    So loads of people have testified that using old Androids as long term computing devices just doesn't work cuz the machines can't deal with being on all the time. I wonder if iPhones and the like are any different on this front. Would you be able to build up a little serve farm of these things?
    - alistairSH 4y ago
      That's kind of weird, since phones are generally on all the time when being actively used. I guess it depends on what active/sleep "modes" are available - ie can Linux on Apple run processes with the screen asleep or whatever. As long as it's plugged in, it should be workable, maybe. But, in my mind, you wouldn't try to build a server farm out of 5+ year old iPads. Instead, you'd continue to use them as consumption devices. Read books, browse web, ie all the things most iPads are doing when new.
      - rtpg 4y ago
        I believe what people have said is that the components can’t handle continuous use (instead of basically idling on user input). Even when being in use for the most part these machines just are rendering some textures onto the screen and the cpu is not doing much
        alistairSH 4y ago
        That wouldn't surprise me. Could still be fun for tinkering and light consumption.
        newswasboring 4y ago
        Oh damn. That sort of explains why my phone gets super hot when I try to solve a project euler problems on it. I never thought about this.
        zozbot234 4y ago
        > I believe what people have said is that the components can’t handle continuous use That could be worked around by using the existing Linux featureset to manage hardware utilization. Especially if CPU/GPU use turns out to be the main issue (as opposed to, e.g. powering the display and radio components).
    - usrn 4y ago
      The Android userspace is absolutely god awful and makes those projects hard. This would be running straight GNU/Xorg/wayland.
  - woojoo666 4y ago
    I think they are just saying if you buy an Apple device to install Linux on it, you are still supporting Apple (including their walled garden approach). Not to mention Apple is constantly fighting against these sorts of hacks so you'll always be playing mouse in their cat-and-mouse game
    - tmikaeld 4y ago
      I'm all for open hardware, but objectively, it's either landfill or Linux, I'd rather see it come to use than become useless.
    - jraph 4y ago
      I completely agree with this line of thinking. That would almost makes me against this kind of projects. However, thinking about the consequences completely flips the coin for me: - without these projects, Apple will still continue doing whatever they are doing - I don't expect many people to actually buy a new iThing because of these projects. Maybe they'd buy second hand iThings on which Linux is guaranteed to work. So Apple is not making new money with this - Yes, they may save some devices from the landfill - it might show Apple that yes, opening their devices a bit may actually increase their sales (but I would not count on it) If I ever need a tablet and these projects work out without too many drawbacks, I'd actually probably consider getting a second hand iPad and install Linux on it. At this point I'd rather avoid both Android and iOS. I'd probably look into Pine64's (and other such manufacturers) devices first though. I hope these projects will help save 2 old iPad 2 sleeping somewhere in my family. These otherwise perfectly capable devices are worthless now just because of one thing: the old version of Safari combined with the fact that Apple forbids browsers with alternative browser engines on these devices. That's so dumb. And I'd probably prefer using existing devices than buying new ones if possible. So, yes please, port Linux to the Apple devices!
- refracture 4y ago
  The only thing I could imagine Apple doing with regards to seeing Linux running on their mobile hardware is further engineer ways to prevent it. I'm personally hoping Apple A5 devices are able to run Linux too as my iPad 2 is 11 years old, has a great battery and is in good condition but hasn't seen a software update in years.
- sgjohnson 4y ago
  > to counter Apple's in-house planned obsolescence program Apple does not do planned obsolescence. iPhone 6S is going to be be supported for 8 years total. (It's not going to receive feature updates anymore, as iOS 16 won't support it, but it also means that iOS 15 gets another year of support)
  - fartcannon 4y ago
    The updates that downgrade the battery life without having user replaceable batteries is planned obsolescence.
    - sgjohnson 4y ago
      Batteries are consumable, and there's not a shred of evidence that Apple is purposefully downgrading battery life with updates.
      - fartcannon 4y ago
        refracture 4y ago
        To be clear it's not that they 'downgraded' battery life, it's that it throttled power draw (and by extension performance) if the phone determined that the battery could no longer reliably power the device at peak draw. Apple's failure to communicate this and give users the option to set power draw back to full (with an explanation of consequences) is exactly why they got sued and deserved to lose. It's up front and made clear in the battery settings menu, but it really should not have required a law suit to make that happen, they've nobody but themselves to blame for the perception that they were just being greedy and trying to coerce people into new phones by hobbling existing ones. I will say on the user experience side I did appreciate that in the aftermath of this we were able to get a new battery in an affected iPhone 6S for free straight from the Apple store. Got some serious mileage out of that phone.
- ntoskrnl 4y ago
  Let's say I have an iPhone 6 that stopped receiving updates. What do you suggest I do with it: - landfill - install Linux - something else?
  - Synaesthesia 4y ago
    Use as an iPod, it's got a headphone jack which is rather nifty, also still works fine as a basic phone, you can have the battery replaced quite cheaply.
    - NeutronStar 4y ago
      And what do I do with my new phone? Just leave it there while I use the older iPhone? No. Realistically you'll use the new phone. The old iPhone is still not going to be used. So what do we do with them now? We install Linux or we just trash it?
      - turtlebits 4y ago
        Sell it or repurpose it, just like anything that gets replaced (fridge, blender, car, etc..)? Just because your old device doesn't support linux doesn't mean it's a brick. (Surely you were aware before you bought the device that it doesn't support linux).
  - robin_reala 4y ago
    - The back camera is probably better than your current webcam - It can make a good pet or baby monitor (several apps that do this have extremely long support schedules because they know people will reuse old phones) - If you’re going to dispose of it, return it to Apple for recycling rather than landfill
  - rvz 4y ago
    > - something else? Recycling it would benefit the planet more right?
  - Klonoar 4y ago
    Recycle it with Apple. I don’t understand this desire to keep arbitrary old devices around. I only do it for as long as I need a device for testing (iOS dev). They simply have no value past this.
- gruturo 4y ago
  > (to counter Apple's in-house planned obsolescence program) iPhones are famous for being supported A LOT longer than almost any other phone. There are manufacturers which abandon you after the 2nd year, and if you buy a model near the end of its sale period, that can mean as little as 13-14 months on a brand new phone. Some iPhones have been, are, or will be supported for 6, 7, even 8 years - which is ridiculously good in comparison, and often the reasons for dropping a model are quite clear (only 1G of RAM, would swap/OOMkill like crazy, or lack of a 64-bit CPU). You could debate some of these reasons, you could debate when none are provided, you could argue about why a certain model had so little RAM to begin with, and of course there have been poorly handled issues like batterygate or certain iOS versions being brutally slow on old models (though it's been years since it last happened).... but frankly, this is an odd choice of a hill to die on.
  - drexlspivey 4y ago
    I am still using my 2012 ipad with iOS 9 to watch youtube and Plex
    - captn3m0 4y ago
      Running iOS8 on my iPad 2 to read books and comics.
      - mobilio 4y ago
        I'm still using iPad 2 for ebooks too.
      - jraph 4y ago
        The iPad 2 is a perfect example. It is good some people still find use for it. However, it is a device that would be perfectly capable of being used to surf the web… but Apple stopped releasing updates for Safari and forbids alternative browser engines for iOS. The web is essentially broken on it, and I'm not even talking about the security issues that it probably has as a consequence.. I'd say it is exactly the example of a device that is today unusable for many things its hardware could handle just fine for no good reason, and therefore obsolete for many people. Obsolete because of its closed nature. This obsolescence was planned. Maybe not intentionally to make you buy a new one, but still bad and the consequences are the same. Many people probably replaced their iPad 2 with a new tablet for exactly this reason. Or bought a new tablet even if they still use their iPad 2 for the uses cases the iPad 2 is not capable of handling anymore. Apple should be legally forced to enable third parties to support this hardware. Next time you consider buying closed hardware (not just Apple, and Android tablets are certainly problematic too), think about the iPad 2. Closed => Waste.
- scarface74 4y ago
  You need a lot more “Android guys” to keep Android usable on old phones when the manufacturer drops support in a year..
- jacquesm 4y ago
  It beats devices going into the landfill or being scrapped, this gives millions of machines a second lease on life. For people who for instance can't afford anything else.
vocram 4y ago
How could we benefit from having Linux on old iDevices? Would I be able to repurpose a device to do something useful I can’t do with iOS?
- pabs3 4y ago
  Its good for devices that stopped receiving iOS security updates, or for doing weird things that you can't do with iOS, like using your iPhone as a USB keyboard for your desktop using Linux's USB gadget support.
- usrn 4y ago
  Yeah, it would actually be a useful computer.
  - umtksa 4y ago
    I'm using one of my old android phone to run node-red and display a dashboard on it. I want to use my old iphone 4 like this
- simion314 4y ago
  >How could we benefit from having Linux on old iDevices? On old devices that do not get updates your internet will stop working because of old browser, missing SSL certificates or old libraries. With Linux you might get an updated browser and you could use the device to browse things and you can do whatever your mind can imagine like maybe write a simple bash/python script to automate something.
  - brk 4y ago
    Technically yes, but when? I just retired an iPhone5 that we were using as a "house controller", streaming Pandora, home automation app, etc. I retired it not because the software stopped working but because the battery won't last more than 30 minutes off the charger, and I had an iPhone8 sitting around doing nothing. IMO an iPhone with linux is going to be less of "do whatever your mind can imagine" and more of "spend countless time trying to hack random stuff into this unsupported platform". Overall, I think it is cool achievement, but (to me), it feels more along the lines of solution looking for a problem than an actual truly useful thing.
fareesh 4y ago
I remember being in an IRC regularly 10-12 years ago where there was a community that was semi-active about a project to port android to the iPhone created by David Wang (planetbeing). There were a few builds going around at the time which I tried out. This video had gone somewhat viral at the time which is what sparked my interest. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uJj0kHQgC9w https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uJj0kHQgC9w. It seems like that project eventually became "Project Sandcastle" and the whole topic has seen some kind of recent resurgence from the looks of it.
- fathyb 4y ago
  I remember flexing my iPhone 3G dual-booting iOS and Android back in high-school. The project was named iDroid: https://www.theiphonewiki.com/wiki/IDroid https://www.theiphonewiki.com/wiki/IDroid It taught me to create custom ramdisks and kernels for iDevices, which eventually landed me my first job as a digital forensics SWE.
  - fareesh 4y ago
    yep that's the one
- extrememacaroni 4y ago
  wow that brings back memories. back then android was truly hideous compared to iOS, unless aided by 3rd party launchers.
  - fareesh 4y ago
    It was ugly for the longest time but ahead on several features. I remember the iPhone not having copy and paste for what felt like ages. A lot of the good stuff was on Cydia.
    - WhyNotHugo 4y ago
      Odd how the tables have turned. Copy-paste is ubiquitous on iOS nowadays, but pretty absent on Android. On Android, I haven't come across a single application that supports copying an image. It's infuriating. Flutter doesn't even support pasting images at all (so things like messaging apps can't support pasting images). I get an impression that Google/Android want copy-paste to disappear. My favourite conspiracy theory on this is that it's so people will have to use the "share" sheet, which shares links with tracking/analytics (rather than pasting a raw image which cannot be tracked).
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
perfobotto 4y ago
Am I the only one not understanding what’s the point of all these efforts to try to run Linux on completely closed with no documentation devices (like iPhones and even mace for that matter). Seems like a lot of effort, for a crappy solution that maybe 0.0001% is going to use before realizing it is crap. Even only effort to keep up with the yearly hw updates that apple does and the complete disregard for backward compatibility and writing hw documentation makes these effort just a technocrat exercise (very cool for sure), but I can’t see anything more than that
- synapse26 4y ago
  I see these as more art and a statement about Linux’s ubiquitousness rather than anything especially meaningful. There’s probably not a lot of people who want to run Doom on a lamp, but people did that anyway.
- nathanwh 4y ago
  From TFA, “Now it was just a matter of what I like the most, hacking on Linux”. This isn’t a product for users, it’s one of this persons hobbies.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- bee_rider 4y ago
  It excites skilled hackers, which is good for the health of the overall community. Every platform has some poorly documented nooks and crannies and doesn't want to be fully opened up. This is practicing those skills in the most hostile environment. Plus, it gives us backup plans, if Intel and AMD are hit by meteors. And maybe they'll keep a couple iPads out of the landfills.
- lm28469 4y ago
  Isn't that one of the "true" mantras of hacking ("hacker news") ? Doing hard things just for the sake of it > A hacker is a person skilled in information technology who uses their technical knowledge to achieve a goal or overcome an obstacle, within a computerized system by non-standard means.
jagger27 4y ago
This is really all about the iPads to me. Having that "magical piece of glass" run free software for years to come is an absolute win.
- xalava 4y ago
  What is the benefit compared to a rooted android tablet?
  - black_puppydog 4y ago
    Not sure this applies here since the OP seems to be only for certain hardware, but... I'd have bought an android tabled years ago if I had found something that seriously competes with the iPad Pro 12" versions.
    - jagger27 4y ago
      iPads are just straight up good hardware, externally and internally.
  - ryandrake 4y ago
    As someone who owns an OG iPad 1, the benefit of potentially being able to run Linux on it is I already have an old iPad but I don't have a rooted Android tablet. Currently, due to Apple refusing to support it with software updates, and providing no other means for me to update it myself, the iPad is kind of useless.
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
  - formerly_proven 4y ago
    There are a lot of iPads.
  - prvc 4y ago
    Way easier to create software for it, and with more flexibility, for starters.
stuntkite 4y ago
I am so stoked on these recent developments. I have piles of useless iPhones and I know people that have huge stashes. I can't wait to waste months trying to get the lidar working on something. It really disgusts me that old phones are bricked. Getting a high powered SBC with an actual 5G modem alone is amazing.
CommanderData 4y ago
I'm so excited. I want to use an old Ipad that has a failing battery as a home automation screen. Poor iOS APIs mean developers can't create good kiosk apps to do simple things like control system settings, lock screen and so many more things that I resorted to an Android tablet. This is finally going to make it possible and turn junk into gold.
- metadat 4y ago
  > This is finally going to make it possible and turn junk into gold. I am also hopeful, but last week when I checked the compatibility matrix, my 3rd generation A5 iPad was "wayyy" too old and not supported. Only A7 chips or newer, iirc.
- nonrandomstring 4y ago
  > This is finally going to make it possible and turn junk into gold. Hearing many people say this. I may write it up from a e-waste POV as a big win for the environment.
- astrange 4y ago
  You can certainly create a kiosk app on iPads using eg autonomous single app mode. Deploying back to an old iPad may be a pain.
  - CommanderData 4y ago
    Full screen kiosl browser for Android has many features I'd consider crucial for the type of task I'm considering. I did some reasons some months back and many features just aren't possible in iOS.
- trip-it-up 4y ago
  A web app that is added to the home screen will do what you want. Create a simple web app (or use someone else's) then in safari click the share button and "Add To Homescreen". Boom, you have a full screen app experience with no App Store. It's not a kiosk as you can press the home button to exit but if it's for your own use that should be fine.
CamelRocketFish 4y ago
Others have already spoken about this amazing achievement so I’m not going to repeat it, but I will say that the flashing cursor animation in the nav bar is horribly distracting whilst reading, if author reads this, please consider removing it.
- dripton 4y ago
  UBlock Origin, right-click on the annoying thing, Block Element, done.
  - CamelRocketFish 4y ago
    Cheers!
srndsnd 4y ago
While only semi-related, this reminds me a lot of iPodLinux, a project from around 2006/2007. I'm on the younger side, and this project was my first real introduction to the possibilities of computing. It let my grayscale iPod Classic play videos and Doom, which at the time, was mindblowing to me and my middle school classmates. In the process I was fortunate enough to actually learn a thing or two about Linux and computers in general. While they're not always the most practical, they can definitely encourage the hacker ethos in people who wonder what their devices can do that Apple might hide outside their walled garden.
- peterburkimsher 4y ago
  Same! iPodLinux was my introduction to Embedded Systems, and that's now my actual job :-) I was only a teenager at the time as well, yet read the whole forum as a moderator. It was always fascinating to learn what new hacks people had made to let the iPod do everything it's capable of! It's so nice to see Linux becoming available for the iPhone and iPad too. Now the iPod is discontinued, I wish Apple would release its intellectual property (schematics, board views), so I can repair the old ones. The screen's a bit glitchy on my 1st gen, and I'm not sure how to fix it.
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
- apocalyptic0n3 4y ago
  iPodLinux (and the semi-related iPodWizard and iPodWiki projects) were some of the best years of my childhood. I loved all the time I spent customizing my iPod and helping others do the same.
- dazhbog 4y ago
  Oh man, the iPodLinux project was the first thing I ever compiled. It took me so long to figure out how to do it, as I was typing Unix commands in Windows and it wasn't working. Best time ever as a smelly teenager pretending to hack stuff.
fartcannon 4y ago
Why does this have to be so hard? Just open your shit up, Apple. The majority of people will still use your walled garden. The rest of us will buy your hardware if you release drivers, etc.
- Teknoman117 4y ago
  Even though android is more open, it's not exactly in much better shape. It's nearly impossible to do anything useful with mainline Linux on most Android devices because the SoC vendors don't upstream anything since their entire financial model is sell new chip every 6 months.
  - fartcannon 4y ago
    Agreed. It's a sad state of affairs.
    - fsflover 4y ago
      Have a look at GNU/Linux phones, Librem 5 and Pinephone.
      - Teknoman117 4y ago
        The problem is that they're both way behind the state of the art. If the day to day experience of the device is still bad I'm not going to be carrying one on me. It gets relegated to yet another thing I can tinker with on the weekend, just like my pinebook pro.
  - google234123 4y ago
    If Linux provided a stable driver interface then they wouldn’t need to upstream.
    - southerntofu 4y ago
      It depends on the perspective. If you're concerned about security fixes and people being able to submit patches for the broken shit drivers manufacturers provide, then we still need the source and relevant schematics. Of course if all you care about is "it boots" then having a binary blob lying around and doing god knows what with your entire computing is a "viable" option. Not so long ago hardware vendors sold hardware and provided all schematics along... because that's what hardware manufacturers are for?! Nowadays they're more like a service provider trying to lock you into weird things and it's certainly not for the benefit of us users and maintainers. I think the issue was explained at length in this blog post called "Ok lenovo we need to talk": https://www.haiku-os.org/blog/mmu_man/2021-10-04_ok_lenovo_we_need_to_talk/ https://www.haiku-os.org/blog/mmu_man/2021-10-04_ok_lenovo_w...
bozhark 4y ago
Anyone remember getting android on early iPhones? Blew my first gen up, well the battery at least, with the dual OS running together. Good times
- grishka 4y ago
  Running a chunk of Android userspace on top of the Darwin kernel feels like a better idea if you want Android on an iPhone. You'll have to shim Android APIs to iOS ones and implement an ELF loader/linker for apps that use native libraries, but that's it. Should also be portable across all (jailbreakable) devices.
  - als0 4y ago
    > but that's it. That’s a heck of a lot of APIs and daemons to shim. And then you’ve got to do all of that again if you want to run a newer version of iOS or Android.
  - scintill76 4y ago
    Uh, ELF is the least of your concerns. I imagine there are native libraries making Linux syscalls. I’ve been toying with ideas about similar approaches to get alternative/updated OS’s on iDevices — use stock kernel for all its device drivers for the proprietary HW, then put a VM on top running Linux or whatever. Sadly I don’t think I’ll have the time for such an ambitious project.
  - 0x0 4y ago
    I think you underestimate this quite a bit. Even running android things on desktop linux would be a feat since the android kernel has several significant android-specific additions such as binder IPC. And even the user-space android API surface is vast
zeckalpha 4y ago
> Diving into the XNU source Uh oh
northisup 4y ago
so _this_ is the year of the linux desktop?
randomrubydev 4y ago
We will finally see a mobile device running a PS3 emulator RPCS3 soon...
breakfastduck 4y ago
It's painful that for whatever reason these projects always tend to get built around old devices rather than more recent models, basically shooting themselves in the foot. Hard to garner excitement from more general crowds running something on an iPhone 5 than it would be 10/11/12 etc. Less people to become interested in contributing.
- nsonha 4y ago
  Yeah same story for linux on Androids. They are at better state, but Ubuntu Touch website is still promoting Nexus 5 as their "official" device, among other similarly old phones. The top spec I can find is Oneplus 6T but it lacks many things, especislly HDMI. Can we deduce that these developers dont make enough money (from these projects)?
- idle_zealot 4y ago
  > for whatever reason these projects always tend to get built around old devices rather than more recent models It’s because the new devices haven’t been cracked open enough to work on yet. Tough to port Linux to a device with a locked bootloader. On the Android phone side even if the bootloader is unlocked it takes a lot of time and effort to write or port drivers.

426 points by zetaposter 4y ago

Sadly my old one (4) up to A6 and the latest 3 is A10. No A7-A8x required for this test.

Although it's always good news to have Linux on more device, in the case of Apple I find it a bit problematic. That means you encourage Apple getting a huge cut on device sale. Or further justify the high prices of second-hand device because now you can 'give them a second-life' (to counter Apple's in-house planned obsolescence program). It's not just about freedom. Apple's walled-garden means you need in every company some "Apple guy" that owns an iPhone, iPad, etc to test Safari quirks. It really feels like an under-handed racket.

usrn 4y ago
What? These devices would be running Firefox not Safari.
tmikaeld 4y ago
There will be millions of no-longer-supported Apple units out there, it makes sense to give them a second life with Linux rather than throwing them in a landfill. And linux on it would not run Apple apps, it would run Firefox or Chromium.
- rtpg 4y ago
  So loads of people have testified that using old Androids as long term computing devices just doesn't work cuz the machines can't deal with being on all the time. I wonder if iPhones and the like are any different on this front. Would you be able to build up a little serve farm of these things?
  - alistairSH 4y ago
    That's kind of weird, since phones are generally on all the time when being actively used. I guess it depends on what active/sleep "modes" are available - ie can Linux on Apple run processes with the screen asleep or whatever. As long as it's plugged in, it should be workable, maybe. But, in my mind, you wouldn't try to build a server farm out of 5+ year old iPads. Instead, you'd continue to use them as consumption devices. Read books, browse web, ie all the things most iPads are doing when new.
    - rtpg 4y ago
      I believe what people have said is that the components can’t handle continuous use (instead of basically idling on user input). Even when being in use for the most part these machines just are rendering some textures onto the screen and the cpu is not doing much
      - alistairSH 4y ago
        That wouldn't surprise me. Could still be fun for tinkering and light consumption.
      - newswasboring 4y ago
        Oh damn. That sort of explains why my phone gets super hot when I try to solve a project euler problems on it. I never thought about this.
      - zozbot234 4y ago
        > I believe what people have said is that the components can’t handle continuous use That could be worked around by using the existing Linux featureset to manage hardware utilization. Especially if CPU/GPU use turns out to be the main issue (as opposed to, e.g. powering the display and radio components).
  - usrn 4y ago
    The Android userspace is absolutely god awful and makes those projects hard. This would be running straight GNU/Xorg/wayland.
- woojoo666 4y ago
  I think they are just saying if you buy an Apple device to install Linux on it, you are still supporting Apple (including their walled garden approach). Not to mention Apple is constantly fighting against these sorts of hacks so you'll always be playing mouse in their cat-and-mouse game
  - tmikaeld 4y ago
    I'm all for open hardware, but objectively, it's either landfill or Linux, I'd rather see it come to use than become useless.
  - jraph 4y ago
    I completely agree with this line of thinking. That would almost makes me against this kind of projects. However, thinking about the consequences completely flips the coin for me: - without these projects, Apple will still continue doing whatever they are doing - I don't expect many people to actually buy a new iThing because of these projects. Maybe they'd buy second hand iThings on which Linux is guaranteed to work. So Apple is not making new money with this - Yes, they may save some devices from the landfill - it might show Apple that yes, opening their devices a bit may actually increase their sales (but I would not count on it) If I ever need a tablet and these projects work out without too many drawbacks, I'd actually probably consider getting a second hand iPad and install Linux on it. At this point I'd rather avoid both Android and iOS. I'd probably look into Pine64's (and other such manufacturers) devices first though. I hope these projects will help save 2 old iPad 2 sleeping somewhere in my family. These otherwise perfectly capable devices are worthless now just because of one thing: the old version of Safari combined with the fact that Apple forbids browsers with alternative browser engines on these devices. That's so dumb. And I'd probably prefer using existing devices than buying new ones if possible. So, yes please, port Linux to the Apple devices!
refracture 4y ago
The only thing I could imagine Apple doing with regards to seeing Linux running on their mobile hardware is further engineer ways to prevent it. I'm personally hoping Apple A5 devices are able to run Linux too as my iPad 2 is 11 years old, has a great battery and is in good condition but hasn't seen a software update in years.
sgjohnson 4y ago
> to counter Apple's in-house planned obsolescence program Apple does not do planned obsolescence. iPhone 6S is going to be be supported for 8 years total. (It's not going to receive feature updates anymore, as iOS 16 won't support it, but it also means that iOS 15 gets another year of support)
- fartcannon 4y ago
  The updates that downgrade the battery life without having user replaceable batteries is planned obsolescence.
  - sgjohnson 4y ago
    Batteries are consumable, and there's not a shred of evidence that Apple is purposefully downgrading battery life with updates.
    - fartcannon 4y ago
      - refracture 4y ago
        To be clear it's not that they 'downgraded' battery life, it's that it throttled power draw (and by extension performance) if the phone determined that the battery could no longer reliably power the device at peak draw. Apple's failure to communicate this and give users the option to set power draw back to full (with an explanation of consequences) is exactly why they got sued and deserved to lose. It's up front and made clear in the battery settings menu, but it really should not have required a law suit to make that happen, they've nobody but themselves to blame for the perception that they were just being greedy and trying to coerce people into new phones by hobbling existing ones. I will say on the user experience side I did appreciate that in the aftermath of this we were able to get a new battery in an affected iPhone 6S for free straight from the Apple store. Got some serious mileage out of that phone.
ntoskrnl 4y ago
Let's say I have an iPhone 6 that stopped receiving updates. What do you suggest I do with it: - landfill - install Linux - something else?
- Synaesthesia 4y ago
  Use as an iPod, it's got a headphone jack which is rather nifty, also still works fine as a basic phone, you can have the battery replaced quite cheaply.
  - NeutronStar 4y ago
    And what do I do with my new phone? Just leave it there while I use the older iPhone? No. Realistically you'll use the new phone. The old iPhone is still not going to be used. So what do we do with them now? We install Linux or we just trash it?
    - turtlebits 4y ago
      Sell it or repurpose it, just like anything that gets replaced (fridge, blender, car, etc..)? Just because your old device doesn't support linux doesn't mean it's a brick. (Surely you were aware before you bought the device that it doesn't support linux).
- robin_reala 4y ago
  - The back camera is probably better than your current webcam - It can make a good pet or baby monitor (several apps that do this have extremely long support schedules because they know people will reuse old phones) - If you’re going to dispose of it, return it to Apple for recycling rather than landfill
- rvz 4y ago
  > - something else? Recycling it would benefit the planet more right?
- Klonoar 4y ago
  Recycle it with Apple. I don’t understand this desire to keep arbitrary old devices around. I only do it for as long as I need a device for testing (iOS dev). They simply have no value past this.
gruturo 4y ago
> (to counter Apple's in-house planned obsolescence program) iPhones are famous for being supported A LOT longer than almost any other phone. There are manufacturers which abandon you after the 2nd year, and if you buy a model near the end of its sale period, that can mean as little as 13-14 months on a brand new phone. Some iPhones have been, are, or will be supported for 6, 7, even 8 years - which is ridiculously good in comparison, and often the reasons for dropping a model are quite clear (only 1G of RAM, would swap/OOMkill like crazy, or lack of a 64-bit CPU). You could debate some of these reasons, you could debate when none are provided, you could argue about why a certain model had so little RAM to begin with, and of course there have been poorly handled issues like batterygate or certain iOS versions being brutally slow on old models (though it's been years since it last happened).... but frankly, this is an odd choice of a hill to die on.
- drexlspivey 4y ago
  I am still using my 2012 ipad with iOS 9 to watch youtube and Plex
  - captn3m0 4y ago
    Running iOS8 on my iPad 2 to read books and comics.
    - mobilio 4y ago
      I'm still using iPad 2 for ebooks too.
    - jraph 4y ago
      The iPad 2 is a perfect example. It is good some people still find use for it. However, it is a device that would be perfectly capable of being used to surf the web… but Apple stopped releasing updates for Safari and forbids alternative browser engines for iOS. The web is essentially broken on it, and I'm not even talking about the security issues that it probably has as a consequence.. I'd say it is exactly the example of a device that is today unusable for many things its hardware could handle just fine for no good reason, and therefore obsolete for many people. Obsolete because of its closed nature. This obsolescence was planned. Maybe not intentionally to make you buy a new one, but still bad and the consequences are the same. Many people probably replaced their iPad 2 with a new tablet for exactly this reason. Or bought a new tablet even if they still use their iPad 2 for the uses cases the iPad 2 is not capable of handling anymore. Apple should be legally forced to enable third parties to support this hardware. Next time you consider buying closed hardware (not just Apple, and Android tablets are certainly problematic too), think about the iPad 2. Closed => Waste.
scarface74 4y ago
You need a lot more “Android guys” to keep Android usable on old phones when the manufacturer drops support in a year..
jacquesm 4y ago
It beats devices going into the landfill or being scrapped, this gives millions of machines a second lease on life. For people who for instance can't afford anything else.

vocram 4y ago

How could we benefit from having Linux on old iDevices? Would I be able to repurpose a device to do something useful I can’t do with iOS?

pabs3 4y ago
Its good for devices that stopped receiving iOS security updates, or for doing weird things that you can't do with iOS, like using your iPhone as a USB keyboard for your desktop using Linux's USB gadget support.
usrn 4y ago
Yeah, it would actually be a useful computer.
- umtksa 4y ago
  I'm using one of my old android phone to run node-red and display a dashboard on it. I want to use my old iphone 4 like this
simion314 4y ago
>How could we benefit from having Linux on old iDevices? On old devices that do not get updates your internet will stop working because of old browser, missing SSL certificates or old libraries. With Linux you might get an updated browser and you could use the device to browse things and you can do whatever your mind can imagine like maybe write a simple bash/python script to automate something.
- brk 4y ago
  Technically yes, but when? I just retired an iPhone5 that we were using as a "house controller", streaming Pandora, home automation app, etc. I retired it not because the software stopped working but because the battery won't last more than 30 minutes off the charger, and I had an iPhone8 sitting around doing nothing. IMO an iPhone with linux is going to be less of "do whatever your mind can imagine" and more of "spend countless time trying to hack random stuff into this unsupported platform". Overall, I think it is cool achievement, but (to me), it feels more along the lines of solution looking for a problem than an actual truly useful thing.

fareesh 4y ago

I remember being in an IRC regularly 10-12 years ago where there was a community that was semi-active about a project to port android to the iPhone created by David Wang (planetbeing). There were a few builds going around at the time which I tried out. This video had gone somewhat viral at the time which is what sparked my interest. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uJj0kHQgC9w https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uJj0kHQgC9w. It seems like that project eventually became "Project Sandcastle" and the whole topic has seen some kind of recent resurgence from the looks of it.

fathyb 4y ago
I remember flexing my iPhone 3G dual-booting iOS and Android back in high-school. The project was named iDroid: https://www.theiphonewiki.com/wiki/IDroid https://www.theiphonewiki.com/wiki/IDroid It taught me to create custom ramdisks and kernels for iDevices, which eventually landed me my first job as a digital forensics SWE.
- fareesh 4y ago
  yep that's the one
extrememacaroni 4y ago
wow that brings back memories. back then android was truly hideous compared to iOS, unless aided by 3rd party launchers.
- fareesh 4y ago
  It was ugly for the longest time but ahead on several features. I remember the iPhone not having copy and paste for what felt like ages. A lot of the good stuff was on Cydia.
  - WhyNotHugo 4y ago
    Odd how the tables have turned. Copy-paste is ubiquitous on iOS nowadays, but pretty absent on Android. On Android, I haven't come across a single application that supports copying an image. It's infuriating. Flutter doesn't even support pasting images at all (so things like messaging apps can't support pasting images). I get an impression that Google/Android want copy-paste to disappear. My favourite conspiracy theory on this is that it's so people will have to use the "share" sheet, which shares links with tracking/analytics (rather than pasting a raw image which cannot be tracked).

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perfobotto 4y ago

Am I the only one not understanding what’s the point of all these efforts to try to run Linux on completely closed with no documentation devices (like iPhones and even mace for that matter). Seems like a lot of effort, for a crappy solution that maybe 0.0001% is going to use before realizing it is crap. Even only effort to keep up with the yearly hw updates that apple does and the complete disregard for backward compatibility and writing hw documentation makes these effort just a technocrat exercise (very cool for sure), but I can’t see anything more than that

synapse26 4y ago
I see these as more art and a statement about Linux’s ubiquitousness rather than anything especially meaningful. There’s probably not a lot of people who want to run Doom on a lamp, but people did that anyway.
nathanwh 4y ago
From TFA, “Now it was just a matter of what I like the most, hacking on Linux”. This isn’t a product for users, it’s one of this persons hobbies.
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bee_rider 4y ago
It excites skilled hackers, which is good for the health of the overall community. Every platform has some poorly documented nooks and crannies and doesn't want to be fully opened up. This is practicing those skills in the most hostile environment. Plus, it gives us backup plans, if Intel and AMD are hit by meteors. And maybe they'll keep a couple iPads out of the landfills.
lm28469 4y ago
Isn't that one of the "true" mantras of hacking ("hacker news") ? Doing hard things just for the sake of it > A hacker is a person skilled in information technology who uses their technical knowledge to achieve a goal or overcome an obstacle, within a computerized system by non-standard means.

jagger27 4y ago

This is really all about the iPads to me. Having that "magical piece of glass" run free software for years to come is an absolute win.

xalava 4y ago
What is the benefit compared to a rooted android tablet?
- black_puppydog 4y ago
  Not sure this applies here since the OP seems to be only for certain hardware, but... I'd have bought an android tabled years ago if I had found something that seriously competes with the iPad Pro 12" versions.
  - jagger27 4y ago
    iPads are just straight up good hardware, externally and internally.
- ryandrake 4y ago
  As someone who owns an OG iPad 1, the benefit of potentially being able to run Linux on it is I already have an old iPad but I don't have a rooted Android tablet. Currently, due to Apple refusing to support it with software updates, and providing no other means for me to update it myself, the iPad is kind of useless.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- formerly_proven 4y ago
  There are a lot of iPads.
- prvc 4y ago
  Way easier to create software for it, and with more flexibility, for starters.

stuntkite 4y ago

I am so stoked on these recent developments. I have piles of useless iPhones and I know people that have huge stashes. I can't wait to waste months trying to get the lidar working on something. It really disgusts me that old phones are bricked. Getting a high powered SBC with an actual 5G modem alone is amazing.

CommanderData 4y ago

I'm so excited. I want to use an old Ipad that has a failing battery as a home automation screen. Poor iOS APIs mean developers can't create good kiosk apps to do simple things like control system settings, lock screen and so many more things that I resorted to an Android tablet. This is finally going to make it possible and turn junk into gold.

metadat 4y ago
> This is finally going to make it possible and turn junk into gold. I am also hopeful, but last week when I checked the compatibility matrix, my 3rd generation A5 iPad was "wayyy" too old and not supported. Only A7 chips or newer, iirc.
nonrandomstring 4y ago
> This is finally going to make it possible and turn junk into gold. Hearing many people say this. I may write it up from a e-waste POV as a big win for the environment.
astrange 4y ago
You can certainly create a kiosk app on iPads using eg autonomous single app mode. Deploying back to an old iPad may be a pain.
- CommanderData 4y ago
  Full screen kiosl browser for Android has many features I'd consider crucial for the type of task I'm considering. I did some reasons some months back and many features just aren't possible in iOS.
trip-it-up 4y ago
A web app that is added to the home screen will do what you want. Create a simple web app (or use someone else's) then in safari click the share button and "Add To Homescreen". Boom, you have a full screen app experience with no App Store. It's not a kiosk as you can press the home button to exit but if it's for your own use that should be fine.

CamelRocketFish 4y ago

Others have already spoken about this amazing achievement so I’m not going to repeat it, but I will say that the flashing cursor animation in the nav bar is horribly distracting whilst reading, if author reads this, please consider removing it.

dripton 4y ago
UBlock Origin, right-click on the annoying thing, Block Element, done.
- CamelRocketFish 4y ago
  Cheers!

srndsnd 4y ago

While only semi-related, this reminds me a lot of iPodLinux, a project from around 2006/2007. I'm on the younger side, and this project was my first real introduction to the possibilities of computing. It let my grayscale iPod Classic play videos and Doom, which at the time, was mindblowing to me and my middle school classmates. In the process I was fortunate enough to actually learn a thing or two about Linux and computers in general. While they're not always the most practical, they can definitely encourage the hacker ethos in people who wonder what their devices can do that Apple might hide outside their walled garden.

peterburkimsher 4y ago
Same! iPodLinux was my introduction to Embedded Systems, and that's now my actual job :-) I was only a teenager at the time as well, yet read the whole forum as a moderator. It was always fascinating to learn what new hacks people had made to let the iPod do everything it's capable of! It's so nice to see Linux becoming available for the iPhone and iPad too. Now the iPod is discontinued, I wish Apple would release its intellectual property (schematics, board views), so I can repair the old ones. The screen's a bit glitchy on my 1st gen, and I'm not sure how to fix it.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
apocalyptic0n3 4y ago
iPodLinux (and the semi-related iPodWizard and iPodWiki projects) were some of the best years of my childhood. I loved all the time I spent customizing my iPod and helping others do the same.
dazhbog 4y ago
Oh man, the iPodLinux project was the first thing I ever compiled. It took me so long to figure out how to do it, as I was typing Unix commands in Windows and it wasn't working. Best time ever as a smelly teenager pretending to hack stuff.

fartcannon 4y ago

Why does this have to be so hard? Just open your shit up, Apple. The majority of people will still use your walled garden. The rest of us will buy your hardware if you release drivers, etc.

Teknoman117 4y ago
Even though android is more open, it's not exactly in much better shape. It's nearly impossible to do anything useful with mainline Linux on most Android devices because the SoC vendors don't upstream anything since their entire financial model is sell new chip every 6 months.
- fartcannon 4y ago
  Agreed. It's a sad state of affairs.
  - fsflover 4y ago
    Have a look at GNU/Linux phones, Librem 5 and Pinephone.
    - Teknoman117 4y ago
      The problem is that they're both way behind the state of the art. If the day to day experience of the device is still bad I'm not going to be carrying one on me. It gets relegated to yet another thing I can tinker with on the weekend, just like my pinebook pro.
- google234123 4y ago
  If Linux provided a stable driver interface then they wouldn’t need to upstream.
  - southerntofu 4y ago
    It depends on the perspective. If you're concerned about security fixes and people being able to submit patches for the broken shit drivers manufacturers provide, then we still need the source and relevant schematics. Of course if all you care about is "it boots" then having a binary blob lying around and doing god knows what with your entire computing is a "viable" option. Not so long ago hardware vendors sold hardware and provided all schematics along... because that's what hardware manufacturers are for?! Nowadays they're more like a service provider trying to lock you into weird things and it's certainly not for the benefit of us users and maintainers. I think the issue was explained at length in this blog post called "Ok lenovo we need to talk": https://www.haiku-os.org/blog/mmu_man/2021-10-04_ok_lenovo_we_need_to_talk/ https://www.haiku-os.org/blog/mmu_man/2021-10-04_ok_lenovo_w...

bozhark 4y ago

Anyone remember getting android on early iPhones? Blew my first gen up, well the battery at least, with the dual OS running together. Good times

grishka 4y ago
Running a chunk of Android userspace on top of the Darwin kernel feels like a better idea if you want Android on an iPhone. You'll have to shim Android APIs to iOS ones and implement an ELF loader/linker for apps that use native libraries, but that's it. Should also be portable across all (jailbreakable) devices.
- als0 4y ago
  > but that's it. That’s a heck of a lot of APIs and daemons to shim. And then you’ve got to do all of that again if you want to run a newer version of iOS or Android.
- scintill76 4y ago
  Uh, ELF is the least of your concerns. I imagine there are native libraries making Linux syscalls. I’ve been toying with ideas about similar approaches to get alternative/updated OS’s on iDevices — use stock kernel for all its device drivers for the proprietary HW, then put a VM on top running Linux or whatever. Sadly I don’t think I’ll have the time for such an ambitious project.
- 0x0 4y ago
  I think you underestimate this quite a bit. Even running android things on desktop linux would be a feat since the android kernel has several significant android-specific additions such as binder IPC. And even the user-space android API surface is vast

zeckalpha 4y ago

> Diving into the XNU source Uh oh

northisup 4y ago

so _this_ is the year of the linux desktop?

randomrubydev 4y ago

We will finally see a mobile device running a PS3 emulator RPCS3 soon...

breakfastduck 4y ago

It's painful that for whatever reason these projects always tend to get built around old devices rather than more recent models, basically shooting themselves in the foot. Hard to garner excitement from more general crowds running something on an iPhone 5 than it would be 10/11/12 etc. Less people to become interested in contributing.

nsonha 4y ago
Yeah same story for linux on Androids. They are at better state, but Ubuntu Touch website is still promoting Nexus 5 as their "official" device, among other similarly old phones. The top spec I can find is Oneplus 6T but it lacks many things, especislly HDMI. Can we deduce that these developers dont make enough money (from these projects)?
idle_zealot 4y ago
> for whatever reason these projects always tend to get built around old devices rather than more recent models It’s because the new devices haven’t been cracked open enough to work on yet. Tough to port Linux to a device with a locked bootloader. On the Android phone side even if the bootloader is unlocked it takes a lot of time and effort to write or port drivers.