8 ms·

For a company who thrives on making cheap devices and charging for licenses/platform, this is almost a crime especially when supporting ipv6 on Linux based devi

For a company who thrives on making cheap devices and charging for licenses/platform, this is almost a crime especially when supporting ipv6 on Linux based devices is much easier now. Wonder why don’t support it.

colordrops 4y ago
Are Rokus Linux based? I'd love to install an alternate distribution on one.
- yamtaddle 4y ago
  From Wikipedia: > The Roku box runs a custom Linux distribution called Roku OS. Looks like yes.
- throw0101c 4y ago
  > Are Rokus Linux based? Even if it wasn't, don't most embedded OSes come with IPv6 support? How small do you have to be to not have it? QNX is pretty compact, and even it has it: * https://www.qnx.com/developers/docs/7.0.0/#com.qnx.doc.neutrino.lib_ref/topic/i/ip6_proto.html https://www.qnx.com/developers/docs/7.0.0/#com.qnx.doc.neutr...
  - kevin_thibedeau 4y ago
    LwIP is common on embedded devices. It has only supported dual stack in the last few years but even if it's possible, there are resource savings when only running v4.
- filmgirlcw 4y ago
  What would the point be, exactly? The stuff that makes a Roku worthwhile are all the apps and the proprietary drivers and networking stack stuff. If you're going to put an alternate distro on it, you might be better off getting a whitebox Android TV/Kodi/whatever box off of Aliexpress than trying to get around the limitations on the Roku hardware.
  - javajosh 4y ago
    It would be pretty cool to be able to program my Roku to do anything I want, rather than be limited to whatever they want. In theory I can connect another device to the TV and use it as a display, but even in that case the Roku software is active. A security researcher (amateur or professional) is going to want to get in there and see what's going on in addition to running through a proxy. There are also some scenarios (admittedly pretty contrived in our compute-rich world) where your TV computer is the only one available to you, and so it would be in your interest to expand its functions. Imagine a kid in a poor neighborhood - theoretically with just a keyboard and a USB stick he could be using that TV as an internet-connected computer to learn how to program. That's a lot more value than running Netflix, IMHO.
    - filmgirlcw 4y ago
      Right -- and I get that -- but I guess my point is, what can even really be done by rooting a Roku, since all the stuff in user space is close source/proprietary and the drivers are unlikely to be useful with an alternate distro. A RPi would be a much better choice for a poor kid in a neighborhood who wanted to have a way to program.
      - javajosh 4y ago
        Have you tried buying an RPi lately? They are impossible to find. And it may be that compute devices will get harder to find over time. That poor kid may not have another choice.
- abracadaniel 4y ago
  This is an area that seems surprisingly empty from my observations. There doesn't seem to be much interest in rooting Rokus, and even if you did there doesn't seem to be a good open source replacement. The closest would be to install Android TV, but that's just exchanging one closed garden for another.
Syonyk 4y ago
> Wonder why don’t support it. It's probably harder to tie devices in a single household together with IPv6 than with IPv4, or so they think. They don't make (much) money on their devices, they make money on selling data collected and aggregated by their devices. Their "privacy" policy [0] is a hoot to read. "Whatever we can do, we will. If the laws of the country we collected the data in would interfere with that, we'll move the data and then do what we want." I mean, they grant themselves permission to nmap your network for other devices! Emphasis mine. > We may receive information about the browsers and devices you use to access the Internet, including our services, such as device types and models, unique identifiers including advertising identifiers (e.g., for Roku Devices, the Advertising Identifier associated with that device), MAC address, IP address, operating system type and version, browser type and language, Wi-Fi network name and connection data, __and information about other devices connected to the same network__. [0]: https://docs.roku.com/published/userprivacypolicy/en/us https://docs.roku.com/published/userprivacypolicy/en/us
- jmclnx 4y ago
  > It's probably harder to tie devices in a single household together with IPv6 than with IPv4, or so they think So I wonder if this means it is harder to ID the consumer with IPv6 ?
  - megous 4y ago
    It's easier. You'd be using SLAAC and your devices would have globally unique IP address based on the MAC address of their network interface.
    - outworlder 4y ago
      Expect that some systems use random temporary IPv6 exactly to make it harder to track (even Windows)
      - megous 4y ago
        Probably not very helpful against adversary device (like Roku) running on the same LAN.

colordrops 4y ago

Are Rokus Linux based? I'd love to install an alternate distribution on one.

yamtaddle 4y ago
From Wikipedia: > The Roku box runs a custom Linux distribution called Roku OS. Looks like yes.
throw0101c 4y ago
> Are Rokus Linux based? Even if it wasn't, don't most embedded OSes come with IPv6 support? How small do you have to be to not have it? QNX is pretty compact, and even it has it: * https://www.qnx.com/developers/docs/7.0.0/#com.qnx.doc.neutrino.lib_ref/topic/i/ip6_proto.html https://www.qnx.com/developers/docs/7.0.0/#com.qnx.doc.neutr...
- kevin_thibedeau 4y ago
  LwIP is common on embedded devices. It has only supported dual stack in the last few years but even if it's possible, there are resource savings when only running v4.
filmgirlcw 4y ago
What would the point be, exactly? The stuff that makes a Roku worthwhile are all the apps and the proprietary drivers and networking stack stuff. If you're going to put an alternate distro on it, you might be better off getting a whitebox Android TV/Kodi/whatever box off of Aliexpress than trying to get around the limitations on the Roku hardware.
- javajosh 4y ago
  It would be pretty cool to be able to program my Roku to do anything I want, rather than be limited to whatever they want. In theory I can connect another device to the TV and use it as a display, but even in that case the Roku software is active. A security researcher (amateur or professional) is going to want to get in there and see what's going on in addition to running through a proxy. There are also some scenarios (admittedly pretty contrived in our compute-rich world) where your TV computer is the only one available to you, and so it would be in your interest to expand its functions. Imagine a kid in a poor neighborhood - theoretically with just a keyboard and a USB stick he could be using that TV as an internet-connected computer to learn how to program. That's a lot more value than running Netflix, IMHO.
  - filmgirlcw 4y ago
    Right -- and I get that -- but I guess my point is, what can even really be done by rooting a Roku, since all the stuff in user space is close source/proprietary and the drivers are unlikely to be useful with an alternate distro. A RPi would be a much better choice for a poor kid in a neighborhood who wanted to have a way to program.
    - javajosh 4y ago
      Have you tried buying an RPi lately? They are impossible to find. And it may be that compute devices will get harder to find over time. That poor kid may not have another choice.
abracadaniel 4y ago
This is an area that seems surprisingly empty from my observations. There doesn't seem to be much interest in rooting Rokus, and even if you did there doesn't seem to be a good open source replacement. The closest would be to install Android TV, but that's just exchanging one closed garden for another.

Syonyk 4y ago

> Wonder why don’t support it. It's probably harder to tie devices in a single household together with IPv6 than with IPv4, or so they think. They don't make (much) money on their devices, they make money on selling data collected and aggregated by their devices. Their "privacy" policy [0] is a hoot to read. "Whatever we can do, we will. If the laws of the country we collected the data in would interfere with that, we'll move the data and then do what we want." I mean, they grant themselves permission to nmap your network for other devices! Emphasis mine. > We may receive information about the browsers and devices you use to access the Internet, including our services, such as device types and models, unique identifiers including advertising identifiers (e.g., for Roku Devices, the Advertising Identifier associated with that device), MAC address, IP address, operating system type and version, browser type and language, Wi-Fi network name and connection data, __and information about other devices connected to the same network__. [0]: https://docs.roku.com/published/userprivacypolicy/en/us https://docs.roku.com/published/userprivacypolicy/en/us

jmclnx 4y ago
> It's probably harder to tie devices in a single household together with IPv6 than with IPv4, or so they think So I wonder if this means it is harder to ID the consumer with IPv6 ?
- megous 4y ago
  It's easier. You'd be using SLAAC and your devices would have globally unique IP address based on the MAC address of their network interface.
  - outworlder 4y ago
    Expect that some systems use random temporary IPv6 exactly to make it harder to track (even Windows)
    - megous 4y ago
      Probably not very helpful against adversary device (like Roku) running on the same LAN.