7 ms·

Upstream Linux support available for Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 Mobile Platform

183 points by fsflover 3y ago

fsflover 3y ago
I wonder if one can run GNU/Linux like PureOS on the respective devices.
neilalexander 3y ago
Perhaps with this, the Microsoft Dev Kit 2023 will turn out to be a decent option for Linux on ARM.
- entropicdrifter 3y ago
  Meh, still worse than a 2020 M1 Mac Mini
  - neilalexander 3y ago
    Unless you like RAM. The Dev Kit comes with 32GB as standard.
    - entropicdrifter 3y ago
      Fair point. For my workloads compute matters a lot more than RAM, but it's not as straightforward a trade-off as I was initially thinking
      - klardotsh 3y ago
        Heh, and then I'm on the opposite end of the spectrum: I can happily get by with the CPU power offered by Skylake (or maybe even older) devices, but need 32GB RAM to be "mostly comfortable, usually" in my developer workflows. I could easily make use of 64GB. I'm considering putting 96-128GB in my next desktop build for some future-proofing. And yet laptop manufacturers seem hellbent on insisting 4GB is still acceptable to ship at all, and even still market 8GB machines to professionals. Folks, "professional software" like Slack takes hundreds of MB of RAM to even render the splash screen these days, it should be nearly criminal to ship a consumer device with less than 16GB now (alternatively, we should be taxing software companies for the negative externalities their waste produces, but that's a messy political fight)
        worksonmine 3y ago
        > Folks, "professional software" like Slack takes hundreds of MB of RAM to even render the splash screen these days, it should be nearly criminal to ship a consumer device with less than 16GB now Maybe the problem is slack (and every other program hogging your RAM). Just because we can doesn't mean we should. I get that some workloads need RAM but consumers and not even every professional needs it. There are still jobs where you mainly work with an e-mail client, normal sized documents and a browser. Blame bad developers for developing terrible software, not the companies providing cheap computing for the masses. There can even be an environmental argument against it. I don't even bother downloading the Slack app, I use it on the web for work, but I refuse to install it. Not going to happen, why would I? You shouldn't either.
        klardotsh 3y ago
        I don't use the app, I use a tab in Firefox. I even alluded to "alternatively, we could tax software companies for their waste". We're on the same team, bud, I just also have to accept the reality I currently live in: to pay the bills, I need a job (I'm not an indie developer yet, though one day I might like to be, and work on patronage or something!), and to do that job I have to use whatever the corporate chat app du jour is. Sadly, I will likely never be in a position to pitch anything for that; these decisions are made by non-tech-geeks for the most part, and so I'll rarely, if ever, get to use eg. Zulip or IRC in a corporate setting again. It's Slack, or Teams, or some other heavyweight mess, all the way down. And so I need the RAM to render it, and thus I need laptop manufacturers, and mini PC manufacturers, and etc., to get their shit together and either: (a) stop soldering RAM down, or (b) provide $LUDICROUS_NUMBER amount of it, and to stop pretending pittances of RAM are acceptable for professionals in nearly-2024.
        worksonmine 3y ago
        The part I'm reacting most to was this: > it should be nearly criminal to ship a consumer device with less than 16GB now I assume you were just being hyperbole because now you're talking strictly professional devices. You can and should give your expertise when non techies have opinions, one could even argue it's in our job description. You seem to have just caved and buy more RAM. I took the other more painful route, scrapped every electron app, learned vim, and am very vocal about the issues at $DAY_JOB. If more people did the same would we be in this situation today? If you're compiling huge programs I get the need for ridiculous amounts of RAM, but consumers should absolutely be fine with 8GB, many even with 4GB. I work in VMs with 4GB daily and it's no problem using my normal stack, a few terminals, a browser window with a couple of tabs. It doesn't break a sweat so it's difficult to relate.
  - tjoff 3y ago
    If you want to support an ecosystem that goes against your own interest. Sure, but what would cause you to be that shortsighted?
    - entropicdrifter 3y ago
      I run my M1 Mac Mini with Asahi Linux? I'm not a big fan of any SoCs which have soldered-on RAM or storage, but I find it an odd point to argue that I'm supporting Apple's ecosystem overall when all I did was buy their hardware on sale. Their App Store is by far their biggest money-maker.
      - tjoff 3y ago
        You are supporting the biggest threat to the open platforms we have. And you are actively not supporting the ones that keep it alive. How is that an odd argument? Voting with your wallet suddenly doesn't count because shiny?
        wmf 3y ago
        I would say it doesn't count because they're all "evil". Apple, Intel, AMD, Qualcomm, Microsoft... The only stuff that's close to being truly open like Freescale and Talos is completely obsolete and overpriced.
        fsflover 3y ago
        Purism, System76, Framework etc. are not evil.
        pjmlp 3y ago
        If only the hardware on their laptops would be 100% functional.
        fsflover 3y ago
bfrog 3y ago
With or without binary blobs and undocumented registers/IPs?
- nomel 3y ago
  Naive question. What's the practical impact for not having these? It seems that AMD and Intel are also guilty.
  - lrvick 3y ago
    Those blobs, if backdoored, could have massive security implications. Also those blobs are often targeted at specific kernel versions, so in 2 years when the upstream vendors stop releasing updated blobs, then it no longer becomes possible to upgrade the kernel, making it very very hard to keep last gen devices secure. This exact problem is why I was forced to admit there is no secure path to use Android today, and a big reason why I gave up on smartphones entirely.
    - fsflover 3y ago
      > and a big reason why I gave up on smartphones entirely This is not necessary: my Librem 5 doesn't rely on blobs in kernel and runs FSF-endorsed GNU/Linux, PureOS.
      - fifteen1506 3y ago
        Pixels may also be an option -- though Librem 5 is, in this context, better. Pixels Pro have now... 7 or 8 years support.
      - dawidpotocki 3y ago
        Because Purism cheated and just moved the blobs into a chip that you can't update and made it go through a separate processor[1]. FSF-endorsement is meaningless. This is worse than having a loadable blob from a kernel. [1]: https://puri.sm/posts/librem5-solving-the-first-fsf-ryf-hurdle/ https://puri.sm/posts/librem5-solving-the-first-fsf-ryf-hurd...
flakiness 3y ago
It doesn't cover either GPU or ISP (image processing unit). Not sure about NPU. Does Hexagon support cover that? It's still a nice progress though.
- robert_foss 3y ago
  ISP won't happen. GPU is just a matter of time, and has been enabled for previous platforms.
apatheticonion 3y ago
Will this help bring Linux to the upcoming Qualcomm Elite X laptop SoC? A viable Linux ARM laptop would be cool, especially if it promised high performance and long battery life!
- seabrookmx 3y ago
  Asahi is very close to daily driver material so it's likely that Macs will be the first viable ARM Linux laptops, funny enough. But it would certainly be great to see more variety, and with a standard (ie: UEFI based) install process. I would already be rocking an X13s if the Linux support was there.
  - apatheticonion 3y ago
    It's honestly incredible how much progress the Asahi team have made with Linux on Apple Silicon. In a few years I imagine we will have Vulkan support, external displays, bluetooth and good performing drivers for most of the hardware. I swear, the MBP running Linux would be an unstoppable development environment - at least as far as ultrabooks go. With the developments in Proton, FEX (x86 translation), and usability improvements in desktop linux (Gnome 4x and KDE); I'd go as far to say a MBP running Linux with full hardware support would be the best gaming and general purpose ultrabook on the market. For now I am testing Asahi but daily driving MacOS.
  - camel-cdr 3y ago
    > Asahi is very close to daily driver material so it's likely that Macs will be the first viable ARM Linux laptops, funny enough I've been daily driving my pinebook pro since 2020.
    - seabrookmx 3y ago
      Fair. The raspberry pi-esque performance is a deal breaker for me personally though.
StillBored 3y ago
The title is upstream support available, yet when I look at the tree in the article it is a 6.6 rc, and a bunch of public patches under review. I don't see a -next branch its on, and I don't see it in the 6.7 merge list. Its not actually upstream, is it? SOS then?
- wyldfire 3y ago
  > Its not actually upstream, is it? I agree: it's not at all clear from the title, it sounds as if it's truly "upstream." But patches based on an upstream tree (as opposed to any forks intended for Android) are pretty useful IMO. They're not accepted/landed but you can use them now and I'd wager good money that they'll continue rebasing them until they land, so you should expect to be able to use them for the foreseeable future.
- robert_foss 3y ago
  I haven't checked but you may be correct, but Linaro has a stellar track record. These patches will land upstream if they haven't already.
bjackman 3y ago
Wow this is fantastic (assuming the matches get merged). Anyone have a picture of how likely/soon we can reach a future where mobile devices get kernel upgrades in the mainstream market? I hear graphics drivers are getting pretty isolated now so is it even possible without open graphics?
- tetris11 3y ago
  PostmarketOS is pretty mainline, and comes with a nice Phosh interface, but smart battery support remains an issue on a lot devices

183 points by fsflover 3y ago

fsflover 3y ago

I wonder if one can run GNU/Linux like PureOS on the respective devices.

neilalexander 3y ago

Perhaps with this, the Microsoft Dev Kit 2023 will turn out to be a decent option for Linux on ARM.

entropicdrifter 3y ago
Meh, still worse than a 2020 M1 Mac Mini
- neilalexander 3y ago
  Unless you like RAM. The Dev Kit comes with 32GB as standard.
  - entropicdrifter 3y ago
    Fair point. For my workloads compute matters a lot more than RAM, but it's not as straightforward a trade-off as I was initially thinking
    - klardotsh 3y ago
      Heh, and then I'm on the opposite end of the spectrum: I can happily get by with the CPU power offered by Skylake (or maybe even older) devices, but need 32GB RAM to be "mostly comfortable, usually" in my developer workflows. I could easily make use of 64GB. I'm considering putting 96-128GB in my next desktop build for some future-proofing. And yet laptop manufacturers seem hellbent on insisting 4GB is still acceptable to ship at all, and even still market 8GB machines to professionals. Folks, "professional software" like Slack takes hundreds of MB of RAM to even render the splash screen these days, it should be nearly criminal to ship a consumer device with less than 16GB now (alternatively, we should be taxing software companies for the negative externalities their waste produces, but that's a messy political fight)
      - worksonmine 3y ago
        > Folks, "professional software" like Slack takes hundreds of MB of RAM to even render the splash screen these days, it should be nearly criminal to ship a consumer device with less than 16GB now Maybe the problem is slack (and every other program hogging your RAM). Just because we can doesn't mean we should. I get that some workloads need RAM but consumers and not even every professional needs it. There are still jobs where you mainly work with an e-mail client, normal sized documents and a browser. Blame bad developers for developing terrible software, not the companies providing cheap computing for the masses. There can even be an environmental argument against it. I don't even bother downloading the Slack app, I use it on the web for work, but I refuse to install it. Not going to happen, why would I? You shouldn't either.
        klardotsh 3y ago
        I don't use the app, I use a tab in Firefox. I even alluded to "alternatively, we could tax software companies for their waste". We're on the same team, bud, I just also have to accept the reality I currently live in: to pay the bills, I need a job (I'm not an indie developer yet, though one day I might like to be, and work on patronage or something!), and to do that job I have to use whatever the corporate chat app du jour is. Sadly, I will likely never be in a position to pitch anything for that; these decisions are made by non-tech-geeks for the most part, and so I'll rarely, if ever, get to use eg. Zulip or IRC in a corporate setting again. It's Slack, or Teams, or some other heavyweight mess, all the way down. And so I need the RAM to render it, and thus I need laptop manufacturers, and mini PC manufacturers, and etc., to get their shit together and either: (a) stop soldering RAM down, or (b) provide $LUDICROUS_NUMBER amount of it, and to stop pretending pittances of RAM are acceptable for professionals in nearly-2024.
        worksonmine 3y ago
        The part I'm reacting most to was this: > it should be nearly criminal to ship a consumer device with less than 16GB now I assume you were just being hyperbole because now you're talking strictly professional devices. You can and should give your expertise when non techies have opinions, one could even argue it's in our job description. You seem to have just caved and buy more RAM. I took the other more painful route, scrapped every electron app, learned vim, and am very vocal about the issues at $DAY_JOB. If more people did the same would we be in this situation today? If you're compiling huge programs I get the need for ridiculous amounts of RAM, but consumers should absolutely be fine with 8GB, many even with 4GB. I work in VMs with 4GB daily and it's no problem using my normal stack, a few terminals, a browser window with a couple of tabs. It doesn't break a sweat so it's difficult to relate.
- tjoff 3y ago
  If you want to support an ecosystem that goes against your own interest. Sure, but what would cause you to be that shortsighted?
  - entropicdrifter 3y ago
    I run my M1 Mac Mini with Asahi Linux? I'm not a big fan of any SoCs which have soldered-on RAM or storage, but I find it an odd point to argue that I'm supporting Apple's ecosystem overall when all I did was buy their hardware on sale. Their App Store is by far their biggest money-maker.
    - tjoff 3y ago
      You are supporting the biggest threat to the open platforms we have. And you are actively not supporting the ones that keep it alive. How is that an odd argument? Voting with your wallet suddenly doesn't count because shiny?
      - wmf 3y ago
        I would say it doesn't count because they're all "evil". Apple, Intel, AMD, Qualcomm, Microsoft... The only stuff that's close to being truly open like Freescale and Talos is completely obsolete and overpriced.
        fsflover 3y ago
        Purism, System76, Framework etc. are not evil.
        pjmlp 3y ago
        If only the hardware on their laptops would be 100% functional.
        fsflover 3y ago

bfrog 3y ago

With or without binary blobs and undocumented registers/IPs?

nomel 3y ago
Naive question. What's the practical impact for not having these? It seems that AMD and Intel are also guilty.
- lrvick 3y ago
  Those blobs, if backdoored, could have massive security implications. Also those blobs are often targeted at specific kernel versions, so in 2 years when the upstream vendors stop releasing updated blobs, then it no longer becomes possible to upgrade the kernel, making it very very hard to keep last gen devices secure. This exact problem is why I was forced to admit there is no secure path to use Android today, and a big reason why I gave up on smartphones entirely.
  - fsflover 3y ago
    > and a big reason why I gave up on smartphones entirely This is not necessary: my Librem 5 doesn't rely on blobs in kernel and runs FSF-endorsed GNU/Linux, PureOS.
    - fifteen1506 3y ago
      Pixels may also be an option -- though Librem 5 is, in this context, better. Pixels Pro have now... 7 or 8 years support.
    - dawidpotocki 3y ago
      Because Purism cheated and just moved the blobs into a chip that you can't update and made it go through a separate processor[1]. FSF-endorsement is meaningless. This is worse than having a loadable blob from a kernel. [1]: https://puri.sm/posts/librem5-solving-the-first-fsf-ryf-hurdle/ https://puri.sm/posts/librem5-solving-the-first-fsf-ryf-hurd...

flakiness 3y ago

It doesn't cover either GPU or ISP (image processing unit). Not sure about NPU. Does Hexagon support cover that? It's still a nice progress though.

robert_foss 3y ago
ISP won't happen. GPU is just a matter of time, and has been enabled for previous platforms.

apatheticonion 3y ago

Will this help bring Linux to the upcoming Qualcomm Elite X laptop SoC? A viable Linux ARM laptop would be cool, especially if it promised high performance and long battery life!

seabrookmx 3y ago
Asahi is very close to daily driver material so it's likely that Macs will be the first viable ARM Linux laptops, funny enough. But it would certainly be great to see more variety, and with a standard (ie: UEFI based) install process. I would already be rocking an X13s if the Linux support was there.
- apatheticonion 3y ago
  It's honestly incredible how much progress the Asahi team have made with Linux on Apple Silicon. In a few years I imagine we will have Vulkan support, external displays, bluetooth and good performing drivers for most of the hardware. I swear, the MBP running Linux would be an unstoppable development environment - at least as far as ultrabooks go. With the developments in Proton, FEX (x86 translation), and usability improvements in desktop linux (Gnome 4x and KDE); I'd go as far to say a MBP running Linux with full hardware support would be the best gaming and general purpose ultrabook on the market. For now I am testing Asahi but daily driving MacOS.
- camel-cdr 3y ago
  > Asahi is very close to daily driver material so it's likely that Macs will be the first viable ARM Linux laptops, funny enough I've been daily driving my pinebook pro since 2020.
  - seabrookmx 3y ago
    Fair. The raspberry pi-esque performance is a deal breaker for me personally though.

StillBored 3y ago

The title is upstream support available, yet when I look at the tree in the article it is a 6.6 rc, and a bunch of public patches under review. I don't see a -next branch its on, and I don't see it in the 6.7 merge list. Its not actually upstream, is it? SOS then?

wyldfire 3y ago
> Its not actually upstream, is it? I agree: it's not at all clear from the title, it sounds as if it's truly "upstream." But patches based on an upstream tree (as opposed to any forks intended for Android) are pretty useful IMO. They're not accepted/landed but you can use them now and I'd wager good money that they'll continue rebasing them until they land, so you should expect to be able to use them for the foreseeable future.
robert_foss 3y ago
I haven't checked but you may be correct, but Linaro has a stellar track record. These patches will land upstream if they haven't already.

bjackman 3y ago

Wow this is fantastic (assuming the matches get merged). Anyone have a picture of how likely/soon we can reach a future where mobile devices get kernel upgrades in the mainstream market? I hear graphics drivers are getting pretty isolated now so is it even possible without open graphics?

tetris11 3y ago
PostmarketOS is pretty mainline, and comes with a nice Phosh interface, but smart battery support remains an issue on a lot devices