Google Finally Shifting To "Upstream First" Linux Kernel Approach For Android Features

[pal666]

I wonder how this would help at all. The SoC and phone vendors don't want to provide more than 0 to 3 years of support (starting from the product launch day). Any Android device will have millions of lines of code for proprietary drivers and firmware.

kernel can't contain proprietary drivers, its license forbids it

[pal666]

Hmm. Could this be an easy PR win for Google, right before they pivot to using the Zircon kernel from Fuchsia OS with Starnix instead of Linux as the Android kernel.

idea that google can write non-linux kernel for android is crazy. it requires too much manpower for one company.

[sinepgib]

PR can have technical reasons. Public relations is ... get this -- establishing and maintaining relationships with the public through things the public need or should know about your product. The term itself is neutral.

By that metric every and all announcements would by definition be PR. Besides, in a post that mentions the one stating it being cynical I think the tone pretty much implies no neutrality in the use of the term.

Are you telling me the Android developer community isn't part of the public? I've already outlined what.

No, I'm telling you the Android developer community cares about what happens at the kernel level just as much as the general population does. Only people who might care are OEMs. Maybe I'm misunderstanding what you mean by "Android developer community" and you're including those?

[ezst036]

I go back and forth on this.

I don't ever want to see Google's spyware mainlined into the kernel so I say it should cost them more to conduct espionage on the citizens. The more it cost them, the better. I want to increase their costs, dramatically. Google can go pound sand. Conversely, I suspect Google doesn't want anybody to know the breadth and depth of their spying operation so that probably wouldn't get mainlined anyways.

At the end of the day I really don't want anything from Google or anything to do with Google because it's all fruit from a poisoned tree. Google is a bad corporate actor and they exemplify and are the living embodiment of everything that anybody has ever written about bad corporate shenanigans and disreputable business practices.

[hubick]

The bottom line for me is, people buying Android phones has resulted in Google pushing quite a bit of improvement to the Linux kernel over the years. If they leave the FOSS ecosystem eventually, others will be able to build similar solutions with much less work than would have been required before those contributions.

[stormcrow]

That won't happen because programmed obsolescence is the fabric of their businesses. There's just not only a lack of incentive but an actual pressing reason for them to avoid it.

Also the bloatware kpedersen mentioned, your data is part of their revenue and making it so you can easily switch the running system is damaging for them.



What exactly do Android developers care about here?



That's not PR, but an actual technical reason. This kind of notice, intended to pressure OEMs, is not precisely something I'd call PR. If anything it makes them look a bit mob-ish.

PR can have technical reasons. Public relations is ... get this -- establishing and maintaining relationships with the public through things the public need or should know about your product. The term itself is neutral. Are you telling me the Android developer community isn't part of the public? I've already outlined what.

[sinepgib]

afaik propitiatory drivers which require kernel patches to work. Qualcomm with their GPU's are biggest offenders.

AFAIK if they need to modify the kernel they need to release the sources as per the GPL. So it's most likely they just build a module like any other driver, with at most a shim that can just be built with DKMS without that much trouble.

There are some things that are maintained out of tree due to being bigger changes I think. Is Binder upstream yet, or even planned for it to be upstream?

[mdedetrich]

Why not switching to mainline Linux kernel entirely?

afaik propitiatory drivers which require kernel patches to work. Qualcomm with their GPU's are biggest offenders.

[tildearrow]

Why not switching to mainline Linux kernel entirely?

Because that would upset every device manufacturer and greatly delay their plans by requiring strict evaluation prior to the addition of a new device/platform.

[brad0]

Why not switching to mainline Linux kernel entirely?

Same reason Linux based OS's don't ship unpatched kernels. Google has tons of patches that would need to be commited to make that happen. A lot of that stuff for various reasons is very unlikely to ever go upstream.