[maemo-developers] How much are Nxxx open?

[From: Nicola Mfb]

On Tue, Sep 1, 2009 at 5:43 PM, Frantisek Dufka<dufkaf at seznam.cz> wrote:
> Nicola Mfb wrote:
>>>
>>> With N900 we don't know yet but hopefully the bootloader will be u-boot.
>>
>> That's nice, the best would be if we'll be able to update/replace
>> u-boot, and have a way to debrick the device if something goes wrong.
>
> u-boot is just my guess, any other choice does not look sane to me, but
> still it can be a wrong guess.
>
> OMAP3 is designed to be unbrickable, it can boot from usb or serial or mmc
> directly from its boot ROM, bootloader in flash is not needed. I'm not sure
> how configurable is the priority list for booting (i.e. if it could be
> locked to load bootloader only from NAND flash) but hopefully it will by
> possible to bypass even the bootloader in NAND(u-boot or whatever).
>
> See also http://elinux.org/BeagleBoard#BootRom

Very nice!, that with free u-boot (we hope) may be perfect!

>> May you elaborate please? wifi is exposed normally?
>
> In N900? Yes. N8x0 used own closed wireless stack and own closed wlan
> driver. Wlan driver was opened later but it needs newer kernel which lacks
> other stuff. See http://stlc45xx.garage.maemo.org
>
> N900 uses normal mac80211 kernel stack and the wl1251 driver is open source
> too.

Very nice too!

> Also apart from Nokia being more open with N900 also TI is more open with
> OMAP3 in general (unlike with OMAP2 based N8x0) so there is more information
> available and bigger community overall. beagleboard.org community is quite
> active
>
>> Again about that, are applications able to full use opengl
>> acceleration without using closed userspace libraries?
>
> Not now. Looks like PowerVR's business model is currently not open source
> friendly :-) Maybe someone will write open alternative in future?
> http://forum.openhandhelds.org/viewtopic.php?f=14&t=341

Not so nice :(, I hope we have at least an X11 full 2D/XVideo
accelerated driver right?

>> Finally, it may be nice if Nokia may donate some devices to FSO and
>> OpenEmbedded core team, any interest/chance about that?
>
> We don't know yet about N900 device developer program but it may be useful
> to join maemo.org community right now and become a karma hunter ;-) For
> previous program check
> http://flors.wordpress.com/2007/10/19/n810-maemo-device-program/
> http://flors.wordpress.com/2007/11/05/rewarding-community-contributors/
> Also having application in Fremantle extras-devel repository might be a good
> idea :-)

I'll begin digging in that ;)

Frantisek, thanks for you detailed and gentle answer, now I miss only
the "audio" alsa/dsp part if possible.

Best Regards

    Nicola