Are there any things preventing an opernsource distribution for N800/770. I have heard that the 770 is abandoned and maybe it will only take 1.5 years untill N800 is abandoned too. If there were an opensource distribution i think it would logen the life of the devices. This is offcourse nothing that nokia would like but something that us as consumers and linux freaks would want. I would probably still by the next gen N900 but it would be nice if the old ones had their future ensured via opensource.

the 770 is not abandoned. there probably be more official updates from nokia, and there will definatly be more apps.

there have been third party kernel for the 770 with extra features (large and fast mmc support etc)

i think the following bits are closed source in the software
power management
dsp (digital signal processing, ie the codecs for media)
opera (the is a mozilla based browser available minimo)
flash (gnash might one day be upto the job)
gtalk (there are open source options)

maybe someone can add more to this list.

A few days ago fpp told me about Ångström in this thread. It seems what they're trying to do is build one single system that will run on several platforms (Zaurus, iPAQ h2200, Nokia 770, A780). The idea is great: Imagine the user base such a distribution could have - if it ever works.

There is a very recent file on one of their servers that seems to be a testing image of Ångström for the 770; they don't provide any kind of information, though, on how to use it, and I am not going to brick my 770 by flashing it with this "testing image" as long as I don't know what happens and if I cant safely revert to OS2006. I remember reading somewhere that they have problems with hardware that's not documented on the Nokia 770.


Don't think so. Still, a free alternative to Nokia's system should be welcome.

The Angstrom image will be similar to the previously released familiar gpe-image. I actually posted about this a while back.

Si

IIRC, there is (was) an Ångström distribution for the Psion 5mx. It seemed to do quite well on that rather severely limited platform (even X with, again: IIRC, the Matchbox window manager).

I do wholeheartedly second Benny's feelings about a free Linux distro on the "Internet" Tablet platform.

There's a thread about the GPE-image here.

Does anybody know about the relation between these 2 projects?

The gpe-image that's talked about in that thread was built using the Familiar/OpenEmbedded metadata and the bitbake tool (see www.openembedded.org for a description of the bitbake buildtool and openembedded metatdata combination -> buildsystem).

The Familiar distribution and metadata supported the iPAQ line of pdas, in much the same way the OpenZaurus distribution and metadata supported the Zaurus (and OpenSimpad the simpad, etc.).

Angstrom is an attempt to pull together all of these sorts of projects (all of which used the same main metadata anyway) to reduce the work needed to support a given hardware platform, etc.

Angstrom also has an EABI toolchain (as Maemo uses) though I'm not sure whether this will allow any form of software compatibility with maemo.

Best place to ask is probably in #angstrom on irc.freenode.net, or on the Angstrom mailing list (or look at the archive). See http://www.angstrom-distribution.org/.


Si