Using Emma is the Windows-only step that we are getting worked up about. If Jolla documents and supports a Linux-based alternative, then there is no problem, however James Noori says that Emma is required. This means Windows is required: early experiments with Wine are not encouraging. This is not speculation: read James' comments on the Jolla blog again if you think that it is.

What we don't know is the level at which Sony enforces the requirement for Emma. If they have simply asked Jolla not to support/document a pure Linux method, a community-supported Linux method will still work and things are still kind-of OK. OTOH they may have required Jolla to somehow add an extra level of signing and/or key verification to the official SFOS X image so that it won't be installable without Emma. That would be seen as an unethical move, and probably as an open invitation to crack the security and find a way around it (I don't have the expertise, but other people who hang out around here probably do).

We will have to wait until the official release to find out what the situation really is of course, but like I said I'm glad that I don't have James' job.

technically, yes. But in reality, how exactly did linux (kernel) benefited from android being "linux"?
But my point was that they are so focused on the wrong thing IMO. I don't know if that's because of SONY or is just another of those silly ideas from Jolla but I don't see regular android user with windows machines discussing sailfish for X. Anywhere.
I know that I'll miss
for a very looooong time because it can't be easier than that.

I suspect that Windows in a VirtualBox under Linux will work. The only tricky thing is to configure the USB connected device to be handled by the VM rather than the host. But I got that working once for a Windows 10 VM on my Ubuntu laptop, for a USB security token, so it can be done.

You do need a Windows license to run Windows of course ..

More importantly you have to trust it and all the software running on in, including the sony tools. Isn't that the bigger issue here?

I really find it difficult to believe that many fulltime Linux users would find it hard to get 15 mins use of a Windows box of some description for a suitably important task. It's more the principle that they don't want to and should not have to.

I have legitimate licenced Windows VMs running for various tasks where there is no alternative (except getting a different job). But if Sony and/or Jolla make a Windows based tool mandatory, then just on principle I think I will either stick to whatever community port is available, or stick my X on ebay

These images will expire in 90 days, straight from the horse's mouth.

Now, they are meant for web developing & testing so I cannot guarantee they can be used for flashing, but you never know.

What is all this whining about Windows-only flashing?

If you look at https://github.com/mer-hybris/droid-...boot/flash.bat you would see that just recently (September, 26th a day before the blog announcement) a new commit for windows flashing hit the repository.

In that batch skript you would find in line https://github.com/mer-hybris/droid-...t/flash.bat#L7 a var set to Emma flashtool website.

A few lines later (https://github.com/mer-hybris/droid-.../flash.bat#L67) you will find that flash.bat will reference to Emma if your devices ASOP is < 34.3 which means you are running MM, but SFOS X requires initial Nougat (7.1.1) image. That recent image will be flashed by Emma and can be flashed by (inofficial) Linux-only tools, too.

The requirement is simply spoken to have a current Qualcom baseband and other device blobs in place to run SFOS X as a common base for all official images flashed to the device. Otherwise some might have MM (32.0.x) blobs installed leading to a faulty device with official image.

Additionally windows flashing will use fastboot.exe to flash boot, system and user partition compared to linux flash.sh which additionally flashes the cache partition with Android 6 properitary blobs which is not required by windows. This might be, because official Nougat has the right blobs by official flashing in place, but I am not sure about it.

Cheers,
Nek

Well, what can I say, except that HMDG is not Nokia.

I was not aware that the bootloader is unlockable, bummer
I sure hope they will come to their senses one day!

And also they specify X Compact there! Seems like they'll make it official soon, too. Which is logical, since it's very similar to X HW-wise.

Yes, my point was that the VM option at least means you don't need to have a separate computer with a Windows host OS.

A dual boot configuration would also solve the issue of course.

Ohhhhhh yeahhhhhh