OMAP3 resources opened - maemo.org

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	benny1967	2008-04-22 , 19:32
	Posts: 3,790 \| Thanked: 5,718 times \| Joined on Mar 2006 @ Vienna, Austria	#1

I stumbled upon this blog post a few days ago and wondered if it would mean anything to Nokia and the tablets. Anybody know if/how (future) tablets are affected?

Texas Instruments OMAP series of mobile CPUs have for some time had okay Linux support with parts of the code coming from community, parts from TI and parts from Nokia, one of the vendors. This month we start seeing results of TI’s recent efforts on making this support better by opening various technical resources that were available only to the vendors earlier. Yesterday the announcement of their DSP-bridge framework release under GPL was posted to the linux-omap list, and as of this week you can download the entire TRMs (35MB PDF each) for various OMAP3 CPUs from ti.com. Added to this are various types of manuals, example code and that covers also the recently announced 35xx models.

I had an occasion to be at TI’s Rishi Bhattacharya’s talk at BossaConference last month with a sneak peek on the process of opening OMAP3 related resources that had been ongoing internally for some time. Apparently more releases are planned including among other things some GPLed sources (and some freeware binaries) of DSP codecs for use on OMAP.

Could this lead to more open code in Maemo?

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fanoush	2008-04-22 , 20:45
Posts: 2,152 \| Thanked: 1,490 times \| Joined on Jan 2006 @ Czech Republic	#2

Yes, future looks promising, too bad they (=TI) will probably open just new OMAP3 stuff, not older OMAP2 (or even 1) used in current tablets. But still it is great for any new OMAP3 based tablet :-)

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jaivy	2008-04-23 , 04:57
Posts: 6 \| Thanked: 1 time \| Joined on Apr 2008	#3

right,fanoush get the point

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	benny1967	2008-04-23 , 07:09
	Posts: 3,790 \| Thanked: 5,718 times \| Joined on Mar 2006 @ Vienna, Austria	#4

Is there anything special that devs cannot do now because of the closed design that they will be able to do in the future? anything that users are waiting for?

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	Bundyo	2008-04-23 , 08:04
	Posts: 4,708 \| Thanked: 4,649 times \| Joined on Oct 2007 @ Bulgaria	#5

3D, java acceleration? But as fanoush said - they probably won't open the OMAP2 docs, so the devs won't be able to do it later too

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	Khertan	2008-04-23 , 08:07
	Posts: 1,012 \| Thanked: 817 times \| Joined on Jul 2007 @ France	#6

a good wifi driver that support channel hopping ...

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	benny1967	2008-04-23 , 08:08
	Posts: 3,790 \| Thanked: 5,718 times \| Joined on Mar 2006 @ Vienna, Austria	#7

Well, there might be an OMAP3 based tablet in the future, so even if the current tablets don't benefit from it, the product line as such might.

Also, if they see that opening the specs doesn't hurt, maybe they reconsider their position on OMAP2?

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fanoush	2008-04-23 , 08:20
Posts: 2,152 \| Thanked: 1,490 times \| Joined on Jan 2006 @ Czech Republic	#8

Originally Posted by benny1967

Is there anything special that devs cannot do now because of the closed design that they will be able to do in the future? anything that users are waiting for?

It is too early to name anything special now. We'll see how much will be opened. At least it will be a bit easier to run own stuff on new DSP and use other hardware that Nokia decides to not to use for whatever reason. But still the 3d chip may remain closed (it is licenced from 3rd party). Also wi-fi chip in current tablets is not from TI and is closed too so there may be not improvement here.

What matters it that it proves that times are changing and companies like TI feel the pressure and see the importance of having things open. And due to domino effect it will sooner or later push others in same direction too.

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fanoush	2008-04-23 , 08:36
Posts: 2,152 \| Thanked: 1,490 times \| Joined on Jan 2006 @ Czech Republic	#9

Originally Posted by benny1967

maybe they reconsider their position on OMAP2?

Well, they planned it for OMAP3, it may not be possible to open older designs retrospectively due to 'intellectual property' reasons as some stuff may be licenced from other parties or other parties who already use current hardware with current licensing rules may not like it. Even if there is no problem they may feel it is not worth the investment to do it for old (soon to be obsolete) stuff. We'll see.