[Arm-netbook] ARM port(s) BoF at DebConf

[Luke Kenneth Casson Leighton]

On Fri, Jul 20, 2012 at 9:30 PM, Steve McIntyre <steve at einval.com> wrote:
> On Thu, Jul 19, 2012 at 08:09:53PM +0100, Luke Kenneth Casson Leighton wrote:
>>On Thu, Jul 19, 2012 at 6:35 PM, Steve McIntyre <steve at einval.com> wrote:
>>
>>> Both armel and armhf are doing well, covering ~96% of the archive. We
>>> don't have any ARM server hardware yet, so we're stuck using
>>> development boards as build machines. They work, but they're a PITA
>>> for hosting and they're not designed for 24x7 usage like we're doing
>>> so they're not that reliable.
>>
>> there was a post on the arm-netbook mailing list about a 7W quad-core
>>tegra3-based mini ITX motherboard which could take up to 2gb of RAM.
>>whether it's the usual
>>"let's-put-something-out-there-see-if-anyone-is-actually-interested"
>>style of vapourware or actual reality i'd strongly suggest someone
>>gets onto them and considers putting together a group buy / bulk order
>>just to make it worthwhile their time making a batch, because it's
>>literally the first ARM-based machine i've ever heard about that can
>>actually take 2gb of RAM.
>>
>> oh: also the motherboards have eSATA and uPCI-e, hm let me find the
>>post.... here you go:
>>
>>     http://lists.phcomp.co.uk/pipermail/arm-netbook/2012-July/005127.html
>
> Cool, sounds interesting maybe... But what's the rest of the system
> like? Is it supported already in the kernel, etc.? We really want to
> get standard machines where possible.

 judging by this phoronix article (*1), it looks like nvidia has been
creating ubuntu 12.04 images at least for their dev-kits for quite
some time. so whether it's mainlined on kernel.org is anyone's guess;
chances are the kontron board will run with ubuntu and at least be
convertible to debian with minimum pain by one person, and then zero
pain by everyone else thereafter.

 aughh, kontron have finally twigged that maybe it's a good idea to
put the actual, like, y'know, availability status? on a page (*2)? and
yippee, it says "coming soon exclamation-mark".  *sigh*... yet another
board to have to wait for [except those openblocks A6 and AX3 ones -
thank you for finding those, hideki]

>> [... rambling stuff about debug builds...]

> That's interesting, but we don't want to be doing non-standard builds
> for one architecture. That's not the way we do things in Debian...

 eyy i didn't say it'd be "standard" :)  but then, having debug c++
builds run for 18+ hours and jamming everything else up isn't exactly
standard either, neh?

/peace.

l.

(*1) http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=MTA3MjQ
(*2) http://us.kontron.com/products/boards+and+mezzanines/embedded+motherboards/miniitx+motherboards/ktt30mitx.html