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Mac OS X May Go Embedded?
VE3OGG writes "Apple Insider is reporting that Apple may very well be developing an embedded version of OSX. The report details what they believe will be the next step in Apple's future, which is extending its consumer electronics division. The first child of such a marriage between OSX and consumer electronic may be the oft-rumoured, not-yet-materialized iPhone — which it also asserts may well be released next fiscal quarter. It seems to be their opinion that with both the desktop and the phone running operating systems with similar underpinnings, 'expansive opportunities' would emerge."
Would it kill story submitter to actually read the article before creaming his jeans over the rumoured iPhone?
Wouldn't the first use of an embedded OSX be the already announced iTV? Even TFA only rates the (rumoured) iPhone as one of the first, not the first. And the (rumoured) iPhone isn't mentioned in relation to the "expansive [interactive] opportunities".
Poor summaries distort a Slashdot story yet again...
Based on the meager info, slips from Disney execs and rumors, it seems like the iTV could be a lot less than a Mac mini. Sure, many are using the mini as a home theater server (I'm one of them). But it's a full-blown Mac OS X computing environment with user home directories and the ability to run any app. The idea of the iTV (from my understanding) is that it's a remote TV displayer with some internet capabilities and maybe a HD for storage.
Seeing how Steve Jobs like single-purpose devices, I could see the iTV being more like the Airport Express or even the WRT54G. An embedded device like that would be more reliable than a general Mac OS X system, since there are fewer breakable (software) parts. An embedded device also has the benefit of instant-on, which is what everyone expects from their consumer appliances.
Yeah, they have been achieving very high clock speeds in embedded processors, but the processors themselves are nowhere near as complex as a "real" processor.
Seriously, my phone is slow. I purchased it to do away with multiple units (cell phone+palm pda) but in the end, I've been walking around for 6 months with an extra phone for making calls because it is so damned inefficient. I mostly blame the phone designers, I have a hunch they bullocksed up the drivers for the OS.
The term I have seen lately is "iChat Mobile."
(%i1) factor(777353);
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Are we still calling it now that Lynksys/Cisco has a product called that?
I'm guessing yeah, still calling it that.
QNX and friends are a very different kettle of fish. They run things like networking, filesystems and display managers as "user processes" and have a tiny microkernel core. Licensees can easily exclude (or not load) whatever modules they don't need and run with the basic minimum.
As I recall OS X consists of the monolithic BSD atop of a microkernel and the networking, filesystems and display are all in the BSD layer. It's not comparable to QNX and I would not draw any conclusions from the success of some proper microkernel designs in embedded usage.
Just a little history on osx:
OSX started out long ago as open step (as far as being for intel). Open step became rhapsody beta, which ran on intel (i have some cds around somewhere still =). I could go on, but the point is that I'd bet, and it's been said, that osx was kept at mostly build parity with the commercially released PPC versions. I think the main thing holding back the intel version was an enabling technology like rosetta. Of course, it had been rumored for years that OSX was/is also compiled for Sparc and some other targets.
Now, this is important because an os kept this relativly flexible would seem to have a monumentally esier time being targeted at different architectures (linux has this benefit as well). And leveraging APIs and frameworks for things like phones, video players, palmtop devices, media centers, could produce the most user friendly and functionaly devices seen yet.
This brings me to why the apple phone will clean up, if even done remotely right. Cell phones suck. The UI's get worse and worse. Cell companies charge in retarded fashions for stuff in the US (ring tones? backgrounds?). Cell phone layouts keep getting worse (am I the only one who thinks the keypad on the new slim line of moto phones is atrocious?). Cell phone companies dont compete in the US (at least on price... has your cell phone bill ever really gone down, even with the current ubiquity?). Oh yeah, #1 thing - a competant music player/photo/video viewer without all the restrictions a verizon would place on it.
And if apple is able to go te way of european phones, sellong unlocked phones useable worldwide with sim chips (and even possibly paid for with the latter in the US), all in all, apple should clean up and maybe, just maybe, force cell companies to make somereally good products. Kinda sucks that apple would be at least somewhat tied to current infrastructure, as it is said to be buying network usage from cingular.
Oh well, I'll been holding off my cell upgrade till macworld.
"Stuff... In my home!? NEVER!" - Zim on Invader Zim
"I want the toilet seat!" - Little Dog on Two Stupid Dogs
QNX's Neutrino is basically BSD layered on a microkernel and from what I've heard is the most highly regarded embedded OS out there. I don't know where you the got the idea you couldn't or shouldn't use a microkernel in an embedded system.
Don't you remember the late 90's? There was eThis and iThat all over the fucking place.
You mean like eWorld (1994) and iMac (1998), for example?