Slashdot Mirror
Airbus 380 To Have Linux In Every Seat
jpatokal writes "Singapore Airlines will be rolling out the A380 superjumbo on October 26th, and a surprise awaits in the seat of every passenger: their personal Linux PC, running Red Hat. In addition to running the in-flight entertainment, passengers can also use a full copy of StarOffice, and there's a USB slot for importing/exporting documents or plugging in your own keyboard/mouse. Screen size is 10.6" (1280x768) in economy, 15.4" in business and a whopping 23" in first class (along with free noise-canceling headphones). The system is already available on current B777-300ER planes and will also be outfitted on the upcoming B787 Dreamliners."
It's not a full machine, but if you've flown Delta and used their in-flight entertainment machines (the trivia is great), they're using Redhat. I know this because I watched it crash and a subsequent reboot which was grub...
the kernel was a 2.4 version as I recall...
Penguins CAN fly!
Last year in february, i flew from Frankfurt, Germany to Johannesburg, South Africa with a brand new South African Airlines A340-400 Airbus. Just after boarding, the cabin crew resetted the In-Flight-Entertainment-System and several hundred screens in the seats showed a typical Linux booting screen with a small penguin in the upper left corner. They did not use a spash screen and it was possible to take a quick look at the booting messages... by the way, they made a network boot.
Hope they secure these well. With all the business travelers it would be a great place to drop a rootkit. From the article it sounds like each seat actually has a thin client, which would in effect reinstall the OS after each user/flight which is good from a security standpoint. But with access to a keyboard and USB hub, it still sounds a bit more vulnerable to abuse than a standard kiosk.
Of course it's possible, and that's how Linux-based embedded systems work. Your /home/$USERNAME can be created in RAM and deleted (recreated from a skeleton) after you log out (or the system restarted.) There is nothing else writeable on the whole box. This is necessary in embedded systems to prevent Flash wearing out, and to ensure reliability. Same needs here.
nerds can join their own version of the mile high club!
Enjoy a few pics here. Incidentally "Song airlines" were the first ones Delta put these on. Song went out of business (there's a Frontline episode you can watch about it) and the Song planes were turned back into Delta planes. Now all the Delta planes are scheduled to have the inflight video stuff too.
This application is also ideal for Linux. Meaning, linux is best in computers or embedded devices where you need high reliability and you want to be able to specify the exact amount of the functionality it should have. Windows CE, at least in my opinion, does not stand a chance here..
In my opinion, the best part about this is Star Office. Eventhough in reality it probably is quite unlikely many people will use it, from the vendor's standpoint, it was nearly trivial to implement... That is the true power of OSS, which is over the longterm adding allot of functionality with limited cost.
You don't know what the hell you're talking about. Strobes don't consume kilowatts. Batteries must supply all flight instrumentation for at least 30 minutes for certification. Deicing is almost all bleed air powered. Engines need no system power to run, even with FADEC. The airplane will not fall like a rock with a total electrical failure. APU's will start just fine without any truck, at all. Gear is hydraulic, not electric. There are a few electrics controlling it, but they have mechanical overrides that allow the flight crew to drop the gear and flaps without electrics.
Yeah, right... when penguins fly!
I really wonder if they are using Virtual machines. The ease that they can be erased and start from scratch would be handy in that type of environment, and it wouldn't matter what you did to it. It would also help in isolating the network, so you couldn't mess up all the other computers.
Doubt no more...
RTLinuxPro is shipping in the just released Gen4 EFIS/One glass cockpit from Blue Mountain Avionics.
"Airspeed, Altitude and VSI, magnetically slaved all-attitude compass, HSI, solid state AHRS (Attitude Heading Reference System), a 12 channel GPS navigation engine and the highest resolution 3D terrain available. There's also a built in digital autopilot with altitude hold and ILS capture, a full air data computer with fuel burn and fuel totalizing functions, a flight planning system and digital monitoring of up to 32 engine gauges. The built in flight recorder and the new flight performance software, monitors flights, engine performance and much more."
Now obviously this is not your average linux distro, but then there are many reasons one could expect to find linux used in a flight control system, one of those reasons is the robust nature of linux and its reputation for not crashing. That's not to say that linux never crashes, but in my experience crashes involve running questionable code, i.e. closed source graphics drivers and the games that require those drivers.
...you've surfed pr0n at 20.000ft
this is probably the most boring sig in the world
If I Wine do I get a Windows seat?
I am a little worried that this is a result of Singapore Airlines management knowing something that the rest of us don't - namely, that it won't be long before laptops are banned from the passenger cabin for "security" reasons.
SQ is already the preferred airline for most business travelers who fly their routes. After this, they'll be able to lock up the rest, providing at least a usable means for productivity to business travelers who would otherwise have to sit on their hands the entire flight.
"Patriotism is your conviction that this country is superior to all other countries because you were born in it." -- GBS