Slashdot Mirror
BeagleBone Black Ships With New Linux 3.8 Kernel
DeviceGuru writes "BeagleBoard.org has begun shipping its faster, cheaper BeagleBone Black SBC with a new Linux 3.8 kernel, supporting Device Tree technology for more streamlined ARM development. The $45 BeagleBone Black runs Linux or Android on a 1GHz TI Sitara AM3359 SOC, doubles the RAM to 512MB of its predecessor, and adds a micro-HDMI port. The updated kernel gives the BeagleBone Black access to a new Direct Rendering Manager (DRM) display driver architecture, as well as full support for the Device Tree data structure introduced to streamline ARM development in Linux 3.7. The project was hesitant to move up to such a recent kernel, but decided it was time to bite the bullet and support the Device Tree. By doing the hard work of switching to Device Tree now, BeagleBoard.org and its developer community can save a lot of configuration and maintenance headaches down the line, says BeagleBoard.org co-founder Jason Kridner. Fortunately, a modified 3.2 kernel 'coming soon' should provide the necessary bridge from the old cape driver architecture to the new one."
Yeah if only people would write GNU/Linux... wait, most distros aren't purely made up of a Linux kernel and GNU tools. Um, SomewhatGNU/Linux? NotJustGNU/Linux? OpenAndOrFreeSource/Linux? But what about whichever distro is using the FreeBSD kernel but the same userland as their Linux-based version? FreeBSD isn't just a kernel, it's an entire OS, so what would that be then? NotJustGNU/FreeBSDKernel?
I don't know about the rest of you, but I think saying "Linux" and "Android" is about as clear as it's going to get. To non-geeks it conveys the necessary distinction, and geeks already know (and debate) the distinction. Context is a wonderful thing after all.