Slashdot Mirror
Google's Mysterious Fuchsia OS Can Now Run On the Pixelbook (theverge.com)
Google's mysterious operating system, dubbed Fuchsia, has been in the works for more than a year now with very few details about the OS made public. According to a new report from Chrome Unboxed, we have learned that Google has released documentation to allow developers to load Fuchsia onto the company's Pixelbook. The Verge reports: This isn't your typical developer operating system, and you'll need two machines to host and target a Pixelbook to load the OS. It's very much a work in progress, with early hints at a user interface and functions. It's still interesting that Google has chosen its own Pixelbook to experiment with, though. Fuchsia has mostly been linked to embedded systems like wearables and Internet of Things devices in the past, but testing was expanded to Intel's NUC and Acer's Switch Alpha 12 Chromebooks. Fuchsia has been created from the Google-built Zircon microkernel, and not the typical Linux kernels that hold Android and Chrome OS together. It's not immediately clear exactly why Google is building a new operating system, nor what devices it will run on. As testing spreads to more Chromebooks, some are now speculating this could be a successor to the "Andromeda" project that never materialized.
I think that this will be disastrous for Linux.
Linux has been floundering on the desktop for ages now, only ever getting perhaps 3% of the market.
Linux has done slightly better in server and VM environments, but even then it faces some serious competition from the BSDs, Windows Server, Solaris, and other OSes. Many Linux users have reported problems involving systemd, which has already driven some server users away to other OSes, like FreeBSD.
Linux has also seen some embedded usage, but these days it's mostly contained to Android on mobile devices. More serious users of embedded Linux have been moving to QNX and other realtime OSes for a while now.
If we see future versions of Android, or perhaps an OS that replaces Android, become popular, it would effectively be removing most of Linux's market share. Linux would go back to being the kernel used on some servers, and a very small percentage of desktop systems.
What's worse, I think that there's the real possibility that this new OS from Google could very well start eating into Linux's desktop and server market share, too, if this new OS ends up being usable in such environments.
It sounds to me like Fuchsia OS could very well become the universal OS that we've all been waiting for: the OS that runs on embedded systems, through to mobile devices, through to servers, through to workstations, and perhaps even through to supercomputers and clusters.
Linux could have been this universal OS, had the Linux community not bungled stuff up so badly with systemd, GNOME 3, Wayland, PulseAudio, and so on. But like so many times before, Linux has missed out on its true potential.
It's looking more and more like Fuchsia OS will be the operating system of the future, with it competing against Windows and macOS, and with Linux becoming less and less relevant.
..., timeo Danaos et dona ferentes. And no, I don't mean the Greek, and in case of Google or any such entity, it actually shouldn't be "even when they bear gifts", but "especially when they bear gifts".
I used to use GNU/Linux on my servers but I had to move to OpenBSD when systemd broke too often. Will Fuchsia eventually run on servers? I like OpenBSD on my servers but it's not a good OS on my laptop. I want to use the same OS on my dev laptop and my servers to make my life as a dev easier. If Fuchsia worked well on both my laptop and my servers then I would consider switching to it.
Google is an $101.8 Billion company. I doubt they will lose any of that if this goes to the phones. Most people do not care.
The millennial that doesn't like most of the stuff designed for millennials.
Doing, needs to go look at the history of microsoft, and the reason for Stallman pushing for the GPL at all levels of the stack.
Google is creating a permissive/proprietary kernel that they will leverage for additional licensing leeway with their downstream manufacturers, as well as having the capability to close it at any time in order to leverage the extinguish phase of microsoft's three Es.
Doing, needs to go look at the history of microsoft, and the reason for Stallman pushing for the GPL at all levels of the stack.
Google is creating a permissive/proprietary kernel that they will leverage for additional licensing leeway with their downstream manufacturers, as well as having the capability to close it at any time in order to leverage the extinguish phase of microsoft's three Es.
License doesn't matter if the software is shit.
Google has always suffered from NIH syndrome. They will develop and abandon their own kernel rather than use the Linux kernel with billions of development hours because Google engineers didn't write linux.
It really is that simple.
I am at a complete loss to understand how a project that is completely open source (https://fuchsia.googlesource.com/) can be considered in any way "mysterious."
It's not immediately clear exactly why Google is building a new operating system...
Possibly to un-encumber themselves from the GPL? I note that Fuchsia's licenses are a mix of MIT, BSD, and Apache. This would potentially allow them to adapt the OS to just about any environment without having to release the source code.
Finding God in a Dog
The whole purpose of this alleged "OS" is to suck off all personal user data to Google.
Google hates the use of the GPL by internal developers. Like most BSD projects, it's written in hate.
https://github.com/fuchsia-mirror/fuchsia/blob/master/LICENSE
I get why Google would do this. Why anyone else would give them development hours without a gurantee of reciprocity escapes me, as it does most developers (who side with GPL 75% of the time). People invest in codebases, they want to be able to take that investment with them - especially if they leave on poor terms.
It's not immediately clear exactly why Google is building a new operating system ...
All the better to spy on you, my dear!
'The Economy' is a giant Ponzi scheme whose most pitiable suckers are the youngest among us and the yet-unborn.
some are now speculating this could be a successor to the "Andromeda" project that never materialized.
Making this the Fuchsia project that will never materialize.
This is a site for MRAs and Trump-lovers who occasionally talk about Linux because it makes them feel all smug and superior.
Posting anonymously because I'm one of the few that don't fit into that category and I want to keep my karma.
âoeIt's not immediately clear exactly why Google is building a new operating system...â
Unix is more than 40 years old. Granted, it works well on computers of different size levels and below the hood on both android and iOS devices.
But still, it is conceptually old, certainly by IT evolution standards.
I can imagine that a company with the funds and intellectual workforce like Google would be capable of innovating operating system principles taking into account the advances in academic research.
It wouldnâ(TM)t surprise me if a team of Apple engineers were also, and obviously more secretively, working on a next generation operating system as well.
Unforeseeable Fuchsia!
Pichai pushes ChromeOS as the mainstream and that flops. I could write reams about how crap Android is on Chromebooks is, but in essence it runs Android badly and removes the big 'locked down' feature that gave ChromeOS its niche.
Pichai also fragments Android, the latest Android that can't run most Android apps being Android Go.
So they can see the opening that's there. As long as Pichai is in that seat, Android for Desktops will be led by Samsung Dex, not from within Google.
So if you were a bored undervalued tech in Google, wouldn't your side project be an OS? It's your best chance of getting a star role. I don't think there is any big plan there, I think its people laying out their wares to the Google board.
FTFY
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
I can tell you it takes a very short time to port a simple kernel/microkernel/nanokernel to a new architecture. Some of the kernels we deal with in the industry have been brought over to entirely new CPU architectures as a proof of concept over a weekend. So that someone at Google got a hankering for some porting work is not surprising, but it's not likely a terrible amount of effort either. (still cool work though)
“Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
You think here is bad? The worst of them left for Soylent News.
Who cares about karma on some random past-its-prime "news" site?
Eat the rich.
Just wanted to clear up how to pronounce Fuchsia. Sounds like "Fucks Ya"...because it does.
No, the companies with the most marketing successes include Apple and Bose. Google isn't much of a marketing company, nor are they anything special when it comes to advertising (Apple and Bose are way ahead of them here.) Google's success is being a master at matching advertisers with their target audience, and they sell a TON of ad space.
Google got search right (or good enough) at the time there was no incumbent. Alta Vista dropped the ball for no apparent reason and it landed at Google's feet.
Everything else they've done had been mediocre at best. That or they bought it in, *then* made it mediocre after optionally fucking the UI up. If by pure dumb luck some renegade skunk works cowboy lunchtime side project makes something even half useful they discontinue it.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."