============================================== Genode Labs Newsletter - February / March 2023 ============================================== Content 1. First system image of mobile Sculpt OS 2. Article series about combining Genode with FPGAs 3. Genode OS release 23.02 1. First system image of mobile Sculpt OS ----------------------------------------- After more than two years of tireless development, we released the first system image of Sculpt OS for the PinePhone at the beginning of February: https://genodians.org/nfeske/2023-02-01-mobile-sculpt It features a custom user interface, voice calls and mobile-data connectivity, on-target software installation and system update, device controls (battery, brightness, volume, mic, reset, shutdown), and a variety of installable software. Among the installable applications, there is the Chromium-based Morph web browser, an OpenGL demo using the GPU, tests for the camera and microphone, as well as a light-weight Unix-like system shell. During the two months since the release, the feedback we received was consistently positive. The quick cold-boot time of just about 5 seconds into the GUI was universally lauded. It clearly hits a point of surprise because the startup of contemporary Linux-based systems usually takes a minute on the same device. Surprisingly, our custom user interface was generally appreciated despite being far off the beaten tracks of consumer smartphones. If the early testers had responded negatively, we would need to re-evaluate the feasibility of our custom UI approach. Now, we even find our confidence in this direction renewed. This initial version of the system image will be followed by new versions over the course of the year, successively shipping improvements as laid out on our public road map: https://genode.org/about/road-map 2. Article series about combining Genode with FPGAs --------------------------------------------------- Back in the November issue of the newsletter, we introduced Genode's channel on the Hackster.io community platform: https://www.hackster.io/genode/ Since then, Genode developer Johannes Schlatow continued his tutorial series about combining Genode with reconfigurable FPGA hardware, specifically targeting Xilinx Zynq. In the latest article "Taking control over DMA transactions on Zynq with Genode", he introduces custom FPGA fabric for implementing DMA protection that is normally not covered by Zynq hardware. It exemplifies how well Genode and reconfigurable hardware can go hand in hand. Please find this latest article among the other Genode tutorials at the Hackster.io channel linked above. 3. Genode OS release 23.02 -------------------------- The first Genode version of the year released at the end of February draws a strong connection to this year's road map, that emphasized the use of advanced platform capabilities. For the PinePhone as our reference platform for the mobile version of Sculpt OS, all the puzzle pieces have come into place for the first ready-to-use system image mentioned above. It motivated plenty of optimizations - from kernel scheduling, over the I/O throughput of the VFS, to the interfacing of GPU drivers - that made it into the release. Besides the phone, also stationary platforms like PCs and ARM laptops received a fair share of attention. The release enables the use of interactive virtual machines on ARM by adding device models for the GPU and input events. For the PC, the principle support for suspend/resume has become available to our custom microkernel in addition to the NOVA kernel, and Genode learned to distinguish Intel's performance cores from energy-efficient cores. These are just a few among the many topics of the release, all of which you can find covered in the detailed documentation: https://genode.org/documentation/release-notes/23.02 About the newsletter -------------------- If you have friends or colleagues who might be interested in our projects, we would appreciate you to forward this email. If you received this newsletter as a forwarded email, you may subscribe to the newsletter here: https://genode-labs.com/newsletter In the case of receiving this newsletter unintended, you can cancel your subscription at any time by replying to this email with the subject set to "unsubscribe". Best regards -- Dr.-Ing. Norman Feske Genode Labs https://www.genode-labs.com/ · https://genode.org/ https://twitter.com/GenodeLabs · /ˈdʒiː.nəʊd/ Genode Labs GmbH · Amtsgericht Dresden · HRB 28424 · Sitz Dresden Geschäftsführer: Dr.-Ing. Norman Feske, Christian Helmuth
