[LinuxBIOS] OFW vs LinuxBIOS or C vs Forth?

[Bari Ari]

C vs Forth.

Does anyone know if this was the main reason for the switch from 
LinuxBIOS to OFW? What were the other issues involved and why did OFW 
seem to be a better fit for OLPC? Were there any other politics involved 
(logic vs feelings, corporate, personal agendas or governmental 
influences, etc.)?

-Bari

[Richard Smith]

Bari Ari wrote:
> C vs Forth.
>
> Does anyone know if this was the main reason for the switch from 
> LinuxBIOS to OFW? What were the other issues involved and why did OFW 
> seem to be a better fit for OLPC? Were there any other politics involved 
> (logic vs feelings, corporate, personal agendas or governmental 
> influences, etc.)?

Yes.  I know all the gory details.  I'll write up something later on 
discussing it.

[ron minnich]

On 5/3/07, Richard Smith  wrote:
> Bari Ari wrote:
> > C vs Forth.
> >
> > Does anyone know if this was the main reason for the switch from
> > LinuxBIOS to OFW? What were the other issues involved and why did OFW
> > seem to be a better fit for OLPC? Were there any other politics involved
> > (logic vs feelings, corporate, personal agendas or governmental
> > influences, etc.)?
>
> Yes.  I know all the gory details.  I'll write up something later on
> discussing it.

I'd rather it not be posted to this list. It's just too much flame
bait. We can start a private discussion, I suppose.

The folks who made the call had their own reasons for making that
decision. We should  respect their judgement.

I think the real issue is this: this year, and in coming years, 10s of
millions of computers are going to be shipped with an open source
bios. Viewed in light of that important point, the choice of which
BIOS is used is of no real importance. I think the vendors who are not
willing to support an open source BIOS on their CPUs are in trouble,
whether they know it or not.

So, that's what matters. In 10 or 15 years, the BIOS landscape will be
unrecognizable, as will (I hope) the OS landscape. But, we can hope
that it will be open source, not closed source, that wins.

thanks

ron

[Richard Smith]

ron minnich wrote:
> So, that's what matters. In 10 or 15 years, the BIOS landscape will be
> unrecognizable, as will (I hope) the OS landscape. But, we can hope
> that it will be open source, not closed source, that wins.

True words of wisdom.  I'll respond to the questions privately.

[Bari Ari]

ron minnich wrote:
> On 5/3/07, Richard Smith  wrote:
> > Bari Ari wrote:
> > > C vs Forth.
> > >
> > > Does anyone know if this was the main reason for the switch from
> > > LinuxBIOS to OFW? What were the other issues involved and why did OFW
> > > seem to be a better fit for OLPC? Were there any other politics
> >
> > involved
> > > (logic vs feelings, corporate, personal agendas or governmental
> > > influences, etc.)?
> >
> > Yes.  I know all the gory details.  I'll write up something later on
> > discussing it.
>
> I'd rather it not be posted to this list. It's just too much flame
> bait. We can start a private discussion, I suppose.
>
> The folks who made the call had their own reasons for making that
> decision. We should  respect their judgement.

I agree. Being a CEO of a high tech firm, I am interested from the 
sociological and business administration perspectives on this. I don't 
mean to bring kindling to an area ripe for a flame war. I'm partial to 
1's and 0's myself. I just wish to compare notes.

We were working on a project similar to OLPC last year. Sub $100 Linux 
PC's for nations developing their digital voice, video and data 
networks. Computex Taipei is supposedly focusing on that sector of the 
PC market this year. 
http://www.computextaipei.com.tw/overview/general_en.shtml

-Bari

[Carl-Daniel Hailfinger]

On 03.05.2007 18:27, Bari Ari wrote:
> C vs Forth.
>
> Does anyone know if this was the main reason for the switch from 
> LinuxBIOS to OFW? What were the other issues involved and why did OFW

AFAIK one of the co-developers of the OFW standard war hired by OLPC.
He did most of the needed fixups in the OFW payload of LinuxBIOS instead
of LinuxBIOS itself and when the switch away from VSA was due, he did
not want to implement all the new infrastructure in LinuxBIOS and chose
OFW. He said this was due to him being more familiar with OFW and OFW
having a better+faster set of build tools. Besides that, his company
offers OFW programming/services.

Regards,
Carl-Daniel