今天我们有一个大消息要发布，从树莓派一发布就有许多社区的程序员们纠结这个问题。这个消息在发布前已经被讨论了有一段时间了，但是我们一直没有发布直到今天。
截至目前，在树莓派ARM上运行的所有的视频核心驱动代码基于FOSS许可（精确点说是3-Clause BSD）。源代码可以从我们新的GitHub空间上获取。如果你不熟悉ARM SoCs的开源驱动状况，这个消息对你来说并不是那么重要，但是对于我们树莓派上跑的BCM2835（它是第一个全功能、开源的基于ARM的多媒体SoC）来说，博通（Broadcom）是第一个对旗下移动GPU驱动开源的厂商。我们树莓派基金会希望看到更多厂商能跟进博通的这一举动。
通过下面的图你将能看到，所有在ARM上运行的代码都开源了。对普通的树莓派用户来说意味着什么呢？除了FOSS狂热者对开源哲学的支持，这一消息也意味着第三方开发者使用X.org更容易支持 Wayland EGL client 和EGL server , 或者提供更好的集成GLES/VG.我们再来看看相关的社区对此反映。图形驱动开源将使vchiq消息传递系统集成到主流Linux内核来的更加容易，另外我们热切希望能与社区一道实现我们的目标。
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图形驱动开源将对那些想在树莓派上使用早期的操作系统的用户带来大量的方便。你将能够使用FreeBSD, NetBSD, Plan9, RISC OS, Haiku 以及其他操作系统，为此我们非常兴奋。所有这些系统都可以充分利用树莓派的图形硬件加速能力。离开那些免费的、开源的软件树莓派是无法存在的，我们也很自豪能够以开源这种形式来反馈社区，并且我们希望这一开源能对你们有用处。我非常感谢第一个吃螃蟹的博通公司，他们走出了图形开源的第一步，同时那些对嵌入式GPUs感兴趣的嵌入式Linux社区以及泛的FOSS社区而言这也是非常有意义的一个进步。
原文附后：
Open Source ARM userland
Posted on October 24, 2012 by asb
Today we have some really big news, which is going to mean a lot to many programmers in our community who have been asking about it ever since launch. This is one of those announcements that has been in the pipeline for quite some time, but we haven’t been able to talk about it until now.
As of right now, all of the VideoCore driver code which runs on the ARM is available under a FOSS license (3-Clause BSD to be precise). The source is available from our new userland repository on GitHub. If you’re not familiar with the status of open source drivers on ARM SoCs this announcement may not seem like such a big deal, but it does actually mean that the BCM2835 used in the Raspberry Pi is the first ARM-based multimedia SoC with fully-functional, vendor-provided (as opposed to partial, reverse engineered) fully open-source drivers, and that Broadcom is the first vendor to open their mobile GPU drivers up in this way. We at the Raspberry Pi Foundation hope to see others follow.
As you’ll see from the diagram above, everything running on the ARM is now open source. So, what does this mean to the average Raspberry Pi user? Aside from being exciting to FOSS enthusiasts for philosophical reasons, it’s also going to make it much easier for third party developers to (for instance) implement Wayland EGL client and EGL server support, or to provide better integration of GLES/VG with X.Org. We look forward to working with the relevant communities on this. It should also now be easier, with appropriate cleanup, to get the vchiq messaging system integrated in to the upstream Linux kernel, which is another goal we are keen to work with the community on achieving.
The open sourcing of the userland libraries is of course going to be massively helpful to those of you who have been either actively porting or wanting to use alternate operating systems on the Raspberry Pi. We’ve been excitedly following the progress of FreeBSD, NetBSD, Plan9, RISC OS, Haiku and others. All these projects could now potentially port these libraries and make use of the full hardware accelerated graphics facilities of the Raspberry Pi. The Raspberry Pi could not have existed without the massive body of Free and Open Source Software we use and build upon. We are delighted to have been involved in giving back to the community in this way, and hope many of you find it useful. I’d like to give a big thank you to Broadcom for being the first vendor to take this step forward, a significant step for the embedded Linux community and the wider FOSS community interested in embedded GPUs.
Alex Bradbury is the Raspberry Pi Foundation’s lead Linux developer. |
