Kernel Support For P Hardware

[danboid]

So now we are on the brink of August, the month when many of us were hoping we'd see Pandora released. The most interesting thing about notaz' recent Q2 vids (for me) was its worrying lack of sound. Notaz did say that he wasn't using the latest kernel but neglected to say if the latest kernel does have ALSA support for the Pandora's sound chip.

So this got me thinking- what is the status of the various components of the Pandora in relation to kernel support? Like

Sound

Power management

USB2 host

TV-out

3D accel

Wifi

Bluetooth

As well as any other important sub-system I've missed off the above list. Everyone keeps asking about the GUI for the P but that, as well as all the apps and emus aren't going anywhere unless we have a complete, stable kernel to base it all on. Which of the above are partially complete/working and which are missing entirely or just not working yet?

Cheers devs!

 

[danboid]

Thinking about it, both TV-out and 3D support concern the X server as much as they do the kernel so I'd like to extend/ correct my original request for a status update to include the status of any accelerated xorg gfx driver, especially with any potential support we might see for Xvmc utilising the Pandoras DSP. I realise Xvmc support is still lacking on the PC so I'm not expecting this to be ready for launch.

EDIT

If this posting gets answered fully it would make a great addition to the FAQ / Wiki, if kept up to date

 

[Squidge]

So this got me thinking- what is the status of the various components of the Pandora in relation to kernel support?

Thats currently under NDA

Nah, really, but stating such things means you need to keep those statuses up to date, and I'm sure the developers don't want to be held responsible for constant status reports.

Howver, the GIT tree should be public soon, so you'll be able to figure out for yourself roughly how complete everything is.

 

[danboid]

fair do's

cheers squidge!

 

[DJWillis]

Ok,

Squidge is quite correct that a fair amount of this is under NDA so please accept my apologies if I don't provide sufficient information.

I also don't want to spend a huge amount of time doing status updates so I am taking some time out to get more of the work into the public view, keep an eye out for that.

Anyway, grugeingly onto a status update .

This would be based on current GIT.

Sound

ALSA driver for the Pandora, few issues still being worked out and may need a cleanup/refactor.

Power management

Basic PM is in, advanced PM for the OMAP3 and its myriad of states is being worked on. That is common to all OMAP3 products under Linux.

USB2 Host/USB OTG Host and Device

Seems good, still needs more device testing.

TV-Out

In kernel, not tested extensively by me.

3D Accel, Wifi, Bluetooth

No comment

 

[fusion_power]

I don't understand much of this but if TI builds the OMAP Chipset, don't they include some kind of Bios for the Chip-Functions? Smoething that do something if you power the Chipset on. Do Texas Instruments ship the OMAP only without any Software/Bios/Firmware etc.?

I can imagine it would make many things more easy, if the Pandora Devs have a ground-structure of Software where they can build up instead of coding everything from Zero.

 

[danboid]

Thanks for the extra detail DJWillis!

I'm presuming from that 'no comment' that you're NDA'd over 3D, wifi and BT and hence these may come as binary blobs?

 

[Null]

I'm presuming from that 'no comment' that you're NDA'd over 3D, wifi and BT and hence these may come as binary blobs?

The 3D driver is only available as a binary blob, the WIFI + BT driver is available as a binary blob to end users, however the source code is available to the developers of the Pandora.

http://www.gp32x.de/board/index.php?s=&am...st&p=622342

EDIT: Added link.

 

[DJWillis]

I can imagine it would make many things more easy, if the Pandora Devs have a ground-structure of Software where they can build up instead of coding everything from Zero.

Who said anything is coded from zero? Our current GIT is based off the Linux-OMAP GIT that provides the open source foundation for these chips we are working from (and in turn regularly takes updates from the mainline kernel.org GIT).

All we need to take care of is the board specific stuff (and there is plenty of that), anything common is shared among all the OMAP3 platforms but even then it usually has to be configured for each board. Remember that a board design with as much as the Pandora has crammed onto it is hardly a simple little job from a hardware or software point of view.

I'm presuming from that 'no comment' that you're NDA'd over 3D, wifi and BT and hence these may come as binary blobs?

Make of it what you will, it is public enough to say the 3D hardware is not open. Everything else is not a subject for discussion at the moment, sorry, give it time and I'll certainly say whatever I can on the subject.