Linux on Iphone

[gfr04c]

Can someone please explain to what the point of having linux on the iphone means, is it of any relevance to the common iphone user. I was trying to understand why someone would even try to run linux on it. Here is the article:




Linux on the iPhone!
I'm pleased to announce that the Linux 2.6 kernel has been ported to Apple's iPhone platform, with support for the first and second generation iPhones as well as the first generation iPod touch. This is a rough first draft of the port, and many drivers are still missing, but it's enough that a real alternative operating system is running on the iPhone.



What we have:

- Framebuffer driver
- Serial driver
- Serial over USB driver
- Interrupts, MMU, clock, etc.

What we have in openiboot (but hasn't been ported yet):

- Read-only support for the NAND

What we don't have (yet!):

- Write support for the NAND
- Wireless networking
- Touchscreen
- Sound
- Accelerometer
- Baseband support

The current userland we're using, in the interest of expedience, is a Busybox installation created with buildroot, but glibc works fine as well, and we're going to build a more permanent userland solution.

A demonstration video can be seen here: [ame=http://www.vimeo.com/2373142]iPhone Linux Demonstration Video on Vimeo[/ame]

Instructions here: http://www.iphone-dev.org/planetbeing/LINUX-README.txt

Download here: http://localhostr.com/files/b00133/i...ux-demo.tar.gz

Project lead: planetbeing

Contributors: CPICH, cmw, poorlad, ius, saurik

If you're experienced with hacking/porting Linux and especially if you're experienced with porting Android, I'd definitely like to hear from you. Come chill in the #iphonelinux channel on irc.osx86.hu. If you're not experienced, and still want to help, you can digg/slashdot this posting to heaven so our little project gets more visibility. Thanks.

[pacmac]

wow very cool..looking to get into this.

thanks

[Nefarious]

Pretty cool. They are doing it just to see if they can. Basically an entire new OS can be written if desired.

[Sayen]

If someone need a Mirror to the File:
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[RicardoFelix]

Haha this looks pretty cool.