Fedora has been supporting ARM architecture for a while now, but it was only as a secondary architecture without official support. With the recent Fedora 20 release, nicknamed “Heisenbug”, the ARM architecture, more exactly ARMv7 hard float and greater, is promoted to a primary architecture meaning ARMv7 will have the same status as x86 and x86_64 architectures with packages officially build and supported by the Fedora community.
What it does not mean however, due to the nature of ARM architecture, is that you can simply download an ISO to install on any ARM platforms, like you would do on an Intel or AMD computer. It’s a little more complicated than that, as it is platform specific, but instructions are available for the Beaglebone Black, Compulab Trimslice, the Wandboard, Calxeda Energycore Midway and Highbank, and Versatile Express in QEMU.
You can download images with MATE, KDE, XFCE, LXDE, SOAS desktops, as well as a minimal image without desktop environment @ http://download.fedoraproject.org/pub/fedora/linux/releases/20/Images/armhfp/
Fedora 20 for ARM includes two types of images:
- For platforms requiring a VFAT partition – include VFAT in the file name.
- For platforms that can boot from an EXT3/4 partition
Now all methods includes booting from an external media, usually a (micro) SD card, and network boot is also available.
Beside promotion ARM as a primary, there were also other noticeable features in the release:
- Cloud and Virtualization Improvements
- First-Class Cloud Images – Developed by the Fedora Cloud SIG, these images are well-suited to running as guests in public and private clouds like Amazon Web Services (AWS) and OpenStack.
- VM Snapshot UI with virt-manager – This feature makes taking VM snapshots much easier, by adding a simple, discoverable UI to virt-manager, and includes adding functionality to libvirt to support deleting and rebasing to external snapshots.
- ARM on x86 with libvirt/virt-manager – This change to Fedora 20 fixes running ARM virtual machines on x86 hosts using standard libvirt tools libvirt virsh, virt-manager and virt-install.
- Developer Features
- WildFly 8 – Previously known as JBoss Application Server, WildFly 8 makes it possible to run Java EE 7 applications with significantly higher speed.
- Ruby on Rails 4.0
- Desktop Improvements
- GNOME 3.10 – Includes a new music application (gnome-music), a new maps application (gnome-maps), a revamp for the system status menu, and Zimbra support in Evolution.
- KDE Plasma Workspaces 4.11 – Includes faster Nepomuk indexing, improvements to Kontact, KScreen integration in KWin, Metalink/HTTP support for KGet, and much more.
- Maturity and Advanced Features
- NetworkManager Improvements – Users will now be able to add, edit, delete, activate, and deactivate network connections via the nmcli command line tool, simplifying non-desktop uses of Fedora. NetworkManager is also getting support for bonding interfaces and bridging interfaces.
- No Default Sendmail, Syslog – Fedora 20 removes the former syslog solution, which is now replaced by systemd journal. Additionally, Sendmail will no longer be installed by default, as typical Fedora installs have no need of a Mail Transfer Agent (MTA).
You can find more details on Fedora 20 release notes.
Jean-Luc started CNX Software in 2010 as a part-time endeavor, before quitting his job as a software engineering manager, and starting to write daily news, and reviews full time later in 2011.
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The big cores are 2 generations better than the RK3588. Wonder if MediaTek got a good ARM Linux support.
AFAIK, Cortex A-77 is not that good. So we could say that it’s 1 generation better than RK3588’s Cortex A-76. Too bad it’s Mediatek SoC. Meaning: no linux for you.
> Too bad it’s Mediatek SoC. Meaning: no linux for you
Not true for all MediaTek business units. See the upstreaming efforts around their router SoCs and for exampling them partnering with BayLibre for their ‘AIoT’ offerings…
Also their Chromebook SoCs have pretty good upstreaming efforts. The MT8395 looks very similar to their MT8195 Chromebook SoC; I think many drivers will be usable without significant changes. The word Android is a bit of a red flag, though.
I see. But from what i heard, the jump from A76 to A77 is some of the biggest generational jump. While the jump from A75 to A76 and A77 to A78 are more of a standard/ordinary jump. But i maybe wrong. Anyway, hope we can get better support for Linux from MediaTek and others in the future. The more chip vendors supporting Linux, the merrier.
It does seem like a bunch o’ work to compile Android 13 on it. Is there a RealTek N00B pack like Capstone/Unicorn to flush out all the undisclosed opcodes and whatnot, or is the idea to license the boxed RealTek CN Rust compiler…or simply use GPT3 and hope it’s trained?
Is there no true optimized binary (say, LibC or LINPAC20) for these chips?
It always depends on how you want to characterize the changes. The way I’d describe them, there were significant changes in the previous generations (new microarchitecture in Cortex-A73, new ISA and bus interface in Cortex-A75, new microarchitecture again in Cortex-A76), but between Cortex-A76, -A77, -A78 -X1 and Neoverse N1 I only see optimizations of the same basic design instead of generational jumps.