Re:Android overtakes Windows as the internet’s most used ope...
by digi_owl on Monday April 03, 2017 @04:29PM
(#14026840)
Its a bit more complicated than that.
Quite often these days when a part is initialized, the driver uploads firmware as part of that.
If you look at most Linux distros they have a package of firmwares that various companies have allowed to be distributed with the kernel.
Meaning there is a small part of the Qualcomm blob that needs to interface with the kernel to upload the firmware.
And the interface changes as the kernel changes. This because Linux devs don't want the hassle of trying to debug a kernel panic only to find that it is happening inside a third party blob, and thus they can't fix it. Instead they want companies to either work with them to maintain drivers or hand them the information needed to maintain a open driver within the kernel source.
Quite often these days when a part is initialized, the driver uploads firmware as part of that.
If you look at most Linux distros they have a package of firmwares that various companies have allowed to be distributed with the kernel.
Meaning there is a small part of the Qualcomm blob that needs to interface with the kernel to upload the firmware.
And the interface changes as the kernel changes. This because Linux devs don't want the hassle of trying to debug a kernel panic only to find that it is happening inside a third party blob, and thus they can't fix it. Instead they want companies to either work with them to maintain drivers or hand them the information needed to maintain a open driver within the kernel source.