Hardening the Kernel in Android Oreo (Android Developers Blog) [LWN.net]

Hardening the Kernel in Android Oreo (Android Developers Blog)

Posted Aug 31, 2017 14:18 UTC (Thu) by alonz (subscriber, #815)
In reply to: Hardening the Kernel in Android Oreo (Android Developers Blog) by kronat
Parent article: Hardening the Kernel in Android Oreo (Android Developers Blog)

Android's current requirements for the Linux kernel are documented here:

All SoCs productized in 2017 must launch with kernel 4.4 or newer.
All other SoCs launching new Android devices running Android O must use kernel 3.18 or newer.
Regardless of launch date, all SoCs with device launches on Android O remain subject to kernel changes required to enable Treble.
Older Android devices released prior to Android O but that will be upgraded to Android O can continue to use their original base kernel version if desired.

The main reason for these odd requirements is mentioned elsewhere in the Android architecture documentation – many system-on-chip devices have huge patch sets, so cannot be ported to newer kernels without the SoC vendor's participation (and these vendors have little incentive to do that, as they prefer to invest in their newer generations instead).

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Hardening the Kernel in Android Oreo (Android Developers Blog)

Posted Aug 31, 2017 16:10 UTC (Thu) by excors (subscriber, #95769) [Link] (1 responses)

That's useful for phones, though it might be worth noting they're only really "requirements" if you want to use Google's proprietary services (Play store, Gmail, Maps, etc). If you don't care about those services, e.g. if you're making an IoT device that doesn't even have a screen, there's nothing to stop you from completely ignoring all the compatibility guidelines while still using almost the entire Android platform (AOSP plus the SoC vendor's Androidified kernel and BSP). And those kinds of devices will often use quite old SoCs (because they're cheaper), with correspondingly old kernels, which is unfortunate.

Hardening the Kernel in Android Oreo (Android Developers Blog)

Posted Aug 31, 2017 21:00 UTC (Thu) by thestinger (guest, #91827) [Link]

It's only Android if it meets the Compatibility Definition Document / Compatibility Test Suites requirements. Google is responsible for defining those and the Android trademark can't be used without complying with them, i.e. a fork not in compliance is very explicitly not Android.