LWN's unreliable predictions for 2022

Posted Jan 5, 2022 14:02 UTC (Wed) by guus (subscriber, #41608)
Parent article: LWN's unreliable predictions for 2022

While there is more competition in the embedded space, it's also the case that embedded devices are getting more and more powerful, requiring more advanced operating systems. Already we have multi-core microcontrollers like the Espressif ESP32 and the Raspberry Pi Pico that (can) run FreeRTOS, which is a small step away from running a BSD or Linux kernel. And a lot of ARM SBCs (like the regular Raspberry Pi lineup) are used in an embedded fashion, and they already run Linux. So even if marketshare drops by percentage, usage of Linux might still go up in absolute numbers.

LWN's unreliable predictions for 2022

Posted Jan 5, 2022 16:02 UTC (Wed) by excors (subscriber, #95769) [Link]

> Already we have multi-core microcontrollers like the Espressif ESP32 and the Raspberry Pi Pico that (can) run FreeRTOS, which is a small step away from running a BSD or Linux kernel.

I don't really see that as a small step. FreeRTOS is basically a task scheduler and some synchronisation primitives (plus a bunch of optional libraries for networking etc) - they advertise the kernel as using single-digit KBs of ROM and a few hundred bytes of RAM, in a minimal but usable configuration. I'm not sure what state-of-the-art embedded Linux is, but I'd expect it's about three orders of magnitude larger.

The Raspberry Pi Pico looks quite powerful for a microcontroller but it's still only 264KB of SRAM (and no MMU), so it seems clearly in the RTOS category and not the stripped-down-Linux category. (I guess it might fit the "soon-to-be-abandoned prototype of an absurdly stripped down Linux kernel with no room for any useful application code" category too, but that doesn't seem very useful in practice.)

LWN's unreliable predictions for 2022

Posted Jan 6, 2022 18:14 UTC (Thu) by ejr (subscriber, #51652) [Link]

Also remember the use cases. Linux is severe overkill for my uses of monitoring sensors and sending along the results. Overkill often results in more power draw, and these often are battery plus *maybe* solar systems.

I am curious why Fuschia even exists. The L4 ecosystem has been around for a long time, and there are others already in that space as well. While it might be pure NIH, I suspect the developers have/had some idea of specific uses they could not tackle. I'd love to know what they are.