decided to turn my attention to the #pine64 #pinebookpro a bit again, and in the process improved our u-boot handling

i'm glad to see that the regression with u-boot 2022.7 where the kernel did not see sd card is gone, and u-boot 2023.4 works perfectly well, the system does too

Big #Thanks to Michal Suchanek for fixing #U-boot on the #PinebookPro

Somewhere in the v2022.07 development cycle u-boot seemed fine and loaded a kernel, but the kernel was unable to find block devices needed for rootfs...

Which has really been nagging at me as the PinebookPro is basically my primary computer!

https://source.denx.de/u-boot/u-boot/-/commit/216928c772798609ba2cb01a42b6f89832bb0587

I have applied the patch to the 2022.10 u-boot packages in #Debian and uploaded 2023.01-rc4 to Debian experimental which contains the fix!

Yay!

@efraim

Well, I wouldn't leave my #pinebookpro at any third-party kennels. They might not play well with the other laptops left there.

Though, I have never tried getting built-in wifi to work, always using usb-wifi dongles or usb-c dock with ethernet.

Interestingly, I first got the pinebookpro working on #guix, and switched to #debian as the guix substitute servers didn't keep up, and I just couldn't resist running "guix pull" daily...

@martijnbraam @debacle @mobian

Debian does, in fact, ship the boot firmware I'm using on my #pinebookpro that I'm using right this very second!

I get as much as anyone how shipping boot firmware on SD and eMMC offsets or partitions or whatever is awkward and #towboot attempts to solve that problem.

But I also don't see a need, for boot firmware that is actually #foss to not also be able to get it from your distribution vendor.

@Hawk1291 Does anybody have a suggestion for a long-battery-life (10+ hrs ideal), low-end, fairly small/light (10-13") #laptop that DOESN'T have to run #ChromeOS? There are many #Chromebooks that fit that description, but I'd want to put #Linux on it. The #PineBookPro would have been suitable, but it's no longer being sold. I'm OK with ARM or x86.

Tried switching to the #pinebookpro last month, but stalled out when #firefox would just consume CPU and display no window.

The solution is simple... if a bit confusing... It works when exporting any of the following the environment variable:

MOZ_ENABLE_WAYLAND=false
MOZ_ENABLE_WAYLAND=1
MOZ_ENABLE_WAYLAND=0
MOZ_ENABLE_WAYLAND=whatever

The only thing that doesn't work is MOZ_ENABLE_WAYLAND=

Environment variable booleans where "set is true, unset is false" are way too confusing.

@PINE64

Specificlly, using the #pinebook u-boot spl offsets 64 and u-boot.itb at 80, and the #pinebookpro spl at 2112 and u-boot.itb at 16384.

Works with mainline #u-boot without passing any special configuration or patches, *should* work for #pinephone and #pinephonepro too!

I got the Idea from a talk at FOSDEM:

https://archive.fosdem.org/2019/schedule/event/one_image_to_rule_them_all/

And presented a simplified implementation for pinebooks (with technical glitches):

https://debconf21.debconf.org/talks/88-two-pinebooks-walk-into-a-bar/

Source to slides:

https://salsa.debian.org/vagrant/two-pinebooks-walk-into-a-bar/-/blob/latest/Two-Pinebooks-Walk-Into-a-Bar.org

@PINE64

Welll... if you use alternate offset locations for u-boot, it should be poissible to make a single image that boots both. I did this successfully with the #pinebook and #pinebookpro!

Made some progress on upgrading from #pinebook to #pinebookpro running #debian as a regularly used computer, and published a bit about my progress via #gemini for the first time:

gemini://sdf.org/vagrantc/2021/12/09/From_Pinebook_to_Pinebook_Pro.gmi

To summarize, it kind of works, it is a lot faster, encountered and fixed a few bugs, and more bugs to figure out left to do...

@meena
It is true out-of-order execution is ripe for exploits and I am both surprised and not at all surprised to see it implemented in #riscv cores. The speed benefits are a powerful draw.

When talking about the #pinebook vs. #pinebookpro I often mention that the pinebook is immune to #spectre and #meltdown attacks. It is also a lot slower. Same holds true for #pinephone vs. #pinephonepro, apparently.

Nice thing about a #gpl licensed core is you could disable the (mis)feature!

Will be giving two talks on the last day of DebConf21.

https://debconf21.debconf.org/talks/89-looking-forward-to-reproducible-builds/

https://debconf21.debconf.org/talks/88-two-pinebooks-walk-into-a-bar/

@reproducible_builds @PINE64 @debian

#pinebook #pinebookpro #reproducible #debconf #debian

Pinebook Pro Linux Laptop Is Back in Stock and You Can Get One for Only $220 USD

https://9to5linux.com/pinebook-pro-linux-laptop-is-back-in-stock-and-you-can-get-one-for-only-220-usd

#Linuxlaptop #PinebookPro #PINE64

RT @thepine64@twitter.com

January Update: announcing #PinePhone @MobianLinux@twitter.com CE; keyboard progress update; #PinebookPro and #PineTab production news; #PineTalk podcast in Feb; new #PINE64 website is now up; #PineTime software news; red #Pinecil & firmware update, and much more! https://www.pine64.org/2021/01/15/january-update-happy-new-gear/

🐦🔗: https://twitter.com/thepine64/status/1350151518142529539

OpenMandriva Lx 4.2 Promises Full Support for ARM64 Devices like Raspberry Pi, Pinebook Pro

https://9to5linux.com/openmandriva-lx-4-2-promises-full-support-for-arm64-devices-like-raspberry-pi-pinebook-pro

#Mandriva #Linuxdistribution #PinebookPro #OpenMandrivaLx #OpenMandrivaLx4.2 #ARM

Debian 11 “Bullseye” Installer Adds Support for Pinebook Pro, Other ARM Devices

https://9to5linux.com/debian-11-bullseye-installer-adds-support-for-pinebook-pro-other-arm-devices

#Debian #PinebookPro #Debian11 #DebianBullseye #DebianInstaller

elementary OS Adds Experimental Support for the Pinebook Pro

A version elementary OS for the Pinebook Pro Linux laptop is in development. Early access builds aren’t production ready and come with limitations.
#Dev#Arm#ArmLaptops#Elementary#Pine64#PinebookPro

:sys_omgubuntu: https://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2020/09/pinebook-pro-elementary-os

@cassidyjames I've been realizing my dependence on #Flatpak / Flathub too. While the technology is not architecture specific, everything is built for x86_64.

At least since I'm still on the #manjaro the #PinebookPro came with I can use AUR to fill in the gaps. Still...

@PINE64 #PinebookPro with the @fedora delivery badge from #nestwithfedora

It actually still has #Manjaro KDE installed, sshh - I'll likely keep it that way and install #Fedora on an SD card later

#aarch64
#laptop
#linux

elementary OS Adds ‘Highly Experimental’ Support for the Pinebook Pro

A version elementary OS for the Pinebook Pro Linux laptop is in development. Early access builds aren’t production ready and come with limitations.
#Dev#Arm#ArmLaptops#Elementary#Pine64#PinebookPro

:sys_omgubuntu: https://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2020/09/pinebook-pro-elementary-os

Exclusive: Serpent OS to Offer Day One Support for Pinebook Pro, Ship with KDE Plasma

https://9to5linux.com/serpent-os-to-offer-day-one-support-for-pinebook-pro-ship-with-kde-plasma

#Linuxdistribution #KDEPlasma #SerpentLinux #SerpentOS #PinebookPro