AM (myname4rwt.delete@this.jee-male.com) on August 17, 2018 2:32 pm wrote:
>
> I agree completely with you that well-designed, unconstrained in whatever silly manner end products
> would be nice. So if you want one, why don't you actually try doing something, like contacting people
> to lend you a proper ARM dev system, Linus? I bet you might even get some for free -- just ask.

Except for one thing.

I don't think it's about Linus individually ever. When he says, 'I' want this, or 'I' want that. He's not referring not to himself as an individual exactly. He's saying that the group or broad community, who're trying to develop in an distributed manner, aspects of the operating system kernel and/or applications, need actual ARM desktops, with actual production ARM cpu's in them,... so that the software developers can start to actually get a feel for the architecture and what it might be able to do.

I think what Linus means when he says 'I' want, is he wants the broader community to start getting access to ARM desktops/laptops today. So that they can get used to using them on a regular basis, and maybe inter-changeably as software engineers, with their other gear. Like their Core Intel stuff, or their threadripper AMD stuff. There isn't much use giving one engineer, on 'proper ARM dev system'. It just doesn't work like that, for just one guy. It has to be a broader group.

I can remember Linus talking about this kind of urgently, almost two years ago. And heck, I'm not even tuned in to any of this. I think he's just coming back to that same point. That a large number of developers out there, do actually need the ARM desktops now. It's not even a case of hooking people up with Cavium/Marvell boxes to play around with either, on the server back end. No it's actual front end desktop ARM's that developers in a large group can all start to work with together.

I haven't time to search back now, through the RWT database, but I'd imagine if you did, you'd find Linus has been more or less consistent on it now for a number of years. And this latest comment by him, isn't saying anything new or earth-shattering different, than that which I've heard all along. And while I'm at, I'll as the question, what exactly is so un-reasonable about his request, in 2016, in 2017, in 2018 or at any time? Because I can't see what is.

Then again, I know precisely less than nothing.