Hackable:1 jffs2 images

The big news of the day, probably, was the announcement of Openmoko 2008.12 (wiki entry here). I've downloaded it, flashed it, and it was all expectedly much the same as the testing image I'd previously been running.

What I found much more interesting, however, was the fact that I discovered the jjfs2 images of Hackable:1. Hackable:1 is based on Debian and the Gnome mobile platform, coupled with the Openmoko 2007.2 applications. It's sponsored by the French Openmoko reseller Bearstech and aims to be, although my description will likely be far too brief, a community driven operating system built upon the code long since removed from Openmoko releases. Marcus Bauer wrote TangoGPS and is heavily involved in Hackable:1, which is a good sign.

But it's the daily jffs2 images that interest me the most. We're working on various bits of code that would all be much easier to get working on Debian & GTK than they are on the Openmoko distributions. Debian usually installs to the micro-SD card of the FreeRunner, but I'd quite like to keep that free for the data we've got planned for it. Debian running from the internal memory is a very attractive prospect indeed. Marcus has said that Hackable:1 is aimed at VARs, and I can see the attraction to this market.

The jjfs2 image is roughly a quarter the size of the one that runs from the SD card, so it's going to be lacking in some of the features of it's older brother. apt-get was the first obvious example and there's some big graphical differences too. Interesting times.