Community Matters

The Linux Foundation had two very interesting announcements at the ELC conference in Cambridge today. First, the merger with CELF (the Consumer Electronics Linux Forum) and second the Yocto Project.

I think both of them are really interesting and important developments. And both really strengthen the embedded Linux market. The LF can (and will) provide more resources and better support to embedded Linux initiatives. It can integrate the embedded Linux events into the extremely well run events that it hosts all over the world. And it can strengthen the voice of the embedded Linux community in the market place.

Additionally, through the Yocto Project it will make it easier for embedded developers to create Linux images for specific embedded devices. The goal here is not to create a new Linux distribution, but to strengthen an existing set of tools (mainly Poky plus a few other tools used around it) to enable developers to focus on the value-add components of creating Linux images for specific embedded devices.

This will lead to a consistent set of tools and methods, available across different architectures, that allow the developer to easily create, optimize and debug a targeted Linux image. With the ability to pick and chose from a significant set of “layers” (or add new ones) that allow the developer to add specific features, capabilities and optimizations to the image. And with an automatically generated SDK that makes it easy to develop applications for such device-specific Linux images.

So not yet another distribution, not even yet another tool – instead resources and investment in existing open source projects with the goal to accelerate embedded Linux development.

Open development, open source tools, with the goal of making it easier to create tightly integrated embedded devices. Open source at its best.