The future of Libre Computing: Crowd Funding Campaign Starts Now
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The problem isn't really writing or reading from MLC NAND flash. If it was there wouldn't be any good SSD drives. The problem lies elsewhere. In real world testing this stuff lasts a *LONG* time. At least the individual MLC NAND chips. There are issues relating to power that cause failures in SSD drives (low end and older drives).
The power related failures theoretically can be solved by utilizing SLC and/or via a super capacitor. I have not had a chance to confirm this in real-world use case testing.
it's full source code available, for both versions (all GPLv2 compliant). the first version from allwinner is... odd. they didn't do an MTD design, and they extended the block size beyond that of a normal NAND write-block... very weird. anyway it works.
the second is a rewrite to conform to MTD, it's experimental, it's now working... sort-of, just be careful. available in u-boot and mainline (or at least in sunxi-next).
yes it would be a libre storage device, these are cheap-and-cheerful raw nand devices.
trisquel isn't one of the suggested OSes because there's no ARM port. or, not an up-to-date one. we looked. couldn't find one. at least now this is modern enough hardware to consider making a port.
So MTD is an abstraction layer for raw flash storage?
According to this, it's needed in order for the CPU to access the NAND (http://www.informit.com/articles/article.aspx?p=1187102&seqNum=5).
So the Allwinner's version is weird, but works.
Why would it be better to have the MTD design then?
You've made it onto SlashDot! Admittedly it isn't one created by the campaign (it's posted by 'EditorDavid'), but it made it into my daily email from SlashDot, so it must be pretty popular.
yeahyeah i spent the whole day yesterday dealing with questions.... :)
https://soylentnews.org/article.pl?sid=16/08/01/083258
the reactions on this article are _really_ aggressive - i need some help answering them.
I replied to 2 comments there, hope it helps. I tried to bring a different perspective.
The main criticisms are performance and upgradability of individual parts. But mostly performance.
But I can understand them (well, besides being so fakking aggressive for no reason). Frankly, it took me a while before posting on the thread.
It's so radically different from the classic RAM CPU HDD parts that are separated and individually upgradable.
I needed time to understand, for the shift to settle, and to gather all the other benefits.
yeahyeah it's a bit of a radical shift, we've been so innocuated to have powerful computers - i'm no exception, i'm typing this from a machine with a 13.3in 2560x1600 LCD, 4 80x50 xterms crammed into the left 2/5ths of the screen and still have room for iceweasel @ 1250 x 1400 on the right - that a 2.5 watt computer really is a bit of a kick to the head.
we'll get there... *in stages* - in manageable increments. that's what this is about. we've got something like... 12-15 years of trusting (and being betrayed by) the incumbent mass-volume manufacturers to catch up with. that's not gonna happen overnight - not on the budget of a single small-to-medium-sized business.
anyway. thank you very much. i was a bit overwhelmed.
This looks like a super small resolution. Disclaimer: I'm not a math person.
I'd describe the product this way:
* 100% free hardware
* long-lived hardware
Hopefully I don't miss anything essential, but I feel any of the other qualities come from those 2 ideas.
When I think performance, I think heavy image editing, heavy video and 3D editing, heavy music making (not necessarily heavy metal), things like that.
For the most part, those are the needs of pros.
16GB of RAM would completely cover those needs, 8 would be more than fine. Plus we're talking about free software, the encremental need for more power isn't as steep, if I'm not mistaken (probably though, I don't know what I'm talking about here).
https://www.crowdsupply.com/eoma68/micro-desktop/updates# just got printing tested and confirmed, and the next update in the queue is 1080p60 hardware-assisted *LIBRE* video playback... :)
Just want to point out that I posted another thread:
aaaa another forum to track, dang :)
I am a member!
Free Talk Live Interview with Luke (lkcl):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RjgxGd2eSn8&feature=youtu.be&t=6m6s
* I'm also in the background
Suggestion: how about a video showing some OpenGL programs running? Not anything really high-end, just things like Tiled that use OpenGL for basic stuff and don't really need a whole lot of speed.
I suggest this because someone on the thread at freegamedev.net just made a post suggesting that no OpenGL programs could possibly run at a reasonable speed without 3-D acceleration:
http://forum.freegamedev.net/viewtopic.php?f=46&t=7094&p=70226#p70225
can't find tiled but am going to try freedoom... :) nope doesn't work needs prboom or odamex... will try tuxracer or something
ok so not a game, at all - a map editor. ok gimme a mo... ok yep i'm not seeing anything hugely slow about this program, it seems pretty quick in fact. got any examples i can try?
You mean of maps to load in Tiled or other non-game programs that use OpenGL?
If you mean Tiled (TMX) maps, you could try level.tmx and map.tmx under examples/data in xsge_tmx:
http://download.savannah.gnu.org/releases/xsge/xsge_tmx/1.0/xsge_tmx-1.0.tar.gz
If you mean programs other than games that use OpenGL, I don't know of any specific examples, but a program that uses the Qt OpenGL Module (as Tiled does) is likely to be one (if you're using Qt, you're probably not making a game). I don't know if that helps or not.
yeah perfect - no that works great, editing with tiled is really quick and responsive. i just wanted some kind of example to run that was a bit more complex than a couple of rectangles: it's clearly responsive. Supertux on the other hand was not... :)
Right, SuperTux is a bit more demanding. ;) I'd bet it would run much better if you ran it without OpenGL, though. You can do that like this if you're interested in checking that:
supertux2 --renderer sdl
I don't know how the speed of the A20 compares to the Pentium 4, but my mom has a computer with one of those and no working hardware acceleration (since it has an integrated GPU from ATI), and it went from running horribly to running pretty well when I used that command-line option.
yep at around 640x480 it's about 10fps, if i expand the window to 1200 x 720 (appx) it's down to about 5fps - that's with sdl.
ikcl, in update 19 you wrote on > difference between our MOQ goal and our dollar goal. What are you going to do, if you reach 250 computer cards, enough to get them made, but not fund limit?
Are you going to renegotiate with crowd supply or those who have bought a laptop with computer card?
tonlee we're getting this question a lot, let me refer you to the arm-netbook archives answer: http://lists.phcomp.co.uk/pipermail/arm-netbook/2016-August/011499.html
basically, i suggest focussing on helping with the campaign.
I disagree on waiting and see. I do not think you will reach the seeked fund. If someone considering buying a computer card reads the crowd funding website, they will notice that funding is lower than 50%. I think that will stop people from getting the computer card. They do not know what happens if full funding is not reached. Set a plan now, a plan that tells computer card buyers they will get the item if 250 computer cards are sold. Best would be if you negotiate with laptop buyers and get that part out of the crowd funding. Set the fund limit to the amount of 250 computer cards. My matter is to get the computer card manufactured. Show people you can sell a free software arm computer.
> If someone considering buying a computer card reads the crowd funding website, they will notice that funding is lower than 50%. I think that will stop people from getting the computer card. They do not know what happens if full funding is not reached.
It's not flexible funding. Contributions are pledges; if the goal is not reached, none of the money gets sent.
If funding goal is not reached, buyers know they will not get their item. Maybe he will come up with something that people get their computer cards anyway. They do not know. If he renegotiates like I wrote, people will know they will get their computer cards if 250 computer cards are sold? He made a decision to put the expensive laptops into the crowd funding and because people are not buying funding is small? He could not know that, but it turned out to be a mistake. What I want him to do is renegotiate such that computer cards get made.
> If funding goal is not reached, buyers know they will not get their item.
...And they won't pay a cent. There is zero risk for backers.
If this is unclear, it should be clarified, but suggesting "renegotiating" would happen if the campaign fails would make potential backers more nervous, not less, because it suggests both desperation and a complicated process which a lot of people are not going to want to get involved in.
>If this ...
Maybe you are right. If I had ordered a computer card, I would look at the funding. Knowing that funding is below 50% and likely there will be no full funding, I would rather get the laptops out of the crowd funding lowering the funding goal to 250 computer cards and a total funding goal of 16250usd. If I had ordered a laptop and got an email asking me to cancel the order because to few are being sold, I would accept that and either buy nothing or order a computer card.
That's not how it works. If the crowdfunding campaign fails, nothing happens. No money gets exchanged, the project doesn't move forward, and Luke will have to launch an entirely new campaign (assuming he can; otherwise he'll have to spend some time coming up with a new game plan, possibly years).
Also, it's not possible to change the campaign's funding goal in the middle of it. If you could suddenly reduce your funding goal to make the campaign succeed, and did so, that would be fraud. So assuming people can cancel their orders (I don't think you can), telling people to do so would only make it almost impossible for the campaign to succeed because you're just cutting off roughly $35,000 of pledges.
What should be done, and what is being done, is focusing on raising the $150,000 goal. That goal can be achieved; please remember that many people might be waiting until the last minute to contribute for one reason or another. If the campaign fails to meet its goal, no money will be raised (i.e. not a problem for backers), and Luke can decide what to do to salvage the situation (possibly with a smaller crowdfunding campaign for example) at that time. There's no need to plain for failure now.
Do you use the word fraud in its legal frame? Tell how you define fraud?
You repeat that if funding goal is not meet nobody pays. I got that. I want to set a new funding goal which is likely going to be meet. If crowd supply rules say, you cannot change parameters during the crowd funding, then nothing can be done. Maybe resulting in what you wrote.
About getting the laptops out of the crowd funding. They will not get them if funding goal is not meet. I want the laptop buyers to accept, that the crowd funding is about the computer cards and funding goal is going to be set to 250 x computer cards. If enough people buy laptops, they will get them, else they will not. If laptops are the obstacle in terms of the funding goal it was a mistake to make them a part of the crowd funding. If the 35000usd steams from laptops the money does not matter, because the laptops will not be made anyway if the funding goal is not meet.
>That goal can be achieved
I do not think so. It would take a sell of about 1328 computer cards to meet the funding goal. Or about 191 laptops.
>no need to plain for failure now
Yes there is. Or rather investigate how to avoid not getting funded by setting a new funding goal.
Some places, like Indiegogo, support what they fall "flexible funding campaigns" which don't have this "all or nothing" rule.
because it is so unique (the 20:1 ratio) this campaign isn't one of those *either*. it's pretty much unprecedented to have a critical dependency between items pledged at $65 and $1200. so we are being flexible... but, AGAIN, the focus IS... *help spread the word*.
tonlee: this isn't helping. every moment spent by you being concerned about "what happens if we fail fail fail FAIL FAIL **FAIL**" is time wasted on helping spread the word so that we succeed succeed SUCCEED.
but not only that, you're *actively* taking up *my* time dealing with answering your questions about *FAILURE* instead of helping me to spread the word that will lead to *SUCCESS*.
even worse than that, this is a *public* forum where you are distracting *other people* from helping to spread the word so that this campaign is a *SUCCESS*.
do you see that that's what you're doing?
so i'm going to be very direct, and ask you quite firmly to stop doing this and turn your attention instead to HOW TO MAKE THIS CAMPAIGN A SUCCESS.
ok?
> I do not think so. It would take a sell of about 1328 computer cards
> to meet the funding goal. Or about 191 laptops.
or it would take an order of 500-1000 computer cards for a separate project (and i am talking privately to someone who wants to do exactly that).
or it would take a much smaller group of people ordering the fully-assembled laptop housing.
or it would take just one person to pledge for the $10k level as that would be more than enough to cover the NREs.
or many many other combinations which give you some idea that this is a COMPLEX campaign that can only be fully assessed at the *end*.
so please.
STOP focussing on "it's gonna fail" and *help us reach people so that it's a success*
ok??
http://rhombus-tech.net/crowdsupply/assess_campaign.py
with some very rough numbers in, it's just about doable, right now, based on $10k NREs, there's about $6k spare [update: corrected the numbers, it's about $10.7k]
> Also, it's not possible to change the campaign's funding goal in the middle of it.
it is.... you just have to have a *really* good reason. most campaign's simply can't justify doing this... but we can. the thing is: we can... but we still shouldn't, as it gives the wrong impression.
> What should be done, and what is being done, is focusing on raising the $150,000 goal.
> That goal can be achieved; please remember that many people might be waiting until
> the last minute to contribute for one reason or another.
e.g. they have a paycheck that's coming in... this is extremely common. so yes.
*help spread the word*.
Ikcl, if you want me to stop writing, I will stop. I looked at the numbers and they made me write what I think should be done. Saying that my writing can influence who is buying what, if anything is exaggerating my part.
I am not writing about failing. If you made a wrong estimation about sold laptops, it is not failing to introduce new parameters in order to get the computer cards manufactured.
>we still shouldn't, as it gives the wrong impression. If you explain laptop buyers why you want a new funding goal, not enough ordered laptops, they will likely get it.
it's fine, tonlee - the answer really is, i genuinely don't know, as it's too complex to make an assessment... but people seem not to be accepting that i don't know (and can't answer), and keep on asking, and it's a bit exasperating if i'm honest :) so i've written that little python program so that people can make their own assessment, http://rhombus-tech.net/crowdsupply/assess_campaign.py - i'll be keeping it up-to-date with numbers, but anyone can play with it and alter the totals to make their own projections.
now, one particularly interesting thing, we're beyond the MOQ 250 already for the Computer Cards, so i may have to ask the factory to re-quote for something like 400 and 750 instead of the 250 and 500 that i previously asked them to do.
there are also some other MOQ quantities that i'd agreed, particularly the battery ($8 ea @ 100) and the 4.3in LCD+CTP (again, $8 @ 100), and the LVDS cable ($12 @ 250). yes really, $12 for a cable as they have to be made by hand and there's 28 wires in a 3.5mm bundle, with custom-wrapped covering so that they fit through the gaps between the casework, properly.
all those i either have to ask for new quotes, or i have to look at placing the orders anyway, and having stock left over which then may need to be *destroyed* - or sold - because the cost of storing them would be too great. $3,000 worth of cables... $2,000 or more would be left over... that's quite a big chunk of the available cash, so i may have to find a different supplier...
... and that's just *one* of the things i have to deal with.
... you see why it's better not to do those kinds of assessments until it's absolutely clear that it's absolutely necessary? they just simply take far too long, send completely the wrong message (not least it will just piss off the suppliers for such small quantities - they don't make very much profit at this small quantities _anyway_...)...
start to make sense now?
Does audio over HDMI work? What about CEC?
I believe having the option to use EOMA68 as a media center device would greatly benefit it's appeal.
yes it does. some software (and some monitors) get confused if they don't actually have HDMI audio support, so there are kernel-based options which are commonly-used to disable HDMI audio, but yes it works fine. CEC as well i understand is fine, too.
yeah the A20 was designed to be a multi-purpose processor - tablet, TV, IPTV, the works, which is why it has GbE and SATA, so that it could act as an internet HDTV box. the box that made it really popular (especially among hackers right the way back around 2010-2011) was the Mele A1000. tom cubie bought a whole stack and sold them really cheap, it was funny because allwinner bless 'em were trying to sell an EVB for $600 and tom, one of their enterprising employees, knew someone at Mele and was able to sell them via aliexpress to developers for... what... $50 or something mad? whoops... :)
anyway yes so this is why the 1080p60 hardware-accelerated video playback is an important part of the A20... so _yes_ HDMI audio will work :)
bit of history now: http://rhombus-tech.net/allwinner_a10/hacking_the_mele_a1000/
I hope the campaign goes well. Don't give up fighting- this may not succeed now, but it's only a matter of time before the world of manufacturer-controlled devices comes undone.
Anyway, my parents have unfortunately prevented me from funding the campaign. It's not because of the campaign itself- thankfully- but because they're concerned about the no-warranty, pay now make later nature of crowdfunding. I'm quite frustrated, as this project is an immensely exciting prospect for supporters of user-controlled devices, but there's not a lot I can do (the decision would appear to be well-meaning anyway- there is a lot of fraud out there on the net, sadly).
As such, I'm quite hopeful for the future of this project. Even if it doesn't get off the ground as a mass-manufactured product, I'm sure it will find some way to make it to market. The fact is that libre software supporters and environmental activists are all willing to tolerate higher prices and lower-quality products if that's what it takes to get something ethical. Whatever it takes, we will get our EOMA68 computer cards!
Overall, the negative statement that "this campaign is going to fail" is, if not inaccurate, irrelevant. The EOMA68 concept is so contrary to the commercial status quo that a standard had to be developed from scratch for something a child could think up. The concept of modular computing really isn't that innovative- I'm neither ingenious nor smart, yet I could make the leap from booting GNU/Linux off a USB to booting it off a portable (usb) hard drive, and from there to having a standalone GNU/Linux machine which you could pull in and out of a 'shell' with a monitor/keyboard/mouse etc. Yet no company had developed something so obviously revolutionary to its full potential before this came along. For this reason alone, we should be preaching about the campaign every chance we get. ThinkPenguin, wonderful as they are, surely aren't the only company who would put some money into this project as something other than investors. Even if our voices can't convince corporations to work with the project, firmware-level rootkits, rising hardware replacement costs, or a boycott certainly will. It may not happen now, but one day the world will wake up to the dangers of consumerism. From there onwards, it's all downhill.
I apologise for the length of this post. I know my verbose two cents may not be appreciated- I apologise profusely if that's the case- but I hope it has a positive effect on someone somewhere. It just really irritates me that people get frustrated with this project. Frustration isn't bad, for sure, but the issues are obvious to anyone who looks at this project- it's the benefits that need to be highlighted.
hiy stbf,
you clearly get it, and that's fantastic. no need to apologise for being able to understand that this is a huge paradigm shift in computing :)
that's a very interesting view taken by your parents. i say "interesting".. i mean "misinformed", as it strikes me that they totally misunderstand what it's about. if they're older and not technically literate, this is not surprising. perhaps this would be an opportunity for you to explain to them that no, you don't need them to be making decisions on your behalf any more, that yes, you're younger and that means "more technically literate". they might actually appreciate that and be really proud of you, that you're happy to make a case to them, as it would tell them that you're standing up for yourself.
if you're brave enough to do that, and say "scuse me, i love you, but this is something i understand and believe in and i'd like to back it" then here's some potentially useful things to say (including printing this message out for them - hello mr and mrs stbf, my name's luke kenneth casson leighton, i'm 46, and i've been a software libre engineer for over 20 years, that means i'm strongly committed to ethical business practices, and from that experience i've been studying and working on how to make a big difference in the world for the past 5 years so that people no longer have to be afraid of their computers - and that includes you).
many people totally misunderstand what crowd-funding is... *including* people who *RUN* crowdfunding campaigns. crowdfunding is a gift economy: it's not a shop. you're not *buying* a "product with a warranty". you're not placing an order. you're not entering into a "contract-of-sale". kickstarter actually had to change their rules back in i think it was 2012 but it still hasn't made any difference: most backers still think of crowdfunding as "a place to go shopping for cool stuff" and that makes it a damn nuisance for those of us who actually understand what crowd-funding is truly about.
what you *are* doing is - if you have any sense - analysing the background of the people behind the campaign, seeing what they are doing and *why* they are doing it - and in the *genuine* crowdfunding campaigns you're following along the story of how they manage to pull it off... or in some cases not... so that everybody learns. keyboard.io is a great example to look at: their story of how they are getting into production is very very funny.
the earliest crowd-funded hardware campaigns didn't even *have* crowd-funding sites, they just did it on their own! 4,000 people sent something like $300 deposits *each* to the openpandora team, and it was over 2 years before they delivered! during that time, they kept in touch, they told people what was going on, all the problems, all the successes, all the hilarious cock-ups that needed fixing, and people loved it.
for the most part yes you're absolutely right, mr and mrs stbf: most people who run crowd-funding campaigns are naive and/or greedy and/or think they're running a pre-orders "shop": they've heard of this thing called "crowd-funding", they've heard of this word called "open", but they have absolutely no idea what they're actually committing themselves to... and they end up lying to themselves *and* their backers.
by complete contrast what i'm doing is taking a stand against the mainstream computing industry, with a strategy that they've *already* declared, thanks to their vested and selfish interests, to be "unprofitable". in fact, many of the mainstream mass-volume manufacturers are behind the efforts to destroy the "right to repair" groups efforts to have the law changed so that people have the LEGAL right to repair their electronics (all mass-produced computing appliances are designed for manufacture, now, not for repair).
this is what your son wants to back. he *fully recognises* that he's not "buying a product" - he's backing an *idea* and a strategy that, if successful at the scale it's intended to reach over the next ten years, could make a significant improvement in how people think of their computers... within *your* lifetime not just his. when i ask people of your age if they are afraid of computers, if they are afraid to use them "in case they do something wrong", they answer - really surprised - "why yes i am!" and the relief is palpable and clearly visible on their faces, as if for the first time in their lives they have had the opportunity to voice something that has been worrying them without them ever really truly realising it.
you're not alone. this is not a computer design that makes people scared to use them, or resent buying them. it's the total opposite.
stbf, if you *really* believe in this, then here's some potential things that you can do - and i would suggest being honest and up-front with your parents that this is what you're going to do. tell them, "ok, so you won't help, but i fully intend to back this project. what i'm going to do is, i'm going to go and find friends - people that i trust - who have a credit card, i'm going to earn some money myself, and i'm going to GIVE it to that person and ask them to back this project for me".
or, if you feel comfortable explaining it to your parents, you could find someone willing to sell you some bitcoin, then contact name at domain (cc me - name at domain) and ask for their bitcoin address.
if you explain that you're starting with say only $5 they'll look really puzzled that you're going to all that effort just to back somebody's ideas with $5. that should get the message across to them that it's *really* not about the "warranty". also let them know that i've had over $1,000 in donations *during* the campaign, that i've had donations from *individuals* in the software libre community over the past 5 years totalling something like $3,000, that i've spent something like $20,000 of my own money to bring this to people, and that even chris, from thinkpenguin, has been *sponsoring* me full-time for the past 2 years, *not* "paying" or "contracting" me. it's gift economy, and it's beautiful.
p.s. i re-read and saw that you said "there's a lot of fraud out there". a "fraud" would not stake their entire career on working in the public eye and committing to public archives for 20 years only to steal $100k from people. an intelligent con-man would spend 20 years to steal about three to five orders of magnitude larger amounts of money than that :)
lkcl.
People like me admire, that you are forwarding this project. It must be a technical difficult task.
If you financially have had expenses, you should consider a crowd funding to cover them. It would be disappointing if free software proponents would not contribute. Rather showing you support than a coffee.
What you suggest should definitely be called a crowdception.
Thank you Luke!
I'll admit I didn't initially plan to re-pitch again, but your fresh perspective provided me with another set of arguments to employ. I've now managed to convince them to back for a computer card. I am truly grateful that you invested your precious time in providing advice to me, which was invaluable.
Also, this is an absolutely incredible project. I know I've said that before, but it's still only just dawning on me how much thought you have put into every detail of this. Just having USB ports on the inside makes this one of the best laptops ever to be invented.
Do you think this device would work well as a FreedomBox?
yes i do - it's low power, it has everything you'd need. the only problem is: if you look at the freedombox wiki which lists "supported hardware"... well... it's best if i don't comment but just list directly what they say.
https://wiki.debian.org/CheapServerBoxHardware?action=show&redirect=FreedomBox%2FTargetedHardware
the specific sentence i should draw your attention to is this one:
"ethernet (proper builtin or on daughterboard, not "toys" like USB-attached or ENC28J60) "
can i leave it to you to make your own assessment of that statement?
l.
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