Linux finally loaded onto iPhone!

Alex Zaharov-Reutt
Saturday, 29 November 2008 07:39

IT Industry - Market

PlanetBeing says: “The current userland we're using, in the interest of expedience, is a Busybox installation created with buildroot, but glibc works fine as well, and we're going to build a more permanent userland solution.”

To see a “demonstration video” of Linux in action on the iPhone, you can watch this Vimeo-hosted video clip, or OpeniBootscoot your way on over to the Dev Team’s blog posting.

Instructions for loading this early Linux port to the iPhone can be found at this link, while the Linux distro in question can be downloaded right here.

The project lead is “planetbeing”, but he names “CPICH, cmw, poorlad, ius and saurik” as contributors.

PlanetBeing adds: “If you're experienced with hacking/porting Linux and especially if you're experienced with porting Android, I'd definitely like to hear from you.

“Come chill in the #iphonelinux channel on irc.osx86.hu. If you're not experienced, and still want to help, you can digg/slashdot this posting to heaven so our little project gets more visibility. Thanks. :)”.

It’s easy to see that Linux development on the iPhone should now progress rapidly, and given the iPhone and iPod Touch’s far more interactive nature than the earlier iPods, a much bigger “homebrew” community developing and extending Linux on iPhone and lots of programs will spring up.

No doubt Apple won’t be pleased at this development, and will probably try to find ways to shut things down or make things difficult for Linux iPhone users, but no-one ever seems to be able to shut out the hackers on a permanent basis.

The cat and mouse game continues, while Apple’s iron grip on the iPhone and its OS continues to rust!