[geeks] Ran the numbers - V240

[J. Alexander Jacocks]

On Thu, Nov 9, 2017 at 8:45 PM, Mouse <mouse at rodents-montreal.org> wrote:

> >> How does reliability fit in?  What is the MTBF for rPi?  (I have no
> >> clue.)
>
> Well, pis usually run Linux; there probably are alternatives, but AIUI
> the pi is not documented enough for any of them to be much good (which,
> if true, also probably means that Linux on a pi depends on binary-blob
> drivers and thus is not truly open source - do any of you know the pi
> well enough to know whether I'm off base here?).
>
<snip>

Actually, the RPi does currently depend on a binary blob to activate the
GPU, but Broadcom is actually working with the community to produce
complete open source code, to do the job:

https://hackaday.com/2017/01/14/blob-less-raspberry-pi-linux-is-a-step-closer/

So, this should also benefit the rest of the community, outside of just
Linux.

- Alex