Introduction
Ben Hutchings <ben.hutchings@...>
I've been asked to introduce myself to the list, before getting into
discussions. So here's a very brief summary. I've been working on the Linux kernel for about 10 years, including co-maintenance of Debian's kernel package for most of that time. Debian provides security support for each stable release for 5 years, and in support of that I backported many fixes to 2.6.32-longterm and took on maintenance of the 3.2-longterm and 3.16-longterm branches. I'm now adding another part-time role as lead kernel maintainer for the CIP. I look forward to working with you all to establish a project and process that can extend the support lifetime even further. Ben. -- Ben Hutchings Software Developer, Codethink Ltd.
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Daniel Sangorrin <daniel.sangorrin@...>
Hi Ben,
I've been asked to introduce myself to the list, before getting intoWelcome to the CIP project. It's great to have such an experienced maintainer in the project. Looking forward to working with you too! Best regards, Daniel -- IoT Technology center Toshiba Corp. Industrial ICT solutions, Daniel SANGORRIN
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Agustin Benito Bethencourt <agustin.benito@...>
Hi,
On 15/09/16 08:50, Daniel Sangorrin wrote: Hi Ben,Daniel, can you tell us a little about yourself?I've been asked to introduce myself to the list, before getting intoWelcome to the CIP project. It's great to have such an experienced maintainer My name is Agustín Benito Bethencourt. I represent Codethink at CIP. I've managed teams-programs-projects for some years ago, the last in the open. I am looking forward to find out how we are going to deal with this outstanding challenge, keeping a Linux system alive and healthy for many years in mission critical environments. I think it is an exciting one. Best Regards Agustin -- Agustin Benito Bethencourt Principal Consultant - FOSS at Codethink agustin.benito@...
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Domenico Andreoli <domenico.andreoli@...>
Hi all,
On Thu, Sep 15, 2016 at 10:30:59AM +0200, Agustin Benito Bethencourt wrote: On 15/09/16 08:50, Daniel Sangorrin wrote:My name is Domenico Andreoli, I've been using Linux since 1995 andHi Ben,Daniel, can you tell us a little about yourself?I've been working on the Linux kernel for about 10 years, includingWelcome to the CIP project. It's great to have such an experienced maintainer actively contributed to Debian for about a decade. I've always worked with Linux, on Linux, for Linux, thanks to Linux, mainly in the embedded context but I learned that without the necessary shared values, Linux is not fun at all. Although I'm not really active nowdays, my FOSS imprinting imposes me to at least observe and keep me informed. So I'm here, just representing myself, with bags full of 2 cents. I am looking forward to find out how we are going to deal with thisYes, very exciting. Do we recognize that big irons and small IoT leaves are in the same need also here? Kind regards, Domenico -- 3B10 0CA1 8674 ACBA B4FE FCD2 CE5B CF17 9960 DE13
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Noriaki Fukuyasu <fukuyasu@...>
Hi Ben Welcome on board! Thank you very much for joining the team. We are all very excited to have you at this project :) Hi all: My name is Noriaki (Nori) Fukuyasu. I work at The Linux Foundation. I am currently helping the CIP members to operate this project.. If anyone has any thoughts on CIP (in terms of the project operation) please let me know. Also if any company wish to support this project as a corporate member, please let me know. Thanks! Nori
On Wed, Sep 14, 2016 at 8:10 PM, Ben Hutchings <ben.hutchings@...> wrote: I've been asked to introduce myself to the list, before getting into --
Noriaki Fukuyasu
The Linux Foundation Mail: fukuyasu@... Tel: +81-80-4350-1133 Twitter: nori_fukuyasu Facebook: linuxfoundationjp Please visit our web sites:
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Paul Sherwood
On 2016-09-15 09:30, Agustin Benito Bethencourt wrote:
To introduce myself, I'm CEO at Codethink, but to the best of my ability I'll be commenting here from a personal perspective, independent of Codethink's official involvement in CIP.Daniel, can you tell us a little about yourself?I'm now adding another part-time role as lead kernel maintainer for theWelcome to the CIP project. It's great to have such an experienced maintainer To start the ball rolling, I'm personally worried about how we are actually going to achieve super-long-term-support and am happy that we can discuss the issues in public. Greg K-H, Ben Hutchings and others have contributed a huge amount to Long Term Stable and followon initiatives in the community over the years. But when I first started exploring how things like LTS and LTSI can work for embedded and automotive in 2012/2013, I hit some fundamental questions, not least - how in practice can a complex embedded project consume a 'stable' kernel that's being released ** every couple of weeks ** with the words 'users of this series must upgrade'? I presented some work at an automotive GENIVI event in Oct 2013 [1] but the audience at that time literally refused to accept that the idea of whole-of-life updates. And as Greg said at the time: "The patches that apply for stuff after 2 years drops off dramatically, and the work involved in keeping stuff working and testing for problems increases greatly.” Just yesterday there was a very interesting post about backports and long term stable kernels on LWN [2]. Greg is quoted there considering: "But if we didn't provide an LTS, would companies constantly update their kernels to newer releases to keep up with the security and bugfixes? That goes against everything those managers/PMs have ever been used to in the past, yet it's actually the best thing they could do." I've been recommending the constant update route route to customers over the last few years, with some success, but many ecosystem members are extremely uncomfortable with the whole idea of aligning with mainline. I think this is broadly because as embedded engineers we've learned over many years that it's best to change the platform as little as possible. I wrote an article trying to challenge this traditional embedded thinking earlier this year [3] Would be very interested in others' thoughts on this. br Paul [1] http://www.devcurmudgeon.com/pdfs/mainline-lts-ltsi-genivi-20131025.pdf [2] https://lwn.net/SubscriberLink/700557/091f804480fab479/ [3] http://www.devcurmudgeon.com/technical-debt-for-whole-systems.html
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Paul Sherwood
On 2016-09-15 17:17, Paul Sherwood wrote:
<snip> Just yesterday there was a very interesting post about backports andOops - I gave the wrong link: https://lwn.net/SubscriberLink/700530/7f1c21b0fd40489e/ "But if we didn't provide an LTS, would companies constantly update
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Ben Hutchings <ben.hutchings@...>
On Thu, 2016-09-15 at 17:17 +0100, Paul Sherwood wrote:
[...] [Greg K-H wrote:] "But if we didn't provide an LTS, would companies constantly updateLinux does have a very good record of maintaining application binary compatibility, which should make it safe to upgrade. But every new release from Linus brings some or all of the following problems: - feature regressions - performance regressions - security regressions - increased resource consumption - removal of deprecated features - driver API churn Most of the regressions get fixed quickly, but some linger long after support for the previous stable branch has ended. So I don't think it's generally sensible to use the latest stable update in production, and that's why I care about longterm branches (and I don't know why Greg does). I've been recommending the constant update route route to customersI agree it's possible to do rolling upgrades, but it's very dependent on the capability and the will (1) to do regular regression testing on the target systems and (2) to address the regressions that are found without waiting for them to be fixed upstream. Where a performance regression or increased resource consumption stretches an existing system so that it no longer meets its requirements, this might not be practically possible. This also applies where non-upstream code is broken by upstream API changes, and that issue is not going away soon. Ben. -- Ben Hutchings Software Developer, Codethink Ltd.
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Daniel Sangorrin <daniel.sangorrin@...>
Hi Agustín and all,
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-----Original Message-----Sure. I've been working for Toshiba Industrial ICT solutions for about 3 years and a half. That included customizing Linux kernels (mostly driver- and RT-related issues) and root filesystems [1] for a wide range of embedded systems; as well as doing research on real-time partitioning, security [2], fast boot, and software updates [3]. # I also have experience developing non-Linux real-time embedded systems # (e.g. RTOSes, drivers, real-time network protocols, or an ARM Trustzone monitor [4]) [1] http://events.linuxfoundation.org/sites/events/files/slides/LinuxConJapan2016_deby.pdf [2] https://lwn.net/Articles/673003/ [3] http://events.linuxfoundation.org/sites/events/files/slides/linuxcon-japan-2016-softwre-updates-sangorrin.pdf [4] https://www.toppers.jp/en/safeg.html My name is Agustín Benito Bethencourt. I represent Codethink at CIP.Yeah, I think so too! Regards, Daniel
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Jan Kiszka
Hi all,
my name is Jan Kiszka. I'm working for Siemens Corporate Technology on enabling and enhancing open source components for the use in our embedded products, and that primarily at lower levels like the kernel. On 2016-09-16 00:31, Ben Hutchings wrote: On Thu, 2016-09-15 at 17:17 +0100, Paul Sherwood wrote:Exactly. And while we are investing in extending long-term support with our SLTSI've been recommending the constant update route route to customersI agree it's possible to do rolling upgrades, but it's very dependent on versions, we have to improve regression testing as well to ensure the quality of those releases. But nothing prevents to use the results also for latest upstream versions. That can also contribute to making rolling updates more realistic in the future, I we should point this out whenever folks complain that SLTS would be against the upstream trend. Jan
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Daniel Sangorrin <daniel.sangorrin@...>
Hi Paul,
To introduce myself, I'm CEO at Codethink, but to the best of myAs for the embedded systems I deal with, a 2-weeks release is definitely not required. A 6 six months cycle, complemented with aperiodic patch releases for really *important* issues, would be good enough. Of course, different use cases may have different requirements so we will probably need to reach a consensus on that. And as Greg said at the time:Thanks, interesting article. " All of which makes perfect sense for traditional embedded projects." I just wanted to clarify that these 'traditional embedded projects' are actually in the scope of the CIP project. I believe embedded systems where continuous updates are hard to implement, should still benefit from other CIP activities (e.g. testing, RAS, real-time partitioning support or kernel self-protection). Best regards, Daniel
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Paul Sherwood
On 2016-09-16 06:15, Daniel Sangorrin wrote:
I expect there are multiple usecases/scenarios and a one-size-fits-all approach may not be possible. But note that even with six month cycle and periodic patch releases, it seems to me you imply requirements thatGreg K-H, Ben Hutchings and others have contributed a huge amount toAs for the embedded systems I deal with, a 2-weeks release is definitely not a) updates are relatively easy, low effort, low risk b) updates may be required for the whole production lifetime of the target I've seen plenty of examples where the real-world LTSI BSP implementation has made the process of updating the kernel 'a nightmare'. And I've had lots of pushback from people insisting that no updates will be required 'after the first couple of years, when the bugs have been ironed out'. I'm not yet sure whether CIP usecases mostly involve devices which are connected to the internet or other third-party services. And I'm not sure whether security and integrity of the software over the longterm is expected to be a key concern or not. Yes, they are.And as Greg said at the time:Thanks, interesting article. I'm just suggesting that once we are working with a connected device containing more than tens of millions of lines of code, the principles we learned on self-contained device projects with tens or hundreds of thousands of lines, even if they have worked successfully for decades, may no longer apply. I believe embedded systems whereAbsolutely.
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Yoshitake Kobayashi
Hi all,
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My name is Yoshitake Kobayashi. I am working for Toshiba. I've been working on operating system related topics for more than 20 years. Currently, I've been leading an embedded Linux team in Toshiba to provide Linux environments for our embedded products. For open source related projects, I represent Toshiba for three projects which include CIP, Debian-LTS [1] and Linux Foundation CE Linux project [2]. I've also made several presentations at Embedded Linux Conferences [3]. In retrospect, the most of my presentations relate to start CIP. For CIP, I am one of the founding member. So, CIP is really exciting and challenging project for us. I am looking forward to working with you. ---------------------------------------------------------------- [1] https://www.freexian.com/en/services/debian-lts.html [2] https://www.linuxfoundation.org/projects/core-embedded-linux [3] http://www.embeddedlinuxconference.com/ ---------------------------------------------------------------- Best regards, Yoshi
On 2016/09/15 17:30, Agustin Benito Bethencourt wrote:
Hi,
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Daniel Sangorrin <daniel.sangorrin@...>
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-----Original Message-----Probably there are many different usecases. Sharing the requirements for each of them could be beneficial for limiting the scope of our work to things that matter the most. In the usecases I'm most familiar with, devices are working either standalone (no physical connection to the Internet) or behind client's security hardened (e.g. VPNs, firewalls..) gateways that we don't control. These devices are usually updated (in practice reinstalled) by hand after stopping the process they are controlling (which can't happen every day) and run tasks that need high predictability. For these usecases, we require software (e.g.: kernel, partitioned hypervisor, rootfs) that has been proved to be stable and reliable for a long-enough period of time, and will keep being supported as long as our clients require. Note that it's not only about making updates, but also about making new devices with software that is known to work reliably across the different companies in the CIP project. Cheers, Daniel Devices that directly connect to the internet (e.g.: gateways) definitelyYes, they are.And as Greg said at the time:Thanks, interesting article. need to be security hardened. However, I'm not sure about the level of security required for devices that are only indirectly connected (e.g.: behind the gateways). And I'm not sure if all security mechanisms are compatible with the predictability required by these systems. I believe embedded systems whereAbsolutely.
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Urs Gleim
Hi, my name is Urs Gleim. I am with
Siemens Corporate Technology. I have a history in embedded
systems development with all the big proprietary embedded
operating systems out there. I worked in projects in the domains
automotive (mainly infotainment), industry automation, healthcare
and others. Today I am more in the managing role pushing the
shift to open source software and (embedded) Linux in particular
in the company (lessons learnt from the work with other OS's :-)
We run the internal "Corporate Competence Center Embedded Linux"
and support businesses units migrating to and maintaining Linux
for their products. The experiences of the last years showed that the way each and every company is building their own customized Linux versions, tool chains, and test infrastructure could be done much more efficiently and more sustainable. Even inside each company there are several solutions for different products. We have different product cycles and
requirements compared to consumer products, data centers, for
example. So what every company in the area of systems used in
rail, traffic control, healthcare, power generation/transmission,
etc. does is: i. adapting Linux for their needs (in terms of
build environment, test, features, ...), ii. maintaining these
solutions for years. Furthermore, having standard
configurations would lead to a common platform as a basis for
others building upon those platform (libraries, network
protocols, tools). At the end this is an ecosystem involving and
bringing together different communities/projects, suppliers, and
the companies creating products. In other domains there are
efforts going in the same direction (e.g., AGL, Genivi). So we
believe we can do much more by joining forces in the operating
system area and Linux will be established even more in the
industrial world. One of the strongest pain points today is the
effort we spend for (super) long-term maintenance, for each
product, in each company. So we start addressing this by
creating a harmonized build and test infrastructure and
agreeing on common super long-term maintained kernel versions
and patch cycles. I am looking forward working with you. Best regards, On 16.09.2016 09:53, KOBAYASHI
Yoshitake wrote:
Hi all,
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