Rockbox.org home
release
dev builds
extras
themes manual
wiki
device status forums
mailing lists
IRC bugs
patches
dev guide



Rockbox mail archive

Subject: Re: Proposal for Bounty to get Linux & Rockbox ported to the iPod Nano 4G and 5G

Re: Proposal for Bounty to get Linux & Rockbox ported to the iPod Nano 4G and 5G

From: Dave Chapman <dave_at_dchapman.com>
Date: Sat, 01 May 2010 09:42:08 +0100

Daniel Stenberg wrote:
>> I like the idea of bounties, because it still works good together with
>> the open source idea.
>
> I disagree. Bounties are very hard to make work in the open source
> spirit. I believe it _can_ be done, but it's not easy.

So what (if anything) can work in attracting developers to undertake new
ports? All the original poster wants is a third-party firmware on his
ipod, and I doubt anyone objects to that goal.

I think we could do more to try and promote Rockbox and promote the
possibility of Rockbox on new devices.

For example, does everyone reading this know that the 3rd/4th gen Nanos
and all versions of the Classic have now been exploited in DFU mode, and
TheSeven's "ibugger" USB-baed debugger is running on them. This allows
relatively easy development of code for these devices (the main issue
now is reverse-engineering).

Similarly, there has recently been an exploit found in the "classic"
(i.e. first generation) Zune which is allowing people to run their own
native WinCE applications. There's a strong possibility that this will
allow the development of a bootloader and hence the start of a Rockbox
port to the Zune. i.e. the "we can't run our own code on the Zune"
problem may be solved.


And then there are the "abandoned" ports - ports where some work has
been done, but there has either been a lack of interest/notivation to
finish it, or the port has hit a wall (e.g. the FTL on a lot of the
Telechips devices).


So I'm wondering if one easy (and free!) thing someone could do is to
collect this information together in some kind of "Future targets" wiki
page, to try and promote these as tasks people could work on.



Dave.
Received on 2010-05-01

Page template was last modified "Tue Sep 7 00:00:02 2021" The Rockbox Crew -- Privacy Policy