Ubuntu & Linux Hardware Support: Working With OEMs Is Key

When it comes to improving hardware support for Linux, there are two traditional strategies: The Do-It-Yourself method, by which geeks write their own device drivers, and the Beg-And-Plead approach, or asking OEMs for open-source drivers and hoping they comply. But Canonical seems to be forging a third path by actually cooperating with upstream manufacturers to bring better hardware support to Ubuntu. Here’s how, and what it means for the lives of Linux users everywhere.

First, though, it’s worth observing that hardware support on Linux has come a long, long way in recent years, especially on the desktop. Complaints about missing drivers or hit-and-miss compatibility for devices like wireless cards, digital cameras and printers will probably remain a perennial refrain within the Linux community for a while to come. But for those of us who remember what things were like as recently as the mid-2000s — when almost no wireless cards were natively supported and users were lucky if even their video cards worked out-of-the-box — it’s hard to deny that the situation has improved vastly since that time.

The Cooperative Approach: Working With OEMs

That said, some hardware still lacks good support on Linux. And as the Linux world continues to creep onto new devices, like tablets, phones and TVs, demand for more and better hardware compatibility will doubtless remain steady.

That’s why it’s encouraging to see Ubuntu developers actively addressing these sorts of issues, with their process outlined in a recent blog post by Victor Tuson Palau, commercial engineering director at Canonical.

What I like especially about the approach as described by Palau is the emphasis on active cooperation with OEMs. Instead of ignoring device manufacturers by trying to engineer drivers independently, or making itself subservient to OEMs by begging for Linux-compatible drivers and having to accept whatever they decide to deliver regardless of its quality or GPL-friendliness, Canonical’s objective is to collaborate with device manufacturers by sharing information and engineering resources.

A cooperative approach may seem like a no-brainer. But given the history of the hardware-support scene in the Linux world, where there has typically been little direct engagement between open-source developers and OEMs, Canonical is actually doing something rather innovative. By no means, of course, is it the first organization in the open-source world to work with device manufacturers on drivers — Red Hat has done the same, although its chief interest tends to be in server hardware, and companies like Intel and ATI have compiled good records of cooperation with Linux developers. But Canonical is remarkable for pursuing systematic collaboration on the desktop and beyond.

Another key point of the Canonical’s hardware-support strategy as outlined by Palau is that there’s no mention of licensing issues. This is also a bigger deal than it might seem at first glance, since in many instances a reluctance on the part of some portions of the Linux community to accept non-GPL’d device drivers has hindered cooperation between the community and OEMs. Without a doubt, fully open-source drivers are always preferable to proprietary blobs. But the fact that Ubuntu developers won’t let philosophical issues get in the way of the simple goal of making stuff work is important.

Since I’m writing this post from a computer where I still need ndiswrapper to get the wireless card running, I can attest that hardware support on Ubuntu remains far from perfect. Nonetheless, it’s great to see the distribution developers working to make it better in a pragmatic and effective way.