Add support for msm8996(Xiaomi mi 5, Gemini)

[StarVase]

Add support for msm8996
(Xiaomi mi 5, Gemini)

[coreycusick]

Windows wouldn't boot on that chip, so I mean porting for that particular SOC would in my opinion be a waste of effort. I suppose someone may, and you are more than welcome to try.

[A-Shahbazi]

Windows wouldn't boot on that chip, so I mean porting for that particular SOC would in my opinion be a waste of effort. I suppose someone may, and you are more than welcome to try.

I would love to try mainline linux on my phone, so the only use for this project isn't using windows on one's phone.
And there is no documentation related to porting to a new SoC, otherwise I would give it a try.

[gus33000]

Booting linux never required the use of a third party uefi project like project renegade. Maintainers of the linux kernel ported linux mainline to phones without ever using one. All they do is flash a new boot image with the right device tree, and ramdisk. and on newer devices, where device tree overlays are exist, they erase the device tree binary overlay partition (DTBO). If you want to try linux not having an uefi should not be such a blocker.

[A-Shahbazi]

Booting linux never required the use of a third party uefi project like project renegade. Maintainers of the linux kernel ported linux mainline to phones without ever using one. All they do is flash a new boot image with the right device tree, and ramdisk. and on newer devices, where device tree overlays are exist, they erase the device tree binary overlay partition (DTBO). If you want to try linux not having an uefi should not be such a blocker.

Sorry, I guess I didn't explain my point thoroughly. Having a UEFI bootloader isn't a blocker for testing mainline kernel on a phone. But my understanding is that for testing one has to compile and flash boot image every time they want to test a different version of kernel. Using a bootloader they simply have to edit the bootloader entries and they can use precompiled mainline kernel and ramdisk images(which are released in a regular basis in linux distros' arm64 package repositories).

[gus33000]

Booting linux never required the use of a third party uefi project like project renegade. Maintainers of the linux kernel ported linux mainline to phones without ever using one. All they do is flash a new boot image with the right device tree, and ramdisk. and on newer devices, where device tree overlays are exist, they erase the device tree binary overlay partition (DTBO). If you want to try linux not having an uefi should not be such a blocker.

Sorry, I guess I didn't explain my point thoroughly. Having a UEFI bootloader isn't a blocker for testing mainline kernel on a phone. But my understanding is that for testing one has to compile and flash boot image every time they want to test a different version of kernel. Using a bootloader they simply have to edit the bootloader entries and they can use precompiled mainline kernel and ramdisk images(which are released in a regular basis in linux distros' arm64 package repositories).

None of the distrubutions that are precompiled contain a kernel image pre-built with support for phone socs. You will always have to build one on your on and update it. Default Def config doesn't include support for exotic phone socs in those usually.

[A-Shahbazi]

None of the distrubutions that are precompiled contain a kernel image pre-built with support for phone socs. You will always have to build one on your on and update it. Default Def config doesn't include support for exotic phone socs in those usually.

Well I guess that could be the exact point of "Testing"!

[gus33000]

Sure enough, except think again about why you want to use an UEFI in the first place here:

Using a bootloader they simply have to edit the bootloader entries and they can use precompiled mainline kernel and ramdisk images(which are released in a regular basis in linux distros' arm64 package repositories).

This will never work, stock distributions do not contain a suitable kernel image, so its not like you gain any real benefit.

Either way, its not like support is here today anyway, I am providing a solution to use linux on these phones without having to wait for something that may not arrive anytime soon, if you want to try linux thats the path forward. If you dont then theres no path here.