How is Armbian for Rock64 developed?

[JSF]

Can someone please help me understand how Armbian for Rock64 is developed?

 

In the past, there was an image for the Rock64 that was a server image, not a desktop image.  Now, I see  Ubuntu and a Debian Stretch desktop images, no server image.  Is there a plan to build a server image going forward?

 

Also, will a newer kernel be built at some point?

 

Not trying to stir the pot or cause trouble, just trying to understand where the Rock64 support is going in the future.

 

Thank you for all the spectacular work the Armbian team does.

[TonyMac32]

11 minutes ago, jsfrederick said:

Also, will a newer kernel be built at some point?

 

The RK3328 has proven to be a bit of a tough SoC for support due to incomplete upstream support. 

 

13 minutes ago, jsfrederick said:

Can someone please help me understand how Armbian for Rock64 is developed?

 

Well, as time permits, more or less.  Remember that we do a lot of kernel and platform work to bring Armbian to the world (more the others, I'm a minor character).  With such a small team, unfortunately the result is a limited group of baords receive better support than others, or you wind up with "focus kernels" where, as we recently decided with Odroid-C2, the vendor legacy kernel is simply abandoned in favor of simply using mainline to reduce workload and problems.  In an ideal world the manufacturers of boards who want to see Armbian support would provide a headcount and/or some sponsoring for the project.  There are some small examples of that, and some nearly equivalent situations like Libre Computer and the BayLibre team with mainline Amlogic support.  For the large part though, you get one-off boards that simply take more resources than they are worth (we just purged a bunch of those)

 

The greatest way you could give your thanks is to pitch in and test what we've created and report back, providing proper logs/etc, and sharing projects on the forum to help build community and hopefully get some more involvement from others to keep the project healthy.

[JSF]

Thanks for that response TonyMac.  Great information.  The Armbian team does some GREAT work, and I really appreciate what they do. I am FAR from a programmer or developer so cannot assist there. Once I get all my RPi's replaced with Rock64's and Armbian, I shall try to assist as you recommend.