Apple-focused security / virtualization startup Corellium has released a very primitive version of Linux for Apple M1 Mac devices.
Corellium is one of several attempts to bring Linux metal to Apple’s new ARM-based systems. This week, the developers involved launched the Linux kernel on M1 Macs, but it’s still early. In fact, the initial build does not yet have a USB working, but it is said to be on hand. Clearly, it’s just starting out in console mode and any Apple M1 graphics support will be far away … It’s probably unlikely that a satisfactory Linux desktop experience will be seen on Apple M1 hardware in 2021.
We had free time today, so we transferred Linux to the M1. Release tomorrow #vrydagfun pic.twitter.com/dCrXApyKef
– Corellium (@CorelliumHQ) 16 January 2021
A new building with SMP and USB support is expected to be placed on Sunday.
Here is a very early beta of Linux on the m1 for * advanced users only *. https://t.co/pFLgksZsdw if you do not know how to do this, then wait until tomorrow when the more complete version will be posted with USB, SMP (with instructions).
– Chris Wade (@cmwdotme) 17 January 2021
Corellium said they would release all of their code to this Apple Silicon port, as well as ‘actively want upstream’, but it looks like they haven’t posted any patches / Git repositories for their code yet. Hopefully it will come soon.
Once the Linux support is a bit more robust, we will definitely try to benchmark it on an Apple Mac Mini M1 for fun … But for most users, it will at least not be too practical until there is support not upstreamed and finally the separate Asahi Linux effort that also works on the reverse engineering of the Apple M1 GPU. Either way, it’s surprising to see that Linux is already uploading to Apple Silicon, albeit in primitive form.