Introduction

In 2014 the Novena open source laptop was announced. In 2019 the laptop officially hit end of life.

novena-next aims to extend the lifetime of the laptop indefinitely.

Current goals:

• Release a newer set of kernel patches
• Create an update path from the stock Jessie firmware to Buster
• Create new SD card images for easy installing
• Document and archive information about the laptop

Future goals:

• Support the *BSDs
• Upstream most Novena patches
• Document and archive information about peripherals

Please report all issues or ideas in this bug tracker.

Come chat on #kosagi on irc.oftc.net or #novena on irc.libera.chat

Repositories

This project is split up in to many different Git repositories.

Documentation repositories:

• novena-next/docs contains this guide, a general issue tracker and various upgrade scripts

Kernel repositories:

• novena-next/kernel-patches contains distro-independent patch sets for Novena-specific features
• novena-next/linux contains the Git development tree for the patch sets

Userspace repositories:

• novena-next/xf86-video-armada is a maintained fork of Russel King's xf86-video-armada repository
• novena-next/xorg-novena contains sample Xorg configuration for xf86-video-armada
• novena-next/pulseaudio-novena contains PulseAudio configuration for the Novena sound system

Software repositories:

• novena-next/novena-bluetooth-reset resets the Bluetooth subsystem when you hit the USER button
• novena-next/novena-disable-ssp disables SSP on all attached Bluetooth devices
• novena-next/novena-eeprom allows viewing and editing the Novena EEPROM values
• novena-next/novena-eeprom-gui allows viewing and editing the Novena EEPROM values in a Qt5 GUI
• novena-next/novena-usb-hub allows powering up or down the various USB hubs in the Novena
• novena-next/novena-whack-lcd tries to reset the LCD when you hit the USER button

Firmware repositories:

• novena-next/firmware-senoko contains the source code for the Senoko and passthrough board firmware

Debian package repositories:

• novena-next/debian-linux contains the Debian package source for the Novena kernel variant
• novena-next/etna_viv contains the Debian package source for the libetnaviv-headers package
• novena-next/libdrm-armada contains the Debian package source for the libdrm-armada package

Unused repositories

These are not included in the novena-next project for various reasons:

• xobs/irqbalanced will eventually be ported to a newer irqbalance
• xobs/libetnaviv is obsoleted by the novena-next/etna_viv repository
• xobs/novena-debian-support is obsoleted by Debian's flash-kernel program and novena-next's configuration
• xobs/novena-firstrun will be replaced by official distribution install scripts
• xobs/novena-heirloom just turns the fan on and is no longer required with the newer kernel
• xobs/novena-image will be replaced by official distribution generation scripts
• xobs/novena-test is not useful to us given all the boards shipped have these tests
• xobs/u-boot-novena will eventually be ported to a newer U-Boot

Code signing

Git tags for each repository release is signed with Jookia's key:

• gpg --recv-key 1439014EF601F45269400315BFE88BA2235C8BDF

The novena-next apt repository is signed with a separate key:

• gpg --recv-key 72365C0E95BD25A7EE20C812DDC2AFA22D5777A9

Please always verify Git tags before using them in production.