[olug] Open Source in the Air

[Jay Swackhamer]

http://www.linuxjournal.com/article.php?sid=7108

Airplane Seatback System Runs Linux

The most amazing thing happened when I was flying back from Detroit—where
I had been teaching a Linux course for one of our customers—to Amsterdam
late Wednesday night. The Northwest airplane was a brand-new Airbus 330,
which had just been put into service the week before. It's their only
Airbus so far, and it was completely new to the cabin crew. They told me
that they had had their training for this aircraft based on photos from
the galley.

The A330 is equipped with an in-flight entertainment system for each and
every individual passenger—even in cattle class every seat has its own LCD
panel, remote control, et cetera. The system is unique in the respect that
it allows you to choose and start a movie at any time. So every passenger
could be watching a different part of a movie at the same time. (This is
actually great—sometimes you hear a giggle behind you, and five minutes
later a giggle in front of you. Two people watching the same thing, only
with five minutes difference in the time they started it. Happened again a
few times.)

Anyway, the cabin crew did not know how to operate the system properly, so
we couldn't even get our reading lights going. After they messed with it
for about 30 minutes, they announced over the PA system that they would be
doing a full power reset on the system. They had evidently talked to tech
support via the sat phone, and that seemed to be the only resolution. And
true enough, power went off and the systems started booting—Linux.

I could not believe my eyes. Here were more than 300 passengers staring at
Tux's friendly smile, while Linux was booting on each and every console,
in frame-buffer mode. I could see that they are using cramfs for their
filesystems, but not much else before X took over. Needless to say, I was
amazed. I should have brought a camera with me. That would have been a
great picture for LJ.

Once the system was rebooted, it worked properly. Movies, multi-user
games, interactive maps, surveys, you name it. You could even send e-mail
(but that would cost $2.50 US, and you needed to type it using a
joystick-like device—not very fast). Currently, I think the range of
applications is actually quite limited. The only multi-user games they've
got right now are multiplayer reversi, and some sort of trivia quiz. But
can you imagine playing Quake at 30,000 feet with the whole passenger load
or getting a true chess competition going on in-flight? Anyway, just
wanted to let you know that our favorite OS is not only used on earth and
in space, but in between these two as well, and it's keeping a lot of
people entertained.
--
Wouter Liefting
IBM Learning Services


-- 
Jay Swackhamer
Reboot The User
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Suite 135
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