Comments on: The Definition of “Firmware”, According To The iPhone

By: Aryeh Shomron

Aryeh Shomron — Mon, 07 Nov 2011 12:38:15 +0000

I personally hate it when people change well-defined and well-established terms for bad and/or stupid reasons. Microsoft on the occasion of launching the non-innovative not-OS Windows 1.0 changed the term “directory” into “folder”, introducing unnecessary complication and confusion. The complication and confusion is because the term “directory” continues to be ubiquitous in programming, system administration, and the UNIX/Linux world while ordinary computer users typically use the term “folder” for the same thing. Similarly I find ridiculous the renaming of the “Negoes” “Blacks” and “Colored” only to be re-renamed a few decades later “African Americans”. “Negro” in Latin means “black” so by saying “black” in English the meaning has not changed and I don’t think the people started to be more respected with the name change! “African American” is a longer expression hence and inferior one. “African American is a very confusing term!” If an american’s ancestry is from Egypt, Libya, Tunisia or Morocco, he is probably an Arab-American or he may be a Berberian-American or a Jewish-American. But although his origin is in Africa, he surely does not belong to the African-American community!

Similarly, I don’t think that calling prostitutes “sex workers” is contributing to these women’s respectibility or anything else.

By: mark

mark — Wed, 22 Jul 2009 02:39:27 +0000

Anthony told me about the product name. He has what he describes as “a very reliable source” regarding Apple insider info, but getting him to name it isn’t going to happen.

By: nilges

nilges — Wed, 22 Jul 2009 01:01:24 +0000

Hey, speaking of Wind, what’s your source for them having a product by that codename? It sounds like something I might’ve heard before, but all Google turns up are references to my afforementioned MSI product.

By: nilges

nilges — Tue, 21 Jul 2009 15:01:00 +0000

Yeah, I think it’s conceptual. Any device that should just work, like your (smart) toaster or your flat-screen television, you don’t want to think of as booting up into an OS, though they probably do. Phones started out as analog devices, and older mobile phones did have nothing but firmware. That, and Apple wants to reinforce that developers are not to tread in any area considered essential to the proper functioning of the phone.

Stealing the name of the foremost hackintosh platform (MSI Wind netbook, on which I presently type, perversely but quite functionally connected to a 1920×1200 LCD thru VGA), now that’s either a nod or a sign of some deeper affinity.

By: iPhone 3Gs CZ

iPhone 3Gs CZ — Mon, 20 Jul 2009 20:06:56 +0000

i guess that the definition comes from the mobile world – in mobile world, all phones have just one system. You cannot have device without system with firmware only, you cannot use a different system on the same device etc. So theoreticaly you are right and there are two systems, but practicaly there is only one and e.g. upgrading one you upgrade the other as well. P.S.: and btw it is mostly known as iPhone OS (3.0), not firmware