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Opening

Good afternoon

Today we're talking about bringing Linux to modern Intel based Macs with T2 chips.

I'm Aditya, I maintain Ubuntu spinoff for T2 Macs I'm Mark, I manage t2linux community I'm Woohyun, I maintain some other distribution spinoffs

What exactly is the T2 Security Chip? (Mark)

  • T2 is a specialized security-focused SoC for Intel Macs
  • Key functions:
    • Managing some USB devices (like keyboard, trackpad, Touch Bar and a camera)
    • Controls audio (speakers, and a microphone)
    • Manages NVMe SSD
    • Houses Secure Enclave for encryption
    • Handles video encoding/decoding

Linux Challenge & Solution (Woohyun)

  • Main obstacle: No T2 drivers meant no basic input device support nor access to the internal disk
  • Breakthrough by Pawel Pawlowski:
    • First achieved NVMe SSD support (on Linux 5.4)
    • Developed critical apple-bce driver with three components:
      1. BCE: Basic T2 communication
      2. VHCI: Internal device support
      3. Audio support

Project Progress (Aditya)

  • Community effort led to t2linux project
  • Current working features:
    • Internal disk access
    • Basic hybrid graphics
    • Full keyboard and trackpad support
    • Wi-Fi/Bluetooth (further improved by Asahi Linux collaboration)
    • FaceTime camera
    • Touch Bar
  • Some features still have minor bugs but are overall usable

Looking Ahead (Mark)

  • Key goals:
    • Implement T2 SEP support for fingerprint reader
    • Fix suspending and resuming (which was broken recently by macOS Sonoma update)
  • And there is challenge to find more kernel developers and hardware experts

Current situation (Woohyun)

  • We are maintaining spinoff versions of major Linux distributions:
    • Ubuntu, Linux Mint, Fedora
    • Arch Linux, EndeavourOS, NixOS
  • There is also official upstream support in blendOS and CachyOS

We need your help (Aditya)

  • We are actively seeking kernel developers
  • And looking to raise project awareness
  • So thank you Canonical for the platform

Demo (Mark)

If you want to see a demo of running Ubuntu on T2 based Intel MacBook Pro, then you can check it out in Linux on Apple Hardware booth.

Closing (Mark)

  • Thank you for listening, if you have any questions we are happy to answer them.

answer to all possible questions

And again, if you want to see things working with your own eyes, or have more detailed questions, feel free to come by our booth.