The name 'FireOS' is a risky name for a OSS Linux project for Chromebooks that is likely to be trademarked by Amazon Inc. 'Fire' is trademarked but not 'FireOS'.
I wouldn't risk getting this project ruined by their patent and trademark lawyers if your project becomes successful, so brace yourselves for a rename.
It doesn't seem to be a full feature OS, just something to use if you want a static, prepared Linux environment for git to drop into quickly to develop on a Chromebook.
Check the .config to see what's provided.
Gallium is a local install. FireOS is live only and works out of git, so nothing is left behind.
I had regrets after buying my boy a Chromebook and ended up upgrading him to GalliumOS and it's been great. Everything works, performance and battery life are fine, and he can actually... do stuff.
I’ve had pretty decent success getting Linux to run directly on Chromebooks. Does this have anything in particular that makes it a better choice than a standard distribution?
This looks interesting — would be cool if the author called out what hardware this was tested on specifically since they mention drivers to support various things like Chromebooks and microboards.
I don't know why others use them, but the main thing for me is price. I got a Toshiba Chromebook 2 at 13 inches and 1080p for < $100. It's 3lbs and if it dies in a fire I can get a replacement no problem. I take it on trips. Most of the heavy computational lifting I do these days on servers anyway.
I wouldn't risk getting this project ruined by their patent and trademark lawyers if your project becomes successful, so brace yourselves for a rename.