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Comment by vvhn | Hacker News Reader

> There is a non-zero chance your stove and microwave are 'running linux'.

Unless Linux comes with a BSD license, there is, in fact, zero chance. Apple is known to run a NetBSD variant on the airport routers - I'd say that is what is likely or whatever the hell a "stub version of iOS" means.

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What does BSD vs GPL have to do with my stove or microwave?

The GPL requires that any changes (made to code used in released products) be released under the GPL. I'm unaware of any home appliance manufacturer that freely releases the OS of their products under the GPL, as they would have to if they were using Linux.

If they did, they would probably do it the way Amazon does with Kindle or Samsung does with Android. A giant tarball you can download from somewhere on their site, but not necessarily easy to just know about (like a link on the homepage).

If you go here: http://opensource.samsung.com you can see that they have the OS for some TV's. This is the typical way they comply (with unuseful, unannotated giant dumps).

LG actually has some appliances:

http://www.lg.com/global/support/opensource/index

There is a false assumption that manufacturers don't use Linux because of GPL. Most products don't use Linux because they don't need it, and they use something like FreeRTOS or another commerical RTOS. Plenty of companies use Linux in all sorts of home appliances, mostly TV products, but an increasing number of fridges from companies like Samsung do have Linux and they do release the code. What manufacturers don't do is release the applications that they run on the OS (despite the false assumption that they should).

I'm sorry, that was a brainfart- I thought you meant the connector and the host device and not quite literally a random microwave and oven :)

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