Rust-Based Tyr Driver for Arm Mali GPUs Boots Firmware in Linux 7.3
The Tyr Rust driver for Mali-G610 GPUs now starts the GPU's onboard microcontroller in mainline Linux 7.3, but it lacks job scheduling and does not replace the C-based Panthor driver.
Tyr, the Rust driver for Arm Mali GPUs, boots firmware in mainline Linux 7.3. This is the first time the driver performs real work on supported hardware, relying on upstreamed Rust memory-management abstractions.
Tyr is a Rust port of Panthor, the existing C driver for the Mali-G610 GPU found in RK3588-based boards like the Orange Pi 5 and the Rock 5B. By starting the GPU's onboard microcontroller, Tyr completes the initial step of hardware bring-up.
Job scheduling is not yet present, so Tyr cannot run graphics or compute workloads and does not replace Panthor. Panthor remains the functional driver for these boards.
Tyr stands as one of the first substantial users of the kernel's Rust DRM (Direct Rendering Manager) layer. Because these abstractions are now in mainline, subsequent Rust GPU drivers can utilize them directly without duplicating bindings.
Collabora published a write-up detailing the upstreaming effort on October 21 under the title "Upstreaming Tyr, Rust DRM and the Linux kernel."