so there's not a clear "why" on this page, just a "download" digging for it yields the wiki which says:
"Why Linux?
More applications
Linux can run many different types of applicatons. No matter what you're trying to do, an application exists for Linux. ChromeOS is very limited. Sure, NaCl (Native Client) brings the ability to run native code to ChromeOS, but that's a hack at best, and there's still no good software to take advantage of it. With Linux you can install any Linux compatible software, totally natively. Firefox, Transmission (BitTorrent), LibreOffice, Steam, VLC Media Player, Kodi Media Center, the GIMP, VirtualBox, and many more are available on Linux to do things that simply aren't possible on ChromeOS. "
The "why" here ... or at least the reason for me to flash my Chromebook BIOS and install Gallium ... was because my Chromebook went EoL by Google and I wanted to see if I can keep it going for a while.
Gallium is an amazing piece of work, and the documentation is superb, but it's starting to show that it's on a very out of date base and there's no sign of a new version for some time. The efforts seem to have slowed down, which is a shame.
It leaves me wondering if the main patches and drivers in the kernel fork could ever be merged upstream. Maybe there's some technical or legal reason why not, or maybe it's just the work required and nobody has the time.
Either way, I hope it remains possible to run old Chromebooks for a while yet! They are often decent, cheap hardware if a little slow.
Yes , there are a lot of quirks in the chrome book platform . I have a 2015 hp 11e and nothing works on it but chromeos, win7 and gallium. No Ubuntu , FreeBSD , NetBSD or red hat .
I installed Gallium several years back, on a chromebook that didn't support any of that (at the time, at least). Gallium was also the only distro I found that worked out of the box with full hardware support (audio, webcam, etc).
Other commenters say that those drivers are now in other distros too, so Gallium may no longer have its original USPs...
Running other OSs on my chromebook is a bit of a pain, because every time you boot, you get a BIOS screen warning you about non-google software (and offering to wipe everything!). Also, (and maybe unique to my chromebook model), it has a nasty gotcha: if you ever let the battery drain empty, then the firmware loses its settings and it will no longer boot at all :( That one was fun to diagnose and fix...
Same reason people install Linux on their computers instead of just using WSL on Windows. It's faster, it's more natural, and the whole OS receives updates forever.
Then why is a Gallium that's out-of-date be an issue? If you have an older Chrombook, from the time when Gallium was maintained, and if Linux indeed "updates forever," go with Gallium.
"Why Linux? More applications Linux can run many different types of applicatons. No matter what you're trying to do, an application exists for Linux. ChromeOS is very limited. Sure, NaCl (Native Client) brings the ability to run native code to ChromeOS, but that's a hack at best, and there's still no good software to take advantage of it. With Linux you can install any Linux compatible software, totally natively. Firefox, Transmission (BitTorrent), LibreOffice, Steam, VLC Media Player, Kodi Media Center, the GIMP, VirtualBox, and many more are available on Linux to do things that simply aren't possible on ChromeOS. "
which... isn't true? chromeos can run at least most of those just fine, and has been able to for a while? https://support.google.com/chromebook/answer/9145439?hl=en