Great result - it would be nice to learn how this could be used..

How would you connect a Tamron lens to a Linux machine? Is this with the external USB port or Bluetooth dongle? Or through the bayonet connector? A linx camera controlling it's lens?

Just for settings and firmware update? Or some imaging workflow? Can you give a practical example of Linux also controlling the camera?

New Tamron lenses have built-in usb-c port close to the lens mount. The utility just replicates what official Windows/Mac software does - not much, configuration of focus-by-wire, corrections, button functions.

Sounds weird to me to have this functionality on the lens in the first place.

Modern lenses are complex electronics now. They need to communicate with the camera about correction params, metadata, control algorithm for focusing and stabilization. Having a usbc port is a natural next step.

Lenses have energy budgets, responsiveness concerns and actuator/sensor pairings through embedded processing. Therefore they need firmware. Firmware goes out of date and has bugs and improvements. Having the ability to configure a lens beyond simply selecting firmware is an obvious second use of the required interface.

Firmware doesn't inherently have more bugs than hardware, in general that's a consequence of the ability to update it more than the other way around. Here the need for an update-able firmware comes more from implementation a reverse engineered interface which might need fixes for compatibility with future cameras or updated camera firmware that only care about official vendor approved lenses. However that still doesn't explain who would want things like auto-focus fine tuning or assignable buttons in the lens rather than the camera body where it already exists. Just because the USB interface is there doesn't mean that this use of it is useful.