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Linus Torvalds: Programs exist for their users

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Re: Linus Torvalds: Programs exist for their users

#121

Post by dredmorbius »

tybris wrote: post #84
ot wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That sentence is a betrayal of UNIX's history: There are two major products that came out of Berkeley: LSD and UNIX. We don't believe this to be a coincidence. (Jeremy S. Anderson)

When did Unix stop being a product of Bell Labs?

In 1916.

That was when AT&T first entered into anti-trust restrictions as a result of its anticomptitive practices in the long-distance telephone market, resulting among other things a 1958 DoJ consent decree preventing the company from marketing computer systems, which meant that in 1969, when Ritchie and Thompson wrote UNIX while at AT&T the company couldn't sell the software, and gave it away (with love, from Ken), resulting in most effective development moving outside the company by the mid/late 1970s (notably to UC Berkeley and MIT), a fact ultimately recognized by AT&T when it sold UNIX to Novell, who transferred the official UNIX trade mark to The Open Group in 1994.

Re: Linus Torvalds: Programs exist for their users

#122

Post by dredmorbius »

mapleoin wrote: post #37
ot wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That sentence is a betrayal of UNIX's history: There are two major products that came out of Berkeley: LSD and UNIX. We don't believe this to be a coincidence. (Jeremy S. Anderson)

I think it rather refers to MINIX.

Yes, it refers to MINIX.

However, it is a betrayal of UNIX's history.

Re: Linus Torvalds: Programs exist for their users

#123

Post by A1kmm »

malkia wrote: post #102
4ad wrote: post #48

It's great that Linus is committed to supporting old binaries, too bad all that effort is in vain because of the glibc disaster. Linux can run statically compiled binaries from 1993, but not the Firefox binaries from 2006.

wouldn't it be possible to still run them with some LD_xxx magic where the c++ shared libs are put in some folder and loaded from there? (It's really userspace problem).

Yes - I've done that to produce more portable Linux binary installers where static binaries would have caused other problems - I tested it for backwards compatibility, but hopefully it will also improve forward compatibility.

One problem that you encounter if you do that is that glibc has an option to disable support for older kernels in exchange for better performance, so you lose backwards compatibility unless you are very careful about how you compile glibc (it fails with an error that the kernel is too old).

Re: Linus Torvalds: Programs exist for their users

#124

Post by lakamash »

dsr_ wrote: post #10

Leadership: communicate a clear mission and inspire others to want to do it. Linus has it.

...which explains why Linux has taken over the desktop market?

Seriously, Linux has had MAJOR advantages, people HATE M$ and the Mac has shown ZERO interest in taking over anything other than the elite market segment.

I tried using Linux for a while, and it is a major pain in the ass. I've been using a Mac for everything since 2009, and it is so much easier. I really miss some Windows apps, so I'm going to have to get another machine just to run those apps, and of course I will install Windows. But there are no killer apps for Linux on the desktop.

Running a server farm? Of course I'll use Linux. No point in using anything else. But on the desktop, what's the point?

If you use Linux, it's like tithing. It's free, but you have to give up 10% of your life just to get by. If you're a sysadmin, that IS your life, and you can kernel hack all day and night. This is why Linux controls the server market.

But Linus has no conception of what the average user wants and needs in an OS. For example: if I'm using Linux, I'd like to be able to seamlessly run lots of Windows software. Linux should have an executive suite for Wine.

The charitable interpretation of his antics is "Lilliputian victim". He sounds like a 13 year old.

On top of that, the vitriol is a waste of breath. The Mac broke binary compatibility two times - Motorolla to PPC and PPC to intel. There were VMs available and fat binary alternatives available for both changes, and Mac users and developers just rolled over.

Linus does some things very well, but I would not describe him as a model leader.

Re: Linus Torvalds: Programs exist for their users

#125

Post by tjoff »

nitrogen wrote: post #111
ahelwer wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The DRM user is the publisher, not the user of the program itself.

I find myself growing tired of our trend of redefining words to make our favorite clichés apply to our favorite companies. Some examples: "The customer is always right." -> "You're the product, not the customer." "Software is made for users." -> "The publisher is the user, not you." Sure, these things sound clever at first, but they only serve to increase our acceptance of these encroachments upon the rights of consu…

I see "You're the product, not the customer." and "The publisher is the user, not you." as labels of warnings.

For me that isn't twisting words to accomodate things like DRM and privacy-invasive tracking. If you tried to mask "You're the product, not the customer." as "The customer is always right." and "The publisher is the user, not you." as "Software is made for users." you'd be twisting words.

If I'm the product or the publisher is the user I'm very careful with what I share or do on the service. One of the many reasons for why it wouldn't affect me much at all if google disappeared tomorrow.

Re: Linus Torvalds: Programs exist for their users

#126

Post by pasiaj »

lakamash wrote: post #124
dsr_ wrote: post #10

Leadership: communicate a clear mission and inspire others to want to do it. Linus has it.

...which explains why Linux has taken over the desktop market? Seriously, Linux has had MAJOR advantages, people HATE M$ and the Mac has shown ZERO interest in taking over anything other than the elite market segment. I tried using Linux for a while, and it is a major pain in the ass. I've been using a Mac for everything since 2009, and it is so much easier. I really miss some Windows apps, so I'm going to have to ge…

Linux is the kernel. Linus doesn't have pretty much anything to do with the desktop or individual applications (save the occasional rant).

What you're saying is like judging the guy who build the road when it's the car that sucks.

Re: Linus Torvalds: Programs exist for their users

#127

Post by Jach »

nitrogen wrote: post #111
ahelwer wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The DRM user is the publisher, not the user of the program itself.

I find myself growing tired of our trend of redefining words to make our favorite clichés apply to our favorite companies. Some examples: "The customer is always right." -> "You're the product, not the customer." "Software is made for users." -> "The publisher is the user, not you." Sure, these things sound clever at first, but they only serve to increase our acceptance of these encroachments upon the rights of consu…

Personally I like the trend, though like others I don't call them "redefinitions", it's more of a context switch and applying the phrase in a way its author didn't see. I like it because it takes seemingly clever or seemingly deep or seemingly insightful sentiments like "Programs exist for their users" and reveals their content-free tautological nature. The more tautologies we find the more we can focus on eliminating those from the conversation and talking about things that matter instead. Of course, sometimes the context switch doesn't reveal tautologies but actually harmful sentiments. You don't want a sado-masochist believing in the Golden Rule as a moral guideline for instance.

Re: Linus Torvalds: Programs exist for their users

#128

Post by ugh »

ajross wrote: post #116
microtherion wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Granted, Jobs was not always a nice person behind closed doors. However, at least during his Apple 2.0 days, he did NOT trash the people working for him in public the way Linus habitually does. Another difference is that a lot of people working for Jobs (again, at least during the Apple 2.0 days) made f * you money for their efforts. There are engineers making a living working on Linux, but not on that scale, I think…

He also didn't praise people working for him in public. Or mention people working for him in public. At all. Are you sure you aren't mistaking silence for civility?

Steve Jobs regularily praised the people working for Apple, sometimes as a group, sometimes by name. Watch any Keynote to see that.

Re: Linus Torvalds: Programs exist for their users

#129

Post by dedward »

microtherion wrote: post #103
ajross wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He's nicer than Jobs, at least.

Granted, Jobs was not always a nice person behind closed doors. However, at least during his Apple 2.0 days, he did NOT trash the people working for him in public the way Linus habitually does. Another difference is that a lot of people working for Jobs (again, at least during the Apple 2.0 days) made f * you money for their efforts. There are engineers making a living working on Linux, but not on that scale, I think…

Are any of these people working for Linus? Is he paying them? Are they not free to fork off their own kernel tree if they don't like the way he maintains his?

Jobs was running a company, and paying people directly for results..... (all other judgement aside)

Re: Linus Torvalds: Programs exist for their users

#130

Post by dedward »

gillianseed wrote: post #97
mllell wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It could be the hurd project. He does have that semi-famous "just say NO TO DRUGS, and maybe you won't end up like the Hurd people" quote.

No it was an obvious (and in my opinion childish) stab at Minix/Tanenbaum (although Tanenbaum sure is just as childish) given that Tanenbaum is still saying that Linux and monolithic kernels are bad, Stallman on the other hand openly admitted his mistake in going with the mach microkernel. The Linus/Tanenbaum adversity is as alive as ever judging by comments like this and the recent-ish interview with Tanenbaum : htt…

It sounded to me more like a simple reference to re-enforce that this is not about theoretical stuff, it's about a piece of software actually being used all over the place.
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