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The early days of Linux (2023)

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Re: The early days of Linux (2023)

#91

Post by [deleted] »

p_ing wrote: post #88
hnthrowaway0315 wrote: post #18

Such an inspiring read! Thanks for writing and/or sharing. One of my many future hermit projects is to hack on an early version of Linux. ------------ Please ignore just jotting down for future myself --------------- (Actually I want to study Win NT more than Linux as it brought me good memories, but Win NT was designed as a mature product from the beginning, and even the leaked 3.5 source code is way too much for me…

> I want to study Win NT Windows NT Design Workbook: https://computernewb.com/~lily/files/Documents/NTDesignWorkb... Tale of Two Kernels: https://youtu.be/HdV9QuvgS_w And I'm sure you've picked up a copy of Windows Internals . Right now I'm waiting for a copy of Inside Windows NT which is the first edition of that series as well as Inside the Windows NT File System , both by Helen Custer.

[deleted]

Re: The early days of Linux (2023)

#92

Post by sgarland »

xtracto wrote: post #37
qwertox wrote: post #36

It's odd how Linux has become the only stable thing in this world. You turn it on and you know that over time it will only become better without any bad intentions.

This is so important to me on this day and age. Most new technology and OS seem to have an agenda. They want to "push" me to do things: buy an iPhone, buy an office subscription , etc. Using Linux is a breath of fresh air in that respect for me. I just want my toaster tu toast bread. I don't want it to tell me what bread should I buy.

This is why I dislike Ubuntu – I don't like Snaps, and I don't want them to be considered the default.

Re: The early days of Linux (2023)

#93

Post by anta40 »

keyle wrote: post #54
openplatypus wrote: post #46

Slackware 3.6/4.0 back in 1998-99 Never forget. The joy of startx command working (sometimes) Fun times.

I remember when I had to choose whether I was a slackware guy or a debian guy! I chose slackware like many french speaking fellas around. Oh, the times. PS: debian all the way since.

Slackware 11 was all I had in PC as univ student circa 2006-2008 (yep, just said goodbye to Win XP). All the tools I need to do assignments were provided in 3 CDs. At that time, fast internet connection was considered a bit expensive.

Now I'm happy with Debian.

Re: The early days of Linux (2023)

#94

Post by NexRebular »

t43562 wrote: post #73
abenga wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Corporate interests are not bad per se , you would have to point to something nefarious that it has led to. Most people seem to think corporate interest in Linux has made it better by raising the level of investment to the extent that we can use it on most commodity hardware.

On the minus side of the equation, large controversial changes, more often outside the kernel but still important nevertheless, do get pushed through by people who are employed at important companies. If your fulltime job is Linux it does give you an ability to influence what happens that others who are earning their daily bread some other way lack. You can use that ability to ride over some objections. For some peop…

> For some people the goal of Linux is to become the world's OS.

This is extremely worrying. There already is enough linux monoculture in critical network infrastructure due every manufacturer except Juniper seemingly putting their penguin eggs into one basket. I can only hope there will be some common sense brewing for the future before linux experiences major failure and Pluto's Kiss starts to feel a bit too real for comfort.

Re: The early days of Linux (2023)

#95

Post by hnlmorg »

II2II wrote: post #85
hnlmorg wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The kernel is only a small part of the overall Linux ecosystem. These days even GNU is a small part. systemd, Wayland, Xorg, PulseAudio, CUPS, KDE, Gnome, etc are all maintained outside of Linus and GNUs governance. What FOSS operating systems (and not even Linux specifically) offers is freedom to choose. But the effort of using some alternatives can be significant. So I wouldn’t say Linux is immune to having its “we…

> What FOSS operating systems (and not even Linux specifically) offers is freedom to choose. But the effort of using some alternatives can be significant. True. On the other hand, Linux (the kernel) does provide the foundation. You can replace most of components above it and you will still have hardware support for a wide range of hardware. Even if you were to develop an entirely new kernel, the Linux kernel can serv…

Linux isn’t a unicorn here. Sure FreeBSD has pretty good driver support. In fact back in the 00s I had fewer problems with FreeBSD WiFi drivers than Linux.

I don’t know what the driver story is like for all of the other main BSDs but DragonflyBSD is a really interesting platform with some real innovations in the kernel.

Technically XNU, the macOS kernel, is open source too. Though there doesn’t seem to be much community effort behind that.

There’s also OpenIndiana. Which itself has some really novel ideas.

Then you have smaller projects that have compatibility layers, for example Haiku can run some Linux and FreeBSD systems. ReactOS and Windows driver support. But even if you exclude them in favour of larger, more stable projects, there’s still plenty of options out there.

I do also think you’re placing far too much emphasis on the kernel here. For example some platforms don’t guarantee ABI compatibility between releases, instead requiring their standard libraries being used as the kernel entry point (eg Darwin instead of XNU, or libc on some UNIXes). This is why people often talk about GNU/Linux, Darwin or NT as more than just a kernel.

And that’s before we address the massive elephant in the room that is all the abstractions that sit on top of the userland. For example how so many applications these days are basically running inside a virtual machine called a “web browser”. These days a modern browser is almost like an OS in its own right.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not taking anything away from Linux nor the Linux kernel. But its main strength is its momentum rather than it being unique.

Re: The early days of Linux (2023)

#96

Post by sgarland »

Great read. My first Linux distro was, I think, Slackware, around kernel version 2.2 - 2.4. I played with a _lot_ of distros; I think Sorcerer was the most esoteric. I settled on Gentoo, as one does, and spent more time compiling / breaking / fixing than I did using anything. I eventually valued stability over bleeding-edge, and have happily been using Debian ever since.

Re: The early days of Linux (2023)

#98

Post by neontomo »

weinzierl wrote: post #49
klysm wrote: post #19

It’s a weird feeling to be young enough to never have experienced a world without Linux, but be close enough in time to its creation that many of the people involved are still around. My entire professional career has mostly revolved around it in some capacity. My entire life even since age like 12? It’s pretty crazy to think about the impact it has had on my life

I feel similar for Computer Science as a whole field. It's weird to think that many of its founding fathers were still during a significant portion of my life. Claude Shannon 2001 Edsger Dijkstra 2012 John McCarthy 2011 Niklaus Wirth 2024 Konrad Zuse 1995 Alonzo Church 1995 Jim Gray 2007/2012 Grace Hopper 1992 Even Alan Turing could still have been alive during my lifetime hadn't he been murdered. Friedrich L. Baur,…

Alan Turing took his own life on purpose or by accident, he wasn't murdered

Re: The early days of Linux (2023)

#99

Post by p_ing »

hnlmorg wrote: post #95
II2II wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What FOSS operating systems (and not even Linux specifically) offers is freedom to choose. But the effort of using some alternatives can be significant. True. On the other hand, Linux (the kernel) does provide the foundation. You can replace most of components above it and you will still have hardware support for a wide range of hardware. Even if you were to develop an entirely new kernel, the Linux kernel can serv…

Linux isn’t a unicorn here. Sure FreeBSD has pretty good driver support. In fact back in the 00s I had fewer problems with FreeBSD WiFi drivers than Linux. I don’t know what the driver story is like for all of the other main BSDs but DragonflyBSD is a really interesting platform with some real innovations in the kernel. Technically XNU, the macOS kernel, is open source too. Though there doesn’t seem to be much commun…

Unfortunately Apple doesn't accept pull requests for XNU. They're more "source available", to put it under the old .NET Framework terms.

Re: The early days of Linux (2023)

#100

Post by cnt-dracula »

exe34 wrote: post #89
qwertox wrote: post #36

It's odd how Linux has become the only stable thing in this world. You turn it on and you know that over time it will only become better without any bad intentions.

I worry that it's a Linus thing - he still has to step in and call for order now and again. I don't know for sure if it will remain on the trajectory of always getting better when he retires.

I think there was a discussion regarding this last year where linus was saying that they are already thinking of who will call shots after him so I think even though right now it's very much a linus thing, I think they are already prepared for the next person to lead it in case we ever need it
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