Re: LINUX is obsolete
[Prev][Next][Index][Thread]
Re: LINUX is obsolete
The history of software shows that availability wins out over
technical quality every time. That's Linux' major advantage. It's a
small 386-based system that's fairly compatible with generic Unix, and
is freely available. I dropped out of the Minix community a couple of
years ago when it became clear that (1) Minix was not going to take
advantage of anything beyond the 8086 anytime in the near future, and
(2) the licensing -- while amazingly friendly -- still made it hard
for people who were interested in producing a 386 version. Several
people apparently did nice work for the 386. But all they could
distribute were diffs. This made bringing up a 386 system a job that
isn't practical for a new user, and in fact I wasn't sure I wanted to
do it.
I apologize if things have changed in the last couple of years. If
it's now possible to get a 386 version in a form that's ready to run,
the community has developed a way to share Minix source, and bringing
up normal Unix programs has become easier in the interim, then I'm
willing to reconsider Minix. I do like its design.
It's possible that Linux will be overtaken by Gnu or a free BSD.
However, if the Gnu OS follows the example of all other Gnu software,
it will require a system with 128MB of memory and a 1GB disk to use.
There will still be room for a small system. My ideal OS would be 4.4
BSD. But 4.4's release date has a history of extreme slippage. With
most of their staff moving to BSDI, it's hard to believe that this
situation is going to be improved. For my own personal use, the BSDI
system will probably be great. But even their very attractive pricing
is likely to be too much for most of our students, and even though
users can get source from them, the fact that some of it is
proprietary will again mean that you can't just put altered code out
for public FTP. At any rate, Linux exists, and the rest of these
alternatives are vapor.