Happy birthday Linux
| It's been 30 years since Finnish graduate student Linus Torvalds drafted a brief note saying he was starting a hobby operating system. The world would never be the same. |
https://www.zdnet.com/article/linus-torvalds-on-linuxs-30th-birthday/
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Awesome isn't it ?
Just the evolution of open source is quite a thing on it's own. I remember my introduction to UNIX in 1988 with Sparc-station 1. IRC the organisation I worked for paid around $250K for 10 machines, plotters, tape drives, large colour monitors, and a CAD system. As well as a consultancy firm to set it all up. And there would have been an annual fee for the OS itself.
Imagine how much it would have hampered the world if we were still paying for proprietary UNIX.
Just the evolution of open source is quite a thing on it's own. I remember my introduction to UNIX in 1988 with Sparc-station 1. IRC the organisation I worked for paid around $250K for 10 machines, plotters, tape drives, large colour monitors, and a CAD system. As well as a consultancy firm to set it all up. And there would have been an annual fee for the OS itself.
Imagine how much it would have hampered the world if we were still paying for proprietary UNIX.
What I find awesome is that a grad student had the confidence and skills to do it.
I guess he was far from being professional.
I guess he was far from being professional.
it was a different era. There were professionals, but the exclusivity came later. Many a coder back then had a totally unrelated degree and was totally self taught.
L.T. is certainly very, very good and has proven that many times over. But if you said you wanted to write an OS on here, today, ... what would we say to that? Its rarely encouraging. I think he had more 'sure, go for it' than 'that is too much for one person' responses.
L.T. is certainly very, very good and has proven that many times over. But if you said you wanted to write an OS on here, today, ... what would we say to that? Its rarely encouraging. I think he had more 'sure, go for it' than 'that is too much for one person' responses.
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Meh. I like Unix better. Although I will admit that Linux (and open-source code) definitely has its place. Mainly I'm just used to Unix, I think.
Ok, you can all Ctrl-Alt-Delete me now or whatever Linuxers do to Unixers who diss Linux.
Ok, you can all Ctrl-Alt-Delete me now or whatever Linuxers do to Unixers who diss Linux.
MacOS, probably.
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For me Linux was a God send when I was at Uni. This was back in the days of lots of floppy disk, a mammoth configuration and several hours of compile time...but it did mean that I didn't have to drag myself into a computer lab to do my work, I could pull allnighters from the comfort of home. Unfortunately I don't like it as a desktop OS.
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For me Linux was a God send when I was at Uni. This was back in the days of lots of floppy disk, a mammoth configuration and several hours of compile time...but it did mean that I didn't have to drag myself into a computer lab to do my work, I could pull allnighters from the comfort of home. Unfortunately I don't like it as a desktop OS.
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"lots of floppy disks". I wish. We used punched cards and paper tape. You haven't lived until you're edited your program by cutting and splicing paper tape! or having to re-sort your card deck of several hundred cards after you're dropped them... Once you'd submitted your deck of cards you then had to wait (possibly for a couple of hours) to get the output back - which could be a compilation error. Change the card, resubmit, wait...
Or for those computers that did have 'storage', being told that there'd been another head crash and you'd need to re-enter your work...
Ah the fun...
Or for those computers that did have 'storage', being told that there'd been another head crash and you'd need to re-enter your work...
Ah the fun...
Is MacOS considered as being UNIX? Well one has to pay for it, but essentially the kernel is very similar to Linux.
For me the first version of Linux back in 1991 was great, I could do similar things (with the shell at least) as what I could do on the UNIX machine at my previous job. And it just blew DOS 3.0 or 6.0 , and Windows 1 completely out of the water.
I also remember the first computer I used at school circa 1980: No secondary storage at all (everything lost on power down); The motherboard wasn't even in a case; a cable running to an old B/W TV ; No idea what OS, but it did have a BASIC interpreter. After that it was a super fancy Apple I with more BASIC and LOGO with the turtle!
For me the first version of Linux back in 1991 was great, I could do similar things (with the shell at least) as what I could do on the UNIX machine at my previous job. And it just blew DOS 3.0 or 6.0 , and Windows 1 completely out of the water.
I also remember the first computer I used at school circa 1980: No secondary storage at all (everything lost on power down); The motherboard wasn't even in a case; a cable running to an old B/W TV ; No idea what OS, but it did have a BASIC interpreter. After that it was a super fancy Apple I with more BASIC and LOGO with the turtle!
| TheIdeasMan wrote: |
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| Is MacOS considered as being UNIX? |
Edit:
https://www.opengroup.org/openbrand/register/
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Grey Wolf is correct, I have a couple of Macs, an old G5 and a newer iMac. I believe macOS uses a Unix kernel, but I'm not 100% sure.
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The G5 was the last PowerPC Mac, right? MacOS 9, which it ran, and below weren't Unices. OSX is based on Mach, which is a BSD descendant.
I think the first version of macOS registered as UNIX was 10.5 Leonard.
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It's more like it conforms to the Single UNIX Specification than uses a UNIX kernel.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Single_UNIX_Specification
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| agent max wrote: |
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| I believe macOS uses a Unix kernel |
| Specification SUSv3 totals some 3700 pages, which are divided into four main parts: ◾ Base Definitions (XBD) - a list of definitions and conventions used in the specifications and a list of C header files which must be provided by compliant systems. 84 header files in total are provided. ◾ Shell and Utilities (XCU) - a list of utilities and a description of the shell, sh. 160 utilities in total are specified. ◾ System Interfaces (XSH) - contains the specification of various functions which are implemented as system calls or library functions. 1123 system interfaces in total are specified. ◾ Rationale (XRAT) - the explanation behind the standard. |
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Correct. My G5 has 10.5.8 Leopard, which has, according to Wikipedia:
Not 100% sure if that means it has a Unix kernel, maybe someone who knows more about my computer than I do could tell me?
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Not 100% sure if that means it has a Unix kernel, maybe someone who knows more about my computer than I do could tell me?
| agent max wrote: |
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| Not 100% sure if that means it has a Unix kernel, maybe someone who knows more about my computer than I do could tell me? |
I would like macOS to be, legally, available for non Apple hardware.
I wouldn't mind an ARM based mac but only after the move to ARMv9...I don't trust Apple not to level the early adopters in the lurch.
I wouldn't mind an ARM based mac but only after the move to ARMv9...I don't trust Apple not to level the early adopters in the lurch.
Ditto. I have no interest in the hardware, but the software I could find some use for.
Not going to happen. Apple keeps tight control over the hardware/drivers so you don't get the plug'n'pray situation as you do with Windows. There's no third party drivers etc. It's either Apple supported hardware with Apple drivers etc or it doesn't work. Since the Macintosh in 1984, Apple have controlled both the hardware and the software.