Red Hat Wins In US Army Contract For Linux Devices 70
zonker writes "This article at C|Net says the army is going to try an embedded version of Linux to use on portable vehicle diagnosis devices. Red Hat got the contract. Here is an article at Red Hat's site." Not a huge deal fiscally, but this is one of the areas where Linux is probably going to grow the most - hence companies like Lineo and others like them.
Watch out army... (Score:2)
If you're not wasted, the day is.
Finally the US Army will be able to defeat... (Score:3)
I'll drink to that!
Ethical clause (Score:2)
What if I write parts of a GPL licensed code which is then used to bomb my people back to stone age?
Oh great.... (Score:2)
Hooray for Linux (Score:3)
``We've tried more traditional PC operating systems in the past for similar embedded appliances, but they were prone to instability, high power requirements, and heat dissipation problems'' said Steve May, Rymic president. ``Red Hat's Clinux provides us with an inherently stable solution that monitors vehicles' performances in real time; because Clinux is open source software, costly per-unit license fees are eliminated.''
To be honest it dosent matter that it's Redhat I'm just glad to see Linux get marketshare and more importantly mindshare.
I'm quite surprised, actually. (Score:1)
Linux Security is good for businesses, but in the army it's different - their enemies have resources and will keep what they develop a secret, before deploying it once.
Could the army's actions be for funding reasons, rather than security reasons? I am British, so I am not very familiar with American politics, but I would have thought that under the Republicans the Army would have more money.
If someone could clear this up for me I'd be most obliged - I am not very technically literate.
KTB:Lover, Poet, Artiste, Aesthete, Programmer.
woohoo (Score:1)
Re:Oh great.... (Score:2)
Ooops...
Linux advocates recruited by army. (Score:4)
WASHINGTON D.C. In a landmark victory for the renegade OS, the United States Army has changed its recruitment and training procedures in order to make military service more attractive to Linux Users.
"We're going all out to get as many of these penguin people into the ranks as we possibly can." Stated General Jack Ripper "These geeks truly are americas finest."
The military became interested in geek warriors after observing multiple flame wars on the popular web site slashdot.org. "We used to think that the Army Rangers were the meanest mothers on earth, then we watched KDE and Gnome users face off." Explained Gen. Ripper. "We then had an elite team of rangers engage in the discussion. When I saw those hardened troops break down in tears from the geek onslaught, I knew we had found the perfect source of violent maladjusted zealots."
Assimilating the new geek recruits required something of a change in the standard training regimen. Instead of boot camp, recruits are now put through reboot camp where they are forced to support mission critical applications on Windows98. This teaches them to hate. Recruits are then put through what is known as the 'burma road' drill - where they attempt to stay abreast of the most recent 2.3.x kernel using a 486sx/25 for compiles and a 1200 baud modem for downloads. After a few short weeks, the perfect killing machine is created. Geek troops are capable of untold attrocities in combat, including roasting prisoners over an overclocked celeron, installing MS Bob on enemy hardware and moderating down 'first posts.'
"Some governments have complained that these troops don't abide by the geneva convention." Admitted Gen. Ripper "But I say that the geneva convention is a closed, proprietary protocol funded by Microsoft - screw em."
--Shoeboy
Don't moderate me because I'm beautiful.
Great, but what about the hardware? (Score:1)
Considering all the excellent networking capabilities that Linux has, I'd be disappointed if I had to use outdated hardware.
And considering Linux needs at least 512kB of memory to run, I suppose we're considering a modern architecture.
I believe that if Linux is the correct choice for this application, then the hardware specs as well as the final product itself must be memorable.
Flavio
No binary.. no source.. (Score:2)
Nothing says the GPL means free as in beer code. The GPL just guarantees anyone you give a binary to, you have to give the source code to, if they ask. That's it, nothing more. Nothing stops them from redistributing it.. unless they don't wanna.
I can't wait for the error messages: (Score:2)
Payload dumped.
Look out below.
The Bradley Fighting Vehicle.... (Score:1)
why rh linux? (Score:1)
...it was a joke, but embedded windows 2000: now there's a scary idea.
-----
# cd /
Good for RH.. (Score:2)
Re:I'm quite surprised, actually. (Score:3)
I would assume that the per-license fees are important here, god only knows how many devices they are going to build, but I wouldn't be able to say that that is the only reason.
I am very intrigued to see this happen, but not very surprised. Maybe the US is worried that Bill Gates is going to take over afterall
Re:Ethical clause (Score:2)
That would be unfortunate. However, adding an "ethical clause" to the GPL would ruin the license. The GPL currently places no restrictions whatsoever on the usage of a piece of software. The only restrictions are on the distribution. This is a major stength of the GPL (and many other open source licenses) as it means that users don't have to agree to the license to use the software. If they don't agree, they simply have no right to distribute it, but they can use it all they want for whatever they want, no questions asked, and no clicking "I Agree".
Also, when you introduce something like an "ethics clause" into the license, you add a significant amount of ambiguity as to what it means. What is ethical? Most of the US government thinks that everything the US army does is ethical (I disagree, personally). If you put in something like "This software may not be used to kill people," you may be preventing your software from being used to defend against a hostile invasion by people bent on genocide (it has happened before!).
If you really want, however, you can add your own ethics clause, provided that you wrote all the code that you are licensing with the clause, or you have permission from all of the authors. It's your choice. If it is added to the GPL itself, however, then people who use the GPL will be forced to use the ethics clause or find a different license. Personally, I would find a different license for my code, as I do not like to put ambiguous usage restrictions on my software. If my software is used against me, so be it.
------
Re:Good for RH.. (Score:1)
Let me say something based on my years of DoD contracting. A military service isn't a monolith. It's a bunch of schmoes who generally can do what they want, within the limits of their responsibilities. Having been one of those schmoes, I know whereof I speak. So, "The Army" hasn't gone over to Linux; it's likely someone at the project manager level has managed to convince his sponsors at the Pentagon to let him try this (until the article is viewable, I'm going to have to guess). Which isn't to minimize the event, but it doesn't rise to the level of a general endorsement by the organization. If this works out, is successful, and gets everyone involved promotions, other projects will follow.
Red Hat's µClinux? (Score:2)
I have done a lot of work on rebuilding uClibc (the Clinux C library) the last 6 months or so to make it cross platform. Have I received even 1 stinking patch from our friends at Red Hat? I think not.
Joe deBlaquiere at Red Hat (who posts frequently on the mailing list and recently put together a nice howto [redhat.com] on porting uClinux) is the only redhat person I have ever seen on the mailing list. Does writing a howto make it Red Hat's? I think not.
uh-oh... (Score:1)
Re:I'm quite surprised, actually. (Score:1)
Most *real* security people (for example the UK's GCHQ) acknowledge that "security through obscurity" is a placebo at best.
As for funding... even the best funded military has a somewhat limited budget.
If they can save $10 on every device they build.. and build 10,000,000 of them then thats enough money left over to buy more cool toys.
I *Think* it was John Glenn who when asked what was going through his mind on the launchpad of a space mission replied along the lines of "I am sitting on top of tons of rocket fuel in a device built by the lowest competitive bidder"
Where the source is... (Score:1)
The uClinux source lives on http://cvs.uclinux.org [uclinux.org]... Of course Red Hat won't tell you that, since Lineo runs uclinux.org and employs nearly all the uClinux developers.
Not a huge deal fiscally? (Score:2)
Actually, I think this is a big deal for RH. Maybe this contract isn't a lot of money, but any contract for the DoD looks pretty good on a company's books - they are very demanding in their specifications and getting the project right.
For a service-based company (which RH is really) it's very important to show you can satisfy demanding customers like this. I'm sure other companies who think Linux isn't useful or reliable in the real world will think twice when they hear the DoD is using it.
So, well done RedHat! Regardless of what anyone thinks of the moral issues, this is a very good indicator for OSS companies.
Re:Red Hat's µClinux? (Score:2)
Re:Finally the US Army will be able to defeat... (Score:1)
Talk about M$ vs Linux writ large (Navy just leapt into M$' pocket again recently).. I just hope the Phalanx cannon support software isn't ported..
Your Working Boy,
Re:Ethical clause (Score:4)
Although the Nuremberg trials imprisoned and condemned many persons whoseroles were obfuscated and nebulized by layers of bureacracy, these persons were both aware of the ends to which their efforts were put. Companies that supplied mass crematorium ovens to the various death camps were aware of the purpose of this equipment, and cooperated in installation, design, and production.
I so not mean to accuse the US military of war crimes-- but it is possible that any (para)military force deploying Linux software will use them in manner that it is morally repugnent to any number of Linux contributors.
It is certainly possible to use GPG (or like crytography software) in the commission of morally indefensible acts. Indeed, cryptographic software is regarded as a dual use device, that could be used as a munition.
MAny of the philosphers of free software would argue against moral restrictions on use. Stallman, and the Gnu project argue that one cannot morally impose restrictions on the use of software-- but only on the distribution and modification of it. And Bruce Perens has argues that the APSL munitiobns clause is difficult to justify.
If you wantto maorraly restrict use, don't use GPL.
Re:Ethical clause (Score:1)
I don't care about whether Linux or Windows or MacOS controls the warfare (unless Windows - and thereby its steered jet fighters - crashes, of course).
1. If you don't write that code which will be part of the program that is involved, you didn't save the world. Somebody else will write the code.
2. If nobody else writes the code, then you'll stop the development of Linux. It's like, "hey, let's stop making babies, because the men might later go to war and kill people."
3. If you want to prevent GPL software from being used by the military, that's fine. Other OSes will be used. That will a. not benefit the Linux community (less funds), b. probably increase costs for the military (which is funded by the taxpayer - hint, hint), c. not make the slightest haze of a difference when hell breaks loose and the bombs DO start dropping. Oh what, you feel better because you didn't contribute to that? That's sweet, but since you're dead anyway and the bombing occured anyway, where's the difference? It's not like, "I could have prevented it".
4. Personally, I'd be PROUD if parts of my code would be used by the military.
Sorry about this tone, but I'm sick of all those "you may not use my software on any computer affiliated with military" license terms I have seen so often. The beauty of many pieces of software - such as the Linux OS - is its versatility, and I don't like people limiting it because there are things THEY don't like.
If you wrote the Linux kernel and everything that's GPL'ed, okay, go ahead and put in your ethical clause. But with the GPL virtually open to everyone, both pacifists as well as members of the military, I don't see why there should be a clause as subjective as that one in it.
Re:Red Hat's µClinux? (Score:1)
BS, I say... uClinux is a Lineo product.
I hope Lineo's looking into this.
Re:Red Hat's µClinux? (Score:1)
I don't think I mis-read it
andersen@winder:~$ w3m -dump http://www.redhat.com/about/2000/press_rymic.html | grep "Red Hat's.*Clinux"
Embedded Device Developers (Score:1)
embedded vehicle diagnostics (Score:2)
I interview with the Navy a few months back as a coop [drexel.edu] for their Naval Sea Systems Command [navy.mil].
The job was developing applications for Windows CE-based PDAs which the maintance crews would take onboard ships to log data on the ship's functions. The data is then entered into an Oracle database and served up using ColdFusion extensions on IIS.
In short, it was a lot of extremely (notoriously?) non-free (neither speech nor beer) software. (And the pay was shitty.)
Needless to say, it would be really cool if other branches of the armed forces followed the Army's lead here. If the above scenario was linux running on the handhelds, and linux, apache, perl, mysql running on the servers, the job would have been much more attractive. And plus, everyone would think the Navy was cool ;-)
Question: /. story awhile back about how the US Armed Forces were having trouble getting new IT workers. Would *you* work for the Army if you knew you could get your hands on these embedded linux devices, and promote OSS at the same time?
There was a
I think I would. For one thing, the job security would sure beat working for a dotcom...
-the wunderhorn
Embedded Developers Website (Score:1)
components such as PC104 devices and Single
Board computers. It list manufacturers of
these devices such as Lineo and even redhat's
embedded business which is called wirespeed.
Go check it out at [sbc-pc104.com]
www.sbc-pc104.com
Is there a case for closed-source here? (Score:2)
Is there a case for using closed-source here, from the point of view of security? After all, this is a question of national security; I think the rules might be a bit different. Now, I'm writing off-the-cuff, so feel free to shoot me down (so to speak).
The argument against "security through obscurity" is that when people gain experience cracking certain locks, the weaknesses become well known and it's in the locksmith's interest to learn about them. To this end, it makes sense to publicize problems so that the locksmiths can fix them, instead of leaving the knowledge only in the hands of crackers.
But military systems aren't really open to a great deal of attack in the first place. There's a lot of physical security (at least, there should be). As such, there's much less chance for weaknesses to become well known in the first place.
So, is it possible that "security through obscurity" actually works a little better in this case?
Would we want to be reading about our military's weaknesses on BugTraq? (Actually, I'm Canadian, so it doesn't directly affect me, but hey...)
Then again, it depends on how the software is used. If you have other kinds of physical and mechanical security to back it up, then software security might be almost irrelevant.
And also, the argument might be false because it's just a question of a difference in community. That is, if we replace "general public" with "international military community," then maybe the obscurity argument remains just as valid.
Hmmmm. I'm starting to argue against myself. I'll stop now, before I end up looking ten times more foolish than I look already.
--
On the other hand (Score:1)
Re:I'm quite surprised, actually. (Score:2)
Looks like a good deal to me (Score:1)
Re:No binary.. no source.. (Score:4)
Actually since they are selling the binaries they have to have the source readily available. But where's the source?
You missed the point. Since they didn't sell YOU a binary, nobody has to give YOU the source. If you buy their binary, you get the source. You could also get the source from someone who bought it.. but nothing says they have to give it to you unless they agree to sell or provide a binary to you. GPL is no guarantee of access, and hence free as in speech is not free as in beer, a point that escapes many here.
Re:Oh great.... (Score:1)
I can see the commercials now... (Score:2)
"Hi, I'm Col. Jeff Sanders, United States Army, Retired."
"And I'm Col. Quan Li, People's Liberation Army, Retired."
"Our two nations may not agree on the important things, like respecting human rights,"
"Or not exploitating the working class,"
"But we both agree on one thing."
"Both the People's Republic of China,"
"And the United States Army,"
"Use Linux to power their operations."
"Linux is cheap, stable, and as flexible as it gets since the source code is available to anyone."
"Linux also works on older, less expensive hardware, and is the glorious product of the unalienated labor of thousands of volunteers."
"And it's under the GPL, which makes it free, as in Free Speech."
"Something which even the People's Republic of China can appreciate."
"When it benefits them."
"That is not in the script....."
"Don't tell me what's in the..."
"SO..try Linux today. Billions of Chinese can't be wrong."
"Try Linux, the Operating System that stands for Freedom and Quality."
The Free ODMG Project [sourceforge.net] needs volunteers.
About the sig (Score:1)
#define OH_YES_INDEED 0
...
int microsoftsuxbadly = OH_YES_INDEED;
Just a minor nitpick.
woohoo (Score:1)
---
``ask not what you can do for your country, ask what your country did to you'' --kmfdm
Red hats off to Linux! (Score:1)
--
I can see it now, in a WinTank(R).. (Score:1)
Motley Foolish (Score:1)
Rack another one up for Linux!
Re:Ethical clause (Score:1)
For The Army (Score:1)
Re:Ethical clause (Score:1)
1) Licenses are irrelevant in critical times. In wartime, the Bad Guys (whoever they happen to be) will be using any code they please. They'll use one CD to install Windows 2K on all their computers or they'll use one CD to install Linux on all of them. Software piracy or license violations are not war crimes. What would we do, execute the enemy's signal officers for violating a licesnse?? Second, the US military would probably tell software companies to take their licenses and shove 'em in a real crisis. Congress would back us up and rewrite the laws to exempt the military from all licenses. If you think this won't happen, look at the degree the fedl govt controlled the economy in World War II.
2) More advanced weapons help protect the lives of our soldiers. Would you be ethically remiss if you *failed* to write GPL which would have saved some grunts' lives? What if that code could have helped defend us from attack. (I assume you're an American. If not, change "us" to "your".)
3) This "ethical clause" is an awfully slippery slope. What's next? Hate groups can't run Apache servers? Then we ban pornographers from using GPL code, then we ban unpopular religions, pretty soon only upstanding corporate citizens are able to use GPL code.
How would you get everyone to agree on the ethics clause? You want the ethics clause to exclude military uses, I want to exclude use by police, IP law firms, record companies, motion picture studios... I'm sure others would want to exclude gay and lesbian groups, Scientology and/or Mormons and/or the Catholic Church and/or Muslims and/or Jews, the Republican and/or Democratic parties, and so forth.
Your ethics clause would fragment the GPL into thousands of different licences. Anyone can throw in an "ethics clause" and call it their own personal GPL. We need to resist fragmenting the license just because our code might be used for reasons we don't like.
Re:I'm quite surprised, actually. (Score:1)
These are hardly mission critical devices. I read once that combat vehicles have approximately one hour of downtime for each hour of uptime. They require absurd maintenance.
I don't think these devices control any critical systems or transmit any critical data. Weapons systems normally have "black box" designed electronics. When the thing fails, you don't attempt to diagnose the problem, you pull the component out and insert the spare. Hopefully someone will eventually fix the orignal, although apparently soldiers discarded millions of dollars of the puppies in the Arabian desert.
Linux Security is good for businesses, but in the army it's different - their enemies have resources and will keep what they develop a secret, before deploying it once.
I think the opposite is true. Closed source software's advantage is security through obscurity. A huge part of obscurity is the idea of not reverse-engineering the closed source software.
In peacetime, the clause in the license against reverse-engineering gets some respect. Microsoft would probably sue me to death if I had a team of 300 engineers reverse-engineering Windows.
But if I "iberate" a Bad Guy Communication System 900 running TopSecret OS the niceties of software licensing do not apply. I can set 300 engineeers on it and reverse-engineer the code and find any flaws quickly. Bear in mind I only need one Bad Guy Comm Sys to do this. What will the enemy do, sue for license violations? Assuming they won, who would enforce their decision?
LinuxToday.com.au's take on this (Score:1)
here [linuxtoday.com.au]
thanks, Renai
red hat with guns (Score:1)
probably best choice (Score:1)
Of course they coudln't use SuSE because it's german.
Same goes for Corel being canadian which is a shame considering their distro is very simple.
Slackware has no corporate backing and there has no accountablitly factor. SO this really isn't an option.
Mandrake (in an effort to bring users the newest products) tends to use a lot of alpha and still in testing products which isn't the best for mission critical systems.
Caldera has had too many security problems.
I guess in the end they powerful red hat is probably the best choice. However, I wonder if solaris was considered at all. I would love to see sun competing against MS with he backing of the US army. Plus Solaris is american made, very secure and rather simple.
Re:About the sig (Score:1)
He uses the INTEGER microsoftsuxbadly as the argument for a switch statement. The value of microsoftsuxbadly gets changed from 1 to 0 depending on some other cases. So what you've just said has little relevance in the code's actual context.
But, if I'm not completely braindead, isn't a boolean TRUE the same as 1? And so if you #define OH_YES_INDEED to be 1, that makes it true, right? And we want microftsuxbadly to be true, right? Or is it your point that microft does not suck badly, and I have just been trolled?
damn.
-the wunderhorn
One problem... (Score:2)
bash: ispell: command not found
Re:About the sig (Score:1)
But, if I'm not completely braindead, isn't a boolean TRUE the same as 1? And so if you #define OH_YES_INDEED to be 1, that makes it true, right? And we want microftsuxbadly to be true, right? Or is it your point that microft does not suck badly, and I have just been trolled?
Hmmmm.... Nope. Need to go program more C/C++. A zero is a true condition and a non-zero is a false condition. While this might seem A$$-backwards, it actually makes sense when you think about it.
Q: How many true conditions can you have?
A: One. True is true regardless.
Q: How many false conditions can you have?
A: Many. 1 could be a staus code for file not found, whereas 2 could mean that a connection to the server could not be established.
Of course, in OOP, this all becomes meaningless because exceptions should be taking the brunt of the errors. But back in the days of procedural programming, this was how it was done. :-)
P.S. As an experiment, try this code:
#include <stdio.h>
void main()
{
int error = 1;
if(error) printf("Error!");
}
Re:For The Army (Score:1)
If (oh hell WHEN) ste/ice crashes you get to send the unit off to some Godforsaken depot level maintanance unit for replacement because you can't debug or fix the thing locally.
The reason they used ste/ice to begin with is because you could teach Joe Shmoe from Idaho to hook up the thing and go through a checklist for diagnosing electronic faults and all sorts of other test problems, but when it goes down you get to fall back on actually knowing whats wrong w/ the vehicle.
In other words, when ste/ice fscks up, you better have a whole crew of really knowledgeable people around to fix it.
As far as ste/ice costing too much to replace, cmon man; you really think that's a major hindrance? We're talking about a government that literally threw out supplies to keep their quota the same fom month to month.
(I don't blame them for that, the supply situation was bizzare during wartime from all accounts.)
As far as the whole, GPL no kill proviso, remember, some of the benefits of these could be to the poor schmuck National Gaurd unit called out during a flood; w/ cheaper more reliable diagnostic tools, they could keep their vehicles in running order for when everybody would appreciate it.
(Oregons forest fire season for example)
Grell-
May you live in Fortean times!
Re:I'm quite surprised, actually. (Score:1)
Shouldn't they change their name (Score:2)
Or perhaps Tin Hat...
Re:I'm quite surprised, actually. (Score:2)
This is embedded, stand-alone software. How would you propose that someone hack into it? Stability is the issue, not security, at least in this application.
With the exception of certain big-ticket items that Congress likes to throw money at (planes, tanks, weapon systems -- anything that funnels sufficient money into a given congressman's district) the military is pretty cost-conscious.
Now, if something goes wrong ... (Score:1)
RHL & US Army deal c. 1996? (Score:1)
Re:I'm quite surprised, actually. (Score:1)
With open source, the bugs are openly published and fixed. With closed source, methinks the enemy is keeping what it knows under its hat.
Re:Ethical clause (Score:1)
You're right that dynamite has no military application. But Nobel's invention saved more lives in the mining industry than he ended. Dynamite is a wonder explosive because it was far more stable than anything else available, like mercury fulminate, nitroglycerin, or picric acid, and as a "low" explosive, it is still far more predictable than TNT and the like.
Nobel's sudden philanthropy came in part because of someone else's journalistic cluelessness. A Swedish newspaper wrongly reported that Nobel had died. In the article, a reporter excoriated Nobel as a wholesale death merchant and claimed that his invention was used in military weapons of mass destruction--or what passed for them at the time. The journalist was wrong, of course, and Nobel knew it. But he did establish the Prize fund. Whether he did this out of guilt, I do not know. But it is for certain that his reputation had been badly damaged by the newspaper's libelous claims.
--
Re:About the sig (Score:1)
Yes, and since if(error) evaluates to 'true', we get the output 'Error!'
Thus, OH_YES_INDEED should be defined as 1 so that microsoftsuxbadly will be true.
-the wunderhorn
Re:About the sig (Score:1)
To add to the confusion, you can have a true, b true, and a&b false (binary 10 & 01).
--- my two bits worth.
Re:Ethical clause (Score:1)
I do apologize for the various spelling and grammatical errors. I should have used "Preview". Ah well.
Persons using the GPL should be aware that later programmers may change the code in ways that the original donor may not approve of.
If I gift a free word processor to the community, it's not my responsibility if someone alters it to assist in the commmission of human rights violations. It is not Microsoft's responsbility if their software was used in an indecent fashion-- why should the onus fall on "free software" developers?
On the other hand, I might donate any proceeds realized from distribution fees to Amnesty International (a la Alfred Nobel).
If, on the other hand, I provided active support to the putative war criminal, who I knew was intent on such modifications, my assistance would be damning.
(Note that I do not write word processing software, and I don't really want to know what "modifications" would create complicity).
a big one for Red Hat (Score:1)
You didn't try the code (Score:1)
Re:You didn't try the code (Score:1)
-the wunderhorn
Re:Linux advocates recruited by army. (Score:1)
Remember though that the US never signed the Geneva convention
---CONFLICT!!---
Oh no! (Score:1)