Wonderful World Of Linux 2.4 - Final Candidate 180
EngrBohn writes "Joe Pranevich has posted the latest & greatest Wonderful World of Linux 2.4 at LinuxToday. 'In the beginning, there was Linus and his 386 ... Several years and many thousands of lines of code later, Linux 2.2 was released ... Linus (and company) continued to hack away at the Linux OS and the 2.4 release of the Linux kernel is nearing completion. Submitted for your approval, this document describes some of the new features in Linux 2.4.'" Helps sort out rumors, half-truths and innuendo. I hope Joe's estimate is conservative on getting CDs shipping with point-four; usually it seems like the distro houses are pretty swift to incorporate.
The bright side... (Score:1)
On the bright side, though, those guys in debian, they have the sexiest asses. Whooo! Yawp!
Well done (Score:1)
As a fully qualified IT consultant working on a report into the freeware phenomenon exemplified by the Linux operating system, I am heartened to see that Linux is still riding the crest of the wave of its recent popularity. Despite what many people in my industry have thought, it continues to garner market share, and its popularity as a server is slowly growing.
With the new features that this release brings, Linux is coming ever closer to being ready to handle mission-critical enterprise applications. While I personally think it is almost there, there are several things which are missing before it is truly ready to compete with superior platforms such as Solaris and Win2K.
Scalability is the key - Linux needs to increase its ability to adapt to the constanly growing demand with enterprise servers are placed under, and unless its ability to scale is improved then it will never truly suceed in this growing market. Another important aspect which is missing is increased support for such emerging protocols such as XML and SOAP, which from what I have seen so far, are sadly lacking in version 2.4. Once these minor oversights are corrected, then I truly believe Linux will be able to compete successfully against the might of Win2K, and maybe even win.
Anyway, well done to Linus Torvelds and Richard Stallmann and all the other Linux developers. Thank you.
Re:2.4 - so what's the _real_ difference? (Score:1)
Re:overcommitting memory (Score:1)
Linux's handling of OOM situations is perfectly fine by both POSIX and ANSI C (since ANSI C only refers to programs, while POSIX defines behavior for processes).
brk/sbrk's behavior is documented as increasing your address space. There is no promise that the memory will be there when you zero fill the page on first page fault.
for the VERY LAST TIME, the system call you want is mlock, its behavior is PRECISELY what you have been whining for. brk/sbrk have certain semantics, which you don't seem to like. that doesn't make them any less correct.
so far everyone has been polite in explaining why you are flat out wrong, but since the first 4 times it was explained seemed to go right over your head, expect flamage if you continue to repost your drivel without even correcting the parts people have poked giant holes in (which is about 95% of it by now).
M$ GOIN' DOWN!!@ (Score:1)
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thank you.
Re:MultiLink PPP & Other added features (Score:1)
Quite an exciting development for s3 owners.
Re:2.4 - so what's the _real_ difference? (Score:1)
Re:2.4==vaporware (Score:1)
Thank you, and good day.
Re:2.4 Delays (Score:1)
Back in the days before Windows 95, I knew of a fellow who had some dinky web site about it on his ISP account. He didn't trash it, or anything too bad (in my opinion), but still got letters from MS, the ISP, etc to remove it. So, I use language like "sell your soul" to describe this behavior, because it prevents you from doing what comes naturally, talking. It is over the top, even absurd, as you don't literally sell your soul to them. But as Mr. Limbaugh says, it's "pointing out absurdity by being absurd."
Re:khttp??? -- uhhghh (Score:1)
Re:2.4 Delays (Score:1)
Even if I cared about trying Windows early, to me, it's just not worth the hassle of jail for a few days, years in court, hundred-thousand dollar fines, having to perform community service, etc. They always go overboard with those sort of trials.
Re:2.4 (Score:1)
Nice try, troll (Score:1)
Faking sigs. How mature.
Do Your Bit! (Score:1)
- Go grab the latest tarball (use a mirror please)
- Configure, compile, and install it.
- Make a report on linux-kernel about what worked and what didn't
Remember: "given enough eyeballs, all (kernel) bugs are shallow" Linux requires the massively parallel bug-finding that only widespread use and testing can provide.
Keep that paper bag off Linus' head! Find and report them bugs! Do your bit!
Re:2.4 - so what's the _real_ difference? (Score:1)
Regardless, truly "new" stuff doesn't magically appear in commercial programs. New concepts are generally developed by research teams, either funded by corporations or working for academia or the government. By the time an idea makes its way into a mainstream program, it's usually been around for a while in one community or another, and someone can point to previous work and say, "See! It's not *new*!"
Still, on the newness theme, the article also has this to say about Linux:
The bit about raw disk access implies that Linux's scheme for raw device access that doesn't require a double for every block device node in /dev is a new thing, too.
You also say
I want a free, robust system that allows me to get my work (programming, research, school work (I attend college in the evenings)) done. Linux does all of that for me. Windows? Not free and far more unstable, anyway. Solaris? Not free, and the Intel version sucks performance-wise anyway. (And no, I'm not going to go buy a Sparc.) BSD? Free, but without the application base Linux has (although most of my work is done with Emacs, LaTeX, CMU-Lisp, and gcc).--Phil (And yes, I'm using 'free' in the 'libre' sense.)
Re:Goodbye /dev/hda . . . Hello /dev/ide0 (Score:1)
Note that devfs is currently an *optional* feature, though there are inklings that in the future (i.e. 2.5/2.6) it may be optional in the sense that procfs is, i.e. you don't have to have it configured, but you loose functionality if it's not.
Richard Gooch has been working on getting devfs included in the kernel for ages, it is nice to see it actually show up.
Re:khttp??? -- uhhghh (Score:1)
It does a little explaining, though I'm not sure there is an absolute justification given. Again, as you said, if you don't like it, don't use it.
Re:2.4 already? i hope not! (Score:1)
/usr/src/linux/REPORTING-BUGS
See, it was on you hard drive all along.
HAHAHAHAH (Score:1)
Thats funny. I wrote it seriously at the time, but then again any time one 'explains' Debian freedom so that people outside debian can understand it Debian people get offended. Go figure. Maybe instead of just moderating you could tell me where I am wrong or "flamebaiting"?
Or does flaimbaiting mean something else in Debian terms, maybe 'something out of the regular authorized mantra.'
I do however ammend a little bit to the definition of stable. They don't want to change it anymore, but they will for security or other emergencies. But they are still rather tired of it and would rather not touch it any more.
^~~^~^^~~^~^~^~^^~^^~^~^~~^^^~^^~~^~~~^~~^
Re:A few points (Score:1)
ipfw allow ip from any to any via lo0
allows all traffic via the loopback device, and
ipfw allow tcp from any to any 80 in via fxp0
ipfw allow tcp from any 80 to any out via fxp0
ipfw deny ip from any to any via fxp0
allows all external traffic (via my ethernet card, named fxp0) to my webserver and nothing else. I haven't messed with natd on FreeBSD much, but the huge advantage it has over Linux's ipchains is that it handles NAT in both directions, so hitting your firewall with a connection to port 80 can be redirected to your internal webserver. On Linux 2.2, you have to use ipchains for masquerading (which is a separate kernel option) and ipportfw (which is yet another kernel option) for port-forwarding, aka reverse NAT.
Right now, FreeBSD's got a few advantages over Linux 2.2 in firewalling:
Where is 2.3.99-pre4? (Score:1)
Got a URL for pre4?
Many thanks!
Fialar
Re:Yeah...but does USB work? (Score:1)
Re:PPPoE (Score:1)
Nice article. Only 1 bug. (Score:1)
#define X(x,y) x##y
Re:2.4 - so what's the _real_ difference? (Score:1)
What is *BSD's net code better for, and how and why? 2.4 isn't out yet, so we don't know exactly what its networking code is like. (Of course, it will be pretty darn close to the code in pre-2.4 releases, so you could have looked at those; Did you? What did you find?)
I admit I haven't looked at either of them, but I'm not going to believe you unless you give me a reason. (threadedness, correctness, efficiency, code clarity/cleanliness, or something. Stuff isn't usually just plain "Better", especially when it is as complicated as networking code.)
#define X(x,y) x##y
Re:2.4 - so what's the _real_ difference? (Score:1)
most people have only two arms, and one head. This means it is hard to use more than one computer at the same time. In any case, most people don't have 3 or 4 good computers to switch between to do their different tasks. Divide and conquer is exactly the way to go with user space software, no question about that. Unix command line tools prove that for the things they are good at doing (file/text manipulation, scripting, pretty much anything that can be batch-done :). For operating systems, it doesn't work. Are you going to turn your chair around and say "I'll use my Windows machine now because it has plug & play support for my video decoder card.", then say "ok, now I'll start downloading this video at streaming speed in real time with OpenBSD, because it has kick ass networking code", then realize that you want to be doing more things at once, so you turn around again to your Solaris box. Yeah, works for me like a hole in the head. multi booting on the same machine is even more annoying.
I sure as hell don't want to have to wait for some other OS to boot every time I want to do something different. You basically need a single OS that does all the stuff you want to do, unless you are willing to be annoyed constantly.
#define X(x,y) x##y
Re:Debian (Score:1)
Linux 2.4 seems very unstable to me. Remember 2.2.x, it wasn't stable until 2.2.10 or something.
So should they release now or wait for another half year, I think not.
so what? (Score:1)
Distributions with kernel 2.4, XFree 4.0, Apache 2.0, etc. will come out by the end of the year. And if you are really desperate, you can just install all this stuff yourself -- nobody is stopping you. But I prefer to wait until everything has been well-tested. Remember, Debian is considered to be the most stable distribution because they freeze it for at least 3 month and spend a lot of time on testing. It comes out rock-solid in the end. And that's why I love Debian. That's the only distro I'd put on a server.
___
khttp??? -- uhhghh (Score:1)
So, what do we want to put in the kernel today?
___
A few points (Score:1)
Why would you need 3 chains? Well, it's actually *very* convenient. All packets arrive intact to the input chain. If they are accepted, they go to the forward chain where they get forwarded/masqueraded. Forwarding changes the interface of the packet (e.g. eth0 may be external interface while eth1 internal. An incoming packet from the outside will change its interface in the forward chane from eth0 to eth1). Also, if you are using masquerading, packets get masqueraded/demasqueraded in the forward chain. So, when packets arrive to the output chain, they have already been forwarded and their headers have been rewritten by masq!
I find it extremely convenient. On my home firewall (which is also a samba/nfs server for the lack of another box), I can block the smb and nfs traffic with just 1 rule (for each), inserted in the output chain.
Oh yeah, also ipchains allows you to match packets by interface. For example, if eth0 is your external interface, you know ips 10.0.0.0/8, etc. cannot come from there. ipchains allows you to block these addresses coming from eth0, but allow them if they come from eth1 (where eth1 is the local interface). I'm not sure how FreeBSD handles it.
Also, does FreeBSD support port forwarding?
___
Re:But will it boot an Iopener? Not Mine. :) (Score:1)
No mention of the new AGP support (Score:1)
Re:M$ GOIN' DOWN!!@ (Score:1)
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Re:The bright side... (Score:1)
The corporate distributions are getting worse with every release. Ful of bugs, nothing works properly or as documented.
Red Hat has turned to utter shit, because they're rushing everything. They're giving linux a bad name.
Re:hot damn... (Score:1)
Ever looked at an xpm file with a text editor?
Re:2.4 - so what's the _real_ difference? (Score:1)
Yeah. What if I want all those things?
That is ... LINUX.
Re:2.4 - so what's the _real_ difference? (Score:1)
then why does Solaris scale to 128-way SMP, while Linux craps out above 8?
Solaris doesn't scale that high on PC hardware.
Solaris does on SPARC since Sun build their own hardware -- a HUGE advantage.
it's just another thing the kernel developers have been wasting time on instead of catching up where they need to catch up. This project needs some direction.
Linux isn't a commercial development house. If someone wants to add a feature that is useful to a certain subset of Linux users, why not, so long as it's stable and well designed?
Maybe has more features, but last time I checked, BSD was FAR faster and scaled better.
Now your true troll colours come out.
BSD is better at certain things than Linux, and worse at others.
Scales better? BSD barely does SMP at all.
Re:Yeah...but does USB work? (Score:1)
Hate to burst your bubble, but if 2.4 has anything to do with fsck'ing the drives after an unclean shutdown then it would be *seriously* overstepping the bounds of what it's supposed to manage.
Sanity checks on the filesystems is the responsibility of the init scripts, not the kernel.
Re:Debian (Score:1)
Compiling debian source pages is stooopid easy. Thus you can run any 'unstable' package on your 'stable' Debian box as long as you can compile from source (so the resulting executable is linked against the proper versions of libaries you have on your stable box.)
Most of this software, especially Xfree86 4.0 and Linux 2.4, will be made availible somewhere somehow in pre-packaged form for stable (potato) Debian systems. Or you can just compile it yourself.
Feel free to contact me directly with any additional questions, or just ask the kind folks in #debian on irc.openprojects.net.
cheers!
Re:So... (Score:1)
This entire article details the stuff in the new kernel.
-- Give him Head? Be a Beacon?
So... (Score:1)
Re:New Slashdot.org feature: Ignore Anonymous Cowa (Score:1)
Re:Debian (Score:1)
Re:Debian [OT] (Score:1)
There's also Storm Linux [stormix.com], which is Debian-based.
--
Re:2.4 - so what's the _real_ difference? (Score:1)
the fact that bigger *NIX variants already have these features will just make it easier for Linux to penetrate the places it's bigger cousins have traditionally held sway over.
but think about it. Solaris and BSD are both descended from the "real" unix, and have had many, many years and lots of money thrown behind them to get the level of performance, stability, and acceptance they have now. Linux is quite new to the playing field, even more so when it comes to the enterprise market. Linux is starting to penetrate this market, even lacking the features of the upcoming 2.4 kernel. The release of 2.4 with the features it adds is only going to speed this adoption. This will get more eyeballs and more dollars pointed at Linux and opensource software, which is a good thing.
Or would you be happier if Linux failed and Solaris took it's place?
--
Re:Debian (Score:1)
Of course, you can just recompile the stuff you want, but that is messy on a Debian box.
--
Re:2.4 - so what's the _real_ difference? (Score:1)
So, expect one of the last untouched remnants of the original IBM PC to go away RSN, if it hasn't already.
--
Re:2.4 - so what's the _real_ difference? (Score:1)
More fine-grained locking - Windows NT has only had this since Service Pack 4 - only a year ago or so.
USB support - Only shipped last month for WinNT
P&P - Only shipped last month for WinNT
WinModems - Many are still not compatible with WinNT
khttpd - When did IIS ship?
raw I/O - Still not in WinNT (or if it is, who uses it?)
rewritten networking - SP4 again. Still behind in firewalling and other network infrastructure type things.
--
Re:all I want to know... (Score:1)
Re:New Slashdot.org feature: Ignore Anonymous Cowa (Score:1)
However, you can always set threshold to 1.
Re:So... (Score:1)
----
Re:[OT] SMP (Score:1)
It is an 8-way xeon machine. Not overly expensive if you take the fact that it's a server into consideration.
--
Leonid S. Knyshov
Network Administrator
Re:Where is 2.3.99-pre4? (Score:1)
Re:ext3 yet? (Score:1)
2) There will be patches for 2.4, just like there are patches for the current 2.2 kernels (including 2.2.15preX). SCT also promised some RPMs with the RH6.2 kernel plus ext3 patches in it. Probably you want to check the linux-fsdevel mailinglist.
Re:overcommitting memory (Score:2)
Remember the Pentium bug was even less likely to affect you, but people didn't accept that becouse the bug was built in, and that made the thing upredictable under normal circumstances.
2.4 Delays (Score:2)
I remember late in 1999 when Linus and Cox were promising kernel 2.4 before the official release of Windows 2000. That day has come and gone, and we still don't have 2.4. In the past, we as a community flame Microsoft for such promises, calling their products "vaporware", yet we did not do the same with our beloved Torvalds when his dates passed.
Now, is this due to the nature of corporations - whose promises are presumably under their control and payroll vs Open Source projects that seem to be improved in spurts - or are we all hypocrites?
That being said, it should be known that I use Linux solely [1] on an SMP machine and I am dying for the new 2.4 kernel.
[1] Well, I did boot w98SE yesterday - in VMWare.
Re:2.4 (Score:2)
----
Re:..haven't tried ext3, but I'm using ReiserFS (Score:2)
http://kurt.andover.net/Reiser -filesystem-HOWTO.html [andover.net]
Reiser driver and utils are still in development, and there's been some flamage on the kernel-dev list over it, but hey, works for me!
Did you file a bug report? (Score:2)
You're missing the point (Score:2)
And you don't have to "un-compile" it. You have to explicitely turn it on if you want to use it. If you don't want the feature, leave the damn thing turned off when building your kernel.
Slow FTP (Score:2)
--
Re:Well done (Score:2)
First, (I don't know what "SOAP" refers too..so
won't go there..) but why does XML have to be supported by the kernel? This is as User Space an item as I can imagine.
Second - what does RMS have to do with release of a Linux kernel? (Answer - nothing
But will it boot an Iopener? Not Mine. :) (Score:2)
2.3 boots just fine on my laptop, but when I move it to the iopener, it fails to find the partitions on
Running an Iopener will be a major hurdle to the acceptance of 2.4. At least in my house.
Anybody had this same problem, or better yet, a solution?
---
Re:Did you file a bug report? (Score:2)
The point of my post is that people should beware of the pre-releases. I track them because I will deploy 2.4 in my production environment at some point, and I need to stay current with bugs and quirks. I won't bother checking into how the features work until the sucker can at least compile cleanly on the box.
-jwb
Let me know when it works (Score:2)
Get back to me when 2.4.20 comes out :)
Re:Debian [OT] (Score:2)
I guess it all comes down to the long-term goals. Mandrake and RedHat, being for-profit companies are driven by the market they cater to to provide the latest stuff in their distribution. Debian has the goal of providing a free, stable Linux, even if it's not up-to-date.
But look at the "current" stable Debian distribution. It's so horribly outdated, it's beyond the "less flashy" area and getting into "less useful". There are many things that I _need_ to be able to do with my Debian boxes that I have no choice but to run potato or some other distro.
--
Debian (Score:2)
XFree86 4.0 has been released
glibc 2.1.3 has been released
apache 1.3.12 has been released
Linux 2.4.0 might get released
i love Debian, but they have the worst timing...
--
Questions from a non-technical user's perspective (Score:2)
Jay (=
The solution to compiling 99-pre2 (Score:2)
That having been said, the original poster is probably referring to the 'THIS_MODULE' undeclared here error message a number of us ran into, the solution to which is here [remarq.com].
In short, you need to #include linux/modules.h just before the first #include asm/.. statement. An annoying buglet in the pre-release code, but easy enough to find the answer at deja.com, altavista.com, or by grepping on the contents of
At the very least, a bug report gets (at this point, has gotten) the bug fixed.
Re:Keep it in User Space... (Score:2)
It would be nice if Linux got some efficient, simple user-space file system support. Until then, I think the best bet is still to put things into the kernel.
Re:2.4 Delays (Score:2)
----
Re:Questions from a non-technical user's perspecti (Score:2)
No RAID-5 (Score:2)
Maybe I should just break down and replace my 8-year old drives, but in the meantime software RAID-5 is an economical way to weather the frequent drive failures.
Unfortunately, it does not seem to be included in the pre3 kernel. Anyone know what's going on with this?
What date was Linux 0.01originally released? (Score:2)
New Slashdot.org feature: Ignore Anonymous Coward (Score:2)
Re:Question: Netmeeting module (Score:2)
There's also commercial solutions such as phonepatch (which works really well, and gives you a 30 day trial). There's a web interface for configure and everything... alas, my license ran out back in Jan...
On the plus side, Dialpad links to ipmasq patches that let it work properly... pretty nifty...
Re:My experiences with 2.3.99-preX (Score:2)
By the way anybody using XFree86 4.0 should include your adition to the
[rreich@orcana rreich]$ ipcs
------ Shared Memory Segments --------
key shmid owner perms bytes nattch status
0x00000000 98305 root 644 4096 5 dest
0x00000000 131074 root 644 4096 2 dest
0x00000000 1376259 root 644 4096 2 dest
0x00000000 1409028 root 644 4096 3 dest
0x00000000 1441797 root 644 4096 2 dest
0x00000000 5210118 root 644 4096 6 dest
0x00000000 5242887 root 644 4096 10 dest
0x00000000 5275656 root 644 4096 6 dest
0x00000000 18710537 root 644 4096 2 dest
0x00000000 18743306 root 644 4096 2 dest
0x00000000 18776075 root 644 4096 2 dest
0x00000000 18808844 root 644 4096 2 dest
0x00000000 18841613 root 644 4096 2 dest
0x00000000 19169294 root 644 4096 2 dest
0x00000000 19202063 root 644 4096 2 dest
0x00000000 19234832 root 644 4096 2 dest
0x00000000 19365905 root 644 4096 2 dest
0x00000000 19300370 root 644 4096 2 dest
0x00000000 19398675 root 644 4096 2 dest
0x00000000 19922964 root 644 4096 2 dest
0x00000000 19955733 root 644 4096 2 dest
0x00000000 20578326 root 644 4096 2 dest
------ Semaphore Arrays --------
key semid owner perms nsems status
------ Message Queues --------
key msqid owner perms used-bytes messages
... all of the SHM entries are for XFree86 4.0. They don't show up if you don't include the stuff in the fstab.
Re:RMS... (Score:2)
PPPoE (Score:2)
Want to work at Transmeta? Hedgefund.net? AT&T?
Re:2.4 - so what's the _real_ difference? (Score:2)
Re: USB
Try buying a Camera for your PC that ISNT USB nowadays.. not to mention that within a couple of years i can see USB replacing the Gameport Joystick for a joke, along with PS/2.
Re:/dev/microcode (Score:2)
"this has got to be a late april fool's prank -- if not, add this to the heap of reasons not to execute binary-only code..."
Or don't run as root.
I definately agree with you, though. I really hope that you cannot write your own microcode. Screw up and you can go buy a new processor.
------
Re:RMS... (Score:2)
OS I run as just "linux". However...I don't think
its silly to use GNU/Linux either.
However, I am a definite supporter of what GNU
and the FSF stand for. While I don't see the need
to make everyone call it "GNU Linux", I do think
the GNU proect deserves some credit.
As far as being major parts of the OS...I don't
use GNOME or KDE (blah). I spend most of my days
in an ETerm typeing into vi and pushing files
around. I think all of those things are fairly
major parts of the OS.
In any case...It doesn't really matter what you
call it. I just favor GNU/Linux for the reasons
that it gives credit to the FSF, and it makes
the note that Linux is just a kernel...there is
alot more to the system than that.
Is it silly? I don't think so. Is it silly to
argue about? yes it is. (tho...I kind of enjoy
arguing over stupid things)
Re:Hurrah! We can stop caring now! (Score:2)
I don't disagree. Just want to point out that none of this would have been possible without the kernel. It's the kernel that determines what you can and cannot do.
(Of course, the GNU stuff was written pretty much without that kernel, on other Unices.)
About submitting bug reports. (Do it!) (Score:2)
Re:PPPoE (Score:2)
segfault@bellatlantic.net [mailto]
Re:Let me know when it works (Score:3)
Did you:
1. Document the compilation errors
2. Report the errors to linux-kernel or any of the hundred related mailing lists
3. Try to fix the code yourself
4. Do anything besides whine about it not compiling
No? Tough cookies for you, then. If you're going to use development.. let me say that again.. *DEVELOPMENT* kernels, at least be willing to debug it.
Re:2.4 Delays (Score:3)
That said, dates in Open Source projects are at best a guess. It depends on far too many developers to be very exact. You want it sooner, go to your favored mirror and download it. Try this with Microsoft or other corporations and their products.
ext3 yet? (Score:3)
Keep it in User Space... (Score:3)
I use CFS - Cryptographic Filesystem, [ucla.edu] personally.
Admittedly, this still leaves you vulnerable to the script kiddie that gets in and can get at /crypt; that is probably still nearly as protectable as kernel-based approaches...
Re:Where is 6.4 at? (Score:3)
There is absolutely nothing wrong with this. They can produce a Linux distribution on CD or DVD and have absolutely NO OBLIGATION under the GPL to give ISOs or tarballs away for free. Their only obligation is to release the source to any GPLed binaries they distribute.
Wonderful 2.4 HOWTOs! (Score:3)
Linux Volume Management [ds9a.nl] - or 'How do I grow my filesystem by buying more disks'
Linux Advanced Routing and Traffic Shaping [ds9a.nl] or 'How do I run my internet exchange with nothing but Linux and keep bandwidt for myself
Re:Goodbye /dev/hda . . . Hello /dev/ide0 (Score:3)
Filesystem Crypto Support? (Score:3)
Any mention of filesystem crypto? Those of you with near terabyte collections of mp3's *ahem* might be interested in this.. that means that "the man" will have a hard time getting into your goodies when the plug gets pulled, or when joe skript kiddie decides it's time for some fun with the latest edition of Redhat.
So, what's the story? Easy filesystem crypto? Where easy == transparent..
Kudos!
Re:2.4 Delays (Score:3)
Note: use Microsoft OSes if you like crashing, since thats all they are good for.
Yeah...but does USB work? (Score:3)
Re:Keep it in User Space... (Score:3)
Another solution is to use a loop-back encrypted file system. There is a how-to [linuxdoc.org] at linuxdoc.org.
My experiences with 2.3.99-preX (Score:4)
nooky:~$ uname -rmpv
2.3.99-pre4 #4 SMP Thu Mar 30 13:14:58 PST 2000 i686 unknown
I've been using the 2.3 series since 2.3.32, and have had tremendous success with them. Several things to note that _weren't_ in the article:
1) sysvipc has changed. if you use anything that depends on shm, you'll need to add this to your
none
2) Along with the new
The Wonderful World of Linux 0.01 (Score:5)
source is included, and this source has been used to produce a running
kernel on two different machines. Currently there are no kernel
binaries for public viewing, as they have to be recompiled for different
machines. You need to compile it with gcc (I use 1.40, don't know if
1.37.1 will handle all __asm__-directives), after having changed the
relevant configuration file(s).
As the version number (0.01) suggests this is not a mature product.
Currently only a subset of AT-hardware is supported (hard-disk, screen,
keyboard and serial lines), and some of the system calls are not yet
fully implemented (notably mount/umount aren't even implemented). See
comments or readme's in the code.
This version is also meant mostly for reading - ie if you are interested
in how the system looks like currently. It will compile and produce a
working kernel, and though I will help in any way I can to get it
working on your machine (mail me), it isn't really supported. Changes
are frequent, and the first "production" version will probably differ
wildly from this pre-alpha-release.
Hardware needed for running linux:
- 386 AT
- VGA/EGA screen
- AT-type harddisk controller (IDE is fine)
- Finnish keyboard (oh, you can use a US keyboard, but not
without some practise
The Finnish keyboard is hard-wired, and as I don't have a US one I
cannot change it without major problems. See kernel/keyboard.s for
details. If anybody is willing to make an even partial port, I'd be
grateful. Shouldn't be too hard, as it's tabledriven (it's assembler
though, so
Although linux is a complete kernel, and uses no code from minix or
other sources, almost none of the support routines have yet been coded.
Thus you currently need minix to bootstrap the system. It might be
possible to use the free minix demo-disk to make a filesystem and run
linux without having minix, but I don't know...
------------
a funny comment: 1 karma
an insightful comment: 1 karma
a good old-fashioned flame: priceless
Speed of Distro's Incorporating New Kernels... (Score:5)
I find this has everything to do with the particular distribution's target audience.
For instance, with Mandrake you see shipments of not only the latest stable kernel, but pratically all of the available patches towards the next stable release already applied. Who is Mandrake's target audience? Desktop users - or at least the Desktop/Workstation sector is where you'll find many of the Mandrake installations. Mandrake is known for it's ease-of-use and execellent default window manager settings. I would predict that many of the desktop/gamer/cutting edge-targetted distributions will be shipping with 2.4 shortly after it becomes available.
The more corporate-oriented distributions will quite likely wait until 2.4 has had a chance to stabelize a bit longer, especially the distributions targetted at servers - Redhat for instance, and probably Caldera and Corel as well.
I further predict that the distributions that aren't shipping with 2.4 running by default will at least include a 2.4-compiled kernel available for install at some point during the installation process - not only so that they are not perceived as "behind the pack" but also to get some feedback from their userbase as to where problems have cropped up.
Also bear in mind that XFree 4.0 was released recently, and at this point can't be considered fully stable/complete since many video card drivers have not been released yet, and there has not be enough time to throughly test it. Many distributions will wait for their next point-oh release until after 2.4 and XFree 4.0 have stabilized somewhat
And of course, some distributions like -ahem- Debian will simply wait until the next stable kernel is just around the corner before a release in say... q1 2001 (c:
Ouch! Bruce... put down that stick! I was just kidding... ouch!
-Cycon
MultiLink PPP & Other added features (Score:5)
One of the things that has worried me about this 2.4 freeze was a number of features that were added last minute (during the 2.3.99 series). One of these such features was a multilink implementation by Paul Mackerras [mailto].
What was disturbing about this feature add is that several people had been working on other implementations of MLPPP for Linux for some time (including, but not limited to: The PPP Multilink Protocol (MP) for Linux [linux-mp.terz.de], Chris's Multilink PPP for Linux [mansol.net.au], and Babylon (by Spellcaster) [spellcast.com]).
I am particularly touched by Chris Pascoe's e-mail:
What disturbes me is that I wrote Paul, the present PPP driver maintainer for Linux, asking him if he would like help testing his new MLPPP code before 2.4 final and if he has a new PPP daemon capable of using his new driver. I, and Chris Pascoe are still waiting for the reply. This seams very counter-productive to the open-source model of development. The last time I mailed Chris he said that we was going to get one of his friends to go knocking on Paul's door at the college where he resides to see if he is still alive...
Anybody heard more on PPP?
Anybody seen anymore recently added code during freeze time?
-AP