Red Hat's Michael Tiemann On gcc, ReiserFS & More 123
Mayank points to this
interview at FreeOS.com with Red Hat CTO Michael Tiemann, in which Tiemann discusses why the Hat shipped a development kernel with their 7.0 distribution, journaling filesystems, the openness of ecos, and the competition (no, not that competition). It's a good read, though it would be cool to see the same questions addressed at even greater length. Guess everyone has a time limit, though;) [Updated by timothy:] I flubbed, that should read "development snapshot of gcc," of course, not "development kernel." Stop hitting me.
It would be nice... (Score:1)
The interviewer asks about other Linux distributions, and he talks about microsoft.
The interviewer asks about a specific type of application, and he talks about the free software development model.
And on and on. It's boring and doesn't do a lot to build trust in Red Hat.
Re:They come over as MegaCorp (tm) (Score:1)
I can post verbatim quotes from the redhat alphalinux mailing list from some of the movers and shakers in RedHat's Alpha group if you don't believe me. Be warned, they use stronger language than I do.
FatPhil
Am I the only one.... (Score:1)
In order to be a bit on topic, I think that RedHat 7.0 is really similar to the technology preview linux release from Caldera, something that is BETA, but is a good indicator of what future distributions will have in them.
Re:Interview (Score:2)
We shipped pgcc only for one release and we didn't do the same errors again since then ...
I tried the Mandrake distribution once, when it's main selling point was the Pentium optimised compiler, but reverted back to RedHat when I changed jobs. If Mandrake are considering a regularily updated SPARC distribution as well as their Intel one then I'd be keen to try it again.
Chris
Re:Interview (Score:1)
>and the API's are dreadful (dodgy socket >libraries for example).
I agree, on the surface it looks nice, but then becomes ugly as hell. Even there on-line courses do not work.
The scary part is kind of related if you can think laterally. Ever tried saving a simple html file with Word? Try that and you will know what I mean by scary....
StarTux
WTF? (Score:1)
We always do open source. It's actually something like the Mozilla public
license. The reason we didn't want to put it out as GPL was because if this
Digital TV company links an application to the kernel. We did not believe it
was commercially possible to GPL the kernel.
Re:I agree: this Marketing blabla. (Score:1)
Seriously, this guy had a major, MAJOR case of the political propaganda bug. It would have been nice to get a straight answer, but you don't "save face" by being technically correct now do you?
What I don't like... (Score:1)
Red Hat is making arbitrary decisions regarding what beta/development features to include in their distributions, and what to leave out.
I like Red Hat 7 (and I may be the only one), but I have run into the 2gig filesystem limit too many times, and I would have preferred the file system to be an area of concentration. Instead, I am forced into the arms of Solaris x86 for certain applications.
Red Hat has always been progressive. I just wish they were a little more attentive to the needs of their customers. It appears to me that the new packages in Red Hat 7 were developed in a vacuum - it is an interesting solution in search of a problem. It adds nothing to my server toolset.
Red Hat 7 should have included:
Today, Red Hat's stock price is a little over $8/share, which is almost below the IPO offering. Talk to us, guys, or it will only get worse.
Re:They come over as MegaCorp (tm) (Score:1)
I went to disable ftp and telnet by outcommenting /etc/inetd.conf. Guess what? There is no inetd.conf!
Redhat: Please leave the standard config files in place! Stop molesting /etc!
Quote from the RedHat 7 Features/Enhancements page:
--
Re:Be careful with ReiserFS (Score:1)
issues related to the ever-changing c++ standard? (Score:2)
Maybe RH needs people who can read a spec?
Re:Good bye Redhat (Score:2)
I downloaded the iPlanet Messaging Server just to test it. I tried to put it on a Mandrake 7.0 distribution.
It didn't work. Unknown library references, and etc.
When I installed in on a RH6.2 system, it worked.
So if RedHat ain't it, what does the world do? Is there NO room for commerical linux apps? If so, do they have to develope against RH, Debian, Slackware, Mandrake, Turbolinux,
How does LINUX do that?
Downloading Mandrake 7.2 Now (Score:1)
After hearing all this stuff about RedHat 7.0 I started downloading Mandrake 7.2. For the project I have going on now, I want users to be able to try Linux and not have a hard time. I don't like to hack/fix things that's why I jump to Mandrake. RedHat is an great company but it's not going to hurt when they push out RedHat 7.1. Then I'll look into getting it, besides Linux is free! I'll just download it from there FTP site just like I am doing with Mandrake 7.2 now or order the CDs for $2 +S&H.
Re:They come over as MegaCorp (tm) (Score:1)
How come you survived for such long time with this totally fucked-up 6.0?
"
- RH/Alpha mover/shaker (anonymity preserved)
That is from a private e-mail, hence the anonymity of the sender. Please believe me, it was a big name in the field.
FatPhil
Re:What I don't like... (Score:1)
Arun
Actually, no (Score:1)
Re:what other distributions? (Score:2)
Anyway, since many RH 7 binaries won't work properly on a 6.2 system, it's probably a good thing that it's a bit of work to get them to install.
Red Hat makes the extremely reasonable choice of not sticking to cruft. This is why this is a 7.0 release, not 6.something. Expect similar things to happen with RH 8. There is utterly nothing wrong with this. Other distributions will come across the same problems as they move to the newer C++ (either the same v2.96 snapshot or v3) and newer glibc. It'll all be in sync again eventually.
And, it should be noted that the *source* RPMs are still completely compatible.
I don't understand what you mean by "All possibilities of 'choice' within Linux being wiped out by them". There's a lot of choice [sourceforge.net].
--
Re:Red Hat 7 (Score:1)
I liked RH 7.0. It was clearly a
You don't need to blame Red Hat. The warnings were posted. (Well, there was all that ad copy, too, I admit, but they didn't hide the warnings.)
Now, personally I wouldn't have called this ready for release, but Red Hat has a tradition of releasing ?4? times per year. They haven't all been winners. And the 7.0 was advanced over 6.2 because it was binary incompatible.
That said, I was pleased enough with 7.0. It did what it said it would. I was far more pleased than with 5.2.
Caution: Now approaching the (technological) singularity.
Geezz.. (Score:1)
Regarding the gcc controversy, I am constantly amazed at the number of people who think they know better than the gcc developers themselves. But what do I know...
Re:almighty buck (Score:2)
Re:Am I the only one.... (Score:1)
No that's not strange. You can have some from me as well...
O
oOooooO
ooOoOOOOOO
Re:what other distributions? (Score:2)
Re:Use a different distro (Score:1)
Re:redhat 7.0 at my company (Score:2)
Re:They come over as MegaCorp (tm) (Score:2)
I do not advocate the use of pirated software.
I do not condone its use.
Any information you may have gotten from this post cannot be used against me.
HELP! MS has sent its elite product-control unit after me. They're trying to raid my house. Oh my god, they have light artillery
almighty buck (Score:1)
I'm not a communist, but I don't trust for-profit companies. The best thing about Red Hat is that they deal almost exclusively in free software. (Their secure web server isn't free, but I imagine that will change, with the passing of the RSA patent.) For better or worse, they've unleashed RPM on the world. They've done extensive QA on gcc and many other packages.
I disagree with the decision to ship Red Hat 7. Version 7 should have included a released version of Linux 2.4, the new gcc, and the corresponding glibc. But that's their business model: periodic releases, where ++.0 > x.++. Making a new version of Red Hat Linux is like printing money. You don't do it too often, or you'll devalue it (and I think they may have done that with version 7). On the other hand, you don't wait too long, because there's an opportunity cost.
Re:competitor ? (Score:2)
yeah, I know what the original question was. I was going against RH's assertion that MS was a competitor (whether or not it is a distribution is irrelevant).
MS is NOT a competitor to RH. Nor vise versa.
This is my opinion of course. If you don't like it, I don't care
Re:Development Kernel was a bad decision by Red Ha (Score:2)
Re:They come over as MegaCorp (tm) (Score:1)
But of course you can legally get 7.0 without paying RedHat a red cent, and if you are angry about the quality of 6.0 I suggest you do just that. Half the time with MS, it isn't a service pack, it's a whole new rev of the OS, which isn't free.
At least with RH, I don't pay to test beta-grade software that is released as version X.0.
Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wagn'nagl dominos.
Be careful with ReiserFS (Score:2)
When I tried to install a 3Com 509 card it froze the system when I ifconfig'ed it and I had to reboot. Then ReiserFS did it's journal replay and when the system was up again it turned out that some files had their contents scrambled (/etc/conf.modules contained some lines from
I wonder if people have experience with ext3. I've heard it also does data journalling whereas ReiserFS only does meta-data journalling. Data journalling may cause a performance hit but I'm willing to take that for reliability.
Also, I wonder if anyone knows if versioning (used in databases like InterBase) has been used in filesystems yet. Versioning seems ideal to me for filesystems as it provides low overhead and atomicity. But maybe I'm completely in the dark here, anybody care to comment?
Good bye Redhat (Score:2)
Completely failed to even admit that other linux distributions exist.
I like Redhat, I want them to do well but I don't think this bodes well for them.
Odd compiler? Use the source... (Score:2)
So what if the compliler produces incompatible binaries? They made a tradeoff for other benefits, and because the kernel and apps we all use almost exclusively have available source code we can just recompile, right?
Got a Debian machine and need to use that prog you built on RH7? *RECOMPILE IT*
M
That makes complete sense, in context (Score:4)
The embedded marketplace is very different from your typical computer/os/software/hardware market. In the embedded market, the developer typically ends up hard-linking his application into the OS, since both pieces are going to be jammed into the same EPROM (or Flash if you've got the budget). To save space, often the developer will decide which OS services he needs, and discard the rest (ie: if you're not building a network appliance, why load the ethernet drivers?) An embedded OS is really more like a development framework -- it gives your application the tools it needs to function without the programmer having to implement those tools from scratch.
If you attempt to GPL the kernel to an embedded OS, then you're going to force developers to release all of their source code, simply because they linked their code with the OS. If you put this restriction on an embedded OS, then no embedded developers will buy your OS, no matter how good it is. On the other hand, either LGPL or MPL can be commercially viable, while still encouraging developers to contribute.
Are you moderating this down because you disagree with it,
Re:gcc snapshot, not development kernel (Score:1)
--
The world is divided in two categories:
those with a loaded gun and those who dig. You dig.
Re:redhat 7.0 at my company (Score:2)
I'm not sure exactly what you mean about the kernel files being messed up; care to explain further?
And, I think the article linked to above explains the compiler issue well pretty well.
What were the other issues?
--
Re:Interview (Score:1)
FreeBSD use the latest gcc.
It wont encourage you unless you know how poor Microsoft or Sun's compilers are
For most of our C++ work (I'm talking of big codes used in the electricity utilities business), Microsoft (on Windows) and Sun compilers (on Solaris/Sparc) are infinitely better than gcc : Better supports of the C++ standards, much better performance.
I don't say gcc is not good : it's an amazing piece of software, and invaluable for the open source developpement. But if you really want to bite, at least bite correctly.
redhat versions (Score:1)
RedHat... REBRAND! or just put nice Stickers on the boxes to keep the dumb It managers at bay, us in the trenches know better, but the goofball that runs our meetings don't, and unfortunately they are the ones making polocy decisions!
Re:What I don't like... (Score:2)
Under ext2, each file is limited to a size of 2 gig. This limit is awkward for database files, http log files, and many other things.
Most other UNIXen had the same problem at some time or another. Sun solved it by patching UFS. HP solved it by integrating Veritas into HP-UX.
let the user choose (Score:2)
a totally hacked default setup is NOT a good idea!
they did ship 2.95.2 to compile the kernel, why wasn't this the default? WHY a hacked version?
if i wanna hack, i install it myself
Re:They come over as MegaCorp (tm) (Score:1)
Isn't one of the advantages of open source (and free software) supposed to be that you aren't at the mercy of other organizations?
The GCC comittiee has different deadlines and standards than Redhat. They don't consider their snapshots to be up to par for a release, but Redhat finds they are good enough for almost all of their purposes. Why should they have to wait for an official release? Besides, object file compatibility is a complete non-issue for about 99% of users. People usually only distribute binaries or source code. Redhat 7 is compatible with both of these methods.
To sum up, if a distributer is required to listen to every group involved then the software isn't free speach, just free beer.
BTW, I agree with you about the config files...
it's a nightmare finding anything.
And what I don't like (Was Re:What I don't like) (Score:3)
You have got to be kidding me. You are taking issue with what features they choose to include and exclude? That is the WHOLE POINT of distributions! They have features. They differ in what they offer. The distributions have been that way for 3 years now. What, can't a company decide what features their OWN product has to offer? Remember, those RPMs don't compile themselves.
What the heck are you talking about? Have you even used RedHat 7.0? 7.0 has USB support. Who else has USB support? RH7 has X4. Who else (before 7) has X4? It has improved security packages and more manageable setups for servers and workstations--things users have been demanding. So how exactly are they ignoring customers?
As for the other things they should have included: they HAVE 2.4 kernel RPMS. I ask again, have you even looked at RH7? I installed the RPMS and gave them a whirl. So what distrib are you using? ReiserFS is not in the distrib, but can easily be added to RedHat.
I'd like to give you the benefit of the doubt, but you appear to have no idea what you are talking about. Have you even used the distribution? If not, why do you feel the need to make a whole lot of noise when you don't have your facts straight?
I am soooo sick and tired of all the baseless Red Hat bashing that takes place on Slashdot. It is not Slashdot (the website) itself, but the hoards of people who want their 15 seconds of fame for having "gave it to the man" in a post. Slashdot is supposed to be a place where we discuss things and offer something of value. Just spouting stuff at random does no one any good.
Plus you end up looking silly.
Red Hat 7 bit me, even though I never used it (Score:1)
Well, I wrote a little (small, but rather neat) library called Atlas-C++ in C++ as part of the WorldForge project [worldforge.org] earlier this year. It uses templates and other "advanced" C++ techniques a lot, giving it amazing flexibility, but making it slightly hard for some compilers to grok. Now, it compiled fine with GCC 2.95.2, after all, that's the current stable release, that's what I use, that's what I expect people to be using. Now, unfortunately, it did not compile (read: threw Internal Compiler Errors) with the gcc snapshot shipped with RH7. This lead to people having to go through a lot of trouble trying to get it to just compile and link properly. *sigh*. This was quite an annoyance.
It makes me glad I use a distribution whose goal is not profits [debian.org].
Re:They come over as MegaCorp (tm) (Score:2)
Re:And what I don't like (Was Re:What I don't like (Score:2)
What about backups? (Score:1)
Besides, is ReiserFS officially stable now? I figured there was a reason it isn't in the kernel yet...
Re:Good bye Redhat (Score:1)
Completely failed to even admit that other linux distributions exist.
There's a difference between failing to admit that they exist and not considering them the primary competition. I think it's cool that RedHat is trying to increase the number of total Linux users by drawing away from other OSs rather than just increasing RedHat usage within the Linux community.
It was a development gcc, not kernel (Score:1)
As Timothy would have noticed if he'd followed the Slashdot link in the story, the controversy was over a development snapshot of gcc (2.96), not the kernel. I haven't used RedHat 7.0 but I assume it ships with a 2.2 kernel and also has a 2.3 dev kernel in there as an optional package.
Re:Dev kernel (Score:1)
Re:What I don't like... (Score:2)
Re:Actually, no (Score:2)
gcc snapshot, not development kernel (Score:2)
--
They come over as MegaCorp (tm) (Score:2)
Not all of which is bad, far from it.
I have an Alpha, I run Redhat 6.0 on it. It's shit. They know that. They've told me to upgrade.
(Which is precisely the attitude which people criticise MS for "just apply service pathc 79...".) 7.0 is already announced for Alpha. I don't know if I can trust them. They've sold me poop before...
Lesson - Avoid N.0 like the plague?
FP.
Re:Actually, no (Score:1)
The point is that if you want to run the same piece of software (say Apache) on a variety of boxes then the GNU/OSS/etc model is to recompile the source code on each different box.
Even if the operating environment is the same on two boxes you still might want to do this, e.g. the same Linux install on a single vs. a dual cpu system. Or how about the exact same Linux distro on a 486/66 versus an Athlon/1GHz? Sure you want the same Apache binary there? Really sure?
It is just fundamentally cool that when I have a box with loads of RAM I can unroll loops to my heart's content and generate a fast but huge binary, and when things are tight I can choose to have the _exact_ same bit of software running in 2/3 the space.
It'd be a shame if people started thinking of binary distributions as in any way natural on Linux.
The Competition! (Score:1)
another stupid question (Score:1)
So when can I see the source for CCVS?
competitor ? (Score:1)
Which distribution do you feel is your main competitor?
Right now our main competitors are Sun Solaris and Microsoft.
So does that mean that Microsoft is a distribution ?
Nevermind...
Developmental COMPILER, not kernel! (Score:1)
Some posters seem to get confused by the incorrect information given. Red Hat didn't ship with a developmental kernel; they shipped with gcc 2.96, which is a developmental branch of gcc. This has been discussed a lot on Slashdot already, and if I remember correctly, everyone except Red Hat's CEO agreed that is was a bad decision... But it's old news now.
Re:Interview (Score:1)
Don't bother reading (Score:1)
"If there's another OS came out that was a Free OS and started doing well then
will we see something like Red Hat BSD or something?"
Answer:
I think comes back to the critical mass question. I think that for Red Hat,
it's better to enhance our technical solutions to meet customer requirements
than it is to dilute our brand with other operating systems that don't have
the critical mass of Red Hat Linux or eCos.
Huh ? The critical mass of 'eCos' vs 'BSD's ? Unfortunately, this stupidity is at the end. If it have been at the top, I woundn't bothered reading all this poor inteview.
Cheers,
--fred
I agree: this Marketing blabla. (Score:1)
There is nothing to learn, it is just marketing bla-bla.
They ask: Why aren't you shipping ReiserFS, or Mandrake ?
He doesn't answer at all!
I think that RedHat suffer from a serious case of NIH syndrome for some parts..
Re:Interview (Score:1)
"Homo sum: humani nil a me alienum puto"
(I am a man: nothing human is alien to me)
Re:competitor ? (Score:3)
MS is a major competitor to Red Hat in the server market, which I'd guess is where RH get most of their income anyway. The fact that MS have 95% of the desktop market, and that they have 100 times the market capitalisation doesn't matter. Linux and Windows have approximately equal sized shares of the server market, and RH wants to increase the size of their share. Of course MS is a competitor.
I suppose its his job, but... (Score:1)
Except for the bit about filesystems, which I appreciated, there was no real news that would of use to anyone -even investors, such as plans are for the 2.4 rollout.
With tux and 2.4 coming up, RH should be saying much more about their philosophy with respect to kernel dev and release, filesystems, and releasing lab results, etc...
It'll be a bit scarier in the next upgrade cycle, and their target markets (RH serves too many) will be very anxious. At least I will be.
Re:Developmental COMPILER, not kernel! (Score:2)
No, that was not the conclusion - there wasn't any (besides, Tiemann is CTO (and from the former Cygnus, the main force behind gcc) and not CEO)
It was the right decision - it fixes bugs, gives better C++ compatibility and actually works on some platforms. "C++ binary compatibility" is FTTB an oxymoron, no loss. We should have handled the political side better, but the technical reasons (which are by far the most important ones) are valid.
Re:what other distributions? (Score:5)
Boo hoo. So the C++ ABI has changed from one version of gcc to another - so what? It wasn't a fixed standard in the first place. If you are relying on implementation-defined details like this you will surely get bitten sooner or later.
Just get RPM 3.0.5 which is forwards-compatible with 4.0.
Red Hat have upgraded the C library in the past, what's so wrong with doing it this time? Surely you don't advocate that we should all still be on libc4 in order to keep binary compatibility?
Re:Be careful with ReiserFS (Score:1)
Re:Be careful with ReiserFS (Score:2)
on the / partition. This is because, after
compiling a new kernel, you might not be
able to boot since the reiserfs module is
not loaded.
The recommended method is to make a comparitively
small / partition (about 250-500 MB) that is
ext2, and making
reiserfs.
I've been using reiserfs for several months now
without problems.
Magnus.
Re:Interview (Score:1)
Re:Good bye Redhat (Score:2)
Completely failed to even admit that other linux distributions exist.
From the interview:
The fact that we don't care about problem X or Y creates opportunities for other distributions.
I pity the fool who lacks basic reading comprehension.
Changes (Score:1)
Hmmm... snapshot of gcc... What bug-fixes/improvments are there? Do I need them right away? If answer is yes then reconsider. Hmm... snapshot... maybe dont produce stable code... Naaa I'll go with RH 6.2 instead.
Re:what other distributions? (Score:1)
Re:Interview (Score:1)
Re:what other distributions? (Score:2)
What the hell are you doing? (Score:1)
I imagine you're using a 2.4.x series kernel too.
Yes, you are in the dark. Stop. Use stuff that's known to work, not stuff that's experimental.
Castles in the air (Score:2)
Do me a small favor. Look [freesoftware.com] at the list of RPMS in 7.0. Do you see a 2.4 kernel? Neither do I. Obviously, what is not included in the distribution is not integrated into the installer.
The decision to support USB and X4, and not ReiserFS, was arbitrary. Red Hat did this before with KDE, but at that time they had good reason. This time they do not.
I have done more to advocate Red Hat than you could probably comprehend. Pardon me if I take your vitriol with a grain of salt.
Re:And what I don't like (Was Re:What I don't like (Score:2)
Red Hat has to make feature decisions, like any company, that some customers don't like - however, it is entirely reasonable for customers to comment on what they want (ideally before the product is finalised!)
As for special things like USB support - Mandrake 7.1 (I think) and definitely 7.2 includes USB backported from 2.4 work.
I agree that Red Hat bashing for the sake of it is pointless, but feature/stability discussions are definitely worthwhile.
That's what the GPL is for (Score:1)
Re:Compatibility is a big big deal. (Score:1)
--
and still more (Score:2)
Personally I am still usnig RH 6.2. I have the gnome helix updates. I have upgrade to rpm 3.0.5 and then to rpm 4.0 (as they suggest) I did have to rebuild the rpm database though that took a little time. I am also found kde 2.0 binaries for my system as well. So I get to run kde or gnome (I use gnome).
Wasn't this article out a month ago or was it just one like it? This sure has gotton them lots of attention though. Hmm maybe that is what they were after.
If you don't like what Redhat did get Mandrake. Mandrake always seems to take the latest version of Redhat and ad the updates and fixes to it anyway.
QYB
I don't want a lot, I just want it all!
Flame away, I have a hose!
Re:redhat 7.0 at my company (Score:2)
Re:They come over as MegaCorp (tm) (Score:2)
Unlike M$, that IS a possibility.
PS: If you haven't got a CD-R, that's why they invented Cheapbytes [cheapbytes.com]
--
Re:almighty buck (Score:3)
Not true. Socialists like to claim the problem is human immorality, but the real problem is in information theory. A race of angels could not get socialism to work, because the necessary information on where resources should be allocated is not generated by any known form of non-free-market economic system.
Now, if you have perfect information available, things change. Not only is socialism workable, it is far more efficient than the expensive feedback mechanism of the free market. Furthermore, with perfect information, you can bypass the "human nature" deficiencies by creating personal-incentive programs within the otherwise socialist system. Asimov described just such a situation in his short story "The Evitable Conflict", the last story in "I, Robot".
But we don't have perfect information. Nobody's even come up with an accounting mechanism for a socialist economy that produces enough information to make central planning as productive as a highly regulated mixed economy, much less a true free market. (And forget non-centralized socialism; the information deficit is enven worse.)
In short, in theory as well as practice, socialism doesn't work. The best that can be said for socialism is that most socialists have their heart in the right place.
Re:What the hell are you doing? (Score:2)
The reason I tried ReiserFS was that it provided (much) higher performance than ext2 and the server (was) a slow machine. I thought it would be stable since both Mandrake and Suse push it as being a production quality fs, my mistake.
The question about being in the dark related to a versioning fs, not the use of ReiserFS.
Question: if nobody ever uses experimental stuff (even on a server), how are we going to evolve?
what other distributions? (Score:3)
They no longer care about compatibility with other Linux distributions (LSB? Whats that?):
- Use a development snapshot of gcc, so that C++ programs compiled on RH7 only work on RH7.
- Again change their RPM binary format (for the utterly stupid reason that it now supports bzip2 compression), so RH7 RPMs only work on RH7.
- Use a glibc2.2 development snapshot, so that again, their RPMs only work on RH7.
All possibilities of 'choice' within Linux being wiped out by them I now nearly agree with the 'RedHat sucks' motto. *sigh*Re:competitor ? (Score:2)
Just my worthless
Re:gcc snapshot, not development kernel (Score:3)
Re:Interview (Score:4)
You're obviously clueless, but I'll bite. After all I am on my lunchbreak ...
Compare this with Windows, which has test periods of a year or more for new Windows releases.
Would you really trust your company to a distro that ships a broken compiler?
Read bugtraq, and learn just how stable and secure those tested versions of Windows are. Not very. As for a `broken' compiler, try Visual C++ 5.0 which was notoriously broken. RedHat's GCC snapshot was only `broken' in the respect that it was binary incompatble with preceding versions and the upcoming version 3.0. They had very good reasons to ship a snapshot, not the least of which was the fact that it produced better object code than 2.95.2. The alternative was to stick with egcs-1.1.2, which is getting exceptionally long in the tooth. If you really want to criticise a Linux distributor for shipping dodgy compilers, then turn your attention to Mandrake. They shipped the Pentium optimised `pgcc', which is known to produce incorrect assembler output.
> > [Why the broken compiler?]
This doesn't make an eachway-incompatible compiler a good idea. What it does say, however, (his words not mine) is that
(a) the current compiler is a POS
(b) we're using an incompatible, and immediately obsolete compiler.
Doesn't really encourage you to use Linux, rather than say, Windows, *bsd or Solaris, does it - the current compiler sucks
It wont encourage you unless you know how poor Microsoft or Sun's compilers are. As for BSD you clearly are clueless, as they use aging versions of gcc. Microsoft have yet to produce an ANSI C compliant compiler, let alone an ANSI C++ compliant one. As for Sun's compiler suite, they no longer ship it by default with Solaris, and many of the companies I have worked for use gcc instead out of preference. In other words, they have a Sunpro licence, but don't bother installing it.
These patches are indicative of the unstable state of Linux development ... (see Mandrake for a desktop product, not that it's a patch on Windows or Mac)
Let's see - my desktop machine has not crashed once since I installed RedHat 6.2 on it four months ago. It has all the tools that my colleague's Windows PC has, and more (ever tried grep'ing or find'ing on a PC?). In the same time the programmer to my immediate left has reinstalled Windows twice, and the Mac programmer is lucky if he get four hours of uptime.
As for your inference that Windows software is easier to use, try Visual C++ some time. Their is no source control as standard, and the API's are dreadful (dodgy socket libraries for example).
Chris
redhat 7.0 at my company (Score:3)
Unfortunettly becuase of the way that everything is cvs quality / hacked / part this part that we have concluded that there is really no was for us to use redhat 7.0. From the kernal files being messed up, X3 and 4 kludged together, and a compiler that never would have seen a real box if it wasn't for redhat we have been virtually unable to get any sort of a build made. This does not mention the other issues we encountered.
Even though companies all "standerdize" on redhat I can say that we now don't.
Re:Don't bother reading (Score:2)
Huh ? The critical mass of 'eCos' vs 'BSD's ?
He's talking about the embedded market, where eCos has a much more significant role than you realise. BSD based code does make an impact in this area, (for example, OpenBSD's Theo de Raadt has been contracted to port code to such systems), but eCos is designed specifically for the embedded market.
Chris
Relanguage standard != ABI (Score:2)
Re:They come over as MegaCorp (tm) (Score:2)
Re:Interview (Score:2)
I've had nothing but success with the Visual C++ 6.0 under Windows. The only compiler that came close to beating it for code speed for graphics apps was Watcom, in the old days.
As for BSD you clearly are clueless, as they use aging versions of gcc.
[root@brick
OpenBSD brick 2.8 GENERIC#3 i386
[root@brick
2.95.3
That doesn't seem very aging to me
As for your inference that Windows software is easier to use, try Visual C++ some time. Their is no source control as standard, and the API's are dreadful (dodgy socket libraries for example).
There is source control as standard with gcc then? Neat, I've never seen it
Where this stuff falls over is documentation for the newbie. If you face off linuxdoc.org vs the MSDN (which is literally gigabytes of copious documentation), I wonder which one would win.
Let's see - my desktop machine has not crashed once since I installed RedHat 6.2 on it four months ago
My RH6.2 install still consistently segfaults if I run 'gtop'. And when I switched to the excellent Debian, it look me literally a week of hard hacking to get XFree4 and 3D acceleration working. Doesn't really take that long under Win2k now, does it?
I'm now trying to use my Debian setup as my primary desktop, but there's a lot of stuff I sorely miss from Windows 2000 (the speed, the consistent interface, not needing to hack up WINE for games). Still, it's leaps and bounds ahead of what it was last year, so I'm pretty pleased with being able to use a *nix desktop again.
Re:what other distributions? (Score:2)
I think it will depend on whether the other distros pick up Red Hat's compiler or stick with 2.95. Given the amount of FUD which has surrounded RH 7.0, they'll probably be scared off and stick with the older release.
Re:Interview (Score:2)
[root@brick /root]# uname -a /root]# gcc --version
OpenBSD brick 2.8 GENERIC#3 i386
[root@brick
2.95.3
That doesn't seem very aging to me ...
Last time I used OpenBSD it was gcc 2.7.2.3. Ditto for NetBSD. I know why OpenBSD's developers would pick an older compiler over the latest release, it's more tried and tested. What I was trying to point out to the original poster was the inconsistencies in his arguments.
My RH6.2 install still consistently segfaults if I run 'gtop'
No, you mean gtop - a poorly written program - segfaults. This is like saying that Windows crashed when in fact it was notepad.
As for Windows 2000 running faster than Linux - there must be something seriously wrong with your configuration of Linux. I was recently surprised to find out how appreciably slower Windows was on an identical box to mine. Opening and closing applications, saving and loading files all seem frustratingly slow on the Windows box.
Chris
Redhat 7.1, 7.2, 8.0... (Score:2)
(this article is also making me think that maybe i should change my fake email addy listed above, as well as my quote below...)
Re:Interview (Score:2)
Indeed, but I expect decent quality control from a distribution to avoid programs crashing out of the box. Win2k is very stable for me; it's crashed _once_, when I experimented with leaked NVidia drivers.
As for Windows 2000 running faster than Linux - there must be something seriously wrong with your configuration of Linux.
Fundamentally, the X-layer, with its protocol in between, makes the Linux desktop slower that the highly integrated Win32 system (which also has the benefit of primary testing from driver developers). And I'm sure I could tweak Linux to run ludicrously fast, but I don't really have time to do this...
And in terms of usability, don't even ask how hard it's been to find a decent web browser under Linux (and then, get the fonts rendering decently)...
Don't get me wrong; I make (and enjoy) my share of contributions to OSS, but I also don't have any illusions about how well something like Linux competes in the desktop market.
BUT THERE IS A 2.4 kernel! (Re:Castles in the air) (Score:2)
HOWEVER, perhaps you are looking in the wrong place.
Disc 2:/preview/RPMS/kernel-2.4.0.*
It is all right there. I found it by reading the README :-)
Now perhaps it wasn't in the installer. But then Red Hat makes a commercial distribution, and they have all sorts of users installing Red Hat. Perhaps they were afraid of people installing a kernel that doesn't support everything. I tried it on mine, and the snapshot (pre1, I think) doesn't do Symbios based SCSI cards (my Fireport 40 didn't work).
With GnoRPM, you have an easy way to install it. Granted, installing kernels isn't for the faint of heart, but then neither is 2.4-pre!
Pardon my first post if it was a bit negative, but as you can see, the kernel is right there, right on the CD. And it is documented in the README and features list. That's how I found it. Reading your post about a lack of 2.4 along with all the other Red Hat bashing in this article seemed to indicate that you were just bashing with no knowledge. Maybe you just were misinformed.
Perhaps you don't read READMEs :-)
Re:It was a development gcc, not kernel (Score:2)
Re:what other distributions? (Score:2)
RPM is open, so any other distribution can update to RPM 4 if they so choose (or even 3.05 which I believe can also handle RPM 4 packages).
As for glibc 2.2 development snapshot, they now have an errata RPM to upgrade to glibc 2.2, so now they look great in that they are able to support the new glibc 2.2 with RH 7.
As for the C++ and gcc snapshot issue, there was not ideal answer (and will not be until until the release of gcc 3). At least this way developers who use C++ can start using a compiler that is far more standards compliant than any other release, and by the time their programs are ready for release hopefully gcc 3 will be here to solve all of the binary compatibility problems.
Re:almighty buck (Score:2)