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Korean Air Mission Critical Systems Moved to Linux 130

Posted by Hemos from the good-work-tux dept.
securitas writes "ZDNet is reporting that Korean Air has decided to move its flight-crew scheduling and daily accounting systems to Linux running on an IBM mainframe, and 5000 users will access this information through their browsers starting in September. "
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Korean Air Mission Critical Systems Moved to Linux More

Korean Air Mission Critical Systems Moved to Linux

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  • As far as I know, many airline/airport software is already written for unix.
    My friend was an intern in a company about 3-4 years back and they were writing C programs for some kind of unix. The company name was a strange one so I don't remember it. I didn't ask what the unix version was either. So sorry about the undetailed post.
  • First time I opened up Slashdot I read:

    Korean Air Missile Crisis Moved on Linus.

    I guess I should get some sleep...

    -Dan

    Too lazy to find a cute sig. Deal with it.

  • Good stats, better comeback. (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Fat Casper ( 260409 ) on Saturday August 11, 2001 @06:47AM (#2115325) Homepage
    "MRTG under Linux has been very stable. It's worked the way it was supposed to," without outages, said Paul Watkins, Rubbermaid's network analyst.

    Rubbermaid previously outsourced the same function and paid $6,000 per month. Watkins said he spent about 200 hours getting the Linux system up and running, but that it's now "pretty much self-sustaining." Rubbermaid purchased mainframe Linux for $180 from SuSE.

    Rubbermaid's Watkins, a Microsoft-certified systems engineer, said Microsoft officials could talk about their own problems, rather than those of open source code. "Microsoft's NT was a good platform, but it had its share of problems," he said.

    Talk about a feel-good article. KAL isn't really using it for much (What? Daily revenue isn't much?), but to see an airline using it is a really good moral boost. Reading about the other companies meant more to me, though. It's nice to read about actual successes- I read about the technical successes all the time. Hell of a way to start the day.



  • A good thing.. Although while I wouldnt elevate a system that pumps out itinieraries for flight crews to the level of "mission critical" (most pilots and flight crews know the times when and where they'll be flying often weeks in advance) its a step in the right direction. It takes projects like this to keep eyeballs focused in the right direction. Has anyone heard anything about what happened to Burlington Coat Factory, after they made the switch? How are they doing now?

    • When I was in Taipei, a Canadian pilot on the Taichung-Taipei flight flew instead to Peng-hu (a small island between Taiwan and China). No one had told him the flight had been changed because their English was so bad. Of course he had to take the fall and was suspended.
    • No idea how they're doing, but it looks like they're still using linux. From the "employment" section of their website:

      POSITION: Store Systems Development QUALIFICATIONS : 3+ years experience , Java Linux/Unix , C, JDBC/Oracle

      Looks like they're doing all their backend development in Java, and Linux is just a common and low cost platform to run it on.

    • I work for a large, US regional carrier. Our flight scheduling system is a 24x7 mission critical system. We have a zero downtime service level agreement with our flight operations department for their critical system. All of them use a brand name version of UNIX.
      Sure the planed schedule is done weeks in advance, but that's only half the story. A pilot will fly six flights a day. If that pilot get fogged in Boston and can't do the 11:00am Boston to Cincinnati flight just before he was supposed to do your 1:30pm Cincinnati to Toronto flight, a last minute replacement must be found or your flight gets fouled up. Flight crews a typically scheduled close to the contractual and legal limits. The flight scheduling systems must ensure that during the day, a crew member doesn't exceed those limits due to delays or re-routes.
    • And how did the flight crews know weeks in advance where and when they'd be flying? How did the airline know that they'd have a plane there (properly maintained--with a zillion things on their own check/replace/fix schedule), fueled and ready to go?

      Hell, if I'd known that crew and planes weren't mission critical, I'd have started my own airline years ago! Mmm, Quantum Airlines. "You might already be there, with a live/dead cat."
      • First koala bear that says "I hate Quantum" gets it in the tits!

        (Quantas/Rocky Horror ref)
        • 1. They are not bears. They are marsupials.

          2. It's Qantas - it's an acronym for Queensland A Northern Territory Aerial Services.
          • Well duh! Anything not a marsupial in Australia is either a Funnel-web or rabbit, or a human or a sheep. Koala "bears" are stoned on the leaves they eat, and will shit on you if you pick them up. And that about says it all.

            Did you know that we have marsupials here in north america? Possums and maybe racoons. (I nominate them for Sapien Next if we bite the big one.) Dogs: a mile high statue of Elvis. Cats: A meter high statue of Elvis ("Yah, so?").
            • Since I actually live here, I guess I know a little more about our native fauna than you probably do (which appears to be solely based on 'Survivor 2'). They are called 'koalas', in the same way lions are not called 'lion cats' - or do you call them 'lion dogs'? Frankly, I would probably shit on you too, if you picked me up.

              Racoon is not a marsupial - as members of the Procyonidae family, their closest relatives are the ringtails, coatis and coatimundis. (racoon.com) The opossum is the only marsupial native to North America
          • make that 'Queensland And Northern...'

  • The Linux gap! (Score:5, Funny)

    by supabeast! ( 84658 ) on Saturday August 11, 2001 @06:25AM (#2122068)
    Remeber in the cold war arms race, when if the Russians had some technology the American government had to have it too (And vice versa.)? Well if we can convince our govenment that the Asains are ahead of us with OS tech, creating a "Linux gap!" Now all we have to do is convince them to move all government systems to Linux, Microsoft be damned!

    Now if only they ever fixed that whole basselope-gap thing...
    • Well if we can convince our govenment that the Asains are ahead of us with OS tech, creating a "Linux gap!

      Here [culturecom.com.hk] you can find some ads and posters that could help you convincing them. :)

      (it's weird that they use WMV format to promote their Linux system, I can't open them....)

  • This is a Good Thing, for a lot of reasons. First, it's a decent-scale commercial deployment of Linux in an industry that isn't typically viewed as "tech" by Joe B. Consumer and Jane D. Executive. Next, it's a good example of making the *right* choice when it comes to stability and security, no matter the industry.

    I've been a Windows developer for years (now reformed, 99% linux dev these days), and I used to work for CompUSA corporate. It was interesting standing around with a bunch of MS marketing execs in meetings in Dallas back then. We used to talk about operating systems, and how they couldn't believe any OS would have pose a significant "threat" to the Windows established customer base.

    Piece by piece, proving 'em wrong ;).

  • KAL's real problem (Score:1, Flamebait)

    by shri ( 17709 )
    Folks, lets not get excited. Their real problem is preventing their pilots (most of them ex Air Force jocks) from crashing their planes. The seem to bring an airliner down more often than their software.
  • One thing I cannot understand... why would they access the information through a browser? I realize that browsers provide for a cheap interface, but its hardly conducive to real time information needs... not to mention the fact that I have come across no browser that is reliable. The "real time" bit can probaly be done by Java applets... but then if your doing that, why not just crate a stand alone client out of Java. My $0.02
    • My guess is that it isn't just a browser issue, but an App Server one. Remember that this is IBM, selling big iron with Linux. I'd bet that WebSphere will also play a pretty big role in that environment. That opens up a ton of interface possibilities.
  • It's interesting that Korean Air is running Linux on an IBM mainframe. According to this story [economist.com] from The Economist [economist.com], IBM has been setting up more and more such installations. For instance, Winnebago Industries (a large maker of motor-homes) recently threw out its distributed e-mail system and replaced it with a Linux-on-mainframe version. The story also mentions Korean Air.

    Such installations are very good for customers who already have a mainframe: they save energy, floor space, and staff--and get mainframe-level reliability.

  • A company called Ubitech, Makes an AFTN Message switch (a system that shuffles flightplans, met data, etc. arround) runs the system on linux

    they sold it through a us company, Litton Denero (yes the same people responsible for the US Navy's NT destroyer)

    installations include singapor, angola, st martin, and a few other countries.

  • IF OPERATING SYSTEMS RAN THE AIRLINES (Score:5, Funny)

    by megas ( 1636 ) on Saturday August 11, 2001 @07:33AM (#2130085) Homepage
    Windows Air
    The terminal is pretty and colorful, with friendly stewards, easy baggage check and boarding, and a smooth take-off. After about 10 minutes in the air, the plane explodes with no warning
    whatsoever.

    Windows NT Air
    Just like Windows Air, but costs more, uses much bigger planes, and takes out all the other aircraft within a 40-mile radius when it explodes.

    UNIX Airways
    Everyone brings one piece of the plane along when they come to the airport. They all go out on the runway and put the plane together piece by piece, arguing non-stop about what kind of
    plane they are supposed to be building.

    Air DOS
    Everybody pushes the airplane until it glides, then they jump on and let the plane coast until it hits the ground again. Then they push again, jump on again, and so on ...

    Mac Airlines
    All the stewards, captains, baggage handlers, and ticket agents look and act exactly the same. Every time you ask questions about details, you are gently but firmly told that you don't
    need to know, don't want to know, and everything will be done for you without your ever having to know, so just shut up.

    Linux Air
    Disgruntled employees of all the other OS airlines decide to start their own airline. They build the planes, ticket counters, and pave the runways themselves. They charge a small fee to
    cover the cost of printing the ticket, but you can also download and print the ticket yourself. When you board the plane, you are given a seat, four bolts, a wrench and a copy of the
    seat-HOWTO.html. Once settled, the fully adjustable seat is very comfortable, the plan leaves and arrives on time without a single problem, the in-flight meal is wonderful. You try to
    tell customers of the other airlines about the great trip, but all they can say is, "You had to do WHAT with the seat?"
    • OSX air: you settle into your nice seat, having payed over the odds to get there. You then realise that BSDAir has been giving away seats next to you for free!
    • That is freakin' classic. I needed a laugh this morning. Thanks.
      fat_mike
    • ...which went under many years back, though there are still some people sitting at the gate, waiting for a flight out. They loudly proclaim the greatness of Amiga Air to everyone passing by in the terminal, but everyone just ignores them.

      Once in a while another airline takes interest in reviving Amiga Air** and the still-waiting passengers get very excited, but then the other airline's interest wanes, and the Amiga Air passengers remain stuck in the terminal, forever waiting.

      * - Several years back, one of the comp.sys.* Usenet groups had a thread asking people to add to the "If OSes were airlines" post. Nobody chose Amiga up to the point that I discovered the thread, so I did. Many thought my post was funny. I have always wanted to get hold of a copy of it, but I can't seem to track it down on Google Groups. I have attempted to recreate it here. If anyone should stumble across the original, I'd love to know about it.

      ** - This is a reference to Gateway's (it was some major PC manufacturer, anyway, but I'm pretty sure it was Gateway) pondering an acquisition of the Amiga name and and technology and starting to make new, updated Amigas a few years ago. They eventually changed their corporate mind.

      ~Philly
      • Just to let you know, Amiga Inc. [amiga.com] actually have a product available again, in conjunction with Tao [tao-group.com] - it's a language independent VM architecture that can run on x86 among other things, both native and hosted under linux or windows. It's actually pretty well-designed, sortof a cross between what Java or .NET should have been and a unixy system, and has some pretty sweet features (including being a very fast Java environment). It doesn't really have all that much to do with the original Amiga design except for the name, though (and the virtual processor assembly is very similar to the (already quite C-like, with structs and so on) Amiga-style M68k/PPC macro assembly).

        I've actually got the SDK sitting on my desk, so, for once, it's not complete vaporware (unfortunately I've got the windows-hosted version, which is utterly useless to me with my linux-only PC).

        It's also the OS for a product that /is/ currently vapor - a non-apple PPC computer from merlancia [merlancia.com]. Even without the new Amiga OS, the merlancia box'd be nice, if only to put LinuxPPC on. PPC is so much nicer than x86, it's a shame it's tricky to find anything but apple mobos...

  • Meanwhile, across the Sea of Japan... (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Lothar+0 ( 444996 ) on Saturday August 11, 2001 @12:06PM (#2130354) Homepage
    I think somebody else's airports need to switch to our favorite OS too...

    Computer crash delays flights in Japan [cnn.com]

  • Well at least this way, you wont hear the airline people saying, " Well sir! We're sorry but we had a scheduling screwup because some sort of blue screen came up then the computer just crashed! Honest! Your flight is cancelled! ".. now you'll just hear " Your flight is on time sir! You can board in 5 minutes "

    Ah gotta love them switching over to Linux, maybe now more airlines will see how they can avoid their scheduling computers crashing now.. I've seen too many computers at the check-in desk crashing but on the other hand, I'm pretty sure the check-in people wont know what the heck to do if they saw a command prompt.. "Uhh theres a word.. 'bash' with an pound sign next to it.. whats that mean?"

    I suppose next they'll have to educate the masses on how to use Linux but hey, at least they'll be more reliable now!
    • AH yes but at least the ENTIRE system wont go down now will it? compared to a blue screen where you just are tempted to kick the crap out of the computer.. now all you have to do is run the program again, as I said, they'd have to learn what to do with a command prompt!
    • I'm pretty sure the check-in people wont know what the heck to do if they saw a command prompt.. "Uhh theres a word.. 'bash' with an pound sign next to it.. whats that mean?"

      Hmmm... I've traveled a lot in Europe (less in the US) and I'll tell you this -- the systems that they have, both at check-in as well as at the travel agencies, are less user-friendly and more arcane than linux. If they can be trained to use the current systems, they can be trained to type checkin_program_start or whatever at the bash prompt.

      Not everyone who doesn't use linux is an idiot.

      • Believe it or not, lots of businesses still use some fairly arcane looking text mode interfaces. I've actually seen accountants typing in printer1=lpt2 followed by a few print paramaters because the laser printer was out of toner or whatever. People really can learn if they feel they need to.
        • Believe it or not, lots of businesses still use some fairly arcane looking text mode interfaces.

          Sometimes even running under some version of Windows or other. But you can't hook up a pile of terminals easily to a Windows machine...
    • You know what? Here in the Seattle metropolitan area we have this airport called SeaTac. It is the possibly the worst airport in the universe. It has the lowest on-time rate of any airport in the nation. Not because of boarding computer screw-ups, but because it doesn't have enough runways.

      Unless Linux can somehow lay tarmac, it won't help here.

    • Re:Less flight screwups? (Score:5, Funny)

      by Jace of Fuse! ( 72042 ) on Saturday August 11, 2001 @06:00AM (#2145957) Homepage
      at least they'll be more reliable now!

      That statement is totally unfounded. You are assuming the scheduling software will be stable.

      If the schedualing software crashes now, it'll be the same situation as before, but the crash is just going to look different and the OS is still going to be running (though uselessly) under it all.

      Blue Screen or Core Dump, it's all the same.

      Face it, Linux won't save you. Airlines are ALWAYS going to be late and you're all going crash down into a firey death. And that's what this is really about anyway. Your fates. Get over it. You're gator food, pal! You hear me? Sleeping with the fish! Slamming into a hillside! Tailspin! Dead! Just like the others!
      • I'm in korea right now. I took Korea air and I have to tell you they are awesome. Completely put to shame any other US airline I've taken. Check in took all of 10 minutes, FOR AN INTERNATION AL FLIGHT. Flight attendants were very nice, and the food was great (They got an award for their food, something they seem proud of). Anyway, they never had any screw ups, and I doubt they'd switch to Linux if they thought if would create problems. I didn't see any problems that needed fixing in the first place. I swear, they made a 12 hour flight bearable. Anyway, I guess I should be playing StarCraft like many other people in this PC room...
      • You set the mainframe up to run multiple instances of the OS and software and enable it to roll over to another instance if the one that you are currently using fails. Quit thinking in PC terms when talking about big iron. We use Alphas in mission critical system and there is never a reason for our system to go down because the software failed. If it does go down someone screwed up with the setup.
      • That statement is totally unfounded. You are assuming the scheduling software will be stable.

        If the schedualing software crashes now, it'll be the same situation as before, but the crash is just going to look different and the OS is still going to be running (though uselessly) under it all.

        while true
        do
        /usr/local/bin/KAschedule
        sleep 10
        done

        That's what I use for especially buggy software that randomly crashes, but needs to be available. Maybe a few tweaks to clean up any mess left over by the process that died, but this kind of script does the trick w/o needing any real use education other than "if it crashes, wait 15-20 seconds for a new one to open".

  • "When asked about Mundie's warning of the risks associated with Linux, Laudati said: 'I'm not sure what he meant. Linux goes through a lot of testing before we use it.'"

    If I had a dime for every occasion I've uttered similar words at a Microsoft press release, I could buy Linux an infinite number of times.
  • i think many of you are missing the point. this article outlines linux being used in a high-profile mission-critical situation, and does not imply in any way the reason for doing so being due to ms os instability. no doubt an airline would have properly configured systems, adequate backups and work-arounds, should their tasks be 'mission critical'. from what i understood from the article, korean airlines has switched to linux to help online flight information services, which may be due to better perfomance in this particular situation with linux over other operating systems, including the unixes and windows, and/or more cost effective, or one of the other hundred reasons to choose between o/s.
  • This is likely the result of the advantadges of having Linux being supported/marketed by IBM. I can see it as part of an IBM marketing solution. Because of this, I can see IBM putting the whole package though vigourous QA.

    Not so suddenly, the words of warning from MS are appearing more and more feable.

    • Re:IBM Advantadges (Score:2, Insightful)

      by LinuxHam ( 52232 )
      As an employee of IBM e-business, I am *extremely* glad to see this development. I joined IBM a year ago so I could do exactly that kind of work. Now I'm expecting to start working on a project developing a Linux-based enterprise network supportng an eventual 250,000 wireless webpad users at hundreds of locations.

      In case anyone is wondering, the new mainframes are not the room-sized behemoths of old. If anyone has visited IBM at a recent LinuxWorld Expo, they would have seen one of the new z900's running hundreds or thousands of copies of Linux in a single 19" rack.

      To facilitate learning how to do just this, I managed to track down one of the company's "mainframe-in-a-server" training units. It's called a P390, and it's a standard-sized OS/2 server with a real S/390 chip on an expansion card. I should expect to be able to run about 5 concurrent copies of Linux, however, not thousands :) Although it is cool winning the "toy contest" among my friends by saving the "I have a mainframe at home" for last.

      And finally, IBM is giving out free virtual machines on a mainframe. Visit www.ibm.com/linux for more information.
    • Excellent point. We all know that managers and the like are queasy about buying into a free OS without having some company selling it and backing it up. This support from a well known company like IBM could really make a difference.
  • Based on the number of L10n and r4m3n worms originating in Korea and hammering my firewall, if this thing is connected to the net they're likely to get nailed. Seems like there's a lot of unsecured machines in .kr and .cn.
    • err yes, that's right. They're going to connect a multi million dollar piece of hardware running critical systems, and their entire internal network to the internet...

      idiot.

  • ... a mission critical system, i wouldn't want all those random internet worms invading and generally screwing up stuff here and there... would i?

  • As time goes, more airlines will come to Linux... (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Uzull ( 16705 ) on Saturday August 11, 2001 @07:03AM (#2145974) Homepage
    Airlines had started very early with IT (1950's !) and think big (averge : 50000 sets worlwide, even in deepest New Guinea). And the two big points are stability and cost !

    Until recently, they were big mainframe users, because of stability and cost efficience. When the world got rid of the dumb terminals, airlines very relunctantly moved to PC's, but still connected to the mainframe. And they sticked to OS/2 because of its stability... And they still use it ! Windows NT just _starts_ to replace those sets, but the _users_ AND the _sysadmins_ are just pissed off by this instable and poorly equipped OS (no embedded scripting language, not onboard tools, poor automation) ! But the managers love it because it is full of colours, and the M$ marketing brochures are so shiny.

    Those days wont last.
    Linux based solution emerge everywhere in the airline industry. It is stable and very cost efficient. And with those cash problems that all the airlines are facing, the calculation is very simple (Linux CD for 1000 PC's = 20 USD, 1000 Licenses for Windows = well above 50000 USD). So the change is there and more coming. Within the next 2 or 3 years, just think when you are airborne : At least a dozen Linux boxes has been involved in your journey, whatever the airline... And mainframes with Linux are a big part of it.
    • the _users_ AND the _sysadmins_ are just pissed off by this instable and poorly equipped OS (no embedded scripting language, not onboard tools, poor automation)

      I have no opinion as to what OS was best for the arlines, but please let's keep the /. unfactual M$ bashing to a minumum...

      No embedded scripting language: Windows Scripting Host (JScript or VBScript). Coming soon: C#, Perl and Python through .NET.

      No onboard tools: MMC. Yes, MMC was a big resource hog in the DOT OH stages, but it's matured into a very reasonable solution for sysadmins. Plus, if you look at all the new tools (eg VisualStudio and others) coming out from M$, you'll notice that all of the configs (server and workstation) are moving to a standardized XML format which can be edited via script or manually.

      Poor automation: Win2K is almost "over-automated"! There's so many fricken wizards that do stuff for you, that it's easy to get lazy and neglect building more optimized automations. Plus, most automation happens at the application level - "system automation" is generally an OS independant issue.

    • More SLOT MACHINES running linux too! (Score:1, Informative)

      by Anonymous Coward
      It's not reported much because gaming manufacturing is a small industry, but most regulators such as the Nevada Gaming Control Board, require full source code of any gaming device submitted for approvel. This pretty much leaves anything Microsoft out in the cold as there's no way to prove that a closed black box like windows isn't capable of cheating or skewing the odds, or able to be manipulated by the player somehow to cheat.

      Until recently, this requirement has kept code in gaming devices to at most a few hundred kilobytes of custom written code. Since the rise of Linux, gaming devices have finally been able to CHEAPLY gain much more functionality. And the regulatory bodies love the stability and open nature of Linux.

      I should know. I write code for slots/poker/keno/etc. machines here in Las Vegas which are shipped worldwide. If you've ever gambled here or anywhere (indian casino, cruise ship, etc.), you've probably used my code, not knowing that it was Linux under there!

      • if you are posting as AC, you could at least give us a juicy tidbit on how to win money with those things. like hold this button and then pull the lever at such and such a rate and then you'll get lucky sevens more often. sheesh, the quality of ac info nowadays is goin down the drain...

        • Re:More SLOT MACHINES running linux too! (Score:3, Informative)

          by Anonymous Coward
          if you are posting as AC, you could at least give us a juicy tidbit on how to win money with those things. like hold this button and then pull the lever at such and such a rate and then you'll get lucky sevens more often. sheesh, the quality of ac info nowadays is goin down the drain...

          Everyone says this. But as I'm sure you know that doing anything STUPID like puting in s3cr33t c0d3z can get you busted and fuck up your life for the next 20 years (and actually longer since you will be banned for life from working in the gaming industry ever again), I'm certainly not going to risk that.

          The games are truly random... well, as random as the random number generator, which does have to meet certain statistical requirements laid out by the control board. rand() will not cut it. They even worry about things like rand() % 10 favoring 0 thru 7 slightly more than 8 and 9 (assuming rand() returns 0-32767). The approved RNG is really fucking complicated, and relies on many unpredictable realtime events, such as network events, the time in microseconds when coins drop or when buttons are pressed.

          And while a slot machine may not be a "mission critical" system, it certainly is considered a "financially critical" one by the people who buy our machines. Which is why Linux is ganing favor here.

          Slot machine Trivia! Many people say they don't like slot machines with "virtual reels" displayed on a computer screen because "that computer thing can cheat". They say they prefer the "mechanical" slot machines with real spinning reels. Well, guess what? Computers run all slot machines just the same and have since the 1970s (analog logic back then). The only difference is the ones with reels, are controlled by stepper motors and told to stop on the sybbols picked when the compuer finished playing that game a few seconds ago. The added randomized "spin time" and non-uniform stopping of the reels is just to please the player. The reels stop exactly where told to by the CPU.

          • Slot machine Trivia! Many people say they don't like slot machines with "virtual reels" displayed on a computer screen because "that computer thing can cheat". They say they prefer the "mechanical" slot machines with real spinning reels. Well, guess what? Computers run all slot machines just the same and have since the 1970s (analog logic back then). The only difference is the ones with reels, are controlled by stepper motors and told to stop on the sybbols picked when the compuer finished playing that game a few seconds ago. The added randomized "spin time" and non-uniform stopping of the reels is just to please the player. The reels stop exactly where told to by the CPU.

            I hope you don't mean that as a criticism. A slot machine is, after all, an entertainment device. If people are entertained by moving machinery, then it is a good thing that there exist slot machines with wheels in them. I can well understand that such a machine may offer a more complete sensory experience than a CRT, even if it is more limited in some of its capabilities. People like things that they can hold in their hands (or at least believe they could hold in their hands, given access to the innards). People are analog critters. There's a bitmap of a clock face with moving hands in the corner of my screen right now. I say, "Bravo!" to the game designers who put physical interfaces on electronic games. Keep up the good work!

          • Saw an article not too long ago about the increase in gang violence in France related to 'stacked' gaming machines. In France, like probably everywhere else, legal gaming machines must pay out at least 85% in winnings. Organised crime have machines which payout around 50%, which they supply to hotels and clubs to keep in the back room, and everyone takes their cut. This is now so lucrative that quite a few gang bosses have been murdered in turf wars over these machines. The police investigating the murder of one high level gang boss have not solved it in over a year, because all their main supects keep getting bumped off by rival gangs.
          • You don't see cool info like this every day.
    • Windows NT just _starts_ to replace those sets, but the _users_ AND the _sysadmins_ are just pissed off by this instable and poorly equipped OS (no embedded scripting language, not onboard tools, poor automation)

      So that's why the ticket desk clerk does all that typing! They're writing shell scripts!

  • we all know that Linux is more difficult to crash than NT, but I wonder if the korean planes will now resist better than back in the 80's when attacked by MiGs....
  • I think they decided to use linux because 50% of all NT and win2k servers in Korea are Code RedII infected ;-)
    • Excellent point here. I sure wouldn't want my mission critical running on a platform which seems to be bombarded on a weekly basis by trojans, viruses, seemingly unworkable or inflexible security patching procedures (my impression anyway). And look at the cost savings from a strictly cost/benefits point of view.
      My two bits
      --- tired of seeing port 80 scans in my syslog --
  • For the greater education need of the "masses," I would have preferred less ambitious talk in the article and more details about what they were moving away *from*. I know that MS was out there pushing very hard for their DataCenter implementation, but I know Sun was out there as well. The community has to get behind these wins big time, so others will consider it for their mid size needs as well, where Sun & Oracle make their killings.
  • This has been a long time coming, as Newsforge reported on this [newsforge.com] a month ago :)

  • I Guess... (Score:4, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday August 11, 2001 @06:03AM (#2146939)
    I guess they got fedup being owned by Chinese :-)

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