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Torvalds Tells All
Eugenia writes: "Linus Torvalds gives an interesting interview to OSNews.com, talking about everything people are wondering about his personal opinions on several matters: on the GNU/Linux naming, the GUIs currently offered for Linux, the kernel 2.6, his plans for hot-plugged devices & drivers, Microsoft, FreeBSD and the future in general."
The machines I am about to mention are behind firewalls, so don't get your hopes up about exploits. But, I have several machines with specialized equipment that will only work in 2.0.33. They have binary modules, and I don't have the source to them, and the company is now out of business with no further development. This has struck a major blow in my ability to offer Linux solutions (unless I can demonstrate a non-Beta, long history).
Click here or here.
Linus Torvalds: "I'm a big non-believer in manual driver and kernel configuration, be it visual or not. Most of the stuff happens automatically, and we're going to make that more and more common. Things like hot-plugging a device and the driver automatically getting loaded is how things are supposed to work, none of this "device manager" stuff."
That is very good news for the eventual acceptance of linux on the desktop. Allowing users the ability to hot swap devices and not have to reconfigure the kernel for new devices will be a huge step towards mainstream acceptance, and it's good to see Torvalds is looking that way.
"Linus Torvalds: I don't actually follow other operating systems much. I don't compete - I just worry about making Linux better than itself, not others. And quite frankly, I don't see anythign very interesting on a technical level in either."
To quote the "Art of War":
One who knows the enemy and knows himself will not be in danger in a hundred battles.
One who does not know the enemy but knows himself will sometimes win, sometimes lose.
One who does not know the enemy and does not know himself will be in danger in every battle.
He should read it:
http://www.sonshi.com/learn.html
Ryan Finley
SurveyMonkey.com -- Create your own professional surveys
Not to Torvalds-bash, I respect the man as a great programmer, and the nucleus of a great system, but that had to be the worst interview I have ever seen. Yes, it's okay to be humble, it's okay not to know the answer, but that was by far, not interesting in the least.
You can't just answer 'I don't care' to 50% of the questions asked...There's a huge difference between not caring, and not having an opinion. Sure, he's not marketing driven, he said as much in the interview, he's only concerned about technical matters...Hoo hah, excellent..But we shouldn't try to pass this off as interesting.
I think the most interesting stuff came at the end
"What's that shift going to be? Who knows. Maybe it will have nothing directly to do with computers at all, just using computers to create new life-forms or whatever.. Where the _excitement_ is not the tool, but what you can do with it."
and with that, you have to respect a man who's ignited countless flame wars with thousands of lines of code
"Anybody who tells me I can't use a program because it's not open source, go suck on rms. I'm not interested." (LT 2004)
Now that has GOT to hurt. The guy that tons of geeks look up to (rightly or wrongly), has just said that he doesn't really give a rats ass about
what one of the Big Names keeps going on about....
Why should he care? Torvalds doesn't have an argument with RMS and RMS doesn't have an argument with Torvalds! LINUX = KERNEL. All Torvalds works on is Kernel, is Linux. Linux is not GNU/Linux.
RMS wants distributors of complete UNIX systems to call their stuff GNU/Linux.
Why is Red Hat called "Red Hat Linux", and not just "Red Hat"? To let you know that it's using the Linux kernel. But they use the entire GNU operating system too! The C library, the compilers, the linker, the text, shell and file utils, the shell... are all GNU. Without them, you wouldn't have a UNIX OS. So why not call it "Red Hat GNU"? Well, then you're missing the kernel used in the GNU OS, so to be fair, call it "Red Hat GNU/Linux". Quite simple.
People have just got it into their head that Linux and GNU are the same thing, because they're almost always used together, and unfortunately Linux is a catchier name than GNU or GNU/Linux, so people just say that.
since they are clued in they'll ask good questions and hopefully stop moaning abt clueless hacks.
Give me a break. If you think you can do it better, sign up as a journalist on OSNews and see how deep the rabbit hole goes. Please, you are welcome!
And btw, we do it for fun, I did not go to a journalist school, english is not even my first language.
I believe that the BSD Interview we had the other day was the best we ever did, and this one was the worst we ever did, not because the questions were invalid, but because Linus wants to play it "a star" and snobbing all of us from really answering the questions asked. His call of course, but don't shoot down the postman.
Eugenia
---
OSNews Editor
So, anyone been working on using computers to create new lifeforms?
Linus, at the end of the interview:
The next "revolution" is going to be the same thing - not about the technology itself being revolutionary, but a shift in how you look at it and how you use it.
What's that shift going to be? Who knows. Maybe it will have nothing directly to do with computers at all, just using computers to create new life-forms or whatever..
-- dR.fuZZo
I worry about Linus and also Linux. I feel like Linus is trying to disassociate himself from Linux because he has two dynamics at work inside him.
1. Linus realizes that he really is the leader of a large and idealistic movement, and would like to see the Good Things(tm) keep rolling.
2. Linus either feels that he is not the man to lead, or he realizes that he cannot be the leader forever.
His reaction is unfortunate. If he really does want things to keep rolling, he needs to provide for a sustainable method of succession of power.
Linux is a religion these days. Really. It may not have gods, but it has a fiercly defended ideology that really does border on the metaphysical.
Human knowledge is libre is not so much a radical notion, but its particular application to technology is very radical--bordering on the spiritual.
Look at all the major world religions. They have all suffered at some point due to the schisms created by lack of smooth power succession. These problems are inherent to systems where there is one guru.
I hope I'm not decending into troll territory here, but the FreeBSD core team idea is a very good one. There are no succession problems, and the team seems to deal well with changes in staff despite the smaller numbers of people working on the project.
-Peter
. Penguins Surely Ca
yahm, RMS calls himself rms too. They're both good guys and they both do what they have passion for. They probably even like that about each other.
Plato: Linus, do you agree there is a human nature?
Torvalds: You know, I could care less. I don't think anything is going to really change if we discover there is indeed a human nature.
Hobbes: But surely you must account that people do what they do to serve their own ends?
Torvalds: Again, see my answer to human nature. It just doesn't matter to me.
[end philosopher round robin]
The thing is that there is an incredible difference between Torvalds and Stallman. Torvalds told us he isn't a big thinker. Stallman is. Insert Stallman in the above conversation he would definitely give the big thinkers something to argue about.
The reason there so much more contraversy over Stallman than Torvalds is because Stallman allows us to disagree with him. You can't disagree with Torvalds point of view because he doesn't have one. Stallman's view of human nature is directly involved in what we consider today free software. Just like the US Fathers of Constitution view of democracy is directly involved in what is today the United States.
I argue that those of you tuned to your computing terminals without thinking of the big picture--the so called pragmatists--that you have no way of arguing against those who do. And I plead you to not argue when you really don't know what you are talking about.
He's simply saying he doesn't take sides, he doesn't care what it's called. He calls his kernel linux, and what anyone else does with it or wants to call it is completely up to them.
THAT is what open-source is about... so many seem to miss that.
See point 5 as well, about competition. Linus says he's not competing with anyone.. just working on linux. He isn't trying to make linux a windows killer.. he's just trying to make it better.
On the other hand, Linus speculated about computers being used to create new life forms. So perhaps he has a little /. blood after all.
I like Linux just as much as the next guy, but Linus is proving to be just about the most lame "leader" in the business. To not care about the competition is silly; even if you don't want to compete, there are good ideas everywhere (even in Windows... Deal with it) that would serve Linux well. He ignores them. That's great. I really want to bet the future on Linux in business using that kind of approach.
He may think he's sounding noble, but in my opinion he's showing a side of his "benevolent dictatorship" that could impact Linux in negative ways. His attitude toward innovation seems lack-lustre, he seems to be just arrogant enough to think that what HE has on his plate is all that anyone should want, yadda yadda yadda.
I'll keep using Linux, but I sure hope Linus isn't in charge of Linux's future direction. If so, don't be surprised if there's a mutiny at some point (lots of his core team are people who work for commercial Linux companies. Competition IS important to them, and they could very easily fork the kernel and move forward from there. Alan already does his own thing to an extent; the next step won't be much of a leap).