Review: Yellow Dog Linux 2.2

fabiolrs writes: "imaclinux.net is running a review on Yellow Dog Linux 2.2. They could manage to run it on the iBook. YDG 2.2 is a great distro with KDE 2.2.2, Gnome 1.4, kernel 2.4.18 and Xfree86 4.2.0." Nice to see PPC systems (meaning "Apple," mostly) getting so much attention in the Linux world lately -- Mandrake's 8.2 PPC is also getting close to a release.

Comments

fp?

[n3r0.m4dski11z]

props to beer!

fr to fp?

[MisterBlister]

First reply to first post!!!!

Bow before ZOD, SUCKAS!

Re:fr to fp?

[vena]

that's KNEEL before Zod, dude.

Re:fr to fp?

[MisterBlister]

Welcome the to new world of trolling, where trolls not only try to get a response, but hope to get one which is likely to be moderated down!!

KISS MY ADIDAS!!! Sho' Nuff!

the truth!

[trollercoaster]

I hate to stir up more trouble, but Yellow Dog Linux is run by a bunch of child molesting, cocaine distributing, AIDS-infected Satanists who routinely butcher small puppies and kittens in worship of the Dark Lord. They are best friends with Gary Condit and he helped pull out Chandra Levy's teeth with a pair of pliers.

You are welcome to post your agreement below.

i was wrong

[fabiolrs]

sorry people! my fault! yellow dog linux 2.2 actually RUNS on an ibook!

Re:i was wrong

[Anonymous Coward]

They could manage to run it on the iBook.

isn't that what you said?

Re:i was wrong

[sllort]

No, you were just unintentionally right. "They could manage to run it on the iBook" means that they were able to run it on an iBook. Maybe you meant to say that they couldn't run it, but you made a Freudian penis. I mean slip.

It's about time...

[carm$y$]

It's about time for a decent OS on that platform. I heard it is a dog, so Yellow Dog 2.2 may be the right decision.

[DUCKS]

Re:It's about time...

[Anonymous Coward]

[KICKS] (knocking out your teeth because you ducked)

Sorry, you shouldn't have ducked!

Past YDL releases were good too

[NewbieSpaz]

I managed to get YDL 2.0 running on my old Apple clone - A Power Computing Power Tower 220e. I have a G3 upgrade card in it, and it works well. I can't wait to try 2.2, hopefully it will be even better at supporting the weird clone hardware. I should download it soon...
YDL's RPMs make it easy for anyone who's familiar with Redhat or Mandrake to get YDL running on a PPC. Woohoo!

Detailed explanation as to why Linux sucks

[Anonymous Coward]

Lets look at the facts....

FACTS:
1. Linux sucks

We can now conclude....

Conclusion
1. Linux sucks

Re:Detailed explanation as to why Linux sucks

[Anonymous Coward]

I just bought an IBM/Lucent PCMCIA WLAN card.

Windows XP recognizes and sets it up perfectly.

The "easy to use" Linux, Mandrake, recognizes the card, does the ifconfig and route stuff, but it still doesn't work.

Fuck that shit. I'm going to format the Linux partition on my laptop right now.

Re:Detailed explanation as to why Linux sucks

[Anonymous Coward]

I just bought an IBM/Lucent PCMCIA WLAN card.

Linux Mandrake recognizes and sets it up perfectly.

The "easy to use" Windows, XP recognizes the card, does the plug-and-pray stuff, but it still doesn't work.

Fuck that shit. I'm going to format the Windows XP partition on my laptop right now.

Re:Detailed explanation as to why Linux sucks

[Anonymous Coward]

Typical smell GNU hippie.

You don't create. You just copy stuff.

Re:Detailed explanation as to why Linux sucks

[Anonymous Coward]

YAY!!! Windows is the greatest!!! YAY!!! I'm a dirty WHORE!! YAY!!! I'm a paid shill! YAY!!!

Lying in court is GOOD BUSINESS!!! YAY FOR MICROSOFT!!! YAY!!! Oh, I can't wait to see the Bad Guys go FREE!!! YAY!!! Cheer with me for the bad guys!! YAY!! I have no scruples!! YAY!!

Microsoft makes the world a better place by lying so much!! YAY FOR LYING!!! YAY FOR CRIME!!! YAY!! I'm a paid shill!! YAY!!

I've never used PPC

[B3ryllium]

I've never had a chance to use PPC, is it more interesting than x86? ;-)

Re:I've never used PPC

[fabiolrs]

well...

almost 10 years ago i was able to conect a new printer on the network and print from any client without installing anything! :))

Re:I've never used PPC

[Anonymous Coward]

Ooh, sounds interesting. What part of that printer used PPC? A machine it was hooked to, or was it embedded? What OSes were involved?

Re:I've never used PPC

[Anonymous Coward]

I've never had a chance to use PPC, is it more interesting than x86? ;-)

Naw. It's fairly boring. They don't require any futzing around, and PPC's don't heat up like August in Texas. Install and run -- boring stuff.

;-) back atcha

Re:I've never used PPC

[B3ryllium]

Yeah, I thought so. Sounds boring.

:)

Re:I've never used PPC

[Anonymous Pancake]

Nope, just a whole lot slower

Re:I've never used PPC

[Strog]

I'd have to agree with this. I have YDL 2.1 on a 8600 and it is identical to most other linux installs on x86. Just have it in a little bit cooler case.

Re:I've never used PPC

[mekkab]

oh, it's definitely sexier. Maybe not exactly interesting, but sexy.

Re:I've never used PPC

[Anonymous Coward]

When you choose PPC, you choose to marginalize yourself. Life is harder - less hardware, less software, less support.

In many ways it is the same problem faced by those who choose to become homosexual. You are marginalized.

• Pros: ``Hey everyone! I'm different!''
• Cons: ``Hey everyone! I'm different!''

The question you must ask yourself is whether the "pros" outweigh the "cons".

Re:I've never used PPC

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't agree, I use Yellow Dog 2.1 on my G4 and it rocks and smokes PCs running Red Hat (which I love.) The PPC IS a faster chip and performs better. It's easy to get things going these days. Older distributions were tough (linuxPPC was painful.) I have everything I have on my PCs. Source compiles, hardware is available, etc. Nothing to complain about.

Re:I've never used PPC

[Enahs]

True, but as far as I'm concerned, it's not that big of a deal. I work in a print-oriented shop, and as far as I can tell, the only hardare we're missing out on is the cheap crap--and not much of that.

Oh, wait, I forgot. We're still in the post-dotbomb days of "CHOICE IS BAD" and it's time to hail MS for helping keep the geriatric x86 line around.

Re:I've never used PPC

[leinhos]

Here's one interesting point. Most PPC machines have a bunch more interrrupts than the legacy x86 machines. When are PC makers going to give us more than 15 usable interrupts?

cat /proc/interrupts
CPU0 CPU1
9: 24405 0 OpenPIC Edge Built-in Sound out
10: 0 0 OpenPIC Edge Built-in Sound in
19: 2776759 0 OpenPIC Level ide0
20: 9516 0 OpenPIC Level ide1
24: 1 0 OpenPIC Level Built-in Sound misc
25: 0 0 OpenPIC Level VIA-PMU
27: 3704799 0 OpenPIC Level usb-ohci
28: 0 0 OpenPIC Level usb-ohci
41: 123719306 0 OpenPIC Level eth0
47: 0 0 OpenPIC Level GPIO1/ADB
55: 0 0 OpenPIC Edge NMI - XMON
72: 11137 13059 OpenPIC Edge IPI0 (call function)
73: 172139016 235590613 OpenPIC Edge IPI1 (reschedule)
74: 0 0 OpenPIC Edge IPI2 (invalidate tlb)
75: 0 0 OpenPIC Edge IPI3 (xmon break)
IPI (recv/sent): 407753825/407753914
BAD: 4

i wouldn't call it great..

[Anonymous Coward]

bug ridden (take a look at their yup, update program for example, core software for the distro and it doesn't work right), difficult to install and very poor support is more like it. take a look at the ydl mailing list for lots of complaints. in addition the company has a pretty lousy policy of releasing iso images months after it's available in stores (to get people to buy it). i miss linuxppc, that was a good distro. fortunately debian, suse and mandrake are available.

posted anonymously so i don't get my butt sued .

Re:i wouldn't call it great..

[SerpentMage]

Sorry I cannot agree with that. I like YDL because they are the only ones trying to keep up with the latest and greatest. Look at Suse and Mandrake and there is no effort whatsoever.

I use YDL 2.1 with Natilaus installed and have say it is totally cool. Have not looked back.

Re:i wouldn't call it great..

[ChadN]

Debian, Debian, Debian (unstable). As bleeding edge as you want to be (and will still be up-to-date 5 months from now). So, YDL is not the *ONLY* one.

Re:i wouldn't call it great..

[Laplace]

SuSE doesn't release any ISOs any more. Why is it fortunate that they have a distro if what you want' doesn't meet your criteria.

p.s. I've used the PPC beta from Mandrake, and it looks to be pretty good. My preference is to run SuSE 7.3, though

Re:i wouldn't call it great..

[Anonymous Coward]

Could you do better? if so then why dont you offer your self to YellowDog and help them better their distro!

Re:i wouldn't call it great..

[Brother Grifter]

First off, if more people purchased YDL in stores, they'd have more resources to allow for better support. With mandrake, its also necessary for you purchase it to get support as well. Same with RedHat.

Second, LinuxPPC was also the most broken distro ever. Their installer used rpm -i --force to install all the packages. Ximian had the an incredibly hard time trying to support the LinuxPPC distro with their RedCarpet service.

YDL has a very active community on irc (#ppclinux on openprojects.net), where support is top notch, and help with any issued is can be resolved if you ask in the channel.

Debian is a great distribution, but it doesn't have the wizards and configuration utilities that come tailored for ppc machines. YDL does, and YDL 2.2 has a slew of these wizards to help any new user setup any modern (and older) apple machines.

Finally, I'd like to say that the community that uses YellowDogLinux all try very hard to contribute to this distribution, and to help its users with any problems as best as it can. In the true spirit of linux, you can't ask for much more.

Re:i wouldn't call it great..

[SerpentMage]

Fair enough... Sorry for forgetting about Debian

Re:i wouldn't call it great..

[jchristopher]

Does Debian work on the iBook2 without screwing around? By "work" I mean working sound, airport, modem, and ethernet without having to download and/or compile a kernel or look up how-to's and type command line mumbo-jumbo. 3 ISOs is a big download if I'm just setting myself up for a disappointment. Mandrake 8.2 is almost there but some stuff still doesn't work.

Re:i wouldn't call it great..

[Analog Penguin]

"Does Debian work on the iBook2 without screwing around?"

No. If you have an iBook2 and you don't like "screwing around", stay away from Debian like Bill Gates upon encountering a penguin in a dark alley. I've been at it for over three weeks (admittedly not full time every day, but for a good solid week at least) and have only managed to get rudimentary sound support a few days ago. If you want internal modem support and you have an iBook 600, forget it. Period. There are some beta drivers for x86, but who can say when we'll get some. (That's another reason it's taken me so long.)

(Before that gets modded down as flamebait, let me point something out. I'm having a hell of a great time doing this. Tinkering with this system and trying to get it running smoothly, and perhaps ultimately displacing the Mac OS entirely, is some of the most fun I've ever had. Alright, back to the real post...)

On the other hand, getting sound, ethernet, and airport working is a snap. Just download the source for BenH's kernel from ppckernel.org, find the iBook .config file on ibooklinux.net, type make oldconfig, and you're set. Finding and following a standard kernel compiling tutorial is no problem...I had no clue about any of this stuff, but I managed to stumble my way through, and feel fairly comfortable with it now. Most of the work is already done by other people; you just need to find their stories online. BenH's kernel has airport, ethernet, sound, etc, though some (VERY) minor digging will be necessary to get it working.

One last side note. Don't download all 3 ISOs. You only need the first one and the last two are full of packages that are out of date already. Just install a minimum system off the first ISO and use dselect to download the latest unstable stuff. Just make sure to print out every scrap of online documentation you can find BEFORE you try to install, and be ready for plenty of reformats.

This page should help a lot...though his "Sound" section is quite outdated now, everything else is very helpful:
http://www.xiph.org/~jack/ibook/

Although now that I look back at your original post, I see that you don't want to have to bother with command line mumbo-jumbo and kernel compiling. Personally, that kind of stuff is a blast for me, but if it's not for you, trust me, Debian is not the way to go. On the other hand, if any other enterprising iBook user happens to be reading this, hopefully it'll help their day out a bit :)

Re:i wouldn't call it great..

[ChadN]

I simply did a net install onto my iBook2 using Brandon Robinson's (and others) web instructions. I then upgraded to Debian's "unstable/development" branch, which installs linux 2.4.18, and is mostly all synced up with the powerpc linux developers. Everything works (except, I'm told, the modem, which I don't use)

However, if it your first Debian experience, it won't be as smooth as a Mandrake install, especially if you don't have a decent network connection (ie. can afford to download a few hundred megs). A recent burn of the unstable branch on CD would be best.

Frankly, while I use Debian, I installed Mandrake on my girlfriend's PC, and think it is fine for people not as concerned with daily updates and developments. But once you get used to Debian's method of keeping up to date, even Mandrake seems a little limiting (Debian has over 9000 software packages ready for download)

Also, the Debian net install allows you to easily get going with a small install (less than one CD worth), and gradually install things as you need them. MUCH better than downloading and burning install CDs, if it is an option.

Re:i wouldn't call it great..

[leinhos]

Well, evey distro has it's quirks. The 'bone' I'd like to pick with YellowDog (sorry) is that it *requires* MacOS to install on older ('Old World') machines like my Wallstreet Powerbook. A Linux distro that depends on another OS to boot? My LinuxPPC 2KQ4 CD had *no* problems booting or installing without MacOS installed (it used miboot for oldworld machines). The funny thing is that BootX (the MacOS bootloader) comes with miboot included, so why didn't the install cd default to that, and then give the user the choice of boot methods after the install was complete?

cha-ching ($0.02)

I don't get it

[Anonymous Pancake]

Apple has a great unix os available for their platform. It is native and that means it is optimized for mac. It has many native programs for it and a very good gui. It has the command line that geeks love.

I'm talking about OS X.

Who needs linux on mac now?

Re:I don't get it

[2nd Post!]

Not to be mean, but how about Macs without OS X support?

To be fair, it seems weird for the developers to be playing with *modern* Macs, instead of 6 year old Macs, but hey, the new iBook is cool.

Re:I don't get it

[Strog]

Me on my pre-G3 machine. It runs much quicker than OS X on my iMac but nvidia issues make OS X look better on this G4 Quicksilver

Re:I don't get it

[IamTheRealMike]

How about .... people who don't like OS X but have a Mac? They do exist you know

Re:I don't get it

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, they exist, but usually it is because they haven't used OS X for a very long time.

Re:I don't get it

[kaimiike1970]

They certainly do exist. The speed difference between OS9.2.1 and OSX is astonishing. The thing is, most of the people that I know that have Macs and don't like OSX are graphic designers that must use Photoshop (which until recently was not OSX compatible) and Quark (which for some reason was just updated but is not OSX compatible). I don't think these people (graphic designers!+*nix =ouch!) are candidates for a *nix distro of any kind though.

Re:I don't get it

[BlowCat]

Your comment shows that your are not a developer. It's much easier to develop on a 500 MHz machine than on a 100 MHz machine. Less time to compile. Usually less time to reboot if the system crashes. Less time between the idea and the implementation. And you don't necessarily have to support all new hardware - you don't need the new soundcard to compile stuff.

Re:I don't get it

[2nd Post!]

What, you mean develop on the fastest Mac, test on the slowest Mac?

This is Linux here! You can code on a fast *or* slow Mac, thanks to NFS, X, and vi or emacs, and compile on the fastest platform available.

Essentially the point being you can own 'the fastest' Mac to do your compiling and such, but you don't actually 'need' to test it on the highest end hardware because you really want to target the lowest end hardware, meaning you should be running, writing code, and using lowest 'mean' available hardware, even if you use the highest end for compilation purposes.

KDE 2.2.2?

[e1en0r]

But everyone knows KDE 3 is the best. I saw it on the poll. It must be true.

Re:KDE 2.2.2?

[Anonymous Coward]

No no, that was which crashes faster, duh.

Eh?

[xdfgf]

"YHBT. YHL. HAND"

Anyone know what that means?

PPC linux is neat.

Re:Eh?

[Anonymous Coward]

Well fuck me up the ass and call me a bitch!

Re:Eh?

[Guns n' Roses Troll]

YHBT = Yank Harder, Brutal Teen
YHL = Yogurt Horking Lesbian
HAND = Handle Asshole, Never Dirty

That last one sounds like a Jap product slogan.

Re:Eh?

[Anonymous Coward]

Ooh ooh yeah bitch.

YDL has issues

[h4l0]

the last time i used YDL (which was about a year and a half ago) it was utter crap. from the sound of this review it looks like it has improved some but not a whol lot. i realise they dont have alot of people working on it, but still you should make sure the basic functionality is there before you realease it.

Re:YDL has issues

[Strog]

YDL is a little behind Redhat releases so it isn't up to latest and greatest by any means. YDL 2.1 was based on Redhat 7.0 base which had its fair share of teething. YDL 2.2 is based on Redhat 7.2 which is a fairly solid release. Redhat 7.3 is basically here now so YDL 2.2 isn't so shiny and new. This could be a good thing if consider that Redhat 7.2 is fairly well tested at this point so you should be fairly aware of what you are getting into.

Mandrake is getting 8.2 ppc ready to roll out a little after the x86 8.2 release so that will be a little more cutting edge if you are looking for that. Mandrake is focusing their resources on New World machines so Old World support might not all you hope for.

13 posts, site down

[westyx]

'nuff said

Re:13 posts, site down

[Anonymous Coward]

maybe it is your internet access, site has worked fine for me since post 1!!

Record?

[mclaren_1010]

Is this a record slashdotting? 12 comments? I guess they aren't running YDL on that imac : ).

Germany may bail out football clubs if Kirch fails

[Anonymous Coward]

The German government on Thursday stepped in to protect the livelihood of Germany's football clubs from financial troubles at Kirch Gruppe, the debt-laden media group.

The federal finance ministry said it was considering an appeal to offer German clubs a credit guarantee to shield them from a possible insolvency of KirchMedia, Kirch's core rights trading and free-TV unit.

The move comes amid rising concern at the Deutsche Fussball Liga, the umbrella organisation for first and second division clubs, about KirchMedia's ability to honour payments related to its acquisition of the broadcasting rights for the sport last year.

KirchMedia holds the rights until 2004 but the Liga is now looking to approach other potential buyers as Kirch has failed to gather support from creditors to save the unit from bankruptcy.

KirchMedia only managed to honour a E100m instalment to the Liga in February thanks to an emergency credit from its banks and is facing additional payments in May and August. Such payments can make up to half the income of Germany's 36 first and second division clubs.

In Britain an official at the department for culture, media and sport said the government had not seen the details of plans to set up a German fund to support football clubs if Kirch collapses. However, the official ruled out any similar action for clubs in the UK threatened with ruin after TV group ITV Digital was forced into administration.

"There's no way taxpayers' money will be used to bail out ITV Digital or the football clubs. The German situation does not change that policy," the official added. Any aid to the German clubs could have to be approved by the European Commission and an investigation may deepen the dispute between Brussels and Berlin, which has accused the European authorities of anti-German bias.

Commission officials said there had been no previous case of state aid to football clubs but cautioned it was not certain whether this could be considered state aid under EU rules.

The commission would have to consider whether the aid harmed competition in more than one country. The government could also claim it is protecting national heritage, exempting itself from EU scrutiny.

A spokeswoman for the federal economics ministry said talks about a credit guarantee had been held with the regional government of North-Rhine Westphalia and the Liga, but that no decision had been reached.

Wolfgang Clement, prime minister of North-Rhine Westphalia, said the guarantee, to be shared between the federal and regional governments, would allow less wealthy clubs to draw bank loans should KirchMedia default.

The guarantee would be available for half a year, he said. He declined to comment on its size but people close to the talks said it would not exceed E200m.

Competition lawyers questioned whether the commission would intervene in a politically charged area such as football. "The commission would be reluctant to stop the payment to German football clubs," said James Killick, a Brussels-based lawyer for White & Case.

Meanwhile, the fate of Kirch Gruppe, which is creaking under a E6.5bn debt pile, was hanging in the balance yesterday as key creditors and minority shareholders reconvened in Munich for a last-gasp attempt at rescuing KirchMedia.

Negotiations about a E150m bridge loan and an E800m capital increase collapsed on Tuesday after KirchMedia's creditor banks failed to persuade minority shareholders to participate in the loan.

oh no

[Anonymous Coward]

I am afraid of all the post about how great macosx is, and why anyone would want to do this.

As hard as it may be to believe some of us like linux guis more that competing ones. It is a personal decision. Lets JUST talk about the merits of this program...

Re:oh no

[gowmc]

Main thing about YDL is the ability to run on pre G3 systems, whereas Mac OS X needs a hack to do so.

Yellow Dog 2.2??

[Anonymous Coward]

Why would I want to use Yellow Dog Linux 2.2 when Red Hat Linux 7.2 is already out?? Red Hat has a higher version number so that means it's more recent, right?

I think these Yellow Dog people have some work to do.

Re:Yellow Dog 2.2??

[Strog]

Then maybe you would like Mandrake 8.2 or better yet Windows 2000. Somebody should invent Linux Infinity. Of course the sequel would be Linux Infinity+1.0.

Anyone know of a good faq

[BiggestPOS]

That has to do with dual-booting Yellow Dog Linux and OS X? just asking.

Re:Anyone know of a good faq

[woggo]

check out this on OpenFirmware and this on partitioning your Mac.

Re:Anyone know of a good faq

[cnmill]

Actually they have a pretty good video (.ram) that answered all of my questions on it. Don't have hte HW to try YDL on though.

Debian & iBook

[Leone]

I have used Mandrake on x86 for several years, but two weeks ago I bought myself an iBook (my old Toshiba fell on the floor, RIP) and decided to go with Debian Woody PPC.

To my great surprise it went mostly smooth. I downloaded a minimal CD image and got up and running from there. apt-get install really is as cool as they say ;)

My biggest problem was that by default I had kernel 2.2 something and PMU (APM for Mac) crashed and burned. 2.4 fixed that though.

I really can't say that PPC is so mega-cool, but walking around with an Apple laptop (very rare) with Linux installed (almost as rare) is very geeky ;)

Re:Debian & iBook

[NorseGod]

Excuse me but... did you buy an iBook with OS X and replaced it with an old linux distro?

Man that sounds weird to me :]

Re:Debian & iBook

[connorbd]

Yeah. Why exactly would you do that when you've already got OS X? I mean, I'm a Linux fan myself, but unless you're making a political statement (and one can argue that if you are, an iBook is not the platform to be making it on) OS X is as good a system for most purposes (if not better because you don't have to go through the trouble of downloading OpenOffice).

/Brian

Re:Debian & iBook

[jchristopher]

Well, OS X is quite slow on the iBook while Linux is not. So that might explain part of the reason someone might want to switch.

Re:Debian & iBook

[Anonymous Coward]

I really hope you don't think 'Debian' is an old linux distro. The latest stable release of it is old, but testing has fairly recent packages, and unstable has very recent packages. I'm not debating the stability of the packages, but I think most people that use Debian do not stick with the stable release.

Re:Debian & iBook

[Leone]

As someone already replied - Linux is a lot faster (I use Gnome and Nautilus, imagine that ;). And I have also got so used to Linux I couldn't work in OS X comfortably.

L.

at least now we know you are truly bonkers

[llamalicious]

If you're using these numbers to do anything important, you're insane

Re:Germany may bail out football clubs if Kirch fa

[justin sane]

Are you a real weener, or are you just playing one on /.?

Link to YDL

[george399]

Why is there no link to YDL itself , but instead there is actually a link to Mandrake in the main story?

Re:Link to YDL

[Strog]

You can only buy YDL 2.2 at the store or download the source rpms right now. The release for download is next week.

The Mandrake release is still beta but you can dl it. Maybe that's why.

Also..

[transient]

meaning "Apple," mostly

Terrasoft makes some nice PPC hardware in addition to their distro.

Re:Also..

[White Roses]

Frankly, I'm surprised that more hardware vendors who want to combat the Wintel cartel aren't using PPC chips. Sure, they're slower on the clock, but they are extremely powerful chips, and inexpensive when compared to Intel chips. I read over here hthat the latest, greatest G4 1 GHz chips are $295 for 10,000, whereas Intel's P4 2.4 GHz chips are $%620 for the same count. I suppose it might be a factor of 10 typo, but Motorola's chips are clearly less expensive to use that Intel's.

Why aren't more vendors who want to distribute Linux machines using PPC? Motherboard costs?

Of course this then begs the question of why Apple hardware is more expensive, but I'm typing this on my new iMac, so clearly I don't care.

I hate Linux

[Anonymous Coward]

"US warns EU not to strike back because of the steel tariffs".

What is this shit? "We can block your trade, but if you do the same we'll raise hell".

Supported hardware still needs a little work...

[MarcoJROM]

Too bad anyone with $2000 (back in 1997) worth of powerbook 1400 rubble liing around are STILL screwed. Check out the hw-support

Oh well...there's always other options:
Apokalypse linux
MachTen

Icon?

[Anonymous Coward]

Since this is both an apple and a linux story can't we get an icon that represents both? Maybe a penguin eating an apple or a Care Bears-like apple on the penguins stomach? I was going to suggest a penguin pooping an apple but I think some people might take it the wrong way

Ack! What's with the banner ad for Katz? It's bad enough you post stories by him but now I have to be reminded of his existence while reading decent /. articles!

No ISO? No go.

[greygent]

I'd try Yellow Dog on my TiBook, but they appear to be one of those companies who don't release ISO's to their distribution until they're virtually obsolete.

It's their right, but not a very good practice to try and win over new customers who don't want to spend $$$ to test out a new distribution.

Thankfully, I was able to get Debian installed. Now only if I could figure out how to boot it properly from OpenFirmware. The steps in the recent O'reilly article didn't work for me.

Re:No ISO? No go.

[Jupiter9]

Don't you people read?
The Yellowdog Linux website says the iso will be distributed on the 8th of April. That's four days from now.

Re:No ISO? No go.

[_typo]

Thankfully, I was able to get Debian installed. Now only if I could figure out how to boot it properly from OpenFirmware. The steps in the recent O'reilly article didn't work for me.

Branden Robinson (the debian XFree maintainer) has a page about that kind of stuff.

Re:No ISO? No go.

[greygent]

Yes, I read, that statement wasn't there as of a couple days ago.

Re:No ISO? No go.

[ichimunki]

Sheesh, if $30 will break your bank you have bigger fish to fry I think. If you're really interested in trying out YDL but are just too cheap to take a $30 chance on a set of CDs, then just use ISOs for 2.0 or 2.1! It's GNU/Linux. It looks just like every other GNU/Linux out there. If you don't like their package choices, or they aren't current enough for your bleeding-edge needs, then compile from source. Personally, I'd prefer paying $30 to Yellow Dog for a distro that works than dinking around all day and night trying to get Debian working. My time is worth more than that to me.

Re:No ISO? No go.

[ChadN]

I got my iBook (my first Mac ever, bought two weeks ago) up and running Debian (and dual booting OS X) using the various instructions on the web (links posted elsewhere in this thread). It was relatively straightforward; what problems specifically do you have, maybe we can help.

PS. Loving my iBook, BTW. It is small, fast, and QUIET! Also, it doesn't burn a hole in my lap.

Re:No ISO? No go.

[Coldfusion97]

The ISOs are hardly obsolete when they release them. Usually Terra Soft (the vendor that produces Yellow Dog) releases the ISOs a few weeks after the CDs start shipping.

They usually give themselves a few weeks to sell some CDs so they have SOME capital to continue development. I can hardly fault them for that, and to tell you the truth, I really don't mind because I'm already using the latest versions of a lot of the software that's included with Yellow Dog.

So you have to wait a couple of weeks to `yup update`* your distro, big deal.

* yup, or Yellow Dog Update, is a cross-platform CLI package management tool that Terra Soft maintains (similar to Debian's apt-get, but trimmed down).

Re:No ISO? No go.

[Anonymous Coward]

download the packages that you want and the boot floppy and use mkisofs. takes less time than downloading an entire image and burning it, since there is likely unwanted software on the vendor's CD. fat lazy troll!

Re:No ISO? No go.

[Tony.Tang]

Don't you people read?

Ha!

Obviously, you didn't notice that you were reading slashdot! You know this because if you scroll to the top, you'll see on the top left of your screen, a picture that says "Slashdot".

Re:No ISO? No go.

[laserjet]

Don't you people read?

No.

Thanks for asking. :)

Eurotrash

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, that's what you get for being eurotrash. Face it! The United States of America rules the world and there's nothing you can do about it!

Re:Eurotrash

[Anonymous Coward]

That's what the Romans said.

When I see shows like Jackass or Jerry Springer imported on my TV, I understand that the collapse is only a question of time...

Re:Eurotrash

[Anonymous Coward]

Exactly. The US is the Microsoft of the world.

They don't deserve to be where they are, they are afraid of playing fair, they lie, cheat and steal, and they have no history and no culture. They are violent thugs who never think of others or try to find a middle ground on any issue. They try to "win", even when they are in the wrong. They use their economic and military muscle to stop the evolution and growth of other countries and cultures, as well as retard the evolution of their own people, preventing newer and more efficient political, economic, and cultural systems and standards from coming to pass.

Of course, this is the American GOVERNMENT I'm talking about. Most American CITIZENS I know (including myself) are nice people. This, of course, excludes the rabid, violent, nonthinking revengeseekers who accept whatever the propaganda machine at CNN feeds them, and the devout trailertrash who milk the system and cripple our already nearly bankrupt economy for fun and profit.

What happened on 9-11?

I just can't believe nobody asks the question "Who profits the most from this?". The true American is a revolutionary who won't be held captive by a corrupt government - see "The Founding Fathers". The true American THINKS, especially when the media portrays complex issues as black-and-white. The true American lives life free, even if it only in his mind. The true American keeps the faith, and strives for a better country, culture, and world.

The NEW America betrays all these truths, in favor of fascism, plain and simple. The New America is what we fought against in WWII. We are what we fought. We have become the enemy, by letting small groups of powerful men control the masses in complete secrecy and unaccountability.

We will be a slave nation, and worse, enslavers of the world. And when I say "we", I don't mean us, the American people, I mean our government, who is already the reason we are almost universally despised worldwide. I am NOT my government, but I am held responsible for their actions, if only because I am a member of the sheep who voted them in. And the government doesn't consider us, the people, to be their equals, but rather cattle to be used and slaughtered if necessary. The government will NEVER share the benefits of their conquests with us. We are slaves, a resource to further their goals, a number on a hard drive.

If "they" would kill Kennedy et al. they'd kill a bunch of nameless stock speculators in order to secure America's place on the "Throne Of Power" for the next 100+ years. To think otherwise is to practice ignorance and naivete on a dangerously massive level. Who "they" are is left as an exercise for the reader.

Check out www.whatreallyhappened.com and have your eyes opened. It's time to start digging deeper than the sound bytes and stock footage of CNN.

Wake up, Chicken Little. The sky is falling.

Signed,

A TRUE AMERICAN WHO BELIEVES IN WHAT THE STATES *USED* TO STAND FOR, AND WHAT IT CAN STAND FOR AGAIN.

Re:Eurotrash

[Anonymous Coward]

i wholeheartedly agree. american's need to realize that raising their voices against the often unfair policies of the american government does not betray those who died on 9/11. the real betrayal is the comodification of the event which has occured in the media. the mega-corporations have turned it into a means of profit. using the events of 9/11 to fuel the "war on drugs", using it to attack intellectual opposition to the saddly facist tendencies of the government and creating a situation where honest people are afraid to express their views for fear of being "unamerican". now more than ever its important to be as pro-active as possible.

d.

Re:Eurotrash

[Anonymous Coward]

> Wake up, Chicken Little.

Wake up yourself. The world consists of more
than America and its government. Not everything
in the world emanates from Washington. Dozens
of countries have experienced Islamic terrorism
in the past decade, the USA is just the latest.

whatreallyhappened.com is a propaganda site.
At the moment it prominently displays an image
labelled "Palestinian man hanging in Ramallah",
above articles unanimously 'blaming Israel'.
The implication is that this man was a victim
of Israeli execution. Yet if you go to the URL
you'll find that the man was executed by
Palestinian forces for collaboration.

http://www.wnd.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=2 70 65

Mitchell Porter

Re:Eurotrash

[Anonymous Coward]

That was a very astute and timely observation. I noticed you're posting as AC, and I think that is even more telling than what you said, because it proves your point: free speech is disappearing. Self-evaluation is now dangerous. Questioning the motives or tactics of our leaders is deadly. Examining our countries' behavior and trying to suggest improvements is tantamount to treason.

These are the signs that we are living in a fascist state. How many of you are fearful of speaking against George Bush in this political climate? I know I am. Look at the laws being rammed through the system, the lack of checks and balances to keep the government honest, and you'll see that George W. Bush, because of September 11th, has carte blanche to do WHATEVER HE WANTS. NOBODY can stop him.

That scares me. A lot.

Just sign me,
Also an Anonymous Coward - for good reason.

And like the .sig says, "Chicken Little was an optimist".

Re:Eurotrash

[Anonymous Coward]

The world consists of more than America and its government.

Try telling THEM that.

signed,
A Finlander

Re:Eurotrash

[Anonymous Coward]

Uhhh... I'm on www.whatreallyhappened.com right now, and there IS no image labelled "Palestinian man hanging in Ramallah", or articles unanimously 'blaming Israel'. It doesn't look like they take anything down, either, since there's news going back to the beginning of March. I set my browser to search the page for "Palestinian man hanging in Ramallah", then "Palestinian man hanging", then just "Palestinian". Found lots of links on Palestinians, but not your link. No picture of a guy hanging either. Sorry.

Which brings me to the next point - that website pretty much only LINKS to news websites of interest. They're not concocting any of those articles. They're just linking to the Washington Times, Yahoo, slate.msn.com, Salon.com, Chicago Tribune, USA Today, Christian Science Monitor, Washington Post, Reuters, MSNBC, etc. Those are a few links I'm looking at right now. Not exactly disreputable sources. Would you trust NBC's news on TV and not on the net? Why?

They do have SOME articles (editorial-type stuff) they've written themselves, but by far the majority of stuff seems to be links to other sites' articles.

And the link you posted is TOTALLY one-sided. You should have known this guy was witch-hunting from the first sentences:

"This is the face of Yasser Arafat's terror. This is what it looks like. This is how he remains in power. This is why we continue to deal with this murdering fiend after more than 30 years."

Yeah. That sounds professional. He barely stops short of calling Arafat a "Brownskinned Pagan Devil". And nobody here's ever said Arafat was a nice guy. What the poster above said was "We should look at what THE U.S. GOVERNMENT is doing, and judge for ourselves whether it is warranted or not." That's all. The guy wants to make sure Bush doesn't become another Arafat or Sharon. That's all. We're losing our civil liberties over here, and if you remember the "temporary measure" known as INCOME TAX, you know that WHAT THE GOVERNMENT TAKES, YOU'LL NEVER GET BACK.

But thanks for your useless link to the website who claims on their "about" page to have been voted the Number 1 website on the internet for over a year during 1999 and 2000. Yeah, right. That's why I never heard of it. I should surf more. 60 hours a week must not be enough. And they were also voted the "stickiest" website. Yeah, these guys should see Slashdot. Alcoholics Anonymous would need a 15-step program to even make a dent on the Slashaholics here.

At least I got a kick out of the Last lines of his "article":

"Special offer: See the horrors with your own eyes captured on video. Get the documentaries, produced in France, "The Trojan Horse" and "Israel and the War of Images," both available in WorldNetDaily's online store.

Joseph Farah is editor and chief executive officer of WorldNetDaily.com and writes a daily column. Get an autographed, first-edition copy of Joseph Farah's 1996 book, "This Land Is Our Land," published by St. Martin's Press."

That's GOOD JOURNALISM if I ever saw it. REAL objective. I'll stick with my Reuters links if you don't mind.

What a loser. "Buy my video." Ha!

As an aside: Actually, I've been surfing Whatreallyhappened.com for a few hours now, and it's not too bad. I recommend it to the Slashdot community if you're interested in this type of stuff. There is a treasure trove of links there, and it's amazing to see what the Washington Post or the Globe and Mail (for you fellow Canadians) has to say about 9/11 or Enron or whatever. Good stuff, although pretty damn scary. Glad I'm from Canada. The only people who're gonna bomb us are the Americans for beating them in hockey.

Re:Eurotrash

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, the image was there, believe it or not.
Although it was gone within thirty minutes of
my post. As for the WorldNetDaily article,
I have my own problems with the author (he's
a creationist) and I would probably never have
looked at it again, if I had not seen its
central image a day later on whatreallyhappened,
given a completely opposite spin.

As far as I can see, whatreallyhappened.com is
currently functioning as a clearing-house for
any story that presents Israel and the USA as
the villains. Perhaps it helps to have all that
stuff in the one place, but don't tell me that's
the whole story about "what really happened".

Mitchell Porter
http://www.geocities.com/paris/chateau/150 0/war-li nks.html

Re:Eurotrash

[Anonymous Coward]

I like Noam Chomsky, myself. www.zmag.org

His credentials are impeccable, and he's Jewish. Being Jewish myself, he taught me not to root for Israel because they're my people and they follow the religion of my father, but to root for the truth, and justice, and honesty, wherever that may be found. Unfortunately, the Israeli government has lost the way. There is a difference between the Israeli government and the Israeli people. Don't hate Jews because our government is corrupt. They're just politicians, and all politicians have no morals. They are religious only to get the religious vote. They kiss babies only when cameras are rolling. And my father remembers Ariel Sharon maintaining terror among the Palestinians by driving a jeep filled with soldiers through Palestinian areas and machine-gunning women and children in the streets during the 60's, when he was a General in the military. He doesn't represent me - but I'm non-practicing, and young, and American, and dating a Christian, so I sometimes think all religion should be illegal. All it does is divide and justify monstrosities. People should be devoted to the truth, not their politicians, and not what their Rabbi or Pastor tells them. Yahweh/Jesus/Jehovah/Allah doesn't endorse murder. And if he does, should we still follow him?

And I, too, have followed the parent poster's link to WhatReallyHappened, and I think that what they give you is probably accurate, but they are too focused on one side. I think they're out to help the "underdogs" rather than find the whole truth, which is that "ALL politicians are dirtier than the mafia or organized crime". Arafat IS a terrorist, in the past he's allowed terrorism and even promoted it. Sharon is a monster as well, and I have many personal stories from my parents. Bush has ties to criminal organizations and seems to be in this for the money. I bet there's not a political leader in the world with a clean slate. Look at the Presidents. Bush, Clinton, Bush Sr., Reagan, Nixon, etc. Is there ANY clean politician? Every one of them was corrupted by his power. THAT'S the story WhatReallyHappened should be reporting on. That we are governed by tyrants, all of us, and wars are just little powerplays and squabbles between them. Voting on one country or another to win is like voting for Pepsi to kill Coke. We pick a side based on the propaganda we WANT to believe. It's not about us. It's none of our business, and meaningless. They don't represent us, they don't care about us, and both sides only want to use and exploit us. It's US and THEM. US being the world's people, THEM being the world's politicians.

Wage war on the system, not each other.

Re:Eurotrash

[Anonymous Coward]

THIS got modded down as a TROLL?? Okay, let me get this straight. Goatse.cx, Steven King is dead, BSD is dying, the page-widener, the Taco Snotting guy, and...

Intelligent conversation on an important topic. All trolls. Yeah. Right.

Who is the MORON who modded this down as a TROLL??? The moron mod just didn't agree with it. Good work, mod! Stifle that free speech, just like the guy said!

What crappy judgement to mod this down as a troll. Idiot. One of the BEST posts I've seen on /. in a long time, modded down as a troll. Kinda proves his point, in a funny way. Better conform, Slashdot mods'll get ya! Slashdot has SUCKED since Microsoft and the other corporations started paying people to promote themselves here.

Typical Crapdot Moderation Prowess at its best.

Re:Eurotrash

[Anonymous Coward]

A Jewish Anarchist. Cool, I thought I was the only one. After living with war and terrorism for 32 years, I moved to the States, to New York. Guess what happened three months later? Now, my wife thinks we're cursed.

Nice world. My life so far has taught me not to trust politicians under any circumstances, which has been hammered home by the fact that I'm working as a Civil Servant here in NY and am in meetings with fairly-high up people in the NY gov't quite often. They all try to please everybody, so they end up pleasing nobody. Same old story. What's worse is that some of our top guys have plaques that say "You can't make an omelette without breaking a few eggs." I don't want to be one of the eggs that gets in their way and gets broken.

Re:Eurotrash

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, if you look at the moderation breakdown on that post, it was modded (+1, Insightful) before some idiot came and downed it as a troll. I agree, the modtard was trying to censor content down to the point where only us AC's and TROLLGODS don't fear to tread. It was probably some Bushcountry.com homo who can't handle any friction that's not in his ass.

Intelligence on Slashdot is dead, as this guy being modded a troll demonstrates. Moderators punishing intelligent postings only serves to drive away the intelligent posters. Soon, Slashdot will be an empty hollow shell, a haven for us SCUM TROLLS. What a glorious day that will be. Taco will have to pay the intelligent posters a subscription fee to post here rather than the other way around.

The original poster should learn his lesson - Slashdot is not for intelligent posts, it's for trolling, flamebaiting, alerting us to a new kernel point release (Hooray! Yippee!), and making fun of Windows (not that Windows doesn't _deserve_ to be made fun of...). Slashdot is the Jerry Springer of internet tech news sites. It's not even lowest common denominator stupid. It's Joe Dirt stupid. Not even, it's Joe Dirt's Dog stupid. You know, the one who froze his nuts to the porch? That's the approximate IQ of the typical Slashdot reader. They statistically all use Windows because they're too STUPID to use Linux and too CHEAP to buy a Mac.

If you want intelligence, go elsewhere. Maybe Kuro5hin can help you. But on Slashdot, you have to wade through many repetitive postings of obvious stale data and karma whoring before you come to an eye-opening piece of introspective debate like the parent. Slashdot sucks.

I would like to state officially for the record that I would sign up for a (lame, stupid, desperate, corporate sellout) Fatdot subscription right now, if these fat lazy bastards at Slashsnot would let me filter out all posts OVER 0. I want to pretend all non-trolls don't exist. I don't come here to read that crap, I come here to read WIPO, the Page Widener, Goatse, and the guys who make Crapdot really tick. Trolls are the heart of Slackpot, and they should be respected as such. Don't mod down intelligent posts, cuz I DON'T WANNA READ THEM!!! Die, Moderators, DIE!!! YOU SUCK!!!

God Bless the Stupid,

Dr. Scooby
Slashdot Troll Academy
(Late to the Party as usual and already half in the bag)

P.S. EAT MY WHITE ASSNUT, MODERATOR FOOLS.

Why?

[Moridineas]

I really don't get the appeal of Linux on Mac (or PPC more generally). Sure, I can understand running linux on older macs, but for any OSX capable computer, what's the point? I can't think of anything you can do in linux but can't do in OSX, and MANY things you cannot.

Re:Why?

[Russ Steffen]

If you have to ask the question you will never understand the answer.

Re:Why?

[ichimunki]

How about view the source code for the operating system? Can you do that with OS X?

Re:Why?

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes...OS X is Darwin in a nice pretty package. http://www.apple.com/darwin

Re:Why?

[Moridineas]

Yes. Yes you can. It's called Darwin. Thanks for trolling!

Besides, source code for source code's sake isn't a good reason in my book. It may be in yours, de gustibus non est disputandem though. I prefer functionality and form over politics and open-source advocacy.

Re:Why?

[ocelotbob]

Because some people want to have choice in how they use their computer. Now, Aqua may have it's fans, but I'm not one of them; I like the more simplistic, straightforward looks of WindowMaker, I feel that the Aqua interface is bloated and ugly. Choice is a good thing - it causes better products all around, this is just another option for the user.

Re:Why?

[greygent]

> I can't think of anything you can do in linux but can't do in OSX

1.) Linux-specific development research
2.) Wireless security & research software

Re:Why?

[Moridineas]

So why not go X86 then? The hardware's cheaper, and by not using the OS for which the mac hardware is intended, you're losing out. Apple's argument has always been that by paying the premium for apple computers, you're paying for the package...by getting rid of the OSX, you're castrating the package.

Note: I'm not denying your argument...choice is a good thing...but why mac hardware over pc hardware, given price/performance differences is my question.

Re:Why?

[larane]

Linux actually works pretty well on new world Macs. I use it on an iBook2 500 mhz. Everything works for me (I don't use exotic hardware), and for anything not supported I simply boot up Mac-on-Linux. Want to look at something in Quicktime, for instance? Mac on Linux will do that just fine, with sound and all. I originally bought the iBook to use with OSX but I simply can't use it: it's too slow and I miss Linux apps (which with some work you can get to run on OSX--Fink works nicely, but it doesn't do KDE). Linux is so fast on that iBook--it really shows the promise of the technology. OSX is like computing through molasses--and don't even try to use Classic mode for anything complicated. Yes I can do X forwarding on OSX but it works SO much better under Linux. For browsers Mozilla is nice and Opera actually has a Linux PPC version as well. And btw I use a much customized and updated Yellow Dog 2.0 on this machine and can't complain too much--most everything worked out of the box. YDL does need to do MUCH better testing, but overall it's not a bad distro for the iBook2. And of course there's just the cool factor of the iBook running Linux (I use Liquid KDE, it looks beautiful on the bright monitor), if nothing else...

Re:Why?

[linuxjack55]

Why is this inane question posed every time an article about Linux on the PPC is posted?

Likely answers to the original question are:

1. Macintosh users are getting just as tired of Apple's corporate crap as Intel users are of Microsoft's. Despite Apple's warm and fuzzy PR persona, the only difference between it and Microsoft is annual revenue. Steve Jobs would trade places with Bill Gates in a heartbeat.

2. Large and important chunks of OS X are, and forever will be, proprietary, which means that end-users are, and forever will be, dependent on Apple for key OS functionality (or the lack thereof).

3. OS X is still a dog, albeit with fewer fleas.

4. More than one of something is a good thing.

5. Freedom from choice isn't really freedom.

6. Assuming that there are indeed things that OS X can do that Linux can't, those things aren't of sufficent value to end-users to justify the incremental cost and loss of control.

7. On a personal note, I got tired of waiting a decade for a new OS from Apple, only to be milked for two hundred bones for a retread that wasn't, and still isn't, ready for prime-time.

Re:Why?

[ocelotbob]

I'm fairly hardware platform agnostic; I'm not choosy, I'll take the hardware that gives the best bang for the buck. I also have occasional runs of brilliant luck in finding near-new products at incredible bargains. As a result, I have come across non-X86 hardware that is a good enough deal that I can't pass it up. However, I am very choosy about my software - I want it to work the way I want it to, which is why I use Linux, I have choice. OSX just doesn't give me the freedom, even though the hardware is pretty decent.

Re:Why?

[Laplace]

Because I don't like to spend my income on new computer equipment (I'd rather devote disposable income to photography and music). Because my 333 G3 beats the hell out of my 333 P2. Because I like the hardware. Because OS X is a dog on my machine.

Re:Why?

[IamTheRealMike]

I can't think of anything you can do in linux but can't do in OSX, and MANY things you cannot.

Use Linux?

Look, you may think OS X is the perfect OS and given a free copy the whole world would instantly convert, but I'm afraid I'm going to have to break it to you - that wouldn't happen. There'd be people who would tell you to get lost

I'd do it for personal beliefs (more below). Others don't like Aqua, don't like the Apple way. Whatever.

I, personally, believe the OS should be open. The OS together with the hardware are absolutely key to computing. Everything else revolves around them, which is why I believe they should be open. Now don't get me wrong, I'm no zealot, I don't give a monkeys ass about the applications on top. That can be as closed or as open as you like, suits me fine either way. I don't mind paying for software. But if one organisation controls the OS then you're heading for trouble, I mean look at Microsoft. I don't believe Apple would be any different in their shoes. And worse, Apple control the hardware too!

Once again, don't get me wrong. Apple produce lovely hardware, and lovely software. I'm willing to pay for those things, but only if I know they are open. Macs aren't standard hardware, though they are getting that way, they basically are made up of components that are standardised throughout the world. And OS X is like the Mac itself, sorta open.

But for me, sorta open isn't good enough. I think the OS should be like the web - governed but not chained to a neutral independant standards organisation like the W3C. Nothing like that exists .... yet

Re:Why?

[Anonymous Coward]

Good answer.

More than likely, he DOESN'T WANT to know the answer.

Re:Why?

[Lussarn]

Do you think Linux users would jump ship over to OS X if it where available for x86. I don't think so. We know our great and stable systems. OS X might be shiny but it isn't anyway near proven.

There are alot of us who would never code for a properiaty windowing system if it wasn't necesarry. Why should we run X on darwin when we already got Linux?

Re:Why?

[ichimunki]

No. You can't. Darwin is not the whole operating system. I also suspect that you don't get the source to any of the compatibility layers that help non-OS-X applications run. It's not a troll any more than your original post was. If you don't value software freedom then fine. But DUH, some of us do.

So here's something else you can't do with OS X that you can with YDL: copy it to your friends' computers legally.

As to your "why not x86 then?" post below: DUH again! It's a little thing called dual-booting. Yes, I'd like to have an all free software system, but why not *also* have the best proprietary OS available too?

And for many YDL users, I suspect YDL came *after* the purchase of the PPC hardware. It sure did in my case. In fact, OS X isn't going to run on my old mac, but with YDL I get to do all the fun stuff like code in Perl or Ruby and run the web browsers that give me control rather than the web designer, I get the email client I like, I get GnuPG, I get emacs, the list goes on and on. The only time I boot to Mac OS is to print or get pix off my digital camera.

Re:Why?

[connorbd]

Actually, it's much the same proposition as SPARC linux. SPARC was a popular early platform for Linux but it's faded into obscurity; hell, if I was going to buy myself a used SPARCstation I'd probably put NetBSD on it, not Linux.

Solaris is a very powerful, very stable system. People buy SPARC hardware to run Solaris, whether it's a cheapskate Blade box or a high-end enterprise server; while SPARC Linux is nice to have around for hack value, the vast majority of real-world Linux use is on Intel/AMD.

And now I completely undermine my own point.

I grant you that the proposition is a little different with an iBook; they're very elegant little computers with lots of nice features (the newer ones, that is). PowerPC Linux does have much more of a real-world presence than SPARC does right now, so there is a better case for it. Granted I can't afford IBM's obscene prices for a PowerPC box, but old Macs are easy enough to come by, and one never knows when the opportunity to hack a TiVo might pop up. That's why there seems to be a fair amount of pent-up demand for ATX PowerPC motherboards.

But the fact is that Linux on an iBook is a bit pointless, at least from a Mac fan's point of view. Look at it this way: you've just bought a laptop that is configured to run one of the most bulletproof operating systems in the industry, one with over thirty years of history behind it branching in from at least three different directions. MacOS X is every bit as good a system as Linux or Windows NT 5+ (2000 and XP), has more software support than the former, and doesn't abuse its users like the latter.

Granted, it does come down to a matter of taste. But if you've gone through the trouble of buying a Mac as your #1 system and don't have any particularly strong reason for not running a Mac OS (bandwidth-intensive processing using the gigabit ethernet in a G4 box comes to mind), you will at the very least get an awful lot of strange looks from a Mac crowd that is just getting used to the advantages of Unix and Open Source (especially on a portable, where the OS invariably is designed to fit the hardware like a glove no matter the platform).

/Brian

Re:Why?

[Moridineas]

I clearly said any OSX capable computer...thanks for reading my post.

Re:Why?

[Moridineas]

My point is, when buying a mac, Apple's argument has always been that you're buy a package...software and hardware and design all molded together in one package...thus the higher price. If you take away the OS, you're taking away a HUGE part of that...so if you want to run linux, why not spend 1/2 as much and get a much faster x86 machine?

Re:Why?

[Moridineas]

I don't believe it's an inane question, because I STILL don't understand the answer.

>1. Macintosh users are getting just as tired of >Apple's corporate crap as Intel users are of >Microsoft's. Despite Apple's warm and fuzzy PR >persona, the only difference between it and >Microsoft is annual revenue. Steve Jobs would >trade places with Bill Gates in a heartbeat.

Translation: Politics affect ease of use. Ok...

>2. Large and important chunks of OS X are, and >forever will be, proprietary, which means that >end-users are, and forever will be, dependent on >Apple for key OS functionality (or the lack >thereof).

A partially valid criticism..on the other hand, Linux hardware support isn't nearly as good as windows (in terms of the x86 platform), so why not go to windows if what you want is the ultimate in compatibility?

>3. OS X is still a dog, albeit with fewer fleas.
>
>4. More than one of something is a good thing.
>
>5. Freedom from choice isn't really freedom.

I'm somehow translating seemingly noble philosophical ideals into computer software.

>6. Assuming that there are indeed things that OS >X can do that Linux can't, those things aren't >of sufficent value to end-users to justify the >incremental cost and loss of control.

Such as QuarkXPress, Itunes, Photoshop, Digital camera integration, best user interface, CONSISTENT user interface, higher game availability, etc.

>7. On a personal note, I got tired of waiting a >decade for a new OS from Apple, only to be >milked for two hundred bones for a retread that >wasn't, and still isn't, ready for prime-time.

That seems somewhat churlish of you...I don't really see how it's not ready for primetime either.

Re:Why?

[Laplace]

Ha!

Syntax vs. semantics again. You, my friend, are an ass.

Re:Why?

[Moridineas]

What's the point...I don't understand. You clearly attacked my argument in a way that avoided my point, and in fact agreed with me (I made a PARTICULAR exception for people like you...running linux on old and slow macs). So instead you call me an ass. Thanks for the intelligent conversation.

Re:Why?

[laserjet]

You have a good point, and I happen to agree with you. There will always be some people who go against the grain (twice in this instance... one for buying an apple, another for running linux on it).

Being both an AMD box and an Apple laptop owner, I like both. I use my AMD athlon as my home computer, and my apple as my laptop. on my home station, I use mandrake, on my laptop, strictly OS X.

OS X is not perfect, but I like it a lot. THe thing I really love is that I can run an X client on it so I can run X apps remotely on my laptop at work. The rest of the crap I do is through a terminal, so OS X is just fine, thank you.

OS X has many advantages: power management, better graphics, the modem works, more software, better hardware support.... everything just works.

and, you are right in that it is a package you are buying. some people just like to change things to their liking for philisophical or other reasons.... I personally am not up to that much work. I love linux on x86 hardware, but when I buy a Mac, I buy if for the lovely hardware and the good software and multimedia capabilites. Some people just love to tweak! good for them, i say, because if you have a choice in which OS you cna run on any given hardware, that is good for everyone.

Re:Why?

[laserjet]

The guy that replied to you is an idiot and did not read your post.

you basically said that you understood running linux if OS X was a dog on whatever hardware one had... he is just illiterate.

Re:Why?

[laserjet]

I'm not saying I don't agree with you, but can you give a specific example of where OS X does not work the way you want it to? Just curious...

Re:Why?

[ocelotbob]

Perhaps one of the biggest dislikes I have with OSX is how it hanldles windows; on my box, I use WindowMaker, it's small, fast, and doesn't use a lot of memory. I like simplicity in my window manager - just give me a close button and a minimize button, and throw all the rest of the items in a context menu. I also like the way it handles task switching. You don't have to worry about a dock being hidden behind an application window, you just have to find a small amount of open desktop space, and right click to pull up the task list. Additionally, the dock is there if I want to use it, I'm just not forced into the matter. I enjoy the customizability of Linux - if I want a feature, it's probably there, if I don't, I can turn it off just as easily, I don't need Gates or Jobs telling me how I should work.

Re:Why?

[linuxjack55]

"Translation: Politics affect ease of use. Ok..."

Please read your own post. Ease of use wasn't even mentioned in it. The question you asked was why people would run Linux on PPC. One's perception of how a company relates to its customers is certainly a valid (and perhaps the most important) criterion for determining whether one is going to purchase - and how one is going to use - a company's products.

"A partially valid criticism..on the other hand, Linux hardware support isn't nearly as good as windows (in terms of the x86 platform), so why not go to windows if what you want is the ultimate in compatibility?"

Huh?

How does a concern over the proprietary aspects of key Mac OS X components translate into a desire for hardware compatibility and a need to use Microsoft products?

"I'm somehow translating seemingly noble philosophical ideals into computer software."

Check your translator. It seems to be generating a series of erroneous responses.

If you find that the "seemingly noble" idea of having a choice to be unsettling, threatening, or confusing, I really don't know how to respond. The subtext of your response seems to be that what's best for you is what's best for everyone.

"Such as QuarkXPress, Itunes, Photoshop, Digital camera integration, best user interface, CONSISTENT user interface, higher game availability, etc."

QuarkXPress - don't use it, don't need it.
Itunes - cdparanoia and XMMS
Photoshop - ImageMagick
Digital camera - don't use it, don't need it
best user interface - it's the one I'm using right now, and, hey, if I don't like it, I can build and install another one.
CONSISTENT user interface - oh, you mean the UI that remains the same, even when you don't want it to.
higher game availability - since 90% of PC games will never reach the OS X desktop, that's an odd thing to say.

"That seems somewhat churlish of you...I don't really see how it's not ready for primetime either."

Churlish, indeed. Dealing with Apple for eighteen years would try the patience of Job.

Re:Why?

[Elwood P Dowd]

Linux feels a lot faster than X on my 600mHz G3 iBook. That's why. Aqua crawls.

What's the point of Linux on an iMac?

[Anonymous Coward]

imaclinux.net is running a review on Yellow Dog Linux 2.2. They could manage to run it on the iBook.

umm... considering the limited hardwares that they need to support, shouldn't it be not too hard to be able to on all the new hardwares?

YDG 2.2 is a great distro with KDE 2.2.2, Gnome 1.4, kernel 2.4.18 and Xfree86 4.2.0.

Shouldn't Gnome, KDE, and other softwares for Linux run fine on OSX? In other words, wouldn't putting effort into Linux application compatibility on OSX be more worthwile?

BTW, I'm also curious as to how Linux apps run on OSX since I'm considering a new computer purchase. Anyone know? Apple's phone number only directs me to tech support for people who already own a mac, which are not for those who are just curious.

Re:What's the point of Linux on an iMac?

[Anonymous Coward]

> Shouldn't Gnome, KDE, and other softwares for Linux run fine on OSX?

No, KDE doesn't work in OSuX

Re:What's the point of Linux on an iMac?

[Uncle Gropey]

You are buy curious hahaha.

Re:What's the point of Linux on an iMac?

[Xenex]

Take a look at the Fink project.

They're going a great job of porting a whole bunch of apps across to OS X, and they use apt too!

reN & $+1mPy!�!!

[Dada Troll]

YElLoW d09 R3M3m8ER$ M3 froM r3N hÖeK!!!1

HuHyHuhvhUh!!

O'Reilly article

[wiredog]

On Debian & iBook

Linux on Powerbook 1400

[beerits]

Have you checked here? They seem to have at least some success getting the 1400 to work.

Re:Linux on Powerbook 1400

[MarcoJROM]

Yeah...I actually did look into that along with mk/linux. And it *would* run linux, but the only things the kernel could access would be anything on the ide bus(hard drive/floppy/cd) and the scsi port on the back. So this is good and bad. Its good if I wanted a standalone linux box without sound or network and could only transport files through cd or floppy. But if I wanted a REAL programming environment or even a router,firewall, or server, I would need to have network capabilities via a PCMCIA NIC card or the appletalk port. Sound would be nice too for programming in the middle of nowhere.

I use a PowerPC

[SerpentMage]

I use my Powerbook and have to say that yes it is nice, but no it is not nice.

It is nice in the sense that the notebook works well. But it is a major headache to get software to work.

While some folks may say, it is LINUX and therefore it will work, that is a figment of the imagination.

Firstly when using closed software people only say Linux. When I mention PowerPC they say no problem if it is Linux it works. But then I mention it is not Intel and they say "oh, sorry, but it works on Intel".

Secondly when using open source many people do not setup the ./configure and autoconf properly to take into account a PowerPc platform. Many times I get platform not support or it simply does not compile. Case in point, Anjuta, or PNET. Sure it could be fixed with a bunch of tweaks, but it gets my goat that I need to tweak at all!!!

The only software that has worked without problem whatsoever are the bigger projects (Apache, Perl, etc) and Java. I am amazed at how well Java moves from Windows, Linux Intel and Linux PowerPC.

My conclusion is that even Open Source and closed source are as arrogant about non-intel platforms.

Re:I use a PowerPC

[David Roundy]

You should try debian. Debian works very hard to make sure their packages work on all their platforms (which, of course, includes powerpc). This involves seeking out and fixing the endianness/signed char issues that keep packages from being portable. Eventually those patches (in theory, at least) make their way upstream.

That being said, even on debian, other architectures are in a sense second class, since most of the developers use the i386 platform. This means that packages get autobuilt more slowly on powerpc, for example, but on the whole, it's a great powerpc distro.

Re:I use a PowerPC

[ambrosius27]

I'm sure that the Anjuta folks would be quite happy to accept your "tweaks" to have Anjuta run on PPC architecture. They want Anjuta to be used as widely as possible: it's a matter of where the patches come from, not of platform arrogance.

Re:I use a PowerPC

[bcrowell]

I think you're a little off-base calling these developers "arrogant." If they don't have a PPC machine to test on, then there will be problems. No big surprise.

I split my time between MacOS X and intel Linux, and after trying several PPC Linux distros, I've never had any luck getting one to install. It's great that there's PPC Linux, and apparently it works for some people, but personally,

• If I want to run open-source software and not have any hassles, I run it on Intel Linux.
• If I want to run open-source software and am willing to put up with some hassles, I can usually get it from Fink and run it in X Windows under MacOS X.

For me, PPC Linux doesn't really offer any advantages (even assuming I could get it to install!).

Debian "Sid" on an ibook...

[Scott Ransom]

I haven't tried the new Yellow Dog, but a couple weeks ago I installed Debian unstable (closely following Branden Robinson's instructions) along with Benjamin Herrenschmidts 2.4.18 kernel on my new ibook (600MHz, 384MB, CD-RW/DVD-ROM, Airport wireless) and am extremely impressed about how everything works (all except the modem - which I never use anyways). DVDs (with xine), CD burning, wireless, sound, hardware accelerated 3D, built in ethernet, power management -- all for ~$2000 US. And Linux seems way more snappy than OSX. This is my first Mac, but if they work this well with Linux in the future, it may not be my last...

Re:Debian "Sid" on an ibook...

[Anonymous Coward]

$2000?! Wow that's soooo cheap for a piece of shit!

Re:Debian "Sid" on an ibook...

[mclaren_1010]

you're a loser

Re:Debian "Sid" on an ibook...

[owenc]

I'm baffled as to why anyone would pay money for YDL when they can get Debian for free. Does YDL have better hardware support?

Re:Debian "Sid" on an ibook...

[Anonymous Coward]

Your a jackass.

Old ad

[Anonymous Coward]

Hehe did anyone see the Debian ad banner that said "The potato has landed..introducing Debian 2.2"?

Things must've _really_ slowed down on the ad front...

Mac Linux distros suck

[moankey]

One of the touted benefits of Linux is that it runs nicely on an old machine so that the machine doesnt need to see a landfill.
Well in the Mac side of things Linux only seems to run on the latest and greatest. I have several PPC 601, 603e machines that Linux just will not run on, or at least a decent disto. MkLinux doesnt count. With YellowDog and LinuxPPC I just dont see the point if one needs a G3 or better.
If I had a Ibook, G4 Powerbook, etc... I think OS X would be a lot better than these RedHat ported to PPC *nixes.

Re:Mac Linux distros suck

[Anonymous Coward]

YDL 2.1 is working very well on my 7300/200 604e machine.

what in the fuck?

[posmon]

that review was quite damning, but the editorial makes it sound positive.

oh yeah, this is /. - silly me.

YDL--not for everybody

[catdevnull]

I've been using YDL on a G3 (Beige) for some 2 years. It's great as a server, but not-so-swell as a desktop solution. Outside of powe routages that exceed the UPS battery, it almost NEVER goes down. Runs as a webserver, mail server, AFP/AppleShare server, SAMBA, et. al. Over 100 users. init level 3 text log in is all I need. However, the desktop environment isn't nearly as robust and flexible as the Intel distros. In short: Use the right tool for the right job. If you want to use linux as a desktop solution, use Intel hardware--it's alot cheaper and supported globally. If you're looking for a rock-solid server that takes advantage of the PPC, YDL is the most stable linux server I've every seen. ...just my 2 cents... catdevnull > stdout

Hello Jason

[Anonymous Coward]

Anyone who calls YDL "bug ridden" and then says they miss LinuxPPC is obviously a former LinuxPPC employee.Not only was LinuxPPC bug-ridden, but they never attempted to put out bugfix errata even when it was handed to them prepackaged. This led to their demise.

Re:Hello Jason

[Anonymous Coward]

actually i never worked for linuxppc, just used it, but thanks for playing. and i still think when it was in its prime it was a far better distro than ydl aspires to be. terra soft has shown repeatedly they simply want to move product now and worry about quality of product later. i just want to make my $0.02USD known that YDL sucks (IMHO) and there are very good alternatives out there. to top it all off i think there are far better distros of linux on the PC platform than the PPC platform. better hardware support, more choices and more support from the community.

the ppc community has a few shining stars like ben but without all his hard work where would linux on the ppc be? (not having any actual support from apple surely doesn't help either.)

please don't tell me YDL is bug free, i've seen way too many postings on ydl-general about how difficult it was to install 2.0 and 2.1, yup problems galone (and i still have problems with it), the kernel being set up with iptables support but iptables not being installed! very lousy support from terra soft, when they choose to answer emails. infact it seems the only time we hear from them is when someone is complaining about their (lack of) support or that they can't find the latest iso's. then they speak up and give us a sob story about being swamped and the email must have been missed and how they will release iso's "weeks" (which usually is many months) later because their developers have to eat. they don't do a lot of development outside of bundling together a lot of work that other people do! (please correct me if i'm wrong, but show me what they have written/contributed to besides yup.)

after purchasing a few releases of YDL, including support (which I never got after several emails) i won't waste another dollar on their products.

--

posted anonymously so i don't get my butt sued.

Re:Hello Jason

[Anonymous Coward]

LinuxPPC had zero support. Their security updates (which they had like 5 of) weren't even packaged by them. They didn't even answer support email. they guy who was reading it in 1999 quit and they just never bothered to answer it. They had more bugs than a Texas fire-ant mound.

For anyone to claim this was better than YDL, shows that you just have a vendetta. YDL does release timely security updates and does fix bugs that it is within their realm to fix (many bugs go upstream, just like debian).

Re:Hello Jason

[Anonymous Coward]

actually i remember emailing them for support a few times and getting fast answers. maybe their support dropped off in the end but if you know anything about the distro you know the "the guy who was reading it in 1999 quit" had a near-fatal car accident. After such a life altering event is it any surprise he decided to focus on himself and his family as opposed to a linux distro?

linuxppc was also one of the first solid, commerical distros out there for the ppc platform, of course it wasn't bug free and neither is ydl. but what good is a linux distro if it can't even install???

Question time

[ACK!!]

Are there any good linux distros that work on older PPC hardware?

There were a couple of posts complaining that PPC distros only run on the latest and greatest stuff.

Are there any PPC Linux distros that break this mould.

Inquiring minds and all that stuff...

I got a friend with an old mac that thinks its time to try linux.

________________________________________________ __

Re:Question time

[Laplace]

Methinks that you might be confused. Are you sure you're not talking about OS X?

SuSE 7.3 PPC runs like a banshee on my Blue and White G3

Re:Question time

[VistaBoy]

Well, LinuxPPC 2000 supports everything from the NuBus PowerMacs (like the 6100s) to the iMacs and everything inbetween. However, you MUST have at least a gig of hard drive space or you won't be able to install anything decent. There's also the matter of MkLinux, which I've never used but heard it's good for Nubus ones. If you're using a 68k, I would suggest Debian.

Linux is dying

[Anonymous Coward]

The reason why yet another *linux distribution doesn't arose much interest is because *linux is dying. Companies and their stock values are dropping like flies. The hype is over. Thank god. Now we can get back to running serious non-toy operating systems like BSD Unix(tm).

PowerBook 1400?

[himself]

Does anyone know of a Linux or *BSD distribution that'll run on my PowerBook 1400?
I have heard that MkLinux will do so (relying on the serial port for networking, or something), but I'd really prefer something that lets me use external SCSI devices, as I only have the floppy drive Expansion Bay unit.

Re:PowerBook 1400?

[ilbrec]

You can use LinuxPPC for NuBus. I believe the current version will let you use SCSI devices on PowerBook. I had it running on a PowerBook 5300 for a while (installed from a SCSI CD-ROM drive). I also had it running on several PowerMac 6100s and PowerMac 7100 until a year ago. You do need to do a bit more work to get it run, than installing on a PCI Macs, though.

Older Macs.

[saintlupus]

A lot of people on here seem to think that Linux for the Mac is only for older machines. Not true.

I've got YDL 2.1 running on a 7200/120 at home - the first PPC mac with PCI slots. Not a new beast by any means. Hell, the BSDs don't even support PPC machines this old.

And I'm looking at installing it on a 6500 as well, which isn't exactly showroom-fresh.

Hopefully this will stem some of the "just run OS X" tide...

--saint

linux on a non PPC mac?

[dcgaber]

I have a Quadra 660 AV sitting in the closet collecting dust. I was wondering if anyone knew of a linux distro for an 040 mac and could point me in the right direction. I would like to try it on this box if that is possible, or is this just a really stupid idea. I seem to recall that this machine has a 500 meg HD (somewhere round that, and believe me, I thought that was huge after upgrading from a 40 meg HD on my LC) and no cd rom, but i think it has ethernet built in to dl anything.

Re:linux on a non PPC mac?

[Anonymous Coward]

I think there are no linux distros available...

you're probably better off looking at netBSD or OpenBSD...
Minix will probably run...
Oh! And if you can grab an old copy of A/UX!!
that is probably the best thing to run on an old 680X0

Re:linux on a non PPC mac?

[lamont116]

I have a Quadra 660 AV sitting in the closet collecting dust. I was wondering if anyone knew of a linux distro for an 040 mac and could point me in the right direction.

http://www.mac.linux-m68k.org/

Re:linux on a non PPC mac?

[saintlupus]

I have a Quadra 660 AV sitting in the closet collecting dust. I was wondering if anyone knew of a linux distro for an 040 mac and could point me in the right direction.

Debian would be a good choice. I ran it briefly on a Quadra, and the performance was pretty good for a machine of that era.

So far as I know, they're the only native-English distro for m68k.

(You might want to read this page as well -- it's a little summary I wrote for installing another OS on a Mac with limited disk space.)

--saint

Re:linux on a non PPC mac?

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't listen to him -- following his instructions will cause you to develop an unholy obsession with 'Knob Creek' whiskey and competitive hand gesturing.

You've been warned!

Re:linux on a non PPC mac?

[ChristTrekker]

Sure, it's possible on machines even older than the '040.

you don't need G3 hardware

[Bobartig]

Every PPC model from 4400-9600 is officially supported. I'm running YDL on a 6500/250. Installation was a breeze, even with using my TV as a monitor in video safe mode. It was certainly no harder than RH. Now that its installed and *RUNNING* I get to figure out how to use the damned thing, but getting it up was cake, even for a linux newbie like me

My experience: great support

[Klox]

I received my YDL 2.2 CDs the same day this was last referenced on Slashdot and posted a rant about the problems I had installing it on a brand new Power Mac G4. The next day, one of their support guys e-mailed me. After a couple of e-mails, I was up and running.

I was really impressed with Terra Soft's support for scanning Slashdot for comments by little whiners like myself and actually giving me a hand. I had mad no effort to understand the problem when I posted my rant but yet this guy went out of his way to help me. I'm certainly not that forgiving to my customers, even though they've paid for my help.

After resolving my install problem, I've been very happy with the distro. I'm planning on using this for the basis for future development at my company.

Kudos to Terra Soft!

Old MacDonald had a chip.

[Ukab the Great]

Of course PowerPC is more interesting CPU than x86! Does x86 have anything like the assembly instruction "eieio"?

Re:Old MacDonald had a chip.

[B3ryllium]

Probably not, but there's always:
B_IS_COMPUTER_ON();
B_IS_COMPUTER_ON_FIRE();

Ahhh, ain't BeOS grand? :)

It's finite resources, not arrogance

[AHumbleOpinion]

My conclusion is that even Open Source and closed source are as arrogant about non-intel platforms

It's finite resources, not arrogance. A Linux developer can reach 99.x% of end users by just targeting x86. They can either spend time targeting the Linux niche platforms or spend time improving the x86 platform. Add to this the spirit of open source and it is not unreasonable to expect the the PPC Linux community to fix things themselves rather than "dictate" where a developer should spend time.

I'll add that simply getting something to a point where it compiles does not mean you truly support a platform. Performance tuning should also take place and it is very easy to write c/c++ code that is tuned for one architecture or class or architectures to the detriment of others, ex. tuned for CISC at the expense of RISC.

Re:It's finite resources, not arrogance

[SerpentMage]

It is a bit of arrogance. And if you mention that a Linux developer can reach 99.x% of the developers by targeting x86 then you are using the same argument as Microsoft. And if I look at the stats then 99.x% of the desktops use Windows hence it would not make sense for me to target Linux? Therefore using that logic LINUX is dead in the water! We might as well all jump to Microsoft!

I am not trying to be sarcastic or pedandic. I am just using the argument that you gave me.

I am always willing to build the apps myself. But the problem is that most of the folks simply choose to ignore me. Ok I will admit that there was a really helpful person on the Anjuta mailing list. But that was clearly the exception. What I would like is that people just think a bit more than simply x86.

Re:It's finite resources, not arrogance

[Anonymous Coward]

Well the problem is many developers don't have ppc machines and therefore have no idea how to "correctly" tune for one of those machines. This isn't arrogance, it is just how it is. If someone suggests to them a fix for the PPC architecture, how will they know that it works? If the fix is big and ugly do they really know if it is worth it for the 2% of the people it would fix things for given they themselves can't test it to make sure it actually works?

Re:It's finite resources, not arrogance

[SerpentMage]

You are right. And hence since most of my buddies do not have Linux machines they should simply ignore Linux, Yes?

There is not having the PPC machine and not being PPC friendly. My point is that many apps are simply not PPC friendly. People assume that it is an Intel world only!

Look harder

[westyx]

http://www.netbsd.org/Ports/mac68k/

Re:Look harder

[saintlupus]

Er, as you would probably have noticed if you'd read the page you'd linked to, that is a port for computers using the 68000 series of processors from Motorola. My post was concerning PPC machines, a different processor family entirely.

The early macs are supported by the mac68k ports of Net and OpenBSD. The later ones (post-601) are supported by the PPC builds. But the 6100, 7100, 8100, and 7200 are all orphaned, so far as BSD is concerned.

Perhaps you ought to've looked harder.

--saint

my YDL (2.1) experiences

[ChristTrekker]

I've only recently installed YDL on my old-ish Mac and haven't had time to even really configure or use it much yet. So I'll probably give 2.2 a miss, but maybe I'll be ready by 2.3. I'm happy just having Linux available for my hardware, so I'll probably pay for my next copy.

Re:my YDL (2.1) experiences

[Anonymous Coward]

ChristTrekker writes:

So I'll probably give 2.2 a miss, but maybe I'll be ready by 2.3. I'm happy just having Linux available for my hardware, so I'll probably pay for my next copy.

I don't know what your financial situation is, but if you have a good job, it wouldn't hurt to support TerraSoft by buying a copy of YDL. TerraSoft is a very small company, and your purchase carries a lot of weight. Small companies really need the support of their fans. It can be a make or break situation. If you don't support them now, who knows if they'll be there for you at some future date? $30 is not much money; you probably earn that much before you finish your morning cup of coffee.

Re:Also.. I'm about to get my hands on some

[slithytove]

I should have 70 BriQs today or tommorow sans drivebay housing. I'm pretty dissapointed with the per-node pricing of Black Lab Linux (by the same folks).
I'm thinking at the moment that I'll netboot Debian and install my own clustering libraries and tools, since as far as I can tell, everything included in Black Lab is available elsewhere except their graphical cluster management tools.
Too bad they didn't see fit to GPL them and just make money on their rather expensive BriQ's (We paid $1500/per for G4s) before Black Lab was released.
Does anyone have any experience with these? Any tips?

Best server distro for PPC?

[glwtta]

I am getting a blue G3 to play with, it will probably never see X and will mostly do some number crunching and web serving - what's the best distro to go with? As I understand it, the major ones for PPC right now are YDL and Mandrake (and I believe RedHat is coming out with something) - anyone have any comparative experiences on the non-desktop side of things?

Looks like it

[westyx]

duh!

iBooks Rare

[hotsauce]

I really can't say that PPC is so mega-cool, but walking around with an Apple laptop (very rare)

You must not go to the same coffee shops I do. At the ones I hang out, you'd think the 90% marketshare belonged to Apple. I guess wintel users don't find their 1 hour battery life too useful.

And that is one of the (many) mega-cool PPC things--massive battery life. Don't know what kind of power management the Linux distros have, though.

Re:iBooks Rare

[tuffy]

And that is one of the (many) mega-cool PPC things--massive battery life. Don't know what kind of power management the Linux distros have, though.

About 3.5 hours is typical for me on an old IBM ThinkPad (300 Mhz PII) running Red Hat and a minimal workload. Lots of CPU cycles will drive that down (and drive the heat up) accordingly. Still, the 3-button trackpoint is nice for X11...

Everything sucks, unix just sucks less

[Arker]

With all due respect to the Mutt project.

"Linux apps" on OS X

[hotsauce]

I'm also curious as to how Linux apps run on OSX since I'm considering a new computer purchase.

Standard Linux binaries will not run on OS X, because Linux binaries assume x86, X and some WM. However, OS X really is a Unix, so installing X, hacking and a compile should work. /. types are already doing this and OS X binaries are starting to appear.

However, you may find you don't want to run standard Linux apps after your OS X purchase. Very nice commercial apps already exist for OS X, and the shareware community is mature and strong. And some of the best Unix apps have already been ported to use Apple APIs.

Amen

[Anonymous Coward]

Amen, brother.

I read the article.

[RestiffBard]

I don't own a mac of any kind though an ibook is on the list of things to get so linux ppc distros are of some interest. I've heard of YDL for some time now and I have to say I'm rather disappointed. There aren't that many macs they need to test on. unlike the pc world the hardware for a mac is mostly unchanging from one machine to the next. why can't they get something as simple as the proper sound output driver correct?

no offense, I'm not distro maintainer but that just seems like an easy one.

Get it!

[Anonymous Coward]

Apple is a hardware company. All software they do is just a sort of demo version - nice at first run, but not for daily use. No matter, is it Mac OS 9, X, Y or Z - it sucks

and it's not OSS - it has bad proprietary design which you cannot fix cause you don't have a source code.

Once we'll finish with M$ - we'll begin to finish Apple as a bad software monopolist on the PPC market.

Re:Get it!

[connorbd]

Troll.

Oh, and when you find a better jukebox program than iTunes let me know, 'kay?

/Brian

Re:Get it!

[jchristopher]

iTunes takes 30-40% of the CPU on my 500mhz macintosh. A common MP3 player on Windows (WinAmp) takes around 4% of a PIII 500.

Something is wrong with that picture. Obviously ripping and encoding is going to be CPU intensive - playback should not be. One of the first things I erased from my iBook was iTunes, for exactly this reason.

iTunes is not exactly the greatest thing since sliced bread.

Re:Get it!

[connorbd]

Okay, so I don't pay that much attention to processor load. I'm mostly just looking at the features, ease of use, etc. and the fact that it's free. I think, however, that CPU load isn't that much of an issue on the desktop unless you're doing something else processor-intensive.

/Brian

Re:Get it!

[jchristopher]

I think, however, that CPU load isn't that much of an issue on the desktop unless you're doing something else processor-intensive.

Like, say, running OS X? Believe me, when OS X is taking half your CPU and iTunes gobbles up another 25%, you notice.

Way to go, YDL!

[Anonymous Coward]

Perfect disrto! Especially perfect for home users where you want to connect to ISP (router), keep your home digital library (web-server and database) and have an access to it from a desktop. So, you need at home a desktop atop of a server. And YDL is a perfect combo for it.

The only think I would advise is to preconfigure database and web servers with some personal automation applications (PIM). My choice is Cocoon and PostgreSQL. Both are platform independent and it might be a question to RedHat, not to YDL. However, it would be nice to have last JDK installed, which is platform specific.

MacOSX vs. YDL

[tqbf]

YDL is interesting because, if your day-to-day operating system is Linux, you cannot do better than a TiBook running Yellow Dog. There simply is no hardware in the X86 world that is comparable (wide screen display, slim, lightweight, with adequate processing power).

I used YDL when I first got my TiBook. I had to, because I needed 802.11 support and Apple didn't support Orinoco. I switched because I needed Firewire more than I needed Orinoco. My experiences:

YDL: Works as well as any mainstream Linux distribution. Yup works, by some definition of "works". Better still, Ximian's stuff builds from SRPMS, and Ximian now explicitly supports them with binaries. Not hard to get current, buildable kernel source, and FreeSWAN works nicely for IPsec. The (major) negative is that Firewire support blows, and it is pointless to buy hard drives that don't come in Firewire enclosures. When I left YDL, SBP2 drivers didn't work at all. The (minor) negative is that companies don't distribute closed-source binaries for YDL, and they do for X86 Linux.

OSX 10.1: A dream; xterms, xemacs, and Adobe Illustrator on the same screen. Rootless XFree86, transparent anything, beautiful user interface, antialiasing. It's faster than Linux for applications and slower for tools. The one (big) negative is that there is no credible IPsec or VPN support. A minor negative is that you can't keep current with BOTH the dev kernel AND Apple's updates.

I'm on OSX 10.1.3 now and I'm not looking back. However, I can understand why people want PPC Linux, if they already simply use Linux for everything and want good portable environments. It's good to hear that YDL continues to move forward.

Does Airport work

[jchristopher]

I have just one question for anyone who has tried YDL 2.2 - does your Airport card work by default?

By "work", I mean by default - not after dicking around, upgrading kernels, and searching google to find the right command line stuff to get it going.

Does the installer set it up for you? If not, my question is why not? Why is this so hard - there is only one Apple Airport card, and every Mac that has one uses the same driver, so what's the problem?

why is this okay?

[jchristopher]

The article basically says that YDL 2.2 is "okay", with quite a few quirks, their configuration tools crash, etc. Why is this considered "acceptable"? Is it wrong to expect more out of what is supposedly a "maintenance release" - shouldn't they have some stuff ironed out by now?

I have $100 just waiting to be donated to the first PPC Linux team that produces something that works properly on my iBook. Seriously. No one seems to want it.

In Yellow Dog 2.1, I followed their Airport setup instructions to the letter, but it does not work. Their "YUP" update tool does not work. Sound did not work. From the way the article reads, it sounds like 2.2 is more of the same, so why bother?

I'm also following the Mandrake 8.2 PPC beta process with much interest. As far as I can tell, there is ONE GUY - Stewart - working on it. He's doing some great things, but frankly, it's clear that he's overwhelmed. For example, my iBook2 cannot get IPs via DHCP over either the built in ethernet or the wireless inteface. Nobody knows why. Modem works, but only after you tweak the timout values in the dialer to be certain values. How would anyone know that? It should be done by the installer if the installation platform is the iBook!

I wish that these folks would work on getting the CORE stuff working, and working well, before they start including 2000 packages on the CDs. I can download Apache, MySQL, and 18 text editors later - right now, I need a working network connection!

The "gold standard", as far as I'm concerned, is RedHat 7.2 on a Dell Inspiron. Everything worked, and I mean EVERYTHING. No tweaking, no kernel upgrade, no command line garbage. Ethernet, video, mouse, keyboard, everything. So that's what I expect, but no PPC vendor has delivered it yet.

Given the very limited hardware a PPC vendor must support, I just expect it to work. It doesn't.

Open Source != You Must Target My Platform

[AHumbleOpinion]

And if you mention that a Linux developer can reach 99.x% of the developers by targeting x86 then you are using the same argument as Microsoft

Irrelevant, the truth is the truth, and a truth isn't invalidated merely because Microsoft can take advantage of it.

I am always willing to build the apps myself. But the problem is that most of the folks simply choose to ignore me

I'll restate my argument again. Developers have limitted resources and given the very nature and spirit of Open Source you should not expect that you can "dicate" how they spend their time and money. They gave you the source, you, or more accurately the PPC Linux community, have the ability to do the work yourself.

Open Source is not about everyone catering to your needs, it is about you being able to look out for yourself, about you doing the work yourself or hiring someone to do it four you.

Re:Open Source != You Must Target My Platform

[SerpentMage]

First I stated I am willing to build the apps myself. But if I am ignored how can I help myself? Using the argument "you have the source" simply does not work in these times. People DO NOT WANT to tweak where they do not want to. And I cannot give something to my client that needs tweaking.

You see I am on the PowerPC platform not because I am glutton for punishment, but because I want to really see which packages are professional and which are "Open Spirit" packages.

My issue is how come a LINUX Intel application will compile, but LINUX PowerPC will not? Seriously think that one over? There are virtually no differences between the platforms.

Doing Open Source does not mean being immature. Professionalism is always useful regardless of the nature of the excercise. For example when you play tennis with someone, do you try to play the game or just shoot the ball whereever? You play the ball so that you can get excitement. Hence Open Source needs to understand this as well.

There are many packages that work without problems. For example Apache, Java, Perl, Python, Ximain, KDE work like a charm and I never need to tweak much, if anything.

Fine Woman in YDL Commercial

[beppu]

In reality, women this fine don't use Linux....
Theoretically, it's possible, but the chances are so slim. It's such a dishonest commercial, and you can tell by her voice that she knows its dishonest. To use sexuality to sell Linux... What a twisted world this is. Linux is about freedom, but I guarantee you that she does not feel completely free. (Sadly, she might not even know what it is... not many people do.)

She doesn't belong there.... Her beauty is being wasted. I hope she finds something where when she speaks, she sounds resolute. It will be good for her soul, because her inner beauty will shine in combination with her outer beauty, and she will be 1000x more beautiful when that happens.

Check it:
http://www.terrasoftsolutions.com/realworld/v ideo/

5 Hours, Twice The Speed

[hotsauce]

Interesting. OS X minimal workload at 600 MHz I get around 5 hours. Using it hard (constant mp3 decoding, drive and cd usage) I get around 3.5 hrs (fav coffee shop just got Airport so will report back on that).

I have 5 mouse buttons on my iBook. They are even named. Mouse button, Control, Option, Command, and Shift.