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Jordan Hubbard moves to new OpenDarwin.org
bootc writes "Last week we heard the news that Jordan Hubbard was leaving the FreeBSD Core Team. I received an email about the new OpenDarwin.org web site and had a look around, just to find that our friend Jordan was member of the OpenDarwin Core Team!" Apple has consolidated its Open Source web site, including Darwin, under its developer site, while the Internet Software Consortium is hosting the independent OpenDarwin.org, which will develop OpenDarwin with the developer community and collaborate with Apple to merge OpenDarwin technologies into Darwin and Mac OS X.
I think Jordan is moving around in a Survivor-style alignment to the most-abundant version of BSD. He likely gets the advantages of working with what he knows, but also being able to show results as users play with the results in Darwin and Mac OS X.
Oh...and I think I got first post. What was that phrase...oh yeah...w00t!
Vos teneo officium eram periculosus ut vos recipero is.
Well, Jordan is an Apple employee, too. So he gets paid to have fun and contribute to the FreeBSD family. A nice arrangement.
Seems that the w00ts go to you for being first poster...
Vos teneo officium eram periculosus ut vos recipero is.
From an OS point of view (not GUI) is Darwin better than the BSDs in any technical way?
Okay...hmmm...something funny to go for the coveted +5 score. How about:
I've decided to fork a *BSD tree into my own offering. I'm going to call it "The Darwin Awards". Why? Because, "BSD is dying". Ba-dump-ba!
I'm not sure if you are serious about this. Darwin has been running on x86 since day one!
Read about it here
I just think it's amazing that there's a hexley.com!
The next comment I write will be ready soon, but subscribers can beat the rush and see it early!
We have a good *nix with the premier desktop...
:)
It is called Mac OS X
Seriously, Aqua and Quartz are definitely slower than KDE or GNOME. That is partially due to some of the effects, but it is also due to their youth. Aqua, Quartz, and OS X as a whole has gotten better with each release and I am looking forward to Jaguar (10.2).
I don't think Apple will open source any of the GUI components as it doesn't have much of an upside for them. The reason Aqua is so nice to look at is that it is uniform. Once it is given away for everyone to change up, we all know what will happen. Everyone would have their own agenda on where to take it. This will destroy the uniformity and make aqua no better than KDE or GNOME (neither has a look as clear, well defined or consistent as OS X). Don't get me wrong, they are nice and I would love more code to be released, but GNOME and KDE don't even come close to comparison to the OS X user experience.
Bill
IMHO, it's the lack of a good desktop (KDE is OK) that's keeping *nix from becoming the premiere desktop and Aqua could help a lot.
I seriously doubt Apple will ever release Aqua, there are too many advantages to keeping it in house, the biggest reason being control. Apple is primarily a hardware company and they, like Sun, use software to sell thier hardware. If Aqua were released to an open source license, it would be ported to other platforms, at which point at least one reason for buying an Apple system is gone. Who would spend $1800 on an iMac when you could get similar functions from a $800 Celeron system.
I personally think we may, in the future see some x86 OEM do something similar with Linux. Have an open source core (command line only), with a proprietary GUI on top (only sold and supported with thier hardware, no retail version), but make it easy to run X Windows concurently in rootless mode, so all the hardcore Linux users can still use thier favorite programs. I suspect someone could sell alot of hardware this way, if done right and done well.
"Our products just aren't engineered for security,"
-Brian Valentine,VP in charge of MS Windows Development
What? No one's forcing Apple to contribute back to BSD. If they wanted to, they could keep all the changes to themselves. It's not like FreeBSD is licensed under the GPL or another viral license.
- Aqua depends on the Quartz rendering layer (Display PDF)
- Apple developed Quartz (Display PDF) in-house specifically in order to avoid paying licensing fees to Adobe like Next was for Display postscript
- The PDF spec is open for anyone else to develop their own implementation, just like Apple did
- Apple's implementation of Display PDF is apparently fairly MacOS X-specific and while chunks of it could likely be retargetted it's supposedly not a candidate for a direct port
- Apple considers the Aqua GUI their trade dress and are quite vigorous about defending it
So, instead of whining at Apple to give away their goodies how about actually supporting the projects out there with the same aims? And instead of looking to rip-off their interface howzabout showing some initiative and coming up with a distinct sperate one - goodness knows there's enough folks happy to criticize the Aqua GUI.When did Open Source become gimme gimme gimme?
I don't read ACs: If a post isn't worth so much as a nom de plume to its author then I wont bother either.
On a slightly more serious note, it's very clear you haven't used OS X. Looks are NOT everything. If you honestly believe that the KDE 3 user experience is on par with Mac OS X, then I truly hope you stay out of usability testing. It's getting better all of the time, as is GNOME, but it's just not there yet. For example, the KDE configuration system is far more complex than System Preferences. Sure, it's because you get a lot of extra customization, but it overwhelms newbie users. (And, on a similar note, any user who really wants to customize things that badly in OS X need merely get the TinkerTool Panel installed and he can configure a number of out-of-the-way system settings.) KDE lacks any functionality close to an iDisk, and you cannot configure things such as webserving with the click of a button like you can in OS X. The excedingly simple directory structure of OS X is completely lacking in all Linux distros. (I.e., while the full structure is, of course, there, the user needn't worry about it. ~/Preferences houses all the user's prefs,
Just because it looks like a duck does not mean that it quacks like a duck.
Don't believe me? Check out these screenshots:
GNUMail on Linux/GNUStep
GNUMail under Aqua/MacOS X
Don't write off GNUStep just because they haven't reached the popularity of KDE or GNOME. I think that with Apple's dominance in the UNIX market place, that we may see GNUStep become increasingly important.
-Peter
. Penguins Surely Ca
I wonder how much Apple is "contributing" towards him.
Why does this even matters? He gotta support his life anyhow, it's a nice thing when one can support open source and make a living out of it at the same time.
geek page at KY speaks
For those sorry lot amongst you who don't use OS X, perhaps you should look into the GNUstep project and help them out.
The more done this project is, the more likely you'll see Mac OS X Cocoa developers compiling GNUstep stuff for the Linux folks. If the GNUstep folks so far, Apple might be willing to start open sourcing bits and components of their GUI.
I was one of the ones that wondered why the GNUstep folks even bothered, but who's piping down now?
In any case, I don't bother, I use OS X already.
I believe slashdot will need a new icon image for Open Darwin's Hexley
[alk]
Talking of usability testing, do you have any data to back this up? It's true the KDE Control Centre is bizarrely designed, but in fact it's being restructured for KDE3.1
KDE lacks any functionality close to an iDisk, and you cannot configure things such as webserving with the click of a button like you can in OS X.
Incorrect. There is no centralised free disk service like the iDisk, but on the other hand remember you effectively pay for the "free" mac.com services when you buy a Mac. If you want, you can pay me and I'll give you some FTP space. You'll then find you can browse your "mikeDisk" direct from Konqueror like a normal filing system, and also all your apps will be able to load and save to it directly - you need never know it's on a remote disk. What, you want even more power? Then try InterMezzo, which is a caching, conflict resolving offlineable remote drive system. Not only do you get network transparecy, but also you can disconnect at any point and continue working.
Oh, I almost forgot, there is a KDE panel applet that includes a small webserver, that can be switched on or off with a mouseclick. I think it's included with KDE3 or if not then with 3.1
The excedingly simple directory structure of OS X is completely lacking in all Linux distros.
Switch to root and try again. The whole UNIX directory structure is there, the finder simply hides it. Fine - I can make a version of Konqueror that hides it all as well, would that make it easier to use? Perhaps. I don't know to be honest. It might be something to look into.
You're right in terms of software management, but it's being worked on. Font management is also improving.
What matters is the process - OS X is simply a way of locking you into proprietary Apple hardware and kit. All platforms have their strengths and weaknesses, and the weaknesses you mentioned in Linux are being resolved fast. I could name a lot of weaknesses in OS X too, which I believe Apple are on the verge of solving. So what? What matters is - are you the one in control 5 years from now?
IMHO, it's the lack of a good desktop (KDE is OK) that's keeping *nix from becoming the premiere desktop and Aqua could help a lot.
There is so much to say in response to this one sentence. Where to begin?
Look, KDE not lacking in anything that is "keeping *nix from becoming the premiere desktop". If we want Linux to take over the world, then we need specialized apps, like games and Adobe products. MacOS X users love to talk all day about how they are running Windows/Mac/Linux software all at the same time. The power of OS X is in the applications. As far as the UI goes, I personally can't stand it. It is too limited and too slow. KDE is much more configurable and fully open-source to boot.
Now, there is no reason that *nix can't be a good desktop system for your average user. Apple proves this. Linux/KDE may not be for the average user, but that's fine. I like the power. Each to his own.
Linux/KDE has the desktop. It doesn't have as many desktops as Microsoft or Apple, but who cares? It doesn't have to take over the world to be viable.
Sorry about the rant. From your post, it seemed like you were saying KDE was not good enough and if Linux had Aqua it would change everything. IMO, this is simply not true. Anyhow, Aqua is not a fantasy, it exists. Go get a Mac, or get your mom a Mac. It's right there, and its lack of existence on x86 is not holding anything back.
I agree. Please see my
-Russ
Me
FreeBSD is not as "user-friendly" as Linux... and by that I mean it is slightly more complicated to use Ports (cd /usr/ports/net/vnc; make && make install) than to walk through a package tree with GnoRPM. Well, actually it isn't more difficult but might be *perceived* to be more difficult. Want to recompile your kernel under FreeBSD? Edit a text file, run config on it then cd to the appropriate directory and compile... no make menuconfig here.
The interesting thing to me is that all of the "hardcore" *nix developers out there are now screaming for a desktop solution akin to Windows. Seems that some people have lost their way in regards to the command line and good old knowledge being necessary to make their machines perform.
Aqua shmaqua.
While the Aqua look is nice, it has and can be duplicated. The fact of the matter is that the real advantage is with the underlying rendering layer. There is no way an X based system is going to be able to present a look and feel of any design, no matter how good that is going to be able to compete with the flat out sophistication of Quartz.
Huh? There's never any fees though and you can have as many accounts as you want. Your statement is like saying you effectively pay for "free" Linux when you buy an x86 machine.
No -- the point is the very real costs of maintaining the ftp servers are paid by Apple out of its income. Transparent ftp connectivity is already part of KDE, the problem is that there can be no centralized server without *somebody* paying for it.
Read the book "The Hacker Ethic" and you will discover that it is possible for a companies bottom line to be contributing to the good of the market and not profits.
In apple's case, the more ties they have in the opensource world, the more resources they have availible to them, the better off they are when the market changes, and they can be at the front as the company with money to throw at the ideas that are being developed.
T Money
World Domination with a plastic spoon since 1984
It's funny watching you open source knobbers get all worked up over OS X. Talk about being jealous...
Apple debuts the most technologically advanced windowing system ever, and it's:
"Aqua/Quartz is so slow! And it doesn't support network transparency! And Aqua is so candy-coated and ugly! Hahahah!" Meanwhile 2,000 different Aqua themes appear on the various themes sites within days.
Apple bases their OS on FreeBSD, something that ALL geeks are supposed to be keen on, and it's:
"They've bastardized the tree hierarchy, and used a microkernel. Microkernels are so slooow."
Apple brings third-party developers like Adobe and MS onto the bandwagon - developers which Linux has been trying and failing to emulate since day one - and it's:
"We never needed that proprietary crap anyway, Gimp is 500% better than Photoshop and OpenOffice kills MS Office and... and... and your mom!"
Apple includes Apache, NFS, and Samba connectivity and it's:
"Enabling/disabling my daemons with one click is so inflexible. I want more configurability."
Apple retains their trademark simplicity in plug & play. Mice, keyboards, scanners, you name it Just Work. The open-source community replies: /proc/modules and you'll see a list of modules. Now go into the XFree86 config file and make sure you see these lines, and..."
"You can do that today in ObscureLinuxDistro 8.3. You just have to make sure you've got x, y, and z modules loaded, use modprobe for this otherwise type cat
Once again, open source software finishes last place in technology and usability, and its zealotry continue to deny it. Get out of the basement and into the real world, pizzafaces. Your mom.
Ah, another troll...
Just for the record, the article's first paragraph actually states:
"Welcome to Security Alerts, an overview of recent Unix and open source security advisories. In this column, we look at buffer overflows in OpenSSH, Squid, Listar/Ecartis, slrnpull, and IRIX's syslogd; problems in Sudo, MHonArc, and Mosix; and a local root hole and denial-of-service attack vulnerability in FreeBSD."
Of these, the only issues that are FreeBSD issues as opposed to issues in theird party software are the IO descriptors and syncache/syncookies problems. The others would almost certainly apply to any unix they were run upon, with the obvious exception of IRIX syslogd - and IRIX is a SysV implementation...
HAND.
Apple will obviously not open source Quartz or allow copies of it's Aqua GUI. The reasons are obvious and have been discussed often enough. There's nothing wrong with that. They need the money and, at the least provide Darwin as an alternative commercially supported Unix to Linux(IBM, RedHat, SuSE etc). Their attention to their Desktop is important, as this provides a real alternative to MS' enormous monopoly, and perhaps even more importantly the Quartz/Aqua GUI provides (at least for PPC) a standard interface for applications. I'm not a big fan of Aqua but it does provide a standard on the platform. This is one of the reasons, I think, for MS' monopoly on the desktop. Think of it as crap or good, but it does make it easier for an application designer to design a GUI. Same for Apple. The controls all look the same and the API's are standard. Linux needs something like this as well. Both GNOME and KDE are good but their lack of intercompatibility with one another does no service to Linux. Choice is good but perhaps sometimes it also leads to confusion, in this case for instance amongst normal users who have difficulty understanding how to use the right mouse button, never mind understanding whether QT3 or GTK is better.
Having started to use ObjC on OSX, which is obviously supported on Darwin and GNUStep as well, I found it similar in it's ease of use to Java. No one owns ObjC and unlike C# you can compile it with GCC. No one is going to hijack ObjC, but can you say the same about C#.
It's not much of an argument, but it's worth thinking about.
Re. transparent file access: that wasn't really my point. The iDisk in OS X is extremely thoroughly integrated, such that applications assume that it's there and you can easily send a file to your iDisk even if it's not mounted. Further, the very structure of the iDisk is critical for much of this to work properly. iPhoto assumes that a folder named Photos exists on your iDisk (just like your home directory, I might add), and HomePage assumes that it will find photos there if for your photos page. KDE doesn't need a central service to dupliate this functionality, but a standard disk format and easy way to essentially point to the iDisk (kDisk?) server of your choice would be a really simple and actually very nice addition.
I know it's still there; hell, I rely on it being there in some of the apps I write that in turn call the standard Unix tools in
Again, I appreciate that everything is improving, but you've got to understand that it's not quite there yet. That was my only point, and I honestly look forward very eagerly to when KDE and friends are on-par or surpass Apple's offerings. That's the point where no one will any longer be able to deny that open source desktops are around the corner.
Not only will that never, ever happen, but it would be a really bad idea for software written for a Dell to not run on a Gateway.
This is a good point, but on the otherhand, why should Dell care if its software ran on a Gateway or not. More likely it would be the other way around, Dell is too entrenched in the Windows world. Gateway, is scrambling for market share and far more likely to try something like this. HP/Compaq is a possibilty and MicronPC is a profitable privately held company, so there is no board of directors or stockholders to satisfy.
The whole point of this business model is to sell hardware and as long as the user can do basic things like watch DvD/Video, burn CD's, listen to music, surf the web, send/recieve email, instant message, create documents of various types and connect to a Windows based network, probably too much more wouldn't be neccessary or could be dealt with by releasing a free SDK and letting the OSS Hackers do what they do best. As an example, it did not take long to port X Windows to OS X, once that happened Gimp and several other programs followed, Apple got a whole lot of runnable software with little work or cost on thier part. This would be even easier because it is Linux at its core, no real port is neccessary beyond getting X Windows running in rootless mode after that the user installs the proper libraries and virtually every program available under Linux is now usable without changing a line of code. I see no problems here, it seems to me everyone wins.
"Our products just aren't engineered for security,"
-Brian Valentine,VP in charge of MS Windows Development
[100% ISO 646 Compliant]
SVM, ERGO MONSTRO.
In the Darwin Q&A they sort of explain why they maintain support for x86. From the article they say:
It's a good answer and it makes sense, but I wouldn't discount your theory about hedging their bets. Jobs is known for screwing companies (switching to NVidia from ATI) and going to new hardware, and it's pretty well known that he isn't very happy with Motorola right now.
All editorial writers ever do is come down from the hill after the battle is over and shoot the wounded.
Great post, Bill. I agree completely with everything you said. You get a pat on the back at the next TriLUG meeting.
Ergonomica Auctorita Illico!
You can go off and write your own C# tools anytime you like. As long as you conform to the ECMA documents, you can claim that your tool deals with C#. Micorosft invented it but does not own it.
Because the $1800 iMac is much nicer hardware than the $800 Celeron?
I agree with you on all your points, the problem is most people will not know the difference and will choose the cheaper hardware, especially if the label says 1 Ghz.
"Our products just aren't engineered for security,"
-Brian Valentine,VP in charge of MS Windows Development
A better point to make would be why would you want to have linux as your base system?
Why not ? At its base (no GUI), Linux is small, fast, dependable, secure and highly configurable. Why start from scratch, when Linux or *BSD can be had for free ?
Why must everyone think linux is something that it isn't,
What do you mean ? Right now, Linux stands as one of the best operating systems available. Of course there also *BSD. Beyond Linux or *BSD, there are not many options.
great that is.
No doubt, Linux is great.
"Our products just aren't engineered for security,"
-Brian Valentine,VP in charge of MS Windows Development
Jordan is not Apple's bitch. He's a grown man. Apple didn't make him do anything - he made up his own mind.
You can grouse about it all you want.
--Richard
Actually, yes, Konqueror (from KDE3) has an integrated webdav:// ioslave.
-clee
Well, I can sort of see why nobody uses it -- it looks interesting, but really strange and a long way from finished. The crufted-together development process reminds me uncomfortably of the strange beast that is Inform (www.gnelson.demon.co.uk/inform), and it really looks like it's a long way away from being ready to go.
/Brian
By that logic, BSD isn't BSD either, as the entire AT&T codebase had been removed by 1995 (4.4BSDlite). OS X is as BSD as NeXTStep was.
/Brian
Believe me, I know about the average user. You're right, they don't need an open source or highly configurable GUI, and apparently you don't either. So I must ask you this: what is the problem with MacOS X? It is available right now and suits your needs.
What I don't understand is the point you are trying to make. All I was trying to say in my previous post was that Aqua on Linux would be of little use. The Linux users (me) don't care about Aqua, and the Aqua users (you) don't care about Linux. So you go get a Mac, and I'll use SuSE Linux. I fail to see the problem here.
I checked out the screenshots, and personally I think the anti-aliased type rendering on MacOS X still looks significantly better than the KDE version. All according to taste, I suppose.
The latest Mozilla for MacOS X has excellent compatibility - I have yet to see a site I can't view in it.
I'd just use Clover-Q to quit applications. Sometimes it's handy to have an application hang around after its last window is gone. Close all your OmniWeb windows and click on a link outside of OmniWeb (assuming you have it as your default browser) and the link will come right up; this is a Good Thing.
The other factor is that, quite frankly, I simply don't have the time to learn all that's needed to install anti-aliasing on Linux. I tried a few months back with no joy. Perhaps if it's built into an existing Linux distribution now it would be time to try again on my work Linux system. But for my personal systems, I have to say that I'm awfully happy with MacOS X.
D
You have to buy a Mac to use the mac.com services, they are paid for out of the Apple hardware sales.
I guess I'm saying that X, as in the extended accelerated XFree version, isn't all that bad.
No you don't. I use my mac.com account on my Windows box at work. Yes, they are paid for by Apple, who makes money from hardware sales among other things. But you don't need a mac to use it, only to sign up. And you can sign up for as many accounts as you want. So in that sense it is pretty free.
mark
If you want to make an apple pie from scratch, you must first create the universe. -- Carl Sagan
Those who refuse to learn History are bound to repeat it – as a farce. Can’t remember who said that, nor exactly in which words.
BSD was hoarded by proprietary vendors before, and this almost killed free software at that time. That’s why copyleft, being so restrictive, got so popular: so that free software wouldn’t be hoarded again.
The same goes for X. XFree hackers even refused a deal to have it GPL’d by the X Group. It’s a kind of idealism, but one which endangers the very continuance of the freedoms we all have come to cherish.
Leandro Guimarães Faria Corcete DUTRA
DA, DBA, SysAdmin, Data Modeller
GNU Project, Debian GNU/Lin
I did not say you only have to buy a Mac to sign up. You don't have to.
It's not like you need to prove you own a Mac when you sign up, or give some serial number. You just have to, at some point in your life, have access to a Macintosh with an Internet connection for 5 minutes.
Go to a library or the Apple store or a friend's house, sign up, and there you go.
mark
If you want to make an apple pie from scratch, you must first create the universe. -- Carl Sagan
If you really know where you can get a 1.x GHz Celeron system with digital flat panel display and DVD-R burner for $800, please let us all in on the secret
You entirly missed the point of my post, which was an answer to the question of why we will never see Aqua ported to the x86 platform. Right now no Celeron systems w/DvD burner is available for $800, but that does not mean we will never see one. The way prices fall in the x86 world, I wouldn't be suprised to see such a system next year some time.
"Our products just aren't engineered for security,"
-Brian Valentine,VP in charge of MS Windows Development