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'Unbreakable Linux'

Posted by michael on from the kids-call-me-mr.-glass dept.

Zadig writes "It appears as if Dell, Oracle, and Red Hat CEOs have decided to make 'Unbreakable Linux'. Could a giant arise amidst today's insecure and constantly patched linux world that could hold the title of Unbreakable Linux? I doubt it, but it will be fun to try, what are your thoughts?" There's a similar article on CNet.

5 of 430 comments (clear)

  1. Wow, taking on IBM mainframes... by killthiskid · · Score: 5, Interesting

    To quote Oracle CEO Larry Ellison


    "That is why we have been seriously looking at Linux in the last six months," said Ellison. "Because Linux is perfect for clustering. People say is Linux ready for prime time? Is it reliable? Is it fast? With clusters, it is fast enough and with no single point of failure. Clusters are fault tolerant. A cluster of four Linux machines is more reliable and less expensive than an IBM mainframe. The problem with traditional database is that you are constantly in an endless upgrade cycle. The biggest benefit to our midrange user is the economics."

    Taking on IBM? Taking on IBM mainframes? That is truly a serious statement.


    If nobody ever gets (got?) fired for buying IBM, what does this mean?

    1. Re:Wow, taking on IBM mainframes... by Lictor · · Score: 4, Interesting

      >Taking on IBM? Taking on IBM mainframes? That is truly a serious statement.

      Indeed.

      >A cluster of four Linux machines is more reliable and less expensive than an IBM mainframe.

      Less expensive? No question. More reliable? Hmm.. I guess I'd have to see some hard numbers to back that up.

      Notice he doesn't mention "more secure"... probably a reason for that, huh? Of course, a lot of it is good old fashioned security through obscurity. How many 14-year-old kids have OS/360 / MVS / [insert your big iron poison here] experience? How many have linux experience? Right. (Yeah, some whacko is bound to point out http://www.conmicro.cx/hercules/, and to that whacko I say "I didn't say *no* script kiddies would have the experience.. just a lot fewer.)

      Its all semantics anyways. Everyone knows the ultimate in reliability and security is MPE running on an HP3000... /ducks

    2. Re:Wow, taking on IBM mainframes... by ninewands · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Moderator ...

      N.B.: this is NOT flamebait ... it's only sarcasm

      I think it means that IBM is going to have wake up and smite someone.

      With what? A bargain-basement priced cluster of AS/400s? zServers are DAMNED reliable, but they are *single* systems in a *single* location. A high-availability cluster doesn't HAVE to be located in a *single* server room, or even a *single* geographic location ... if you don't believe me, ask Akamai ...

      Give me 16 "Unbreakable Linux" PowerEdges and some damned fat pipes and I can design you a cluster that a nuclear attack probably couldn't take out. Edge-of-the-network clusters give good performance and DAMNED good availability.

      --
      utter rubbish
  2. Dell, Schmell by pete-classic · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Okay, I used to be a Dell server support technician. Time and time again I would see these big pushes for Linux on servers and they were NEVER backed up by any significant effort to acutally be able to support Linux to any reasonable degree.

    The last big push before I quit was when they released a couple of 1u boxes. One ran NetWare and the other Red Hat Linux. They really "went the extra mile" that time and provided maybe 25% of the technicians with a big one day class and a copy of O'Reily's "Running Linux"; which is a very good book, but was grossly out of date at the time. One day. You couldn't get your foot in the door without being able to say you had two years of NT experience with a straight face, and back it up in a techinical interview that was no punk.

    I genuinely hope that this aliance ends up being a boon for the community, but to be honest I think 'ole Mike has used up his credibility in this department.

    -Peter

  3. Don't forget: Larry often talks sh*t by rcs1000 · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Larry Ellison is often treated with a reverence Bill Gates can only dream of. Yet, if you've ever read about him (in say the excellent, The Difference Between God and Larry Ellison* by Mike Wilson) you'll discover he his faults (like, allegedly, being a pathalogical liar.)

    Anyways, to come back on-topic, Larry talk a lot of sh*t. And he isn't really trying to promote Linux, only to bash IBM DB/2. And the reason he's bash DB/2 is that Oracle has being losing a fair amount of share in the database market, particularly at the high-end.

    For the last nine months, Larry's hobby-horse has been 'unbreakable' real-application database clustering. Yet, there has been remarkably little support: partly at least because early point releases of Oracle software have a reputation for instability (and possibly insecurity, too) that make Microsoft look... well only very bad rather than really, really bad. (Take Oracle 11i, their latest application suite; now on 11.5.4 and still not stable, allegedly.)

    Anyway, I take anything Larry says with a very large grain of salt.

    --
    --- My dad's political betting