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The 2.7 Kernel: Back To The Future For Linux
Anonymous Coward writes "Now that the Linux 2.6 kernel has been released and is being worked into distributions, many in the open-source community are turning their attention to the next development and test kernel, known as the 2.7 tree. To get an early glimpse at some of the thinking going into the next kernel, key vendors that aid in shaping the Linux kernel helped eWEEK last week put together a long-range wish list for 2.7."
The article was ok and all, but where is the list of long awaited features???
I go to read about the 2.7 Linux Kernel and I get an advertisement telling me that Linux costs 11%-22% more on average in 4 out of 5 workload scenarios... I immediately lost interest in the 2.7 kernel and just got angry at Microsoft.
So that is their plan... the whole Yoda "hate blinds" plot... darn they're good.
that they remove all the SCO code this time. Maybe then it will fit on a floppy again.
What?
There is nothing specific about anything. What a useless article. You can say you want a milkshake with your 2.7 kernel and it be just as valid as the things mentioned.
Is just great driver compatability. That seems like the primary hurdle that can really keep people out, as well as a large area that is easily neglected in a more server-oriented mindset (especially in terms of user peripherals).
Something that will autoconfigure the desktop (using voice commands of course, not this obsolete keyboard thing) while serving me a pint of Guinness at the same time...
Thoughts influence feelings. Feelings influence thought. Choose your thoughts wisely.
I have always felt that Linux is a nice operating system (for hobbyists and
geeks), but there are some areas where it is seriously lacking, especially when
compared to its main competitor, Microsoft? Windows?.
* File sharing. Windows has long been superior when it comes to making large
amounts of files available to third parties. Even early versions of Windows
automatically detected and made available all directories thanks to the built in
NetBIOS-powered file sharing support. But Microsoft has realized that this
technology is inherently limited and has added even better file sharing support
to its Windows XP operating system. "Universal Plug an Play" [slashdot.org] will
make it possible to literally access any file, from any device! I think
universal file sharing support needs to be built into the Linux kernel soon.
* Intelligent agents. With innovations like Clippy, the talking paperclip
[dmu.ac.uk] and Microsoft Bob, Microsoft has always tried to make life easier
for its customers. With Outlook and Outlook Express, Microsoft has built a
framework for developers to create even smarter agents. Especially popular
agents include "Sircam", which automatically asks the users' friends for advice
on files he is working on and the "Hybris" agent, which is a self-replicating
copy of a humorous take on "Snow-White and the Seven Dwarves" (the real story!).
Microsoft is working on expanding this P2P technology to its web servers. This
project is still in the beta stage, thus the name "Code Red". The next versions
will be called "Code Yellow" and "Code Green".
* Version numbers. Linux has real naming problems. What's the difference
between a 2.4.19 and a 2.2.17 kernel anyway? And what's with those odd and even
numbers? Microsoft has always had clear and sophisticated naming/versioning
policies. For example, Windows 95 was named Windows 95 because it was released
in 1995. Windows 98 was released three years later, and so on. Windows XP
brought a whole new "experience" to the user, therefore the name. I suggest that
the next Linux kernel releases be called Linux 03, Linux 04, Linux 04.5 (OSR1),
Linux 04.7B (OSR2 SP4 OEM), Linux 2005 and Linux VD (Valentine's Day edition).
Furthermore, remember how Microsoft named every upcoming version of Windows
after some Egyptian city? Cairo, Chicago and so on. I think that the development
kernels should be named after Spanish cities to celebrate Linux' Spanish
origins. Linux Milano or Linux Rome anyone?
* Multi-User Support. This has always been one of Microsoft's strong sides,
especially in the Windows 95/98 variants, where passwords were completely
unnecessary. Microsoft has made the right decision by not bothering the user
with a distinction between "normal" and "root" users too much -- practice has
shown that average users can be trusted to act responsibly and in full awareness
of the potential consequences of their actions. After all, if your operating
system doesn't trust you, why should you trust it? (To be fair, Linux is making
some progress here with the Lindows [lindows.com] distribution, where users are
always running as root.)
With Windows XP, Microsoft has again improved multi-user support. Not only
does Windows XP come with a large library of user pictures that are displayed on
the login screen, such as a guitar and a flower, it also has "quick user
change". This makes it possible to login as a different user with a simple
keyboard shortcut, and the good news is: programs from the old user keep running
in the background! Beat that, Linux!
* Programmability. Microsoft has always been known for making computer
machine power accessible to end users. The operating system comes with many
helpful tools such as VBScript, a programming language especially useful for
developing intelligent agents as mentioned above, and QBASIC, a truly innovative
"hacker" tool that makes it pos
Is there any reason why after all these years we don't have MPPE in a stock kernel? I always have to get a specially built kernel so that I can use pppd to connect to a MSFT/Windows VPN server. I use somebody else's build (deb http://www.vanadac.com/~dajhorn/projects/debian-pp tp woody main) which makes my life much easier, but it's not released as fast as the stock kernels.
I'm aware of projects such as The Hurd -- this seems to follow closely the unix philosophy, but it's a ways off from general usability. Others have noted that it's usually easier to debug a monolithic program than to debug communication problems between small unixy programs. (Maybe there is some way to make a communications chart of said small programs, so that it looks like monolithic code? )
Discuss.
Computers are useless. They can only give you answers.
-- Pablo Picasso
I saw something about clustering support. Not much of a list. There's gotta be more than that. "Focusing on the desktop" does not make a list...it's too vague. Any specifics?
Then again, I suppose you're not going to get very specific on an e-week article.
Don't get me wrong. I'm all excited about 2.6 making the distros and then hearing about what awesome stuff they'll have on 2.7 -- but this article really just leaves me hanging.
After a frustrating weekend trying to get a High Point SATA card working in my Linux server, I'm putting better SATA support on the top my my wish list!
"We have nothing in common, your attitude annoys me, and your political views are appalling."
With so many people with their own agendas pushing and pulling at the kernel, and Linus being the steadfast leader he is, I can't help but think Linux may be headed for a fork in the not so distant future. Unless there is a way to make the kernel truly enterprise class as well as a responsive, low latency desktop system and a near real time embedded platform all at the same time.
I'm amazed (in the good way) the kernel devs have made it as versatile as they have to this point. Hats off to them and here's to hoping they can keep it up.
"Watch your cornhole, bud."
The ad du jour: Windows saved 11-22% over Linux in TCO in 4 out of 5 environments.
From the story: Amazon, which has been running Linux since 2000, has been steadily moving its infrastructure from Sun Microsystems Inc.'s Unix servers to Hewlett-Packard Co. ProLiant servers running Linux. The company said in a 2001 Securities and Exchange Commission filing that Linux cut its technology expenses by $16 million, or 25 percent.
I know the Amazon example is in comparison to Solaris; but still... I felt like stoking the fire.
That's still the idea. When they say "putting new stuff in the kernel," they really mean "new options that you *can* compile into the kernel." Don't like Ham radio support in your kernel? Don't compile it in. Same for multiprocessor support, or virtualization support, or whatever the hell they throw in that you happen not to want.
That's the beauty. Now - you *are* compiling your own kernels, right? Cuz if you blindly use whatever default kernel RedHat or whoever throws at you, that's not so good maybe. ;)
That was quoted from an Oracle Exec. let's not get ahead of ourselves. I'm not sure how 2.6 is considered a "server" release. The Kernel is the kernel. 2.6 will be the default kernel on desktop installs in a few months I'm sure.
A lot of the patches in 2.6 benefit both the server and desktop camps equally. The scheduler and VM improvments and XFS. I believe RedHat backports those patches to the 2.4 kernel for the ES/AS/WS versions.
If you haven't tried 2.6 yet, you really should. I noticed a considerable increase in X response time with it.
Not much infomation in the article but I must admit it would be nice to start having SAN/Cluster filesystems as part of stock kernels. People realy dont understand the power of these filesystems to provide security and scaleability. With modern cluters inconnects being able to serve up fiber channel multigigabit ethernet and low latency interconnects it gets easier and easier to make pure diskless compute nodes that are for more than just number chrunching.
Think about only needing a single copy of your web server image mounted read only to the web servers themselves.
Setting up CAD farms that all utilize direct attached storage in a shared method leaving network bottlenecks behind.
Low end systems like firewire may even be able to attach single disks between multiple machines with similtanious access (have to check on multi initiator firewire looks posible never seen a definate though) in a safe manner.
No sir I dont like it.
Will there be support for my orbiting brain lasers in the 2.7 series?
--
No bits were harmed during the production of this mail
A web browser and a media player would make 2.7 a killer kernel.
I've read and re-read the article. Other than a couple of vague references, there is no list there at all.
"I'd rather be a lightning rod than a seismometer." -Ken Kesey
Now, I don't know if they mean something like ReactOS or not, but if you had a Linux that could deftly boot a RedmondOS, such that you could tap into all of its drivers, how cool would that be?
I end up running XP so that my HP6110 driver can give me double-sided, four sheets per page printouts of those endless
Don't get me wrong, I love my RH9 and all, but the pragmatist runs Linux for love, and Redmond products when it makes sense.
Such a potential capability in Linux must be soiling laundry in the State of Washington even as you read this.
Get thee glass eyes, and, like a scurvy politician, seem to see things thou dost not.--King Lear
I would like to see less things in the 2.7 kernel than in the 2.6 kernel. Getting device drivers, network drivers, etc, out of the kernel core and into modules was a step forward, but I think the next step forward would be to get these things out of the kernel entirely, and into userland. That would give Linux a huge advantage over Microsoft Windows. Installing and un-installing device drivers would become much easier for users. Manufacturers would like this too because then there would be less concern about GPL and device drivers. It would be easier to release binary-only drivers.
That article was amazingly content-free.
Interesting that CA is pushing for inclusion of a kernel auditing facility in 2.7. That sort of functionality, required in a number of federal contexts, is already available in a Linux-compatible, GPL'ed code base, from Intersect Alliance down in Australia. The Snare project patches the Linux kernel with auditing instrumentation, making it possible to detect abnormal system call activity that other methods don't.
Solaris has had something like this for a long time in the form of BSM, as had Windows. Even Mac OS X has preliminary BSM support in Mac OS X Panther. It would be very great to see this kind of functionality as a config option on the Linux kernel, and hopefully sooner rather than later.
- jon
Ganymede, a GPL'ed metadirectory for UNIX
I want filesystem priorities. A background task that is grinding the hard drive, should only do so when a high priority task isn't using the drive, or when its data is adjacent to the high priority data the head is next to anyway.
If you haven't tried 2.6 yet, you really should. I noticed a considerable increase in X response time with it.
:P
I hope you didn't mean what you wrote.
I noticed a considerable increase in X response time with it.
I noticed the exact opposite.
times were signifigantly decreased.
Wow, sent an e-mail as suggested when clicking on "use classic" banner, and got a fast response that addressed my msg
They mentioned the word in passing, but I think for the kernel to provide this will be a huge benefit on many levels - and immediate benefits could be seen in projects like udev and the HAL stuff that is going on.
Besides, machines are getting to resemble the big iron of yesterday enough that you can (and a large number of people do) run multiple OS's on a single machine. Having an underlying architecture to better support those goals would be a great thing.
To a certain degree, it is like the evolution from a shared memory space to a virtual memory space - one of the greatest features was protection. Virtualize the entire OS (wow!) and you can run your different server apps on the same machine without the risks of one nuking the other.
Emulation has a ton of cool things going on right now. With a swift boost from an OS designed to virtualize the hardware it would make it trivial to have multiple copies of the OS running at very near full speed with complete access to the hardware.
"hotplugging" is already a feature of linux. /var/log/messages and watch the output as you add/remove devices).
once you've shoved your usb pen/mouse/kb into the port, the kernel will see it(try running tail -f
the problem here is implementing the interface in userland(Gnome tools for example).
The next version of gnome will support this through "Project Utopia".
Read Robert Love's blog for more info on that:
here
i wish i was but oh well
I believe they mean something like this.
In a setup like this you have one big machine running lots of copies of Linux or some other operating system with each in its own virtual machine. To manage all of this you have z/VM running on top. If I understand correctly, what they are talking about is being able to have Linux serve z/VM's role.
Of course, at least half (possibly all) of this goes way over my head since I'm just a math guy who likes to fool around with computers sometimes.
My only political goal is to see to it that no political party achieves its goals.
They need to a standardize on a graphics API. I would say OpenGL, and not X.
OpenGL comes supported by the hardware guys, and X windows actually could be written on top of it, so that you don't need a new X server for each hardware revision. Harware accelerated anti-aliased alpha blended window manager running at 100fps. It's very doable. And, it'll be used by non-windowing devices (like game-boxes) that don't need X-windows.
This helps installation ease of use: Define the interface spec, and let the hardware vendors build on top of that, rather than defining the hardware spec, and writing device drivers for each indivdual hardware that desktop users have to go seek out and download.
The API spec should also be defined for other parts of the desktop. We shouldn't have to define individual ethernet drivers- it should just be one ethernet driver that all the hardware guys design their device around. Same for audio and other desktop functions.
If they're successful they'll be able to throw away all previous device drivers going forward into 3.0 or 3.2. If not, then they have to have device driver maintainers for the kernel.
We should make the desktop as easy to use as a game-box.
Um. We have this already, right? You can run linux virtually in linux, to do just as you describe iin paragraph 3. You can run any kind of emulator for other OS's to run on. What else would you want again?
"..complete access to the hardware..."
That's the point of virtualization, etc. Access to the hardware breaks the security part of virtualization and emulation. If you can access memory just like you were the original operating system, then you ARE the operating system, and you can trash anything and everything running.
Who is this Anonymous Coward character, how does he post so much, and why is he always such a whore?
I would like to see something in the nature of a area where all executable commands for any user software get put into.. Many programs today install theirselves into various /usr /usr/share /usr/local it just goes on and on. Reguardless of where the program installs itself I think a top level directory /usr/software where all programs put in a link back to it's working directory and main executable for all programs..
/usr/software and it makes it easier for plugin/mod authors to know where things are.
:) where people now know their programs (With very few exceptions) now end up.
That way all users know that their programs reside in
Either way if this is not feasable then it's time to standardize where things are going.. Windows has it's Program Files which went a long way towards fixing user confustion
From a MS ad embeeded in the article:
"Windows Server 2003 offers a savings of 11-22% over Linux in 4 out of 5 workplace scenarios."
From the text of the article:
"The company said in a 2001 Securities and Exchange Commission filing that Linux cut its technology expenses by $16 million, or 25 percent."
Whatever it is I'm complaining about, I'm sure the Republicans did it. This is
Sure, but it wasn't really informative. About 4 ideas were suggested, and a lot of effort was put into making sure we knew who the players were. I still haven't figgured out what amazon.com wants, but they get a couple paragraphs.
What is going to happen? I still don't know after reading this. Well I can make a couple of guesses. Some clustering support. a couple other things. Not everyone wants all of the above.
I gaurentee that a lot more will go into 2.7 than the above. This gives me no clue as to what though. It was a waste of time reading that artical.
erm, Linux does this already
mount your
only give exec permission to applications that you want people to run (by setting the owner, group, and appropriate permission bits on each file).
now only root can allow a user's program to run (by installing it outside
Wouldn't be hard to have a setuid-root (or even setuid-special-user) program that checked the signing of the new software and moved it to the executable area, and we already have the sandboxing
- Binaries meant for normal users go in to
/usr/bin, unless they're part of the base system, in which case they go in to /bin. If they're part of XFree86's special playground, then they go in to /usr/X11R6/bin, but that's really an ugly holdover more than anything.
- Binaries for administrators go in to
/sbin or /usr/sbin
- Shared libraries go in to
/usr/lib or /lib, depending on how close to the base system it is. Sometimes they put their own subfolder in /usr/lib, but not as often.
- Executables meant just for the app and not the user, as well as images, sounds, etc go in to
/usr/share/appname
- Documents go in to
/usr/share/doc/
- System-wide config files go in to
/etc
This is all really well established, and I'd be surprised if all the major dists didn't follow it. It's not really that complex, especially when normal users really only have to know about"I may not have morals, but I have standards."
Yes, because that's what linux has been missing all along! The Windows Add Hardware Wizard!!!
Jesus cockgobbling Christ, am I the only one that thinks this guy should get karma-bombed back to -50 for this cretinish piece of ass-stinky opinion?
Menuconfig is about as simple and consistent as it gets, and unlike some other un-named operating system, linux doesn't have a "ports" category that only sometimes includes 3rd party serial cards or USB busses. Drivers have a certain category they belong in (barring some truly innovative/bizarre piece of hardware), and you'd do good to learn them. As for kudzu, get a real distro.
2.6 is a server release?!?
/dev stuff is cool but that's neither server- nor desktop-specific. The IO rewrites were a big thing but only kernel developers really care about that.
The biggest feature in 2.6 is the massive improvement in scheduler performance focused mainly on DESKTOP use. This is the version that will stop the choppy mouse movements and sounds that newcomers to Linux hate so much.
Basically everything else in 2.6, while nice, is just cleanup and added hardware support (drivers). The virtual
The author of the article was both wrong and boring.
-- laws are the opinions of politicians --
And #1 on that list is... Paul, can we get a drum roll?
#1- get rid of those damn, damn, r00t exploits!
Manipulate the moderator system! Mod someone as "overrated" today.
I always click MS ad in sites I like, That is same money for the site.
This may come off as overly aggressive, and for that I apologize in advance, but people who haven't adminstrated *nix boxes in large-scale deployments often fail to recognize that there's a delibrate method behind the file system.
/bin, /usr/bin, and /usr/local/bin may seem trivial to you as a user, but from an administrative vantage point, they are very important.
/bin, /sbin, and /lib. That means that all tools necessary for fixing the system must be there including all kernel modules and shared libraries. It must also be possible for this device to be completely read-only, possibly even residing in firmware. Installing an application in /bin while its companion libraries are on /usr/lib would be folly since the /usr partition may be completely inaccessible. You may notice that some distributions install a stripped-down, statically-linked version of vi in /bin and a full-featured, shared-library version in /usr/bin. Now you know why.
/lib, the remaining partitions can be mounted. On a single-user machine, the /usr directory may be on the same partition as root. Often times it has its own partition. But for large-scale deployments, the entire /usr partition may be on a network share. It may also be on a CDROM. Installing software to /usr may be impossible or require a site-wide change. Secondly, it won't do to have software trying to write data to this partition, so programs and data are always separated. All data goes to /var which is normally a machine-specific mount. Also, a diskless machine may mount /var on a ram disk.
/usr/local directory. If /usr is read-only, /usr/local is mounted to a separate writeable volume. All software not packaged by the distributor or site administrator belongs in /usr/local if it's machine-wide and in the user's home directory if not. Other conventions exist, including the use of /opt, but that's a site policy issue.
/bin, /usr/bin, or /usr/local/bin. Libraries go to the equivalent lib directory. Header files to the equivalent include directory. Manual pages to man. Cross-application data to share. All application data goes to /var including log files and databases. All temporary files go to /tmp. If you follow these rules, there's no end to the configurations you can create. Violate any single rule and you have a machine that cannot be recovered, applications that cannot be shared site-wide, machine-wide, or between users, and data that cannot be conveniently backed up. Sorta like Windows.
/usr/software/netscape won't help if the installer is looking for /usr/software/mozilla. This class of problem has been solved many times over with package configuration files and scripts. The responsibility is mainly that of the distribution maintainers to facilitate this. If it's not happening for your distro, get satisfaction, or move to a distro that cares.
Each one of those directories has a very distinct purpose; it didn't happen that way by accident. The difference between
In single user mode with an ailing system, the most you may successfully get booted is the root partition. You have at your disposal only
Once booted and all the necessary kernel modules are loaded from
To address software installed on individual machines, we use the
So that's that. Given any package, it is a simple matter to determine if its executables go to
You specifically address the issue of plug-ins, but even having an application located at
That said, the browser plug-in issue annoys me, too.
-Hope
Hot Swappable processor support (obviously on 2+ processor systems), hot swappable memory support (obviously on systems with more than 1 stick of memory). Better system-within-a-system support (currently you can run Linux under Linux). Clusters would be nice. At some point, SOC systems will come along, at which point support for that will need to be put in. Selectable schedulers would be nice too (although that is too much bother for most people).
"With a new Mozilla released, is the browser war back?
I'm sticking with Internet Explorer
I'm giving Mozilla a second chance
The browser war?"
What a dumb poll, what a dumb site. What should I choose if I am NOT using IE at all?
Maybe there are better sites to put articles about Linux Kernel than that one?
There used to be a cluster fs for windows called Mango - but that's now obsolete thanks to Win2003, which clusters. But Linux can't access that as far as I know. So there is a middleman - Coda. Coda is a clustered file system for use with WinNt/Win95/Linux and is already in the kernel as far as I know. Just clearing up the hole that appears to be at the bottom of the article (really... it's been in since 2.4!)
in windows, put this file in 'C:\WINDOWS\system32\drivers\etc'. for linux, it goes in '/etc'
the real trick is changing the 'action canceled' message into a plain-white (or your favorite bgcolor) page so blocked ads show up as a color patch instead of a text message...
credit where credit is due, i did not create this file. i downloaded it pretty much how it appears (but from where i can't remember)
Wave upon wave of demented avengers March cheerfully out of obscurity into the dream