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A Power Users Look at Linux on the Mac
An anonymous reader writes "Even though most Linux users have treated Linux as an operating system for their x86 white boxes, Linux runs equally well on PowerPC machines. This article looks at Linux on the PowerPC and the appealing range of PPC machines produced by Apple, where the option of using Linux is of great value to many users."
... the OS X system is just so fucking sweet though. I *never* thought I'd enjoy it, but a student got a new Mac notebook when OS X was first introduced, and he showed me how he organized his iCal and Outlook to keep track of homework, labs, and projects, and how he could open a native terminal window and do things like ls -R | grep filename and search his system for files.
Well, needless to say, I feel in love. Things like the recent introduction of iTunes and a better browser only make the deal sweeter.
Sure, the hardware's pricier and maybe a bit modern art-deco for my tastes, but as much as I love Linux, I can't imagine running it instead of OS X on my laptop.
Even Robin Malda uses OS X!
Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate. Ex-O'Reilly/MIT employee, now a full-time Google employee.
But I would really like to see IBM announce and open hardware platform based on the PowerPC chips.
I'd like to see instant on Linux desktops, and S3 suspend-to-ram states that are 99.99% reliable.
BTW, can any mac user tell me: how well does the ACPI equivalent on MAC work?
[p]I would like to ask, as a completely serious question, aside from the matter of personal preference, the whole, "Linux is better than anything else in the world," thing, why in the hell would anyone feel a need to install Linux on a Mac?[/p][p]OS X runs on most modern Macs, and is based on a *BSD. It's stable as hell, more secure than any distro of Linux I know of, and it has a very functional GUI (if you like such things).[/p][p]I mean, I run two Linux boxen, one as a server, the other as a generic code monkey-ing machine, and if I had a Mac I would in no way see or feel a need to put Linux on it.[/p]
Edward@Tomato - /home/Edward/ man woman
man: no entry for woman in the manual.
"Qua!?"
Anyway, I am planning to buy an old mac (mostly because I like its colour), and, of course, I want a Linux-only system.
Therefore, which distributions do you suggest. Are there sws that are not available for the mac-linux (openoffice?)?
Thanks,
M.
--
http://incuso.altervista.org
Here's hoping that Apple does real well, so that there are a lot of cheap used PPCs out there. I like what I see on my friends powerbook, I just can't justify the price at this time.
...will they sell me one without charging me for the MacOS?
If I buy a Mac then I'm paying for the OS and the brand. Is there another, cheaper, source for the hardware?
The last paragraph of the article talks about running a program called Mac-On-Linux, which lets you run Mac OS 9 and/or Mac OS X while running Linux. I have heard about this before, but does it actually work? There is no way that I would give up the number of apps that I use every day in Mac OS X to run Linux. If Reason, Photoshop, Director, and HTML Face X run under MOL I'll be happy to try a Linux distribution.
...the best of both worlds under linux on Mac hardware:
http://www.maconlinux.org
-Ghostis
Computer Science is all about trying to find the right wrench to bang in the right screw. -T.Cumbo?
One thing that is certain: If you use a Mac, you have no exotic hardware and drivers should work quite well. Thousands of users have the same harware configuration as you. Therefore you can get the most out of the hardware - if you want to use linux on a mac - I think MacOSX is quite a nice Operating System, especially for desktop use.
Spelling mistakes: My is english spoken not tongue of mother.
Everyone talks about user-friendliness issues that prevent Linux from becoming desktop-worthy. Wouldn't Apple be the best platform to introduce this on? Not due to technical merit, but simply because ease-of-use is a major selling point to Apple? If people want to make a truly slam-bang intuitive GUI for Linux, code it for PPC and worry about porting it later. Hell, Apple themselves could sponsor such a project and use it as a way to garner themselves more Mac sales. "Look, the most intuitive Linux distro out there runs best on a Mac!" Maybe end-users wouldn't get it right away, but sysadmins and such types would, and there's always the "My friend knows computers, and..." factor to be considered. They'll hear about it soon enough (remember when the Internet was a geek-exclusive playground?).
Help protect civil rights from abuse by the TSA - visit TSA News Blog.
http://www.tsanewsblog.com
Does anyone know where I can find Knoppix for PPC? I'd love to play around with it on some old iMacs I have lying around. However I only found an old release. I would think that linux-live cds should work even better om macs than on pcs, since there is so much less hardware to configure. The knoppix homepage states that the minimum requirements include a x86 processor.
Hm - there are some interesting implications with that.
IBM wants to sell chips. Apple wants to sell hardware. If IBM came out with a "desktop" or even "workstation" PowerPC machine that ran, say, Yellow Dog Linux (or PPC Suse or the like), how would Apple respond?
Especially since most of the programs made for PPC Linux can easily be ported to Apple - whether running under X11 or adding in Cocoa portions - and I'm sure Apple would be more than happy to supply a compiler that could turn PPC-X-Windows code to Aqua code - cludgy, but it could work.
If such a system took off, Apple would be pretty happy - more programs could be converted easily. And odds are, if you're already running PPC desktop, you might be looking at OS X for ease of use issues.
On the other hand - who would use such a system? Most people would probably go for x86 Linux - x86 parts are cheaper, more software is available (even on just the Linux side alone). So a person wanting a PPC desktop would have to have a very good reason, like wanting to do high-end calculations or graphics rendering.
In which case, they'd probably just go for a Mac first anyway.
Personally, I think that Apple's best move is this:
1. Keep the high-end Powermacs/powerbooks.
2. Keep the lower-cost iBooks.
3. Make the iMacs truly cost compatible. Yes, there are the eMacs - what I think would blow away the market is a $600 headless iMac. Small base, maybe like the Cube (only upgradeable - that's what killed the little guy). Most people already have monitors, and if they could by a $600 G4 Mac they'd be estatic. Apple would make money, and could eventually move them over into the more expensive stuff - and even if they didn't, they'd gain market share, which would still mean more money.
Either way, we'll have to see what happens with IBM and Apple. The 970 chips are becoming more popular (Xbox Next, anyone? - this could be a side issue about how many Xbox games could be ported to OS X if the Xbox Next is truly G5 based....), so the future could hold anything.
52 Weeks, 52 Religions with John Hummel
For almost any model there is an installation report about Linux on an Apple PowerBook or iBook.
... in Europe. Seriously, compare the prices at the current exchange rates, especially for Powerbooks (but do remember to substract the VAT, which is included in most European Apple stores). Apple sells it's stuff for hundreds of dollars more in Europe. Same goes for many brand stuff electronics and PCs. But with PCs, at least you can buy separate components, which are usually not much more expensive than in the US.
OK, I'm not trying to be anal here but people who don't know might be misled by the following in the article:
Apple's G5 towers are comparable in speed to the fastest x86-derived CPUs and systems; in other words, the Intel Itanium and AMD Athlon64.
Itanium is not x86 derived. It has its own novel instruction set.
If so, then that would be a real good reason to replace OS/X with it.
This is my sig.
Mac OS X is so much more refined than Linux, and actually has a huge amount of produtivity software. So why should anyone in their right mind want to run Linux on a Mac, unless (s)he is a masochist?
Yellow dog linux
might very well be Mac on Linux, ironically enough. Check out this:
http://www.maconlinux.org/sshots/pic12.jpg
Running multiple versions of MacOS in parallel. Think about the possibilities for software developers. Having multiple environments immediately available for testing.
Then of course there's the ability to run all those Mac apps when needed and still have the Linux desktop to go to when they aren't needed.
Mac on Linux is what the open source world should try and create for the Windows world. Think of the possibilities if you could run Windows at work in a Window - be able to do all the windows specific stuff at need, but have Linux goodness in which to work as well. If a phb strolls in, just flip your desktop over to full screen windows. Then for the rest of the time go stealth with Xpde, good enough to fool a casual glance. Maybe some rootless window hack could even be figured out.
Of course, if your boss says you Must Use Windows, there's not a whole lot you can do. But perhaps this would be an acceptible compromise.
"I object to doing things that computers can do." -- Olin Shivers, lispers.org
Exactly. It's like putting a VW Bug engine into a mid-60's porsche. Not only is it not going to work right(and LinuxPPC doesn't work nearly as well, just on a features basis, as OS X), but it'll be slow and everyone who sees it will just stare at you- and if they're not polite enough, demand to know why you did it. Even Robin Malda uses OS X!
Who cares? Slashdot is hardly an example of technical prowess; in fact, it's rotting(HTML 3?!?). The FAQ hasn't been touched since '99, and they have yet to rise to the challenge of solving any of the problems they themselves created(slashdotting for example). From what I've heard(several OSDN sales people worked where I used to work), Malda got wined and dined by one company after another hoping he'd either post about them or endorse their products. Absolutely no integrity.
Please help metamoderate.
Doesn't OS X have the 'locate ' command?
It's faster that ls -R | grep since it goes against a pre-indexed db of the file system.
You cannot boot directly from OF (openfirmware) into Linux. Wrong, OF is a really a boot loader and can load any ELF or xcoff binary from many different file system formats, hfs, hfs+, ISO CD, ext2, and ufs.
Also OF can read both partion maps, Apple format and x86 format.
Of course you can still use yaboot if you want.
While the heading refers to Linux on Macs, there's a number of other PPC machines that'll run Linux
a pegasos I or II is a PPC based machine, there's also Amiga One boards - a new Mini-ITX AmigaOne looks REALLY appealing, as long as it's not slugged with the "Amiga Tax" (double the price for the privilege of being able to run AmigaOS4 if it's released). a Mini ITX board with a GHz or more G4 - not a scaled down VIA type setup, but a full honest-to-goodness G4. That's appealing.
There's also several VMEbus boards based on PPC chips from PPC440 to G4s, and a newer one out soon from Momentum computer, Dual G5s on an ATX board. Pricey, but it's just a reference board at the moment.
If prices dropped on these, especially on the Momentum board, I could see these being real alternatives to x86, especially for people a bit worried about MS's palladium plans. A mac is a wonderful thing, but if you ask 'Why bother" about putting Linux over the top of a machine that'll run OSX, one of the above solutions might be an option.
OK... maybe this note is a little karma whoring by the author of the referred article. But what the heck, I -did- write it, and I'm always pleased when things by or about me make the slashdot headline.
:-)).
/.-ing.
A question a bunch of people have raised in comments is "why bother with Linux if you buy a Mac with OSX on it"... well, read the article. I don't say that switching to or adding Linux is always desirable; but I think I do a good job of describing some scenarios where it is. That said, I certainly -do- like OSX quite a bit (where my favorite installed application is still bash
Also, contrary to some down-modded poster, IBM can INDEED easily handle the load of slashdotting. In fact, a zillion hits to my article is indirectly good for me (I'm not on commission or anything, but it puts an extra sparkle in my editors' eyes). Also, FWIW, all my articles soon make it to [http://gnosis.cx/publish/] (which reminds me that I need some updating, it's been a couple months)... which is also quite strong enough to survive
Yours, David...
Buy Text Processing in Python
Locate just looks at files, not the content in them.
`locate foo` will turn up much different results than `grep -R foo`.
a lobster. But they are not the same.
That's why I bought an iBook.. I figured it would be a perfect linux laptop.
Then I tried OSX for the heck of it, you know, it was already installed.
And now you can pry OSX off my mac from my cold, dead hands.
That second hierarchy actually comes from NeXTSTEP, where it was called /NextApplications, /NextLibrary, /NextDeveloper, etc. Mac OS 9 did not have a particular imposition of hierarchy in the same way that UNIX might; applications can live just about anywhere.
Secondly there's a very conscious and IMHO good reason to farm off the NeXTish stuff into a different hierarchy - that is that it's a different system. All of the files in /etc, /usr, /var etc. are in the same places that you would expect to find them on any UNIX. Looking for the run control scripts? They're in /etc/rc*.
The OPENSTEP-derived APIs, the Aqua GUI, Cocoa applications etc. are orthogonal to UNIX. They just happen to be running on a UNIX system (unless you're using Yellow Box for Windows NT). Keeping them in their own hierarchies so that they don't intrude on or get confused with UNIX stuff is a good idea.
There is an anti-case-study: GNUstep does indeed put all of its files into the UNIX hierarchy, but it still partitions them into separate subdirectories, namely /usr/GNUstep and ~/GNUstep. Again, because it's orthogonal to the underlying UNIX system, it tries to keep out of its way.
The author isn't aware that Mandrake can do the same thing by running urpmi PACKAGENAME. And the graphical front end, rpmdrake, is a competant method of installing softare. Also, it is possible to install yum or apt-rpm via urpmi if you prefer them.
Of course... Linux on a Mac presents an interesting question.
There are x86s available without Windows, but Apple will start shipping PPC based PCs without OSX shortly after Satan orders anti-freeze and warm winter woollens.
Does that make it more or less a candidate for replacement with Linux??
You cant make anything foolproof, they'll only invent better fools.
Ok, so according to Apple, iCal was introduced as part of OS 10.2 and not part of OS 10.0. This could a simply mistake or, by looking at Amsterdam Vallon (639622)'s posts, I see our friend likes to post crap that moderators will push up, gain karma and troll. Most of his posts have been modded down.
2000-01-05: Apple Unveils Mac OS X
2002-07-17: Apple Introduces "Jaguar," the Next Major Release of Mac OS X
2002-07-17: Apple Introduces iCal
Apple - Mac OS X - Features by Version
The Common Hardware Reference Platform (CHRP, aka PPCP) was released many many years ago, but it hasn't really taken off. IBM did sell some of these systems, and the modern pegasos platform offers G3 & G4 processors.
Here's some more technical info.
p.s. mac sleeping is perfect - sleep and wake are quick, and network connectivity (even when roaming) is very fast.
HIV Crosses Species Barrier... into Muppets
I still run linux exclusively on my laptop and in the office, and on just about any server I have a say over. Some people ask why install Linux on a ppc but a lot of oss apps don't run smoothly on osx even with fink. I've had a lot of problems, where running a full fledged distro seems to run pretty smoothly on the ppc.
OSX is nice but if I was not running photoshop, garageband, or final cut, I would not have purchased a mac. I have a dual 2.8 xeon at work running gentoo that I prefer hands down over the G5 for coding, mainly for software reasons.
I like the gentoo packaging system, everything is available through portage. With OSX, I feel like I'm running windows again because most of the software is shareware. Like I just paid $130 for isight, but I can pretty much only video chat with it by default. If I want to use it for a webcam, I need to pay $30. If I want to record video with imovie, I need to pay $50 for ilife.
Another thing that bugged me about isight was the apple has hard coded the min requirements for the software. So if you plug the isight in to a 500mhz g3 ibook, it will not even attempt to work even though it could. I've never ran in to windows or linux software that will not even attempt to run if you don't meet the min requirements.
so it turns out I can use the isight with the g3 500 ibook, but I have to spend another $30 for some shareware that removes the limit and lets usb cameras work for isight. So in total, it cost me $110 in software in order to get basic functionality out of my $130 fire wire camera.
My debacle with the isight is classic case of why free software and keeping a separation between the software developers ands the company that makes the hardware, has a lot of value.
I doubt locate would be as useful in that situation -- if you're doing an ls in only directory, the time difference will be minimal and the results more up-to-date than locate's. If you're doing a find over multiple dirs, on the other hand, then you'd probably have need to look for a faster solution (ie, locate) -- so long as what you're looking for existed the last time locate's db was updated.
However I had a coworker who had a MAC OSX lap top. I was impressed. All the goodness of a nix shell, xwindows, plus easy-to-do everything MAC style.
Given all that a MAC 0SX gives you I can't see why anyone would want to run linux on it.
It would be like bringing bolagna on whitebread with you to a fancy restaurant you love.
Steve
I have a second hand 400mhz G4 powerbook. When OSX came out I tried it, but it seemed to run a bit too slow on the powerbook for me and watching a divx movie in osx was nearly impossible with quicktime.
After a week I was fed up with it. I've been running gentoo linux on a lot of x86 servers, so I decided to make it a gentooppc computer - with a GUI for the first time.
It took some effort at that time, since gentooppc was just starting, but eventually I managed it.
I felt proud that it worked and it made many mac addicts give me strange but cool looks.
Nowadays I run the 2.6 kernel and kde 3.2 and I must say it's perfect (only vga out is a bit of a b!tch with my graphical chipset): reliable and fast and all of the hardware is supported. I use it mainly for webbrowsing (konqueror), movies (mplayer), email (sylpheed-claws) and SSH'ing to other machines.
Only one but, if you run linux on a non x86 computer, you don't have the nice Wine things, but on the other hand you can run DOS apps with Bochs (though terribly slow on my system).
I won't swap if someone offered me a faster powerbook with OSX and I weren't allowed to reinstall my beloved linuxppc.
OpenOffice should run fine. It will also run with OSX using apple's X11, but not natively under Aqua.
Actually, the current preferred implementation is called NeoOffice/J. It uses Java to make OO.o act much more like a native Aqua app. The GUI still looks out-of-place, but it supports native fonts and printing, standard OS X keyboard shortcuts, OS X's various foreign language input methods (like Japanese), double-clickable files, and is self-contained as a .app package.
Java and Flash plugins. In Brazil it is nearly impossible to find a job or use a bank in the Web without them both.
Leandro Guimarães Faria Corcete DUTRA
DA, DBA, SysAdmin, Data Modeller
GNU Project, Debian GNU/Lin
...and don't see an incentive of using Linux. Most of my linux apps have been ported to osx , some with cocoa gui and the works, like xchat, wget, etc.
And there isn't an nvidia driver for linux/ppc.
So really, why use Linux here? I even have fink if i need some gnu/linux stuff.
I wouldn't even know how to install linux here, because i would need to repartition and don't want to lose data.
Open Source Java Web Forum with LDAP authentication
One of the things that people have been saying with each iteration of OS X is that it is getting faster and faster. While this may be true, they still have a long way to go. I recently tried out a gentoo live cd on a friends 600MHz G3 iBook, and I was blown away. In OS X 10.3 the iBook feels responsive, but it is clear that a fast G4 or G5 would fair a great deal better. Under Gentoo running gnome 2.4 this computer was sickeningly fast. It felt almost as fast as my Athlon XP 2500. I was amazed at how much this little 600MHz G3 was capable of. If you are looking for a reason to use Linux over Mac OS X, look no further than getting to utilize the performance your system is capable of.
I know I know OS X is a more modern os blah blah blah. People used to say (maybe they still do and I just ignore them) the same thing about java, it is a more modern language and all of it's advanced capabilities are too much for todays computers. The end result? Very few modern GUI apps are written in java. I say the same thing for OS X, just because it uses a somewhat new concept for GUI (pdf-based) doesn't justify it's cripplingly slow speeds. I for one would rather have a fully functional GUI that doesn't make a decent processor suck wind every time I try to resize a browser window, than have the prettiest antialised interface. For the record I personally find gnome 2.4 with the ximian industrial theme quite pleasing to the eye. Just my $0.02.
Fear trumps hope and ignorance trumps both
I have used Linux as a desktop for a good part of a year. I also now own 3 macs running OSX. I would NEVER go back to Linux as my desktop. Linux was a pain to maintain. I felt like I was spending more time updating my box than actually using it.
You may ask, why bother updating your linux desktop all the time? The Answer, Linux is not ready to be a stable desktop yet. You always update thinking the next newest release of EVERYTHING will stabailize your machine and speed it up. New Kernel release, rebuild the kernel. New KDE release, chase down and update all the dependencies. New Gnome release, rebuild the newest gdk, glibc, etc..
I've been there, done that. I just want to use a UNIX based desktop where I can admin all my box, do development, and have major vendor/application support (Microsoft Office, photoshop, final cut pro, Shake, Logic, Cubase, etc).
Sure on linux you CAN try to use GIMP, OpenOffice, and who knows what for video editing/sound, but it always feels like you're using a BETA application. Nothing on linux seems to feel like it's a professional COMPLETED application.
I have a All in One G3, 250mhz G3 w/768 mb of ram.
OS X runs OK on it but Yellow Dog, in addition to providing a modern browser for the platform, etc., just flat flies on the machine.
Resize a window on an old machine running OS X and you will know the pain of having a kick ass OS that is unusable in normal circumstances.
Linux provides older macs with a modern OS without the bloat.
As for hardware support, at least using YDL, the volume control on the old AIO is functional while on OS X it is broken.
YDL also fits nicely on my 1Ghz G4 flat panel imac although it does not provide any additional functionality that is not already available through OS X.
If voting were effective, it would be illegal by now.
OK, someone who uses Linux on the Mac, answer this for me: how the hell do you make it come back on after the power fails? In OS 9, this is called 'server mode'. OldWorld machines have a way to enable it by catting a few bytes at /dev/adb.
Nobody has a way to do this on anything newer, which means something like FOUR YEARS worth of machines (or more!) can't reboot when the power goes out and then comes back on.
Linux on the Mac is nothing more than a toy until someone can figure out how to set the server mode flag. I don't care if I have to run it in my boot scripts. As long as it works I will be happy.
Until it exists, I know that nobody is really using Linux on Macs for anything important, since all their machines would stay off the first time they lost power (including draining a UPS)!
Yes, I'm bitching, and no, I'm not trolling. I've done a lot of work with Linux and a G4, and this has been pissing me off the whole time.
I've installed Debian on numerous Macs upgraded with accelerater cards(powerlogix, newertech, etc.,) and the one thing you must remember is to enable your backside cache by setting the correct l2cr on the boot prompt. Most g3 cards can be handeled correctly with the BootX utility to enable the backside cache then checking on the backside cache in BootX. However G4's are another matter. The only way I've managed to enable the l2cr is manually putting it on the boot prompt line since BootX only handles G3s backside cache corectly. Another thing about setting the backside cache on G4s is finding the correct init mask for the l2cr, they are not all the same. You have to do some heavy googling to find the specific value for a specific card. But once these values are found, my upgraded old powercomputing machines, espicially the 60mhz boards perform extremely well with linux. Also many of the problems with XFree86 server can be overcome by using the fbdev. You can even use dri with it.
Try Jaguar on a 7300. Or Panther on a 9600. Or even Panther on a beige G3. For those of us who love Apple hardware, can't afford gear more recent than four years old, and want to get some UNIX out of it, Linux just blows OS X right out of the water.
Linux doesn't care about my video chipset. X11 DEs don't require 32 megs of VRAM. Linux runs inside of 128 megs of physical memory without difficulty. Fluxbox is just as responsive as OS 9 on the same hardware- something OS X still can't claim.
All that and here's the bag of chips: The Debian "Software Update" (apt) updates EVERY APPLICATION ON THE SYSTEM. Compare to OS X, where I get my Apple updates through SWU and have to download and install Adobe updates, new builds of BZFlag, new versions of Quicksilver, etceteras myself.
Not to say I don't have issues with various packages, but dear GODS Linux is far more useable on older hardware than OS X. On a general level- quality of applications and userland are a slightly different matter.
Well done on copying that from Trollaxor's site - I've seen this before. However, I shall reply to each of these points as if they were your own, in the hope that I may enlighten you..
1) True... to an extent. Why run software on PowerPC that did not originate on PowerPC? So, let's get rid of Microsoft Office v.X, the Mach microkernel, most of OS X's userspace utilities... They originated on Intel CPUs (mainly), so what are we using them on PowerPC for? Also, please note that Apple did *not* write Mach - it was developed at Carnegie Mellon University... on ia32.
2) How is Aqua/Quartz more complicated than Mach? Mach is the core of the OS - if that goes wrong you're screwed. If Aqua goes wrong - no problem. You just fall back to a text console. If Apple *could* make Mach closed source - I bet they would. Unfortunately, because they didn't write it, but instead just borrowed Mach from a university, it must remain open source. Hence why it is open. Aqua/Quartz is closed because *they wrote it*.
And Linus Torvalds may sift through a few dozen megabytes of patches a day, but that's what his job is. He works full time on Linux. He does not have any other job at the moment. Neither does he have to "attempt to integrate it into the kernel" - the patch is simply a patch - he just okays it and it goes in. Please also note that if Linux and open source wasn't here, Apple's OS X wouldn't exist.
3) This is precisely where Linux's advantage for both power users and newbies is; power users have the option of *completely* changing the GUI - something you can not do in OS X. Newbies use the default GUI, such as KDE or GNOME, which are just as good as any other GUI. Of course, people have their preferences.
And Aqua is much slower than X11. Neither does it have any of the really useful features that X11 has, such as network transparency.
4) True - this is probably Linux's major weakness, but distribution vendors such as Mandrake are making this much less user-centric and automating the process instead.
Regarding the sendmail stuff, it's your decision to have decided to compile the stuff from source. If you were running a decent distribution, such as Debian, then just a simple apt-get command would have done it all for you, in much less time. And don't say "oh, but any normal user wouldn't know about apt-get", because no "normal user" would want to patch sendmail/ssh because of security issues.
I use Linux on two PowerBook G4s - a 667MHz rev B and a 1.25GHz 15" Aluminium - and it's much more useful, and snappy, than OS X ever was.
George
George Wright
Linux on Sparc is the real untold story. The installation of Debian unstable on an unused Sun Ultra 5 has been a recent revelation, and given the prevalence of such hardware sitting unused in many locations, represents a low (or no, if one carries out an ftp install) way of recycling such hardware to make it truly useful. The Sun Ultra 5 recently rejuvenated in this way is running much faster than it ever did using Solaris 7 or 8, and also has none of the compilation/compatibility problems which beset Sun desktop users who don't have Sun's own (expensive) compiler. apt-get install - could life get any easier?
I've been a Linux on Mac supporter for awhile... as I'm sure a few people are annoyingly aware. So let's make this simple, eh?
Not everyone has OS X ready (or practical) hardware. And of those, many are simply sick of OS 9 (and earlier) OS options.
Look, I try and keep moderately up to date, but with multiple systems it's not the easiest (financially) thing to do. My PC stays current, but my Mac's don't. My old G4 400 runs OS X and is the backbone of my sound studio (runs OS X), my G3 (Lombard) laptop however, blows chunks under the strain of OS X. So, what're my options? OS 9? Please... No, it runs YDL 2.3 and is a very usable, very stable, very powerful Linux based laptop. And by the way... the great Apple support you're talking about is the same support that drops paying customers between the cracks every few years (Lombards, Yikes, 603e's, etc...).
Also, not everyone throws systems away just because it's reached the Manufacturer's end of life estimate. Man, I've got several old pre- G3 Mac's that are very useful... as file servers, MP3 servers, web appliances, etc... primarily because they run Linux.
Also, running Linux on a Mac is no different than running Linux on x86. Some people do it because they can. Why not direct a negative anti-Linux post towards Windows users? Afterall, all of your arguments would be just as (in)valid there... Why use Linux when you can run XP?
In short... just because you don't like the idea of people trashing their Mac with a non Apple created OS doesn't mean that people will stop. Some of us use multiple OSes because we like to tinker. Some because we want to continue to have a usable product even when the manufacturer would really prefer us to spend another $2000. Who knows, maybe a few people even use Linux just to tick you off.
Silly thought, huh? About as silly as firing off a post telling other's why you believe it is pointless for them to do what they wish with their machine.
Heaven forbid anyone has an enjoyable learning experience from a piece of equipment without someone else getting an endless stream of royalties.
-------
rage
#SickNotWeak
I have Puma on my 8600 and Jaguar on my Beige G3, atm. Have a look at X Post Facto.
If you want to run X11, then yes it does. Have a look at /etc/X11/XFree86Config-4 on your Linux box. Now go and install X11 on Darwin, and look at the same file. Oops! It isn't there. That's right; it doesn't need you to tell it what blinking graphics card you have, it can just ask the kernel.
Only if you only install Debian packages. As soon as you install something from another source, you have to maintain it yourself. Just as you would on OS X.
OS X also has the benefits of being a BSD: no ugly klunky SysV init, a classy signal handling mechanism, and Ceren. But it's a ++BSD; have a look at the System Starter. Marvel at the way you can compile a single binary that will run on multiple architectures. Drool over the dynamic loader. Whimper in awe at the Mach threading system.
Oh look, you're just regurgitating a pre-written troll from a troll site. Go away, troll.
I get much more annoyed when I see Photoshop eating up 10% cpu when it's just sitting there doing nothing.
I am a believer of momentum and curves.
The Mac has been 32-bit since day one, the 68000 8MHz CPU. I don't know if that's why, but the Macs have a LOT of IRQs, one for every device, and MANY more to spare.
My IDE is on IRQ 26 on my Mac, and USB is 28, I don't know what else is in there, but I'm pretty sure the Mac has 255 IRQs and there's no sharing.
This is why hardware for the Mac is so much easier to plug-and-play.
Do you realize that even on modern PCs there's only 8 IRQs? There's another 'cascade' interrupt device that provides IRQ 9-15.
"Sometimes, I think Trent just needs a cup of hot chocolate and a blankie." -Tori Amos on Nine Inch Nails
It's an iBook G4. I'm now a happy and proud owner of such a machine, and user of both MacOS X Panther an Linux on it.
/home directory, so now I have a single home for both Linux and OS X. Same desktop, same config for common programs.
The first thing I did when I got my hands on it was to re-partition it's hard drive and install Panther. Then I followed the instructions on setting up the mother of all Linux distributions on it from here.
I did the initial install of the Debian GNU/Linux base system (not without having to use a different kernel image for the ATA support, among other things to fiddle with), but then I started to take a serious look at OS X. It's an impressive operating system, with such a lovely and responsive GUI but the real power of UNIX I'm all used to underneath. I installed lots of open source software that I've get used to and couldn't live without. It all works so smoothly and nicely along other native applications, such as iTunes, Mail.app, Safari, Keynote, etc. - you get the best of both worlds. You have fink, you have darwinports, there's even OpenOffice.org. And if you're a developer, you also got Xcode from Apple. As I said, the both of worlds. And for some extra bucks you can get back some of your most beloved features from the Linux world: WindowShade X is a fine example of it.
Panther is also packed with some neat features not present anywhere else. Finder, for example, if one of the best file manager I've ever used. And Expose - I really miss it when working on Linux. One of the most useful enhancements a desktop environment could have get, it's not only eyecandy.
But then the necessity came and striked me hard. I have a small Linux consulting company. I was in a meeting with a customer the other day, and he wasn't so convinced that Linux could be a _viable_ alternative on the desktop. He thought it was just a black screen with UNIX-y commands and such. And there I was, with my iBook with Debian loaded on it but with no desktop environment to show off. Just a black screen with UNIX-y commands and such.
So I spent the whole night that day googling around and finally got my iBook to work nicely with Linux 2.6.2, supporting almost every single feature that's present on it except for Airport Extreme and the sleep functionality, which are not supported: sound, networking, USB 2.0, firewire, the combo drive, the ATI Radeon 9200 with DRI, the special function keys, the CPU frequency scaling. I even configured it to use an hfsplus partition for the
There are still some things that Linux can do better than OS X. Like OpenOffice.org or GIMP. Certainly both programs do exist for OS X but their performance and overall integration with the rest of the system is not so good.
The conclusion of it is that, even if MacOS X is one hell of an operating system, Linux is fun. I love to use the same plataform on my x86 desktop I've grown used to for more than 6 years than on my PPC based laptop. And I still have the chance to reboot and use Panther for the amusement of it.
Regards,
Articulos para gente geek: Poleras, linux, libros y mas
Anacron is a periodic command scheduler. It executes commands at intervals specified in days. Unlike cron, it does not assume that the system is running continuously. It can therefore be used to control the execution of daily, weekly, and monthly jobs (or anything with a period of n days), on systems that do not run 24 hours a day. When installed and configured properly, Anacron will make sure that the commands are run at the specified intervals as closely as machine-uptime permits.
If Tyranny and Oppression come to this land,
it will be in the guise of fighting a foreign enemy. -James Madison
His problem the tech support guy didn't let him know that Airport runs its own DHCP server, that the Apple documentation doesn't mention it, or that it was one of those things that Just Runs (TM) even if you already have a DHCP server on the network (the Linux machine).
It's totally his fault that a piece of equipment was designed to be "smarter" by autoproviding certain services without checking to see if they already exist!
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Internet Explorer (n): Another bug -- that is, a feature that can't be turned off -- in Windows.
much love to linux, i LOVE it and use it on all the pc's at work and in my past (before i switched to mac). that said, i think OSX is a better choice right now for the macs. i'm very trained to use linux/oss and that same usage pattern i still use on my mac. i have to learn the darwin way of doing things, but it's usually pretty easy to pick up.
:-)
problem with linux/ppc for me is the java support. there simply is no 1.4 support out there and that straight up blows. OS X lags behind in their implementation enough as it is. it's also not uncommon to have difficulty with hardware, power management (laptops), etc. i think if you want to run X/KDE and whatnot to preserve your uniform UI, you may as well use opendarwin. it's just a better fit, at the moment.
besides running a few commercial apps, there's not much i do with my OS X install that i can't do on linux -- with a little effort. but i think more importantly, there's very little (nothing?) i do on a regular basis that i CAN do under linux and CAN'T do under OS X (&& fink). that realization, plus the ease of use of apple's stuff, pretty much closed the deal for me to use OS X on my hardwar.... but i do miss linux, and this 2.6 kernel looks fun -- maybe i'll build a little mini-itx/x86 box for it when i got some money to burn.
This is patently untrue. On my TiBook at least there is no loss of hardware functionality whatsoever under Linux and the difference in performance is obvious. There's nothing wrong with preferring OS X to Linux so why not just say so?
The company I work for writes software for wireless adapters, and Windows was our first platform. The appeal for us of porting our software to another platform would have been much greater if there was some similarity between OSX and Linux, but there is very little. The driver model, the device management, the hardware platform, the GUI, and even the main user mode languages (OC vs. C/C++) are different. I recognize that there is a fair bit of compatibility in the user, non GUI, API's and in the CLI, but I think that was the minimum possible (ie. it couldn't be avoided).
This was Apple's choice when they did the big jump to PPC and OSX: they could have gone with the PC platform, they could have built OSX on the Linux kernel, etc. I think the OSS community would have embraced the slick, polished GUI and software that Apple has if Apple had given them a reason to - it's exactly what Linux needs. But what the OSS community did not need (and still doesn't need) was to reopen the BSD vs. Linux divide (like GTK vs. Qt).
I'm sure they had solid financial and strategic reasons for staying away from any Linux compatibility, but for both Apple and Linux users (and for us developers) it was a bad choice. Perhaps they were concerned that if they did something that really benefited the OSS community then MS would get mad (ie. no more Office).
It's a shame - since Linux is focussed on the low cost, business market, and Apple is focussed on premium, brand conscious, consumers, they could have co-existed and cooperated very nicely.
In the end my company delayed, but has recently decided to port to Linux.
My last machine was a TiBook 400MHz (the original Titanium Powerbook). Largely as a result of reading so much about Linux on Slashdot, I decided to try creating a dual boot system.
I went with Yellow Dog Linux 3.0. After re-partitioning my drive, I installed it and it ran great. Fast, simple, let me do what I wanted. Mac-on-Linux is installed by default, and that ran fine, too.
I did this becuase I only owned that one machine, and I wanted to get my hands dirty a bit with Linux. This was free and fun and easy to do, and I do recommend it for those wanting to extend the life of their machine. It is also a great way to learn more about your machine in general (I'm not a real geek, just a lifelong user and musician).
In the end, I'm not using Linux on my new machine (17" PowerBook), but I would jump back to a minute if I felt the need, and have complete confidence in the OS on the PPC platform.
Also the software is outrageously high. When I have to spend 1000 bucks to get a decent office suite, music studio, and web server they are just as bad as ms.
Last I checked, Apple didn't make an office suite. If you want to bitch about extortionate Mac office suite pricing, talk to Microsoft.
GarageBand is a decent music app, and costs $50.
Apache comes with OS X Client. OS X Server comes in a 10-user version for $500, only the unlimited client costs $1000. If you think $1000 is "just as bad as MS," then you haven't priced unlimited Windows client licenses-- think "well into five figures." When it comes to server stuff, Apple beats the living shit out of Microsoft's pricing.
I've yet to see Debian or YDL support a new apple computer straight out of the gate. When they do support a new model, its most often in a crippled state. Like some posters here have mentioned, the nvidia Go line of graphics cards are barely supported and lack 2d and 3d acceleration. Other items still NOT supported are Bluetooth, Airport Extreme, and external video (on powerbooks). These features were all in the 12" powerbook that came out over 12 months ago!!! The powermac g5 support page just simply lists "No."
YDL hardware support page
Linux on ppc is just not worth it on a new machine. But on a positive note, by the time support is available, the computer will be too old to upgrade to the newest MacOS and will need the linux build.
You forgot to mention the fact that OS X doesn't even use X, but instead uses the heavily modified NeXT environment. Ooops!
I am no Debian user (I use Slackware-current >= 9.1), but anyone who claims the need to install package xyz "from source" and "maintain it yourself" on Debian is clearly talking out of his ass. Debian has the most comprehensive package selection (and a rabidly fanatic user base that keeps debianizing every damn packages they see), and dpkg allows you to easily upgrade, install, remove just by knowing the name (or part of name) of a program. Many a times I was amazed as a friend of mine apt-get installed a packages I was so sure was too new and too obscure to be debianized.
Also - not all Linux distros revolve around System V init - Slackware for one uses BSD style init.
Also - OS X is not BSD. Is that so freaking hard to understand? It has BSD services running on top of Darwin. Darwin is the kernel, not BSD.
Darwin is not Mach. Darwin is not intellectual property of CMU. Ok? Darwin is based on Mach. Ok? If you don't stop calling Darwin Mach, I am going to have to start calling ntoskrnl.exe Mach as well (also based-on, although to a microscopically unrecognisable level - thats what teh 1337 VMS developers do fer ya)
"Fat" binaries are nothing new, and in fact are something that Apple acquisitioned (along with the OS that was formed into OS X) from NeXT. I am sure you're old enough to remember good ol' NeXT - which ran on many, many architectures aside from the good' ol black boxen.
Drool over the dynamic loader? Roflmao... That has to be the most idiotic comment I heard by far. yeah man - what an achievement, resolving unresolved symbols, loading shared libraries, and performing relocation. Yay. Need I tell you that OS X doesn't even do ELF? Yay. *cough*
Because they require the user to manage complex mental models to use. This is counter to Apple's (and OS X's) principle of a simple interfaces (same reason they won't sell a multibutton mouse).
clever as Expose might be, it is just a crutch for missing virtual desktops.
It's nothing of the sort. Indeed, Expose is an excellent *compliment* to virtual desktops. However, they solve different problems - Expose is for *switching* between windows, Virtual Desktops are for *grouping* applications/windows.
That would be because that is incorrect. Rhapsody and the earliest release of OS X, OS X Server 1, did indeed use the Display PostScript system from NeXTSTEP, modified to present a slightly more Mac-esque user interface. But when Adobe bumped up the licensing costs for DPS, Apple were forced to go back and effectively write a new graphics system from scratch. They based it on Portable Document Format, it's called Quartz and the user interface is known as Aqua.
I find your assertion that OS X does not use X laughable. The latest version of OS X comes bundled with an X server that will run rootless right on top of the Aqua screen. The XFree86 distribution will build from unmodified source and work on earlier OS Xs too: have a look at X11 running in Aqua on a Beige G3 with Jaguar. I develop software for a network of Linux PCs, OPENSTEP PCs, NeXTs, Macs, Suns and assorted other systems. If it wasn't for OS X's support for X11 there would be much less portability between the systems (although GNUstep helps a great deal in that regard). So OS X does use X11, even if you and some other users choose not to.
Actually I'm talking from the perspective of a Debian user here. Debian's package hierarchy is good, but it's still far from exhaustive. There will come times when the program you would like has not been Debianised. And when it does, you have to install that program yourself and maintain it yourself, just as you would on any other operating system.
Darwin is not the kernel. Is that so freaking hard to understand? XNU is the kernel, which is a part of the Darwin Operating System. Darwin is a BSD operating system which includes the Mach microkernel running in monolith mode, with features from the BSD kernel added in. The BSD subsystem does not as some people think run as a personality on top of Mach; the two have been combined by Apple.
Yes indeed I am. This post comes to you from a turbo colour slab running OmniWeb 2.0 on top of NeXTSTEP 3.3. Acquisitioned is not a real word, acquired is. Yes, I know that fat binaries came from NeXT. They're still in use today, in OS X. OS X is the only modern operating system to use this technology, in which it is far superior to other offerings. It's jsut a pity that Apple don't make more of it.
No you don't, and frankly I don't give a monkey's because ELF is getting old. The Mach_O binary format provides portability as well as small executables when compiled thin. It provides superior threading by realising processes, LWPs and threads as kernel-scheduled Mach threads. It's better than ELF.
It appears that more homework is required on your part regarding the various parts that go to make up OS X. Find out about Xnu, Mach, Darwin and FreeBSD, then report back on your progress. The second assignment will focus on Cocoa, Quartz, Aqua, CoreFoundation, IOKit and possibly WebObjects if we have time.
Right now the best Virtual Desktop App for OS X is Desktop Manager. Any number of virtual desktops you can name and switch to with command-option-left (or right) arrow. The end desktops roll to each (turning your desktops into a loop). The latest rev even lets you specify the transition effect between virtual desktops -- mine set to slide, like it sliding around that loop of desktops.
Fast user switching rolls me between users with an effect like it's rotating a cube.
I've got systems running Linux and XP --with MS' virtual window add-on-- at work and the combination creates the best virtual desktop and fast user switching setup I have access to.
And expose is mindblowing. Between that desktop manager, the Dock really only has to be there so you can start apps/sometimes open docs (via a popup folder)/stash a open app to move it between virtual windows.
The three work great together.
But I'm still going to install Linux in some form or another when I get a larger harddrive. Why? Because it gives me a way to try things without fscking a production LAMP box. In general, there are always things that can only be done when you've got access to that OS.
the clock on the wall says 4 til 7
As a Mac (primarily) and Linux user, I would say Linux on the Mac or Mac clone is not ready for prime time. Just look at Yellow Dog Linux. Terrasoft sells Macs with YDL preinstalled, but, if you browse their site, there are major areas in their own Mac machines which are not supported.
I run Gentoo on a Mac clone (Power Computing PowerCenter Pro accelerated with a G3 add-on card). Getting this up was quite a chore and the video (an on-board version of an ATI Rage card) still only works in fb mode despite literally months screwing around with it. On a G4 dual processor Mac, Gentoo works better, but the DRI acceleration is still not up to snuff.
I mostly find Linux useful in bringing slow older x86 boxes to a useful speed. My main laptop is an old 400 MHz P2 Dell which runs wonderfully with Knoppix/Debian (although the Dell Rage Mobility is still a problem).
In this very thread I covered the fact that 'massive' does not mean 'omnipresent'. There will be packages that are not covered, as you indeed go on to talk about.
You can do that on Mac systems too, using mkbom and the developer tools for package management.
And me. Most of my systems management experience is in Solaris, and Linux. I hate SysV init. You've never fully appreciated overkill until you observe that their are eleven states you can put your server into.
One can't violate POSIX. One can implement it, or not. BSD does implement POSIX and also supplements it just as some SysVs do. Ignoring that oversight for the moment, let's have a look at why the BSD signal handler mechanism is superior (indeed, many SysVs now implement it in acknowledgement of this, though I'd be wary about claiming that all SysVs do). In the SysV/SysIII/VIIed signals API, once a signal has been received, the signal handler is reset to its default value. This means that if I'm expecting SIGHUP to be overloaded somehow, and send my process two SIGHUP signals, I cannot guarantee that the second is handled in the expected manner. Not so with the BSD handler mechanism, which does not reset the signal handlers. Then what happens if you receive a signal while within a signal handler? Well, in SysV, you've got an interesting race condition on your hands. The BSD signal handler introduce ways in which signals could be vetoed or suspended over blocks of code.
Yes it was, although Classic MacOS didn't have fat binaries. Todays topic: NeXT Computer, Inc. (later NeXT Software, Inc.)
No it's not. But that's only because you're using a system that doesn't support it. Think of this: I can develop an application on my black slab, then bundle it up and distribute that one bundle to people using SPARC, M68k, Intel and HP-PA. This saves me a lot of work. Have a look too at the Darwin installation CD available from Apple. That one CD will install on both PowerPC and IA32 architectures. Let's say I decided that I didn't like any of the systems available today, and went out to create uber-UNIX for IA32, IA64, PowerPC, Itanium, SPARC, M68k, ARM, HP-PA, PDP-7 and Alpha. Wouldn't it be great if I only had one distribution set to maintain? Wouldn't it be great if all of my developers could compile for all supported platforms, without the tedium involved with cross-compiling on less aware systems?
I'm sorry, but the article you linked to doesn't give enough information for those benchmarks to be supported. For instance, when comparing file system latencies, why does the benchmarker not tell us which filesystem he is using on each system? My guess is that he's using e2fs on Linux and HFS+ on Darwin. Why not use UFS on both, to actually determine whether the Operating System is the source of the bottlen