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Happy 13th Birthday Linux!

carlmenezes writes "On August 25, 2001 we celebrated the 10th birthday of Linux. Today, it's year 13. Lucky for Linux, maybe?" Congrats to everyone who managed to get their name in the credits! You must be very proud parents.

65 of 322 comments (clear)

  1. puberty by nuggetman · · Score: 4, Funny

    soon its voice will be cracking and hair will be apearing in places it never appeared befeore

    --
    ...and that's all there is to it.
    1. Re:puberty by zymurgy_cat · · Score: 5, Funny

      don't forget that all the jobs in your crontab file will only get done once a week, but you'll now have to configure them to run every 5 minutes. ps and top will now start outputting things like, "yeah, yeah, i'll get to it later" and "i already did it this week!"

      --
      -- Fugacity: Confusing chemists since 1908
    2. Re:puberty by Barto · · Score: 2, Funny

      Ah, so that's why my desktop suddenly messy and the system log is showing frequent "bathroom breaks"

    3. Re:puberty by doggiesnot · · Score: 4, Funny

      Ah, they grow up so fast!

      You're lucky, when your little penguin is ready for junior/senior prom, at least you won't need to rent a tuxedo.


      rm -rf /bin/laden http://andrewhitchcock.org/index.pl?page=binladen

    4. Re:puberty by b0r0din · · Score: 5, Funny

      young-man$ rm trash
      rm: Aww, Mom! I'll do it later.
      young-man$ set TABLE "now"
      set: But I did it last week! Ask the Sparc5, I'm busy playing Counterstrike.
      young-man$ exec homework
      exec: Command failed.
      young-man$ write paper
      write: paper is not logged on.
      young-man$ kill -9 1
      NOOOOooooooooooo...

    5. Re:puberty by EvilTwinSkippy · · Score: 3, Funny

      And let's not forget look forward to Tux's first $600 phone bill, nor the constant onslaught of "I need a car."

      --
      "Learning is not compulsory... neither is survival."
      --Dr.W.Edwards Deming
    6. Re:puberty by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

      And it'll start downloading pr0n.

      Guess we'll soon now whether Linux really is gay...

    7. Re:puberty by lukewarmfusion · · Score: 5, Funny

      Before he gets a car, he'll have to pay $699 for a license...

    8. Re:puberty by fr2asbury · · Score: 2, Funny

      Now depending on what parts of it are just like Unix, it may not have that problem. ;-)

  2. My Experience with the Linux by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

    I work as a consultant for several fortune 500 companies, and I think
    I can shed a little light on the climate of the open source community
    at the moment. I believe that part of the reason that open source
    based startups are failing left and right is not an issue of marketing
    as it's commonly believed but more of an issue of the underlying
    technology.

    I know that that's a strong statement to make, but I have evidence to
    back it up! At one of the major corps(5000+ employees) that I consult
    for, we wanted to integrate the shareware version of Linux into our
    server pool. The allure of not having to pay any restrictive licensing
    fees was too great to ignore. I reccomended the installation of
    several boxes running the new 2.4.9 kernel, and my hopes were high
    that it would perform up to snuff with the Windows 2k boxes which
    were(and still are!) doing an AMAZING job at their respective tasks of
    serving HTTP requests, DNS, and fileserving.

    I consider myself to be very technically inclined having programmed in
    VB for the last 8 years doing kernel level programming. I don't
    believe in C programming because contrary to popular belief, VB can go
    just as low level as C and the newest VB compiler generates code
    that's every bit as fast. I took it upon myself to configure the
    system from scratch and even used an optimised version of gcc 3.1 to
    increase the execution speed of the binaries. I integrated the 3
    machines I had configured into the server pool, and I'd have to say
    the results were less than impressive... We all know that linux isn't
    even close to being ready for the desktop, but I had heard that it was
    supposed to perform decently as a "server" based operating system. The
    3 machines all went into swap immediately, and it was obvious that
    they weren't going to be able to handle the load in this "enterprise"
    environment. After running for less than 24 hours, 2 of them had
    experienced kernel panics caused by Bind and Apache crashing! Granted,
    Apache is a volunteer based project written by weekend hackers in
    their spare time while Microsft's IIS has an actual professional full
    fledged development team devoted to it. Not to mention the fact that
    the Linux kernel itself lacks any support for any type of journaled
    filesystem, memory protection, SMP support, etc, but I thought that
    since Linux is based on such "old" technology that it would run with
    some level of stability. After several days of this type of behaviour,
    we decided to reinstall windows 2k on the boxes to make sure it wasn't
    a hardware problem that was causing things to go wrong. The machines
    instantly shaped up and were seamlessly reintegrated into the server
    pool with just one Win2K machine doing more work than all 3 of the
    Linux boxes.

    Needless to say, I won't be reccomending Linux/FSF to anymore of my
    clients. I'm dissappointed that they won't be able to leverege the
    free cost of Linux to their advantage, but in this case I suppose the
    old adage stands true that, "you get what you pay for." I would have
    also liked to have access to the source code of the applications that
    we're running on our mission critical systems; however, from the looks
    of it, the Microsoft "shared source" program seems to offer all of the
    same freedoms as the GPL.

    As things stand now, I can understand using Linux in academia to
    compile simple "Hello World" style programs and learn C programming,
    but I'm afraid that for anything more than a hobby OS, Windows
    98/NT/2K are your only choices.

    1. Re:My Experience with the Linux by KrisCowboy · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Woooow buddy. Here in India, we consider it a bad practise and disrespectful to insult someone on their birthday :) So you a VB programmer, huh? To quote ESR,
      Visual Basic is especially awful. Like other Basics it's a poorly-designed language that will teach you bad programming habits. No, don't ask me to describe them in detail; that explanation would fill a book. Learn a well-designed language instead.

      So the Linux server crashed, huh? That's a pretty lame excuse. I'm a part-time administator for a server running httpd, file-sharing, DNS and squid. And the uptime is 55 days and still running. Come on buddy, see what we got here :)

      Not to mention the fact that the Linux kernel itself lacks any support for any type of journaled filesystem, memory protection, SMP support, etc,

      Well well well, what age are you in? What are ext3 and reiferfs? No SMP support? My server is a IBM Xeon Dual processor with hyper-threading. however, from the looks of it, the Microsoft "shared source" program seems to offer all of the same freedoms as the GPL.
      You got to be kidding me.
      Note to self: Alter the companies for which this anonymous coward does consulting.

    2. Re:My Experience with the Linux by rben · · Score: 4, Informative
      I believe that part of the reason that open source based startups are failing left and right is not an issue of marketing as it's commonly believed but more of an issue of the underlying technology. ... I have evidence to back it up!

      No, you have a story, that's not evidence. Besides, most of what you say here is wrong either because you are uninformed or deliberately spreading misinformation.

      We all know that linux isn't even close to being ready for the desktop

      Many of my friends now use Linux as their desktop operating system. I also use Linux as my desktop OS when I'm not playing games. Walmart has started selling Linux equipped PCs which are selling fairly well. The fact is that for the average PC user, Linux will work just fine. There will be a learning curve, but that would be true of any new technology.

      After running for less than 24 hours, 2 of them had experienced kernel panics caused by Bind and Apache crashing! Granted, Apache is a volunteer based project written by weekend hackers in their spare time while Microsft's IIS has an actual professional full fledged development team devoted to it.

      Given that so many others have been running Bind and Apache for many years without substantial problems, I'd have to say that you probably misconfigured your system.

      The "weekend volunteers" that you refer to are some of the finest programmers in the world or the code that they have written is comparable with that written by the best. If they weren't, the code they wrote would not get past the peer reviews and into these popular open source projects. The people who write code for Open Source projects are often the same people who write for the large software development companies. The difference is that they write Open Source code out of love for the work and the project, and the respect of their peers.

      While MS might have a "full development team" working on some projects, I doubt they have a full team working on any mature product that isn't undergoing constant new development. What resources they have are devoted to adding marketable features that will bring in additional sales, not necessarily reworking the code in pursuit of engineering excellence.

      Not to mention the fact that the Linux kernel itself lacks any support for any type of journaled filesystem, memory protection, SMP support, etc, but I thought that since Linux is based on such "old" technology that it would run with some level of stability.

      Again you have demonstrated that you are badly misinformed about Linux. The 2.6 Kernel does in fact have SMP support. There are at least 3 journeling file systems that I can think of off the top of my head, ext3, jfs, and rieserfs.

      As for being based on "old technology", Linux has caught up and passed MS. Linux now often incorporates new standards and technologies before the large software companies can even get them on the planning schedule. Linux developers have already put in place buffer overflow protection stipulated by new security standards that Microsoft has endorsed but has been unable to implement to-date. Microsoft hasn't even been able to finish and release it's new security patch, SP2 on-time, leaving millions of PC users vulnerable to viruses, trojans, and other malware. It is truely hard to appreciate just what it means to have thousands of people working on a single project and contributing their enthusiasm and expertise.

      There are many places where you can get help on configuring Linux machines. It appears, based on your posting, that you went about it by yourself without much knowledge of Linux. Had you looked for help, I believe you would have had far different results. I suggest you check out The Linux Documentation Project, my own site which is aimed at new Linux users moving over from Windows, and A How To Get Linux HOWTO that I have been working on. Perhaps you'll find that your experience changes when you work with the community rather than on your own.

      --

      -All that is gold does not glitter - Tolkien
      www.ra

    3. Re:My Experience with the Linux by vivekg · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Dude! That was history. (rest /. 's read as trolling of him)

      Today linux offer all of the sutff you mentioned earlier.

      At one of the major corps(5000+ employees) that I consult....were(and still are!) doing an AMAZING job at their respective tasks of serving HTTP requests, DNS, and fileserving.

      Just look at the sites like google.com, slahsdot.org; I am sure they supports more than 5000+ user less than second without any panic.In one of my past experience (RH 7.2 box) ProFTPD server daily servers more than 100-500 users with 35-50 GB data transfer on just Intel Cel 1.3, 512 MB RAM. Same server gets mirrored every day for backup (at midnight in same IDC).

      Not to mention the fact that the Linux kernel itself lacks any support for any type of journaled filesystem, memory protection, SMP support, etc

      journaled filesystem - Yes linux got it
      memory protection - Yes linux got it
      SMP support - Yes linux got it
      Read Kernel 2.6 Rocks the Enterprise World - http://www.linuxplanet.com/linuxplanet/reviews/526 3/1/
      Did you read Microsoft Found Guilty of Misleading Advertising http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=04/08/25/115625 3&tid=109

      As things stand now, I can understand using Linux in academia to compile simple "Hello World" style programs and learn C programming, but I'm afraid that for anything more than a hobby OS, Windows 98/NT/2K are your only choices.

      Yah it rocks with virues, IE bugs and all sorts of things. I'm dam sure within next 5 years people stop dealing with business those rely of buggy Microsoft technologies.

      Long live to tux. Happy birthday :)

      --
      The important thing is not to stop questioning --Albert Einstein.
    4. Re:My Experience with the Linux by mr_z_beeblebrox · · Score: 3, Insightful

      we wanted to integrate the shareware version of Linux into our server pool.

      Which version is that? Did you remember to send in your 15$
      I consider myself to be very technically inclined having programmed in VB for the last 8 years doing kernel level programming.

      Then you should know that 'technically' VB is not kernel level programming. I think the reason that you failed so amazingly in your project is you put no forethought into it. Yes, the Win 2K servers can handle a decent load (albeit insecurely) and they are so simple to run that even an MCSE can set them up (I have an old MCSE cert so that is not a flame, I know the ed level needed for that and abandoned it long ago). However, the Linux servers are enterprise unix boxes and Apache can run circles around IIS. I hope that fortune 5000 company realizes that you were the problem.
      but I'm afraid that for anything more than a hobby OS, Windows 98/NT/2K are your only choices.

      Were that the case I would choose to use paper based data processing.

    5. Re:My Experience with the Linux by tigerc · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Apache is a volunteer based project written by weekend hackers in their spare time while Microsft's IIS has an actual professional full fledged development team devoted to it.
      Uh huh. That's why a majority of the world's web servers run Apache. here These developers are hardly "weekend hackers", but devoted people. Read this

      As things stand now, I can understand using Linux in academia to compile simple "Hello World" style programs and learn C programming, but I'm afraid that for anything more than a hobby OS, Windows 98/NT/2K are your only choices.
      So that's why Google and Amazon, for example, run Linux? [netcraft.com]

    6. Re:My Experience with the Linux by daperdan · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Granted,
      Apache is a volunteer based project written by weekend hackers in
      their spare time while Microsft's IIS has an actual professional full
      fledged development team devoted to it.


      I guess we'd better call Google and let them know. Linux can't hack it. While we're at it lets call Amazon.com and let them know. For a product that is not professional it continues to be far and away the most popular Web server on the net. I'm sorry to burst your bubble but Microsoft has lost the web server war. It will continue to be popular with VB programmers and system admins since it's so easy. Good luck and thanks for the FUD.

  3. Closed party by tcdk · · Score: 4, Funny
    So I click "Read More" and get a

    Nothing for you to see here. Please move along.

    ...message. Inviting people to a birthday party and they not letring them in the door...

    That's just rude...

    --
    TC - My Photos..
  4. it's teenage years by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny

    when the child genius starts getting distracted and all rebelious.

    linus: what are you rebeling against?

    tux: whadda ya got?

  5. Little boy is growing up. by The+I+Shing · · Score: 4, Funny

    Linux is 13? Pretty soon it's going to start liking girls, [sniff] and then before you know it you're handing over the car keys and telling it to please be careful. (oops, I've assigned the male gender to an operating system... all the girls who read Slashdot will be mad at me... all three of them...)

    --
    You are in error. No-one is screaming. Thank you for your cooperation.
    1. Re:Little boy is growing up. by MmmmAqua · · Score: 4, Funny

      Hey now, don't go forcing Linux into your gender roles! Linux is about choice - so you'll just have to become comfortable with Linux's new companion - Tim.

      --
      Arr! The laws of physics be a harsh mistress!
    2. Re:Little boy is growing up. by Qzukk · · Score: 3, Funny

      Could be worse, Linux could have chosen Bob ;)

      --
      If I have been able to see further than others, it is because I bought a pair of binoculars.
  6. Linux a Teen? by Manip · · Score: 4, Funny

    Oh woot, we've had 10years of calm quiet Linux and now we get 5 of teen Linux.. moody and depressed. :-/

    I for one can't wait until Linux reaches maturity on its 18th.

    PS I bet Linux will get more girls fiddling with it than I did as a teen.. UHH even than I do currently :'(

    1. Re:Linux a Teen? by whovian · · Score: 2, Funny

      now we get 5 [years] of teen Linux.. moody and depressed.

      Linux will grow out of it. We just need to speak out against Clippy Suicide.

      --
      To-do List: Receive telemarketing call during a tornado warning. Check.
    2. Re:Linux a Teen? by Lumpy · · Score: 3, Funny

      I for one can't wait until Linux reaches maturity on its 18th.

      please, show me one 18 year old that has maturity...

      drinking like everything's a wild party.. no sense of reality..

      call me when it's made it through 4 years of college, 3 of which it had to pay for because mom and adad got pissed and pulled all their funding in the first year because linux was doing nothing but partying all the time at college and getting bad grades.

      more is learned by the kids that get slapped with the reality of having to enter the real world of pain and work and exiting the magical world of everything is done for me. than all the graduate classes at the best colleges on this planet.

      I think every child at graduation from highschool should be FORCED to work 8 months in a public service role locally or part of the peace corps abroad. slap them in the face hard with reality befoer they waste their first year at college getting high and still to this day cant remember where the car he had when he went to school is.

      Yes, I lost a 1982 ford mustang at school my first year... it was one hell of a party (a 3 month drunk play's hell on your Calculus grade) and I still find beer caps in storage boxes I rendomly look in from my first year of undergrad..

      I think I had a couple of roommates... and I am sure the car was red.

      Oh man I really hope that Linux is not going to follow the human maturity cycle... it's going to be a complete know-it-all ass until around 23..

      --
      Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
  7. This is TH and I pronounce Linux as... by TeknoHog · · Score: 3, Funny
    It was thirteen years ago today
    Col. Torvalds let the source away.
    We've been going in and out of drives
    but we guarantee to raise uptimes.

    So may I introduce to you
    the hack you've known for all these years
    Col. Torvalds' Linux slash GNU Band!

    We're Col. Torvalds' Linux slash GNU Band,
    we hope you will enjoy the code.
    Col. Torvalds' Linux slash GNU Band,
    just hack and let the evening go!

    Col. Torvalds' Linux
    Col. Torvalds' Linux
    Col. Torvalds' Linux slash GNU Band!

    It's wonderful to post here,
    it's certainly no troll.
    You're such a loyal userbase,
    we'd like to merge your code with us,
    we'd love to grep your /home.

    I don't really want to freeze the code,
    but I thought you might like to know
    this release is going to fix the root
    and we want you all to patch for good.

    So let me introduce to you
    the one and only Billy's fear
    Col. Torvalds' Linux slash GNU Band!
    --
    Escher was the first MC and Giger invented the HR department.
    1. Re:This is TH and I pronounce Linux as... by EvilTwinSkippy · · Score: 2, Funny
      I learned the truth at seventeen,
      that code was meant for blue machines,
      and high school kids with pasty smiles
      who started dot coms then retired
      The valentines I never knew
      the Friday night deep coding foos
      were spent on one more professional
      at seventeen I learned the truth

      And those of us with ravaged faces
      lacking in the social graces
      deperately remained at home
      exchanging patches on the phone
      to add new bits to the feature tree
      and murmured vague obscenities
      they weren't all it seems at seventeen

      A brown eyed girl in hand me downs
      whos name I never could pronounce
      said pity please the ones who code
      they always seem to get the chode
      the soft and cushy m.s.c.e.
      who cannot't buy what is for free
      gets paid by the company
      which is a haven for the elderly

      So remember those who win the game
      lose the love they sought to gain
      in debentures for quality and dubious integrity
      the small-town eyes will gape at you
      in dull surprise when payment due
      exceed benefits recieved at sevententeen

      (Instrumental)

      To those of use who knew the pain
      of valentines that never came
      and those whose names where never called
      when choosing sides for basketball
      it was long ago and far away
      the world was younger than today
      when code was all they gave out for free
      to ugly duckling geeks like me

      We all play the game, and when we dare
      we cheat ourselved at solitaire
      submitting patches over the phone
      repenting other lives unknown
      to ask for new bits to the feature tree
      and murmur vague obscenities
      at ugly geeks like me, at seventeen
      --
      "Learning is not compulsory... neither is survival."
      --Dr.W.Edwards Deming
  8. And that is why... by Gunfighter · · Score: 5, Funny

    ... I got married on the 10th birthday of Linux. That way my anniversary would be easy to remember.

    By the way honey, if you're reading this... Happy Anniversary.

    --
    -- Stu

    /. ID under 2,000. I feel old now.
    1. Re:And that is why... by kfg · · Score: 3, Funny

      Don't forget to email her a jpeg of flowers. It would be a bitch to have to play CounterStrike Source alone for the next week.

      KFG

    2. Re:And that is why... by sometwo · · Score: 4, Funny

      Maybe you can get her some Linux jewelry....

  9. Fingers crossed... by sczimme · · Score: 2, Funny


    I hope it doesn't become a petulant and rebellious teenager - sleeping late, making people wait, grumbling about garbage collection, exploring promiscuous mode, ignoring quotas, etc.

    /"Excuse me, I seem to have the plague" - E. Izzard

    --
    I want to drag this out as long as possible. Bring me my protractor.
  10. A happy birthday cake... by derphilipp · · Score: 2, Funny

    ..leftover from the sysadminday: http://www.pweissmann.de/kuchen.jpg
    (A blackberry cake I made, a really simple recipe).

    Happy Birthday Linux !

    --
    Spelling mistakes: My is english spoken not tongue of mother.
  11. Only 13?!?! by SirStanley · · Score: 5, Funny

    I feel kinda creepy for having to fsck my linux partition now.

    --
    --------========+++Dont Feed The Lab Techs+++========--------
  12. First words by hotspotbloc · · Score: 2, Interesting
    "Hello everybody out there using minux - I'm doing a (free) operating system (just a hobby, won't be big and professinal like gnu) for 386 (486) AT clones." - Linus Torvalds, August 25, 2001

    Does anyone have a link or the text to the complete accouncement email?

    --
    "I hate to advocate drugs, alcohol, violence or insanity but they've always worked for me" - HST
    1. Re:First words by md81544 · · Score: 2, Informative

      Er... that would be 1991...

    2. Re:First words by pjt33 · · Score: 2, Informative
    3. Re:First words by mqRakkis · · Score: 5, Interesting
      From: torvalds@klaava.Helsinki.FI (Linus Benedict Torvalds)
      Newsgroups: comp.os.minix
      Subject: What would you like to see most in minix?
      Summary: small poll for my new operating system
      Message-ID: <1991Aug25.205708.9541@klaava.Helsinki.FI>
      Dat e: 25 Aug 91 20:57:08 GMT
      Organization: University of Helsinki

      Hello everybody out there using minix -
      I'm doing a (free) operating system (just a hobby, won't be big and
      professional like gnu) for 386(486) AT clones. This has been brewing
      since april, and is starting to get ready. I'd like any feedback on
      things people like/dislike in minix, as my OS resembles it somewhat
      (same physical layout of the file-system (due to practical reasons)
      among other things).
      I've currently ported bash(1.08) and gcc(1.40), and things seem to work.
      This implies that I'll get something practical within a few months, and
      I'd like to know what features most people would want. Any suggestions
      are welcome, but I won't promise I'll implement them :-)
      Linus (torvalds@kruuna.helsinki.fi)
      PS. Yes - it's free of any minix code, and it has a multi-threaded fs.
      It is NOT protable (uses 386 task switching etc), and it probably never
      will support anything other than AT-harddisks, as that's all I have :-(.
    4. Re:First words by hoofie · · Score: 4, Funny

      I like the bit at the bottom:

      ...it probably never will support anything other than AT-harddisks, as that's all I have :-(."

      I think the hardware support has moved on a bit from then....[My linux is currently running on a dual-processor pentium with SCSI raid array].

  13. Favorite Unix/Linux Links by Davak · · Score: 3, Informative

    What's your favorite help sites?

    Computer Hope's Unix
    Tech-recipes's Unix
    Tek-tips forums
    Sun's BigAdmin

    Help me add to my favorites...

    Davak

    1. Re:Favorite Unix/Linux Links by itsnotthenetwork · · Score: 4, Informative

      I like this one a lot.
      http://216.218.185.154/index.html

    2. Re:Favorite Unix/Linux Links by termos · · Score: 2, Funny
      Official Gentoo-Linux-Zealot translator-o-matic

      Gentoo Linux is an interesting new distribution with some great features. Unfortunately, it has attracted a large number of clueless wannabes and leprotards who absolutely MUST advocate Gentoo at every opportunity. Let's look at the language of these zealots, and find out what it really means...

      "Gentoo makes me so much more productive."
      "Although I can't use the box at the moment because it's compiling something, as it will be for the next five days, it gives me more time to check out the latest USE flags and potentially unstable optimisation settings."

      "Gentoo is more in the spirit of open source!"
      "Apart from Hello World in Pascal at school, I've never written a single program in my life or contributed to an open source project, yet staring at endless streams of GCC output whizzing by somehow helps me contribute to international freedom."

      "I use Gentoo because it's more like the BSDs."
      "Last month I tried to install FreeBSD on a well-supported machine, but the text-based installer scared me off. I've never used a BSD, but the guys on Slashdot say that it's l33t though, so surely I must be for using Gentoo."

      "Heh, my system is soooo much faster after installing Gentoo."
      "I've spent hours recompiling Fetchmail, X-Chat, gEdit and thousands of other programs which spend 99% of their time waiting for user input. Even though only the kernel and glibc make a significant difference with optimisations, and RPMs and .debs can be rebuilt with a handful of commands (AND Red Hat supplies i686 kernel and glibc packages), my box MUST be faster. It's nothing to do with the fact that I've disabled all startup services and I'm running BlackBox instead of GNOME or KDE."

      "...my Gentoo Linux workstation..."
      "...my overclocked AMD eMachines box from PC World, and apart from the third-grade made-to-break components and dodgy fan..."

      "You Red Hat guys must get sick of dependency hell..."
      "I'm too stupid to understand that circular dependencies can be resolved by specifying BOTH .rpms together on the command line, and that problems hardly ever occur if one uses proper Red Hat packages instead of mixing SuSE, Mandrake and Joe's Linux packages together (which the system wasn't designed for)."

      "All the other distros are soooo out of date."
      "Constantly upgrading to the latest bleeding-edge untested software makes me more productive. Never mind the extensive testing and patching that Debian and Red Hat perform on their packages; I've just emerged the latest GNOME beta snapshot and compiled with -O9 -fomit-instructions, and it only crashes once every few hours."

      "Let's face it, Gentoo is the future."
      "OK, so no serious business is going to even consider Gentoo in the near future, and even with proper support and QA in place, it'll still eat up far too much of a company's valuable time. But this guy I met on #animepr0n is now using it, so it must be growing!"

      -

      --
      Note to self: get smarter troll to guard door.
  14. Don't feed the trolls.... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    n/t

  15. happy birthday! by sometwo · · Score: 4, Funny

    Here's a special birthday package

  16. Colonel? by Glytch · · Score: 3, Funny

    Shouldn't that be Kernel Torvalds?

  17. Google Doodle by r.jimenezz · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Too bad the Google Doodle is taken up for a couple of weeks with the Olympics, otherwise Google should put up a penguin there to acknowledge this milestone.

    --
    The revolution will not be televised.
    1. Re:Google Doodle by niteice · · Score: 2, Informative

      Try their Linux section.

      --
      ROMANES EUNT DOMUS
  18. original post by Errtu76 · · Score: 2, Informative

    Message-ID: 1991Aug25.205708.9541@klaava.helsinki.fi
    From: torvalds@klaava.helsinki.fi (Linus Benedict Torvalds)
    To: Newsgroups: comp.os.minix
    Subject: What would you like to see most in minix?
    Summary: small poll for my new operating system

    Hello everybody out there using minix-I'm doing a (free)
    operating system (just a hobby, won't be big and professional
    like gnu) for 386 (486) AT clones. This has been brewing since
    april, and is starting to get ready. I'd like any feedback on
    things people like/dislike in minix, as my OS resembles it
    somewhat

    Any suggestions are welcome, but I won't promise I'll implement them :-)

    Linus

  19. Come on... by StevenHenderson · · Score: 4, Funny

    Come on, Linux...just tell me you're 18. I'm dying to install you on my computers any play with you all night long

  20. Still took ten years by ToasterTester · · Score: 2, Interesting

    I remember ten years ago read an article about developing a OS. It quoted Bill Gates on why there is so little competition. The gist of his answer is first the cost is too high for most companies to want to take on. Second he said to get to market then have the product mature takes about ten years. So Linux beat the cost factor, but not the time factor.

  21. Re:Happy B-Day! by danormsby · · Score: 2, Interesting
    Here, here.

    But why only have one birthday a year. Later this year we have 7,000,000 minutes old and next year there is 5,000 days old to celebrate.

    More useless date facts available here.

    --
    Omnis amans amens
  22. Nah ah! by Nicholas+Evans · · Score: 5, Informative

    According to Linus' book, Linux 0.01 was released on Sept. 17, 1991. (Second to last line, Page 87, Just for Fun). So today isn't the birthday. :(

    1. Re:Nah ah! by suso · · Score: 4, Funny

      You're right, the release date of the first version should be its birthday. So today is more like the 13th anniversary of the middle of its third tri-mester. ;-)

  23. Re:Linux is 13.. by spellraiser · · Score: 3, Funny
    And what a revolution that was!

    I mean, jumping from version 3.1 to a whopping 95 in just over 3 years ... it boggles the mind.

    Here's to the fine people at Microsoft!

    Thank you, thank you. No, thank you. You can stop applauding now. Really.

    --
    I hear there's rumors on the Slashdots
  24. song by Tomahawk · · Score: 2, Funny

    /me sings:

    Happy Birthday to you,
    You live in the zoo,
    You look like a penguin,
    and you smell like one too! :)

    Happy 13th Linux!

    T.

  25. That's really cool by The+Slashdolt · · Score: 2, Interesting

    because today is my birthday, seriously (29). I had no idea I shared my birthday with Linux.

    --
    mp3's are only for those with bad memories
  26. Re:Post your confessions here: by grunt107 · · Score: 2, Funny

    My distro has diabetes (Type 2).
    Gotta diet (removes KDE, Gnome GUIs...)

  27. Re:Linux is 13.. by Orgazmus · · Score: 2, Funny

    I still think 98 -> 2000 is more impressive

    --
    The system had the verbosity of HTML combined with all the readability of compiled assembly viewed as bitmap images
  28. Haiku 3rd Birthday too... by technix4beos · · Score: 2, Informative
    Speaking of Birthdays...

    The Haiku project recently turned 3 years old. Several websites have covered the nice letter Michael Phipps wrote to the community.

    Happy birthday Linux, naturally... Without all of the hard work in regular Open Source projects, I doubt there would have been half as much motivation for our small projects, in another timeline. (You know, the evil timeline where Billy G is president of the US of A. :)

    Cheers!

    --
    user@host$ diff /dev/urandom /dev/uspto
  29. With apologies to Bill Cosby by gosand · · Score: 5, Funny

    I spawned your process, and I can kill -9 you!

    --

    My beliefs do not require that you agree with them.

  30. Congrats... by fudgefactor7 · · Score: 2, Funny

    ...you are now an awkward teen.

    Now, stay the hell out of my pr0n.

  31. Penguin years... by atomic-penguin · · Score: 4, Funny

    But the average penguin lives 15-20 years. So that is like 46 in penguin years. So Tux would be going through a mid-life crisis about now.

    --
    /^([Ss]ame [Bb]at (time, |channel.)){2}$/
  32. Re:crap... by lucas+teh+geek · · Score: 2, Funny

    root$ uptime
    102342342323423 days, 26 hours, 87 minutes

    huh?

    root$ uname
    teh Windows xp sp3 l33t alpha-beta 666

    Wow! I can make up numbers too!

    --
    TIAEAE!
  33. Pregnant by Hieronymus+Howard · · Score: 4, Interesting

    So today is not Linux's 13th birthday. It's actually the 13th anniversary of Linus announcing that he was pregnant. The date of the first public release of the code should be the actual birthday.

    As someone mentioned earlier, Linux 0.01 was released on Sept. 17, 1991

  34. Someone rent a band... by Judeccan · · Score: 2, Informative

    It's Bar Mitzvah time. You're a man, now, Linux.

  35. Mazel Tov by Aggrav8d · · Score: 2

    Now is the time for everyone to attend the bar-mitzvah and quietly slip the young man a cheque or two after the ceremony.

  36. Re:Uh huh! by AME · · Score: 2, Funny
    won't be big and professional like gnu ... it probably never will support anything other than AT-harddisks

    Not much of a visionary, is he?

    --
    "I have a good idea why it's hard to verify programs. They're usually wrong." --Manuel Blum, FOCS 94