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Next G5 Multitasks Operating Systems
squiggleslash writes "IBM has big plans for the 970, Apple's so-called "G5". The CPU will support partitioning, similar to IBM's mainframe systems, allowing multiple operating systems to run at the same time on a single CPU. A Mac built around this chip could theoretically run OS X, GNU/Linux, Mac OS 9, and the PowerPC version of Windows NT, all simultaneously and independently."
so now I can crash at least five systems at the same time?
OS X is already the best OS available anyway.
What is this, 1994?
Finally! Something that will stop the big Linux vs. Windows flame wars!
Xierox
But it sounded really interesting.
On a more serious note, I doubt it could run the PPC WindowsNT as it would be lacking a few important drivers, but running OS X and Linux side by side would make a very interesting system. It would be nice to see som Xserves in our datacenter here.
"I use a Mac because I'm just better than you are."
>A Mac built around this chip could theoretically run OS X, GNU/Linux, Mac OS 9, and the PowerPC version of Windows NT, all simultaneously and independently."
But in reality, i believe this is so apple can release "big iron" type systems (servers), the VM would allow Multiple versions of the server OS to run for maximum uptime, protection etc...
Most people are going to take it as "Cool i can run windows and OSX at the same time at full speed" But in reality its closer to what i described above.
But if others care to chime in i could be completely wrong...
I see it runs this "GNU/Linux", but the question is... does it run Linux?
But will it come in a stylish case with a 4-figure price tag?
if you had a dual, would it be more efficient to have each processor run 50% of two OS'es or each CPU running one OS?
I'm going to need more than one mouse button!
-ch
Speeding up the multitasking of apps under that one OS would be a nice artifact, though!
-Apple
But parallel operating systems?
Maybe Mac users should get accustomed to the complexity of a two button mouse first...
...the CPU PartitionMagic is released.
From the article:
The technology, called partitioning, relies on a concept called virtualization that breaks the hard link between an operating system and the underlying hardware.
Well, that's what VMware and QEMU already do, isn't it?
I'm assuming "partitioning" is some sort of architecture change to make schemes like these work better/more easily/more efficiently - but I don't think they should be pushing it as something new.
Unless it *is* something new and I've missed the point, that is.
Weaselmancer
rediculous.
can it run linux?
oh,
five versions, you say?
well.. cool
So what about the rest of the hardware ? Now you have two OS's accessing the same hard drive. There goes the IO ... unless you had two SCSI drives .. now it gets interesting.
Michael.
Linux: For those able to think out side of a window
Linux is a kernel, not an OS.
The first generation of chips with features like those are never fast enough.
A Beowulf cluster of these would be fast enough (if you could get it work at all).
Yeah, I'm a cynical, bitter shell of the promising youth I once was.
Raise your children as if you were teaching them to raise your grandchildren, because you are.
Please spare us your:
"Kewl! I've always wanted to run OS A and OS B at the same time on my computer at home!"
drivel.
This is a big iron server feature.
NT for PowerPC. Be still, my heart!
You did not explain why Linux is correct in this case. Reason is this time we are only interested in running the kernel, in this case, just Linux, not with the other GNU applications.
Just kidding. I get kidded by friends about owning a computer that comes standard with less than three buttons. :-)
A Mac built around this chip could theoretically run OS X, GNU/Linux, Mac OS 9, and ...
The G5 cannot natively boot Mac OS 9. However, you can run most OS 9 software through the Classic Environment in Mac OS X.
If we count the Classic Environment, though, why stop at that list? You could run virtually any OS, through various emulators. Windows 95, DOS, BeOS, etc...
2) IBM Sells off its intel based PC & Laptop line
3) IBM incorporates more features into the g5 to make it a bigger competitor to intel / amd
(begin conspiracy)
4) IBM pushes linux more heavily on the apple g5
5) IBM pushes the idea of apple desktops paired with IBM servers running linux or AIX
Could a stronger IBM / apple partnership be the culmination of technologies (power processors, apple desktops, IBM servers, the marketing engine of both companies) that finally steps up and pushes an all *nix platform to challenge Microsoft?
Yeah, I feel a burning need to run two Unices at the same time on the same machine. Maybe Ill have the GIMP running on X Windows in OS X and Ill have another GIMP under Red Hat. Just for the heck of it.
The next pasture is always greener
Seriously, isn't this exactly what IBM said about "OS WORKPLACE" at the time? Right down to the "PPC Version of Windows NT" (which was cancelled at that time). Maybe it was a slow day at the IBM PR department.
What would be cool if you have one partition for the Mac Os and another partition running VMware to emulate a (AMD :P ) x86 CPU for the all the non-Mac OSes.
I been wanting to get a Mac for a long time but I really haven't found the "killer app" reason to do so spend the money.
I have a P550 running right now, and it has 2 AIX (5.3), 2 SuSE linux, and 2 virtual IO servers running on 4 processors and eight Gig ram...
This isn't really a surprise, LPAR and Hypervisor are relatively easy to add to a microprocessor.
I'd guess it's mainly adding an extra supervisor mode above the existing supervisor mode. Some control logic needs to be adjusted to take a privledged interrupt if a resource isn't allowed to be accessed in hypervisor mode.
Expect multithreading to be added soon as well, It's mainly just adding a thread bit to each pipeline, some extra control logic, and more registers.
For comparison, adding this stuff to the PPC970 as it is now is much easier than, say, adding VMX/Altivec to a stripped-down Power5.
..the REALLY cool partitioning is the new POWER5 based iSeries and pSeries. Hell, we've been using a Linux LPAR on our iSeries for two years now.
Now it just works better with POWER5. The FSP (Flexible System Processor) that contains the Hypervisor code is just a card that runs an embedded Linux kernel. Plug that in to a IBM "HMC", or a xSeries Xeon box running SuSE Enterprise 8, which boots into Fluxbox. Open a Java-based config utility, and control all your partitions. Do you see a ongoing theme here? That's right folks, IBM trusts Linux enough to stake the reputation of their Big Iron on it.
With POWER5 all the partitioning is transparent to the OSes. WIth out i5/520 I can move RAM and CPU seamlessly without OS reboots. Hell, I can (and do) have my Linux partition specified with just 2/10ths of one of the POWER5's, with a "burst" limit of 8/10ths. You just setup the FSP/Hypervisor with permissions/profiles for the OSes. If it sees that OS/400 needs more CPU and has a higher priority than Linux, it gets it.
However, this is a very cool move for apple. If I could get a Mac that did all that?
Well, yeah. That would own.
Insert profit.
I'm sorry, but... what the heck is "native mode" Java?
Sounds like an oxymoron.
you still need a stupervisor
d ex.html
see http://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/Research/SRG/netos/xen/in
they calll this a managment console but linux already has this kind of caperbility with the right software.... hence MOL and to a lesser degreee UML
you could even go down the virtual ISA route hence IBM daisy and transmeta....
really old thing but nice to have support in hardware to make easy for the software but I am at a loss to see where in PowerPC thay are going to do this what are they going to add ?
anyone ?
regards
John Jones
How does this tie in with Mach? I heard something about OSX running the Java Virtual Machine directly on top of Mach for better performance, but I don't really understand how any of this stuff works....
$x='S24;r)>63/* h@<5+oZ)32"5cz';$me='phroggy'x$];
$x=~y+ -xz+\0-Tx+;print$_^chop$me for split'',$x;
...with such a CPU, wouldn't it be more efficient to run just one OS that takes advantage of the partitioning for redundancy / uptime reliability / something along those lines?
It seems kinda pointless (and, I also imagine, quite slow) to run multiple OSes unless each one is aware of the other one(s).
#roses { color: #ff0000; } #violets { color: #0000ff; }
Apple is finally getting serious about Linux.
Given how this is the setup being used on the S/390 (with Linux and Z/OS being able to run concurrently, including multiple Linux partions), and possibly (though I'm not certain about this one) the AS400.
A multi-cored CPU, or a CPU which has a technology similar to Intel's Hyper Threading would be very well suited to this task.
Of course if tools such as VMWARE and Xen virtualization already offer such capabilities in software, I wonder if it's even needed or desireable to use CPU-specific features for this, couldn't this be simply done at the BIOS level (or by simply porting IBM's VM from the S/390 to the PPC?).
Probably wrong too. Perhaps it should be Linux/970 with GNU utilities. I mean, following the examples of Solaris/86, OS/400, and others.
Click here or here.
Running systems in parallel sounds interesting, but I have to wonder if, with the same amount of logic, we couldn't make a simpler CPU that would run faster.
Please correct me if I got my facts wrong.
True. I have to comment on this for the trolls out there.
:)
While Linux is the GNU operating system, he doesn't really have any right to call it GNU/Linux. It's like saying Model T/Ferrari, or Wright/747, or even IBM PC. Oh wait
It is accurate to describe it as a GNU operating system (errr, in so much as linux can be called an operating system, since it is just a kernel).
Sorry. You can mod this offtopic now.
-- Having a Creationist Museum is like having an Atheist place of worship
I hate the state the obvious, but, why not get two computers?
A Mac built around this chip could theoretically run OS X, GNU/Linux, Mac OS 9, and the PowerPC version of Windows NT, all simultaneously and independently.
That sounds cool and all, but I don't multitask nearly as well as even the current G5. One OS running a few applications is about all I need most of the time. Until Apple (or someone else) starts selling extra terminals that can connect to my machine, I can't really share the machine with other people (aside from providing various services, or letting them log into a command line environment). And no matter what, I don't want a copy of any version of Windows running on even a sliver of my machine, thanks very much.
What would be much more interesting, for developers at least, would be to run multiple copies of the same operating system. I could run my app in one copy of the OS and debug it "remotely" from a second copy... two machine debugging in one machine!
"so now I can crash at least five systems at the same time?"
Just wait till partitioning comes to the automotive industry.
IBM sells a product simply called VM. Actually, I guess it's more of a lease option, as it's only available for mainframes (and I used it on an ES/9000...one of the biggest mainframe (read: MVS/CICS) machines around). It's cool in that you could assign separate processors separate copies of the OS, unlike VMware which has a "host" operating system and then various Guests. There's still a bit of low-level software, but for us it was seemless (which, given how much everything associated with this machine cost, had better have been).
... strange times. Full of promises yet to be fulfilled. But as someone else pointed out, now that OS X is essentialy Unix, there would be precious little reason to go back to the "personality" scheme. I rather think they'd bring out some kick-ass server type box running multiple copies of OS X server, if that is in fact what they're trying to do.
Interestingly, this brought to mind the Pink operating system that IBM and Apple were working on way-back-when(tm). The idea, if I remember correctly, was to have a low level OS kernel that could run multiple personalities...they talked about a MacOS personality (back when System 8 was still being developed), OS/2 and probably some flavor of Unix.
I remember being at what I believe was the last Unix Convention at the Javits Center in NYC around '92 or '93 and they (IBM) had a prototype Power box that purported to be running a super super early pre-alpha version of it. The guy standing by it wouldn't let me touch it, and all he said he could do was run a "DIR" on what was supposed to be the OS/2 personality (no Mac one in sight, for the obvious reason there never was one). He also mentioned that there was a second box, but they couldn't get it to boot.
*Sigh*
I was actually under the impression it was just going to be a dual core PPC, but I RTFA off os OSNews.com a couple of days ago and I don't really remember it.
will apple every allow it? hahaah.. maybe you can run osx & os9.. but you can bet they'll restrict it from running anything else..
what ever happened to the chrp machines that would multi-boot apple's OS + anything else you wanted?
abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz
Fap, fap, fap...
Did i say that out loud?
Recursive: Adj. See Recursive.
Linux is a kernel GNU/Linux is an operating system.
Why are you including GNU but not IBM? Who is doing the actual work here? It's IBM that is putting forth the effort and resources, not GNU. And if you are trying to be "fair", the name should be more along the lines of "IBM 970/Linux with some plenty of BSD code and some GNU code". Yeah, the "ls" command might be GNU's but the TCP stack sure as hell isn't.
In an article I read about this, the IBM rep was quoted as saying that Apple would be using it. Whether or not they use that feature is up in the air.
Am I the only one who just read this /. news item as "IBM has big plans for 1970"... and weren't surprised a least bit?
Forgive me. How about */* since just about everyone has contributed to this by dreaming up computing, making microprocessors, writing software, developing hardware, or purchasing them (thus funding future development)?
Click here or here.
In other words. Mainframe features coming to a CPU near you. Now if we could only get the insane IO.
Do I only have to pay "1/5 CPU" if I'm running 5 OS's on the same CPU?
can they put inside an iPod?
An interesting article and commentary about this Power 5 stuff related to Apple.
Yep.
At some point Linux needs to be purged of the majority of the GNU crap. BSD tools/utilities would be the obvious choice.
The GNU loonies are going to need to be jettisoned at some point for Linux to continue to grow. Sooner rather than later.
That works for me. At least it keeps RMS from hijacking other people's efforts by insisting his self-righteous GNU "seal of approval" gets plastered on without contributing one new thing.
Me sitting at computer A would rlogin to computer B and "setenv DISPLAY a:0"
The guy sitting at computer B would login to my computer (A) and "setenv DISPLAY b:0"
Since the network was far faster than the CPUs, it made the systems far more responsive for both users - when you hit a key, your application an your display would both get to work at the same time... when your partner hit a key, chances were that you were idle.
Yeah, I know that won't help if both OSs are sharing a single CPU - but it might be fun just for the memories.
Instead of running multiple operating systems on one processor, could it fundamentally change the way an operating system runs on a computer? Also, if you were to run multiple operating systems, how would you switch between them? Would you have a key combination (like the apple and enter keys that switched between a mac and pc on hybrid systems back in the day) that would allow you to switch or would you be running a super OS that would let you see what each OS is doing at each moment? Or, would you have a multiple graphics card setup that will have an independant terminal for each OS? Lotsa unanswered questions there...
The G5 is a 970. The 970 is a G5.
The Power5 is not a 970. They scaled down the Power5 to make the 970.
There are no trails. There are no trees out here.
But the only two OSes that I would ever want to run simultaneously on a PPC box would be Linux and OSX. Mac-on-Linux already allows this handily.
Only in a Slashdot fantasy can a Slackware install turn into several hours of sex . . . . .
This is probably not going to be a big deal for Apple: Windows NT on PPC is non-existent, and people who want to run Linux alongside OS X on Macintosh hardware already have good solutions.
The main utility of virtualization is for server farms and mainframes. IBM will probably be shipping some server solutions based on the 970, and the rest of the market will go to Intel and AMD-based solutions. Neither Apple nor OS X are big players in that market.
Yeah Right... just get rid of all the GNU/ and everything in "GNU/Linux" that was created by the toolsets....
Next "good idea" please!
hahahahahahahahahahahahaha...
Until, of course, a flaw is found in the virtualization layer itself, at which point it would be possible to hijack a computer at the CPU level and run a new, independent, trojan OS to do who-knows-what. Thankfully IBM has some experience with this, which means that such a vulnerability is less likely... right? ^^;
For IBM pSeries systems that are partitionable, they need to have a Hardware Maintenance Console (HMC) to configure the system resources into the separate Logical Partitions (LPARs). For pSeries boxes it is a x86 PC with redhat 7.1 installed. (With an msdos bootloader...wierd). So you have a Mac G5 that you can partition, but you might have to use a cheap PC to configure it. That would just be wrong. Also, it connects via serial cables. Do the new Macs even have serial cables?
There are an aweful lot they would need to add to the Macs to make this work. But, from experience it is awesome to run multiple instances of the OS from one machine. (And not on top of one another like VMWARE or Virtual PC). Good Luck Apple and IBM. It would be sweet to have a partitionable system at the Apple price point.
Flexible bare-metal recovery for Linux/UNIX
It's a bit sad that with all the comments posted so far, nobody has mentioned xen, and the fact that it is accomplishing the same kind of thing today on x86 machines with operating systems (including linux 2.4 and 2.6, a couple xbsds, and plan 9) that have been ported to it, and will be able to support un-ported operating systems (e.g. windows xxx) once Intel's silvervale or AMD's pacifica technologies (both are CPU extensions that assist virtualization in hardware) become available (probably in 2006).
I do count the Hurd as a kernel replacement because otherwise it is hard to explain what GNU/Hurd is and how it differs from the way in which most people use GNU (with the Linux kernel). Some people are running GNU/Hurd on their computers right now, so this isn't just an idea in someone's head. Granted, the complete GNU OS (which includes the Hurd) isn't ready for everyone's use yet and is nowhere nearly as popular as GNU/Linux, but in the past the Linux kernel was used by only a few technical people and in no way fit for everyday use. I don't think decisions of fairness and accuracy need to hinge on popularity.
/. thread), I wouldn't say that the Firefox program has undergone some transformation that makes it significantly different from what Firefox users on other OSes are using.
Who's doing the porting hardly qualifies as relevant criteria. When I see that the programmers who make Sky OS ported Firefox (a recent
I want to give credit to the projects that I'm discussing, I want to be more clear in what I'm describing, and I want to be accurate to what I'm describing. Therefore, I don't see a problem with giving GNU a share of the credit when I'm talking about the union of the GNU OS with the Linux kernel. These days, the Linux kernel shows up in so many places that I need to differentiate between where it is being used with GNU, where it is being used alone, and where Linux is being used with something else.
There are other instances where it is simply inaccurate to call something by another name--calling the "free software" movement "open source", for instance, is simply wrong, as is trying to link the open source movement (or Open Source Initiative) to the GNU GPL in a substantive way. I would be happy to explain more on this if you're curious, but generally I think this explains why I use language in a way you claim nobody does.
Digital Citizen
They scaled the Power4 down to create the 970, not the Power5.
Are viruses that affect the Windows portion going to compromise the other ones?
With a Linux/Windows dual-boot, you run the risk of having a Windows partition virus affect the Linux part.
imagine what quality decisions you can make if you simply look for "systems that don't suck."
Well, the decisions may not be of higher quality, but the decision tree is that much more robust.
Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens.
History repeats itself. VM/CMS is back, but
on smaller sexier boxes.
Yep.
It's already in progress...
What's so fucking hilarious about the GNU freaks is how similar their reactions are to MS freaks when they realize that, no, the world won't come to an end if/when they are dumped.
Longterm the only GNU stuff likely to last is GCC...
wow!!! windows on mac...
my mom can barely manage 2 apps on windows or on a mac. apple's main focus is on simplifying the computing experience 'for the rest us'. which is why they'll never ship a machine that runs more than one operating system.
Why is OSX on the latest dual processor G5 system sluggish compared to Win 2K on a 1.6Ghz AMD system? Will the G5 processor innovations finally eliminate the clunkiness factor of OSX?
Hello there, my name is Bob. Not really, but oh well. So, how's the weather out there? Rain? Yeah, rain is wet. What about them Pacers? Ouch, don't hit me! Look a cat is up that tree over there. No, don't use the rifle, I'll get it out with this rock. Meeeoowwrrrlll! He's okay, now. This would be a lot easier if Slashdot didn't abort my simpler test posts so much. That's life.
Hello there, my name is Bob. Not really, but oh well. So, how's the weather out there? Rain? Yeah, rain is wet. What about them Pacers? Ouch, don't hit me! Look a cat is up that tree over there. No, don't use the rifle, I'll get it out with this rock. Meeeoowwrrrlll! He's okay, now. This would be a lot easier if Slashdot didn't abort my simpler test posts so much. That's life.
Hello there, my name is Bob. Not really, but oh well. So, how's the weather out there? Rain? Yeah, rain is wet. What about them Pacers? Ouch, don't hit me! Look a cat is up that tree over there. No, don't use the rifle, I'll get it out with this rock. Meeeoowwrrrlll! He's okay, now. This would be a lot easier if Slashdot didn't abort my simpler test posts so much. That's life.
Hello there, my name is Bob. Not really, but oh well. So, how's the weather out there? Rain? Yeah, rain is wet. What about them Pacers? Ouch, don't hit me! Look a cat is up that tree over there. No, don't use the rifle, I'll get it out with this rock. Meeeoowwrrrlll! He's okay, now. This would be a lot easier if Slashdot didn't abort my simpler test posts so much. That's life.
What is this, all the college students on slashdot today?
You don't need this feature for your desktop.
And you probably wouldn't use this often for running *different* operating systems.
Server virtualization is great for *multiple instances of the same OS*.
This would be great for security, for instance. Let's say you've got a server with a custom app. You wrote it yourself and it's very secure, efficient, and it uses partitioning techniques that would make DJB proud. Everything is cool. Then the client insists on this open-source 3rd-party module. You check out the source code and it looks like a high school kid wrote it. You spot 2 buffer overflows in the code that prints the version string. Wonderful.
If you have a virtualized OS (think "jails" under FreeBSD or some of those Linux virtual servers), you just set up a separate instance to run just this crappy code. When the kiddies hack it, you don't sweat too much, because this separate VM has its own memory limits, its own firewall, and runs nothing special except this one module.
This would be so cool.. I'd love to see Mac OS X virtualized. I'm really starting to run out of reasons to NOT recommend Xserves in the future.
Hello there, my name is Bob. Not really, but oh well. So, how's the weather out there? Rain? Yeah, rain is wet. What about them Pacers? Ouch, don't hit me! Look a cat is up that tree over there. No, don't use the rifle, I'll get it out with this rock. Meeeoowwrrrlll! He's okay, now. This would be a lot easier if Slashdot didn't abort my simpler test posts so much. That's life.
Hello there, my name is Bob. Not really, but oh well. So, how's the weather out there? Rain? Yeah, rain is wet. What about them Pacers? Ouch, don't hit me! Look a cat is up that tree over there. No, don't use the rifle, I'll get it out with this rock. Meeeoowwrrrlll! He's okay, now. This would be a lot easier if Slashdot didn't abort my simpler test posts so much. That's life.
I wasn't aware that the z-series (the S/390 ancestor?) was using a PPC. I knew that the iSERIES were using some sort of a RISC chip now, but wasn't sure whether this was a PPC or something more proprietary, now that I see this it does make a great deal of sense.
Crap.
Thanks.
There are no trails. There are no trees out here.
I know you're trolling, but I'll bite.
I have (ok, had, it went back to the demo pool) a dual 2.5GHz PowerMac G5 on my desk for the past week. It was lightning fast on any task I threw at it. I was doing some benchmarks for a customer, and our numbers were much, much better than any of the competition running their benchmark code, including the latest Itanium and Opterons.
You can argue price, but to argue that a Dual 2.5GHz PowerMac G5 is sluggish is insane. Care to provide some data to back that up?
- "When you want something with all your heart, the entire universe conspires to give it to you" -Paulo Coelho
is the security level that can be achieved with such a processor; not the fact that it can run "several OSs at the same time", which is just a by-product of its architecture. Apart from some real crude memory protection, modern "mainstream" processors hadn't had any kind of abstraction/security feature, so I think this is good news. And if that ever succeeds in a reasonably "mainstream" future Apple computer, along with a hardened Mac OS, the couple Intel/Microsoft or even AMD/Microsoft are in for a rough ride...
Selling space on a virtual server is not a new concept. Very handy when a client needs full autonomy over their own server but you don't want them to have root everywhere. They have the rights to install all the services they need but it doesn't necessarily affect the over all security of the rest of the machine. You can do this with a product called Vmware which is basicly a host OS that allows you to spawn independent virtual machines. It looks like they plan to do this on the hardware level.
Not too useful for a home user but very useful for a Blade Server.
There is no sanctuary. There is no sanctuary. SHUT UP! There is no shut up. There is no shut up.
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Hopefully they've added the segment registers to this architecture... that would be so cool. Er, waitaminute...
Obviously not what they'd do. But I gotta admit, it was the first thing that popped into my head when I read the headline.
- Leo
You don't use science to show that you're right, you use science to become right.
Partitioning is just VM in "firmware". It's great for testing new stuff. Want to test a new Linux kernel. Just create a new partition and boot it. Excellent debugging facilities if it's anything like what VM had.
People keep getting this wrong:
iSeries is not Big Iron -- zSeries is Big Iron.
iSeries is either Medium Iron or Big Manganese, according to taste.
Either way the eServer i5 rocks, it's just the eServer zSeries z990 is just that bit more ferric...
Phil
I guess today is a passable day to die.
Then stop using gcc and glibc.
I would presume that virtual machines implemented on the hardware would be faster than virtual machines implemented in software but, other than the speed issue, is there anything different about this than running multiple operating systems with VMWare?
We must be alert to the danger that public policy could become captive to a scientific-technological elite. - Eisenhower
Depending on the virus. I am no windows expert, but if it can access the disk as a raw device, then it could easily effect the other systems.
For instance, if it was two linux machines on different partitions or disks, you could simply run: dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/hda bs=1024 count=100 and wipe out the partition table on the other disk. Even the echo or cat command can write ascii text to a raw device. I am sure windows has it's own version of those programs.
Flexible bare-metal recovery for Linux/UNIX
OS X currently isn't optimized for the G5. I'd understand if it's clunky on such machines. Although, it's quite fast on a 1Ghz G4.
The solution? OS X 10.4, optimized for G5. You don't need all this CPU partitoning stuff to make OS X fast.
I wouldn't place any bets on this being used in the G5.
There were MANY variations of the G4-series chips which were not specifically designed for workstation/mainframe use and were never picked up by Apple.
Offtopic, but interesting to note is that there were actually TWO G4s. I'm not 100% sure, but I think when apple transitioned to DDR RAM, they used a different series of processor -- they were quite different chips... apple never made a big deal out of it (and rightfully so, as it made little difference to the consumer). Still, compiling using optimizations only found on the newer G4s can yield impressive results as shown with the optimized firefox builds.
-- If you try to fail and succeed, which have you done? - Uli's moose
VirusOS!
You shouldn't feed the trolls, but just in case the parent is genuine in his belief and he's actually used OS X for a minute, he may be influenced by the double-buffered screen redraw and comparing it unfavorably to the flickering redraw done by Windows (pre-Longhorn).
I've noticed a lot of people who don't know what they're talking about play around with the scrollbars and windows and conclude the system is sluggish.
A Mac built around this chip could theoretically run OS X, GNU/Linux, Mac OS 9, and the PowerPC version of Windows NT, all simultaneously and independently."
... and slowly.
The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.
Actually, they scaled down the Power4 to make the 970.
after I install some software on thw windows-NT it asks for a reboot! How will that work, without taking down the other systems. And what about system shutdown, which OS will be allowed to shut the power down?
I think such a system will require some sort of an OS manager ! a layer downwards between the OS(es) and the hardware.
Spreading rumors about future Apple products is likely to get them sued.
I got this error message on the main Slashdot website:
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The service is not available. Please try again later.
This sig donated to Pater. Long live
I run the Mac OS X panther...I used to have Debian running on it, but OS X makes it unnecessary (also see the FINK project http://fink.sf.net/ and DarwinPorts http://www.darwinports.org/
I run Fluxbox in my apple X11. It's very handy..
I have lost at anywhere of thousands and thousands of PPC's instructions!!! (see pem64b.pdf e-book)
PowerPC is worse, worse, worse, harder, harder, harder, dirtier, dirtier, dirtier than the cleanest & simpler Alpha 21364.
I'm building an Alpha 21364 simulator!!!
open4free ©
I've never heard such shite in all my life.
I've used Linux for just as long and although not a current mac user I can not remember arseing around for hours with dependancies on OSX to get simple stuff like an MP3 player working.
I also can not think of one Linux app with anywhere near the thought apple put into GUI design. Most are frankly hideous and clunky as hell.
And WhoTF uses X11 on a mac? Its there as a "add-on" at best. When you can Quartz render stuff I don't see the point. X11 is crap on anyway.
And we all know OpenOffice only exists cos MS will never release a "proper" office (you know - the one OO keeps chasing and never catches up) on Linux os Solaris. Mac has an office from MS which is better than the Windows one!!
You've missed the point mate - your a budget shopper confused in Harrods....
yes but I run a beowolf ckuster in the chip
They even got into a fight years ago with the altivec unit. Motorola started making the CPU's for Apple and they got out of that in a hurry. The CPU's where not cutting enough edge and the Mac line started going downhill.
This is a good feature, but not really for Apple. I think it was designed for IBM's Power line of (super)computers.
Apple doesn't do big iron. They do iPods, consumer grade stuff.
So, what happens if WinNT gets a BSoD and reboots; does that reboot all the OSes running on the machine or just Window$?
Kilauea, I must agree. The parent contains the biggest wheel-barrow load of bollocks I've ever heard.
IBM supplies the virtual disk device drivers for the guest OSes. The device driver does i/o via hypervisor calls. The virtual disk is simple so the device drivers are easy to write. Something like that. Think how logical volumes work.
michaeldot, i don't know jack about graphics -- would you explain this for me? it sounds interesting... thanks!
Neither Apple nor OS X are big players in that market
This is quite simply not true. The Apple XServe and Mac OS X Server are both considered very powerful, cost-effective solutions. That is why Virgina Tech has 1100 dual-2.3Ghz XServes in their System X. It was determined to have the highest gigaflops-to-price and takes the least power consumption and physical space, ratio by COLSA Corp. & the US Army for their MACH5 cluster, with 1,562 dual 2Ghz G5 XServes. And it runs Mac OS X Server. Apple's XServes are extremely competitive, making them a big player in the server market.
why would one need to run 5 operating systems at once? All an O/S does is tell the hardware what to do. The actual software should be agnostic IMO and unless I'm wrong is why good old C is still such a strong and popular language.
Perhaps I misunderstand though, let me know.
Rob
I only use professional delux OS's. Because I demand, no ...deserve, the very best.
I thought the segment cludge is what allows you to address more than 64k on the 8088?
I've been a linux user for 12 years now since slackware 0.91, and I've finally managed to get everything the way I like on a linux desktop.
...except that xmms and skins are ugly as hell compared to iTunes, and won't automatically sync with my iPod.
/chuckle/ ANYTHING looks ugly as hell in X11 dude!
That was the sound of you shooting yourself in the foot. Ouch. I feel for you.
unless you like the strange program they enclose (iLife) I hate iTunes (a properitary mp3 player tied to a online service for ripping money out of you.)
Personally, I like iLife, which is actually a combo of several programs like iPhoto, iMovie, iTunes, iDVD and Garage Band. They just work, out of the box. While they're not work-horse applications, they do enough for what I want for my hobbies. I have an iPod, and iTunes is like magic. I can't imagine things getting any easier. I didn't expect my MIDI equipment to "just work" with a toy like Garage Band. It did, and it blew me away. So really, it depends on what you want to do with your computer. (As a side note, I live in a country where iTMS is not available even if I wanted it. Which I don't, but that again is a choice that is allowed.)
Its better to just use xmms and add all the various decoder plugins.
The X11 term window is not scrollable with the mouse, how do you set the windowbuffer. it is way to small.
OK, you got me there, but I think you're something like the 3rd person that actually attempted to use X11 on MacOS. There's a need, I'm sure, but what it has right now is usually good enough to get around the temporary "need". If you need something more than a temporary fix, you shouldn't be using a Mac. Or Windows, for that matter. Sorta like walking into a shoe store and complaining that you can't find suitable pants!
Openoffice must be used through the X11 windowmanager.
This begs the question... why do you want to use OOo on a Mac? It's fun to tinker around with, as a hobby, but I'd use MS Office for MacOS X. And if you're complaining about the cost, well really, you should have thought about the cost of ownership before you bought that Hummer, son. A Mac is a fancy piece of equipment, and it costs. The cost does not end at hardware alone, although you can sorta get by if you really need to. Sorta like only taking out your H2 on Sundays because you realized you couldn't pay for gas.
Fonts look terrible (poor antialiasing) in the X11 windowmanager.
The enclosed PDF viewing-program called preview is fast, but I've never got search working. this work fine in ggv and xpdf in linux.
I have no idea what you're talking about, since it works fine for me. Dunno, can't help you.
I'm seriously considering wiping out the mac OsX and install latest Debian for PPC on it instead.
Sounds like a viable solution. Sort of wastes part of the idea of buying a PowerBook in the first place, but if that's your thing, why not? In the mean time, the majority of PB users will just merily chug along getting things done on MacOS X.
Hopefully, the following helps clear up some things:
A virtual machine (which for some reason Java-ites seem to believe is *ONLY* a concept which applies to java) "virtualizes" aspects of the host machine. In the case of VMware on intel a technique called a monitor is used to run code natively on the processor for maximum speed. The monitor is basically a pseudo-device which accesses memory directly (you'll see it in the dev dir as vmmon). Other aspects of the machine, such as video, audio, keyboard, network, etc must be "virtualized".
With CPU parititioning, running several operating systems becomes more or less trivial since much of the work of handling all of the ins and outs of virtualizing the hardware is handled for you at the lowest possible level.
So, yes, there may be some performance hit when running several OSes in this way, but not quite as much of one as when this is done totally in software.
GJC
Gregory Casamento
## Chief Maintainer for GNUstep
X11 is really nice for those of us who work in a unix environment on a regular basis, since we can run apps remotely on the mac and have the best of both worlds. I do this sort of thing fairly regularly for school and work, and the only real downside is that if I'm doing it from home, it runs painfully slowly.
You're still using Panther?
:-)
I've been running MacOS X 10.6 Calico for a year now, ever since I found that souped up Delorean...
But I remember Panther.. you're being hypercritical, or just a troll..
In the future, we feed trolls to Iraqi children. They call it Soylent Green.
Merry Christmas all!
Actually I believe they scaled down the Power 4 to make the G5.
Booo on you. OS X rocks for many reasons. I'm not saying it is better than Linux, but definately competes with it quite well, IMHO. Your comment that even windows is better is completely Bogus. In Os X everything just works. You don't have to worry about having to install drivers for things that should work without one (Something I have trouble on windows with ALL of the time), and the interface is just worlds ahead of Windows, and even kde, IMHO.
Actually the 970 has the feature already, witness the IBM blade server.
I don't know what you mean by 'only the protege can access subwindows'. In OS X Command-Tab cycles applications and Command-Backquote cycles windows within the current application.
I find mail fast enough. I'm not sure what you want from 'postfiltering' but I find the rules which let me place email from particular people or mailing lists into particular folders, or forward to my gmail account flexible enough to do anything I need.
Search works in preview for me.
Tom
I have discovered a wonderful
Which is nice on Mac, because it's just there as a tool, not the only game in town.
You had me at "dicks fuck assholes".
I seem to recall them showing multiple Operating Systems running at the same time when the PowerPC was reviewed in magazines in the earyl 90's...I think. Didn't I? I'm sure I remember seeing a magazine article showing two windows with two OS'es running. Call me crazy.
Then again I remember when people said processors will get so fast (1GHz oooh) all devices will be virtual, no need for a modem just have a "virtual modem".
Reading the replies I see mostly prejudiced personal opinions.
Apple has always made great OSes for their computers. They are more intuitive for beginners, the interface is clean and easy to read. On kde/gnome It can be quite difficult to find applications. With linux in general there's the massive and complex dependency tree to worry about. I wanna install xmms and i gotta install 5 other things as well (ok I'm exagerating for effect.)
People have to realize that Linux isn't quite ready for the average user desktop. It's great for our parents/releatives because when they have problems they'll ask us. But not everyone has that luxury. Mac and windows, for the most part, you install it and it just works. No worries. Also, lets see you do High quality graphics work on Linux. Mac gives you more true colors for the image and prints the way you see it.
And for those of you that are gonna say so-and-so copied so-and-so, lets just set the record straight. Apple BOUGHT their interface from Xerox PARC after Microsoft turned it away. Then when MS saw the success apple was having in the early 90's decided to copy and modify the interface and created the "Start" menu (Finder anyone.) Incidently kde/gnome also designed their launcher menus based on the apple one. Which apple had been prototyping for a while, and many Geeks/nerds knew about it before it was released.
So don't bad mouth a company you know nothing about, especially when most of the technology we have is owed to them.
BTW: i feel I should tell you this was written on a Windows/Xandros Dual boot system. I was beta testing Xandros 3.0 prior to release.
DarkMantle I been bored, so I started a blog.
Apple gets to sell a Windows compatible box without having to sell Windows on their boxes. Further, the idea that Apple makes its money off hardware is still in play because Apple isn't switching to Intel, rather MS et al will be switching to Power5/Apple.
So just as one might have multiple desktops on a PC, this would allow a home user who traditionally uses Windows to have a MS Windows "Desktop" as well as an OS X and/or Linux desktop. The consumer gets to use the applications they are familiar with natively, but also has the choice of other OSes when work compatibility gives way to curiosity.
The question is, will Apple and IBM shack up to lock out Wintel and if they do, how much of the iTunes/iPod enterprise does IBM want in return.
I only came here to do two things; kick some ass, and drink some beer...looks like we're almost out of beer.
Funny you should mention Hurd...
Hurd and Darwin (the core of MacOS) are both based on Mach.
I rarely criticize things I don't care about.
I've been doing this for years running VMWare. I run as many as 4 virtual machines in addition to my host regularly. None interfere with the others.
The main uses for this type thing that I've seen are:
1. Partitioning a large box into a number of smaller virtual boxes. This is done typically to handle load during certain peak seasons. Example: with a Sun 10K, the IT folks I know at a university partitioned the 32 proc machine into three. Administration got 8 processors, general computing needs got 16, and someone else got 8. During registration, they would move 4 to 8 processors from the general use to Administration because students aren't using it so heavy at that time, but administration needs more CPU power.
2. Q/A testing. VMWare works great for this (version 5 looks like it's going to be even better for it) where someone may have to test a product against multiple platforms for compatibility both running on top of them and interfacing between them (Windows client against a Linux server, for example).
We have had a bunch of dual boot machines in labs before (Windows and Linux) and found that 99.999% of the time, each machine stays in one OS or the other (most often Windows). Folks dual booting is rare outside of developer/enthusiast circles and basically becomes a waste of HDD space.
Sun's slogan is "The Network is the computer".
... which to them is better than having a client buy AMD or Intel.
This has me thinking. Maybe IBM isn't trying to kill off MS or compete against it right away. Maybe its trying to take on Sun covertly.
Consider this:
1) Sun is using, ever increasingly, commodity hardware. The mobo's etc are definately "custom".
I might 'lose' on this point, but consider my other two.
2) Solaris and AIX are probably comparable Unixes but OS X is gaining ground in other markets (NAS, SAN) which Sun couldn't touch because they were too expensive. IBM can push AIX (if it wants to continue it) on the one end for high availabilty server and/or promote Linux more. For the smaller companies with smaller budgets than want low maintenance and easy use Apple is their solution. IBM doesn't lose out since their CPUs are still being bought
And more specifically yet,
3) This point specifically had me thinking of the SUN slogan. Sun wanted "their" servers running office computers and the databases. With dummy networked terminals providing a screen, no storage space and a nice looking OS. What if IBM is willing to accept that their servers and OS might not run the network or the desktops.... but THEIR chips will (using OS X as both the desktop and server OS. They still make money on the chip sales.
Wait a sec.... with a mulit-taking VM PPC chip, couldn't the server OS also run the desktop at the same time???? So there you have it. A SUN killer with a fast, high power chip running the corporate desktops in small/med businesses.
The PowerPC 970 is the CPU in the G5 model PowerMac. The G5 designation encompasses the whole system, including the logic board, case design, etc. Like the G4 before it, individual components of the system will be changed and upgraded over time, but the system will remain a G5 for, probably, several years and past the time when the 970 has been replaced with a 975 or 980.
What IBM's added is a simplification of this procedure in order to help out their mainframe crowd. IBM's been doing this for a long, long, long time. You see, back in the '60s IBM introduced an operating system called VM, which had this crazy notion of being able to provide virtual machines each with their own operating system environment....
...of when the first cd burners with buffer underrun-proof technology came out, a sales rep made the outrageous claim you could theoretically burn a cd and play Quake 3 simultaneously. This is another overly optimistic theoretical claim that is best ignored until proven.
SEO Copywriter. Just Say ON
[emphasis is mine]
So those of you who argue that people want commodity hardware (i.e. x86) and commodity software are living in the past models of this economy. Wait until 64-bit is the norm and we will see the shakedown of what processor is king. Tom Yager makes the argument that x86 (to 64-bit Itanium) is too butt-tied to MS that consumers will be fed up and will buy IBM PowerPC with an OS smorgasbord (Linux, Mac OS X, etc.)
Linux at home
I use X11 all the time, and use Apple's wonky window manager. I like it! I can run those few apps I can't live without, and I don't have to use the equally wonky Aqua ports of X11 apps. And thanks to the Fink project, I can install something like Emacs for X11 and have it just work.
This begs the question... why do you want to use OOo on a Mac? It's fun to tinker around with, as a hobby, but I'd use MS Office for MacOS X. And if you're complaining about the cost, well really, you should have thought about the cost of ownership before you bought that Hummer, son. A Mac is a fancy piece of equipment, and it costs. The cost does not end at hardware alone, although you can sorta get by if you really need to. Sorta like only taking out your H2 on Sundays because you realized you couldn't pay for gas.
Heh. I work at a small newspaper. Explain that to my boss. Someone high up has everyone bamboozled that, hey, MacOS has great, uhm, everything for publishing. Yep, it does. The next time I see someone doing any real color calibration will be the first.
Stating on Slashdot that I like cheese since 1997.
I'm still waiting for the Powermac G5's to get ECC memory support. I really want one of those sexy machines but I won't buy a workstation that doesn't have ECC memory.
Not just mainframe systems support LPARING. We have 3 LPARS running on our big Power 5 570 server. It's a beefy server. Plenty of ram (106 GB split between LPARS) and 16 processors to divide between LPARS. When AIX 5.3 comes out, you can order a new feature code that adds fractional LPARING....that is you can create a LPAR with as little as 1/10th of a processor. It's not surprising that the next 970 has this built in it. The real competition for UNIX servers in the near future will both be powered by IBM chips. That is, Apple, and IBM. IBM better be careful in how much power they give the 970's because IBM could get a real run for it's money if Apple exploits this ability.
Gorkman
Hopefully someone will complete the PPC port and you will Be able to run your BeOS software natively. A dual G5, that would Be some BeBox!!!
not really, but I thought of something like this a while ago.
http://snipes.undergroundcanada.net/articles/
What goes around comes around, kid.
The most annoying thing with running the 2.6 kernel on a production server is that you've to reboot it every time you wan't to have all the bugfixes and so on. :)
My question is: Is it possible to run a kernel and then compile the latest 2.6 kernel and then start it on another cpu "partition"?Then move over all the applications running under the old kernel to the new one without any significant downtime (under 1 second). And you just kill the old kernel and vola you're running the latest 2.6 kernel without any rebooting?
God,root what's the difference? I read slashdot, there for I errr... am stupid?
MOL is primarily intended to be used by those who run linux/ppc as their main operating system but still want to be able to run that occasional Mac OS application.
Oh, and soon it would be possible to run linux on top of Mac Os X too.
Anthony
--
Bellua Cyber Security Asia 2005
The 970 already supports that feature and always did. It's derived from a POWER4 core.
I don't think Apple enables it when they bootstrap the processor though, but it's just a matter for them of updating the service processor firmware.
However, good partitionning (read: safe) would also require some support at the chipset level, for example, the ability for the IOMMU to prevent a PCI card used by one partition from doing DMA to the memory of anohter partition etc...
IBM hardware has this support in the complete chipset, Apple hardware doesn't, at least not so far.
I don't like to see a troll go unfed at Christmas.
I've been a linux user for 12 years now since slackware 0.91, and I've finally managed to get everything the way I like on a linux desktop. (server side has been great for years).
But in June I bought a Powerbook G4 12". it looks great and the hardware is great, but the OS stink! Even windows is better. Linux is now way ahead. latest kde or gnome have all the features I need, maybe not all the fancy bells and whizzles in OsX, but it is configurable and productive.
If it took 12 years to get the Linux desktop working, shouldn't you give OS X the same amount time. Post a reply sometime around 2016 to let us know how it worked out.
I hate iTunes (a properitary mp3 player tied to a online service for ripping money out of you.)
Damn that whole idea of exchanging money for goods and services.
You do know that you're not actually required to use the Music Store? I think most people don't care if their software is proprietry as long as it works. iTunes can support ogg though via a plug-in.
The enclosed PDF viewing-program called preview is fast, but I've never got search working. this work fine in ggv and xpdf in linux.
Sounds like problem is located between the keyboard and chair. RTFM.
-- Using the preview button since 2005
Can you imagine it?!
True, although Darwin is a single-server (uses Mach as a HAL) and Hurd is multi-server (true microkernel) implementation. Not to mention the fact that there is an effort underway to move Hurd to L4 (a much lighter microkernel than Mach).
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
Well, it's hoped that most of the hardware involved is connected to a SAN anyway, so it wouldn't matter much.
But in my experience using Mac-On-Linux, which lets you virtualize Mac OS (and OS X) sessions on Linux, the disk performance is actually INCREASED. What you have is one OS providing the virtualization services (network, disks, memory segment) for the others. When the hosted system does IO it gets handed to the master OS right away, all IO becomes asynchronous when it hits the hosting layer.
What you end up with is an OS that's tuned for great IO providing services with 'native dummy' drivers to the hosted systems. the net result is increased performance.
Overall though, partitioning is really nothing new, my G3 can run partitioned sessions of Linux, Mac OS, Mac OS X, and I'll bet getting *BSD wouldn't be rocket science. I think this announcement by IBM is really just market-driven hype of a feature they've already got. They might just be reimplementing their way of doing it too. I can see the next PPC970 hardware running the 'hosting OS' as embedded Linux on the PC4XX 'control chip' present on all the 9XX motherboards. This would essentially be an IBM/PowerPC-enhanced version of LinuxBIOS. It would be LinuxBIOS that booted your OS inside a virtualized environment. Way cool, and way useful!
"Sometimes, I think Trent just needs a cup of hot chocolate and a blankie." -Tori Amos on Nine Inch Nails
I was refering to the whole operating system, not just the kernel. If I wanted to write "Linux" I'd have had to say "run xnu, Linux, nu, and the PowerPC version of ntkrnl.sys" for consistance, and I can bet 90% of Slashbots who express concerns about GNU being mentioned with Linux wouldn't have understood a word of that.
You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
...at least not since Microsoft dropped support for NT 4 PPC in 1997. There is no reason to believe it will ever be back, if only because nobody ever bothered to port applications to it.
wanted MORE EMULATORS ALL SORTS OF STYLES please send to antiqueoperatingsystems @ msn groups
lawrephord2@hotmail.com
"Have you written your own operating system yet ?"
"Have you written your own operating system yet ?"
That's not the point. I've been using OOo for years and if I switch back to MS I need to alter all my templates, which works by the way on all versions of OOo. with the correct template and window configs OOo is highly productive. OOo is not available in a quartz native version.
I've no problems with hardware on the powerbook, but the OS on it makes me unproductive.
in apple's mail program there is no option to postfiler the messages into various folders of various BCC, CC,etc, you can only cc yourself.
So I had to set up a sendmailserver on localhost to filter it.
I installed Debian on it and it works excellent. some problems with audio and wfi setup, but it is fixed now. care shit about hw-accelerated graphics.
And whoo it is fast, it loads in 15sec.
Haven't booted OSX in an week :-)
And I've had to restart mozilla once either.
"theoretically" is the keyword in this article description. Apple has already prevented users from the choice of booting operating systems such as OS 9 on it's computers. This was key to forcing users to increasing the number of users to use OS X. When there was a choice of operating systems OS 9 and OS X, users chose OS 9 by overwhelming numbers. These numbers were an emberassment inside of Apple and Steve needed to convince users and third party developers that OS X was being adopted and used at a radical pace (a fact that did not exist). Apple had failed with previous operating systems replacements in the past for OS 9. We can all remember what happened with Copeland. Apple was attempting to force third party developers to rewrite their apps. in this new OS and users to purchase all news apps. as well as a new OS to run on their hardware. The Copeland OS was a failure. Third party developers refused to write new applications to support Apple's new operating system and users of the Mac OS has no real reason to upgrade. Apple was determined not to repeat the history of Copeland with OS X. Apple remidied this issue by making new hardware incompatible with OS 9. If Apple perceives any OS a threat to OS X on it's hardware you can be sure that a simple firmware update or new hardware introduction will remove the threat of any legitimate competition. I know that many will respond by stating that Linux runs on PowerPC hardware provided by Apple and Apple has not locked out this OS. The GNU/Linux distributions that run on PowerPC hardware provided by Apple do NOT pose a real threat to the OS X operating system. My point is that any OS that poses a REAL threat to Apple's OS X will not be allowed to continue to thirve on Apple's closed and proprietary hardware.