Torvalds Switches to a Mac

renai42 writes "Linux creator Linus Torvalds said this afternoon that he's now running an Apple Macintosh as his main desktop, mainly for work reasons, although partly simply because he's a self-described "technology whore" and got the machine for free." And yes, he is running Linux on it ;)

Comments

Big Deal

[tsmithnj]

My carpenter switched from a 15" hammer to a 16" hammer. It's just a tool fer Chrissakes....

Re:Big Deal

[Stevyn]

Yeah, but to people here, it's like Jesus was that carpenter switching from a 15" hammer to a 16" hammer. I don't think this is particularly newsworthy. If I got a free Mac one day, I'd sure as hell use it.

He has been posting from torvalds@ppc970.osdl.org

[tabkey12]

for a long time now - thought it was obvious he was using a G5.

Always good to see another boost to the PPC64 platform though...

He already stated this

[BoomerSooner]

This has been known for a while. Read it and he discusses why he runs PPC instead of x86, just to have a different view on kernel development. Plus it's not like he runs OS X or something.

Re:He already stated this

[NoData]

Yeah right. You know that, late at night, when all the other coders have gone home, after the custodian has come by his office...he peeks out of his office to make sure the coast is clear...draws the blinds, locks the door...and he's dual booting, man, he's dual booting so hard. And it's wrong, but it feels so right.

Hey

[Lostie]

It should be pointed out that he is certainly not using Mac OSX - but Linux's PPC port (of course). Don't worry - *BSD is still dying. ;-)

Linus has beaten the two biggest drawbacks of macs

[Overzeetop]

Cost of hardware (he got it for free) and cost o software (he writes his own).

Hey, I'd take it too, given that kind of deal!

Nice tidbit and all

[jtwJGuevara]

But seriously, let's not turn this into the E! network for geeks. I really personally don't care what hardware platform Linus uses or whether he buys his underwear from thinkgeek.com just so long as he continues doing a smashing job maintaining kernel development.

Have you ever heard about...

[kunwon1]

Rats who jump from sinking ships, because somehow, they just instinctively KNOW that it's sinking?









Just kidding. For GODS SAKE I was just kidding. I swear.

single-handedly

[millwall]

"[...] the man who has single-handedly revolutionised the use of Unix on the x86 platform"

Oh, I thought there were several people involved in Linux? Didn't know Linus created it "single-handedly".

Thanks for pointing that out to me, ZDNet!

Re:So what.

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, but does the spell checker work?

Re:smart people think alike

[Anonymous Coward]

> b) Apple hardware is desired over your Average Joe's box from Dell or HP.

Rather, free hardware is desired over your average hardware you pay for.

Re:Just hardware, no apple OS.

[skingers6894]

The thing about Apple is that they put just as much effort into their hardware as their software. If you buy a Mac and ditch OSX in favor of Linux, they have still made a sale of exactly the same value. If a bunch of Linux users started buying Macs to run Linux because Linus does (even though he got his for free!) I'm pretty sure they'd be happy with that.

oblig Torvalds quote

[Anonymous Coward]

"The memory management on the PowerPC can be used to frighten small children."

Tragic little story

[Panaflex]

I'm writing to share a tragic little story.

I have a PC that my sister and I used to use for our operating system development. One night, I was writing a new memory manager on it, when all of a sudden it went berserk, the screen started flashing, and the whole VI session just disappeared. All of it. And it was a good memory manager! I had to cram and rewrite it really quickly. Needless to say, my rushed memory manager wasn't nearly as good, and I blame that PC for the crap I got.

I'm happy to report that my sister and I now share an Apple Dual G5 that we got for free! It's a lot nicer to work on than my old PC was, it hasn't let me down once, and my memory managers have all been really good.

Thanks, Apple.

Linux Thorvalds

Re:Yea but...

[Tony Hoyle]

Who is this 'Linux Torvalds'?

Is he any relation to Linus?

You're all missing the point

[IGnatius T Foobar]

There's one HUGE important point to all this, and it has nothing to do with fashion, nothing to do with conspiracy, nothing to do with elitism.

It completely prevents the merging of kernel patches that malfunction on non-x86 platforms.

Sure, these would get ironed out eventually, but if someone were to inadvertently do something x86-specific, it would immediately break on Linus's computer. That's a pretty darn good guarantee that the kernel is going to remain architecture-independent all the time, rather than only after cross-platform QA has been recently performed.

Great! We can finally end the language argument

[zogger]

How many times have people been chided for saying "Linux" when referring to a Linux Operating system? They get lectured "linux is only the kernel" blah blah blah

Well, here ya go, time to STFU about that

"Torvald's response came quickly and succinctly. "My main machine these days is a dual 2GHz G5 (aka PowerPC 970) - it's physically a regular Apple Mac, although it obviously only runs Linux, so I don't think you can call it a Mac any more ;)" he said."

If the inventor of it can call the operating system "Linux", then I say that means it's officially "cool" to use the term "Linux" to in fact refer to Joe Blow's "LinuxOS". We;ve more or less dropped saying GNU in front of it, so let's just drop the pedantic grammar fascist lecturing about the difference between a Kernel and the OS.

Now the other issue. He doesn't care about userland space. You know, I think this is a serious problem. Think about this long and hard for awhile. Then rethink about it.

Maybe it's time someone with ultimate say so DID care? Just maybe that might be a good idea seeing as how it's 2005 and not 1995? Look on the shelf at the retail level, how much "Linux" do you see? Perhaps time for some groups to think about forking the kernel and having the forked maintainer dictators actually *care* about userland? Get some much needed standards going? Evolution is not static.

Linus is probably biased about Mach though....

[Paradox]

Long ago, long before most folks were using Linux, Linus got into a fight with Andrew Tanenbaum about Linux and its design as a monolithic kernel. This is one of the more famous debates of linux lore, so it doesn't hurt read it and its annotations.

The quick summary is that Andy Tanenbaum proclaimed Linux dead way back in '92, saying, "While I could go into a long story here about the relative merits of the two designs, suffice it to say that among the people who actually design operating systems, the debate is essentially over. Microkernels have won."

Linus on the other hand much preferred the monolithic design of linux, for a variety of reasons. Mr. Tanenbaum even went so far as to imply that Linux wouldn't be a passing project for his class. Ironic, no?

Even so, Tanenbaum did and still does have some good points about the Mach microkernel. I can't exactly imagine Torvalds is the most impartial judge of the mach microkernel.

Re:Linus is probably biased about Mach though....

[dorto]

From what i remember, Mr. Tanenbaum did not say that linux is dead but rather that monolithic kernels are dead on which the then linux kernel was based. that was not completely wrong, he also provided some references to support his arguments. what Mr. Torvalds maintained through out was that he was not designing an academic operating system but a practical one and hence efficiency and other considerations were more important to him for his OS. IMHO Tanenbaum was not wrong in saying that a kernel so badly designed wouldn't have been accepted by him if Torvalds were his student(though that should not in any way discredit the effort put into creating linux). finally it was summarised that(IIRC): 1)Tanenbaum is looking from aesthetics point of view, and is correct in what he said about OS theory, a living example is his own minix 2)Torvalds has practical concerns to look into when he was making linux, so adv of monolithic kernel looked more important at that time than microkernel architecture. it cannot be said that (who)Torvalds finally won the battle as not every thing successful is necessarily well designed - microsoft windows and x86 architecture are good examples. in addition i think linux is not completely monolithic anymore and has become a lot more modular to the Mr. Tanenbaum's liking.

No news, Alpha was there first

[leandrod]

It is funny but disheartening to see how even Slashdot editors can't remember yesterday... before Intel (or HP or Compaq, you name 'em) killed the Alpha, Linus was given a four-way Alpha workstation he used for quite some time, I think it was two or three years until x86 hardware took over in performance (over his three-years old system!) or Alpha was seen as a dead end or whatever.

So he's just doing the same, this time with a platform not so fancy but with a safer future.

It means an easier life for us Linuxers on PPC, but we were already blessed with great hackers both on the kernel and in other parts; for example the leader(s?) of the Debian X Strike Force are Linux on PPC users.

Now what would be great is if proprietary vendors start porting their stuff... every day I miss things like j2re plugin for Mozilla, a Flash player, Adobe Acrobat and NX. Granted there are alternatives and clones, but gcjwebplugin still crashes Epiphany and ain't Java 2 level yet, swf_player is only playback, no interaction and takes way too much CPU, Evince doesn't do PDF forms and X.Fast (LBX) simply can't work in POTS dial-up situations where NX shines.