LinuxPPC64 Contest

Robert MacFarlan writes: "IBM is sponsoring a Open Source developer contest for their Linux on POWER (Linux PPC 64) effort. The contest is designed to award and showcase innovative new open source applications that are designed or optimized specifically for Linux running on the PPC architecture. The contest also awards ports of existing applications from a predetermined list. Contest prizes include Segway HTs, Apple Power Mac G5s, and cash awards. "

Comments

...What?

[Cooler1011]

Wtf happened to the other article that was here a second ago?

Re:...What?

[pHZero]

Wondering the same thing myself, the article about a combined P4 and A64 motherboard

Re:...What?

[Avyakata]

They realized it was a dupe and decided to do away with it...executioner style...*cough*

Re:...What?

[Anonymous Coward]

It was a dupe that was brushed under the carpet. Congratulations on beating me to First Post, by the way.

Re:...What?

[jawtheshark]

Perhaps because it would have been a dupe?
For a change the mysterious future worked! :-)

Apple?

[polyhue]

Mentioning PPC gives an Apple topic automatically?

Re:Apple?

[AnFraX]

Yes

Re:Apple?

[FrothyBitter]

That makes perfect sense, because IBM makes the PPC. Oh wait, you're right, that doesn't make sense at all.

Re:Apple?

[jcromartie]

IBM is primarily shooting for Linux on Power Mac systems. The prizes also include a G5.

Re:Apple?

[tehshen]

If you look at the topic list, it's in 'Hardware (Apple)', so it's in Apple.

Re:Apple?

[squiggleslash]

It's probably the same reason that everything about applications for generic Unix systems get filed under the "Linux" section. The current list of sections is a little poorly chosen, to put it mildly. There is no IBM or Power section, or anything that really would make a good home for Power related topics.

Re:Apple?

[Anonymous Coward]

Look what happened when Torvalds announced he was using one.

Re:Apple?

[nine-times]

I was wondering that myself, but I guess then there's the question: how many vendors are there selling PPC-based desktops?

Are there any that move anywhere near Apple's volume? So maybe in that sense, there's a de facto association, even if not a necessary one.

Re:Apple?

[remahl]

But it isn't Apple hardware! It's all IBM. It's not even PPC, it's POWER, which Apple doesn't use.

Re:Apple?

[Seehund]

Mentioning PPC gives an Apple topic automatically?

Welcome to Slashdot, User 38... Oh.

Yes. So does anything having anything to do with portable digital audio players. :)

Re:Apple?

[tehshen]

I meant 'Technology (Apple)', not Hardware, if it makes it any better.

Re:Apple?

[Anonymous Coward]

How many people do you think actually has one of these to work on?

Yeah, I'm thinking they all own Macs.

Re:Apple?

[tigersha]

Ok.Question. I am not a white-box-with-linux zealot but seriously, what would a $15000 AIX graphics workstation bring to the table and why would someone want to buy one?

Re:Apple?

[gl4ss]

well.

it's IBM's competition, for IBM's platform.

if it should have any icon on it.. then IBM would be it.

that being said, second tier prize is 50 apple g5's.

Re:Apple?

[jericho4.0]

I think you mean 1 of 50 G5's.

Re:Apple?

[Anonymous Coward]

Read more closely. PPC64. I have a feeling your question reveals a bias more than an ignorance.

Re:Apple?

[FidelCatsro]

Well i can see How it got the Apple topic , as any advances on linux for power will also aid linux on PPC (Thus Mac hardware ,and newer Amigas for that matter)

as you can see some of the instruction sets are a little diffrent however the core architecture is very simmilar and iirmprc(my press releases corectly) PPC is Power for the home computer(power being a server , and workstation chip arch)

So i think including apple in this is ok , as it is not the main bit just an associate

Re:Apple?

[Teknobob]

At least it is now posted under "Developer".

Re:Apple?

[Anonymous Coward]

IBM is phasing out the term "PowerPC" -- Recently they tend to use "POWER" to refer to the whole lineup.

(POWER has used the "PowerPC" ISA for many years so there's no software difference between them.)

Re:Apple?

[Anonymous Coward]

Apple has never had any technology. They get it from others and sell it.

Re:Apple?

[Anonymous Coward]

No, mentioning that IBM is giving away Macs as prizes in their contest gives an Apple topic.

They're also giving away Segways, but Slashdot doesn't have an icon for those.

Re:Apple?

[DenDave]

Is there another consumer PPC64 machine (widely and affodably) available?

Re:Apple?

[Lars T.]

RTFA: "Linux running on the PPC architecture". I bet most people running Linux on PPC or POWER run it on Apple hardware.

Re:Apple?

[caino59]

Zing!

Pure Gold.

Re:Apple?

[kn.]

We use plenty of them. And still you'll read some (c) Apple stuff in the firmware messages when booting those machines.

Re:Apple?

[citog]

In that case, I'm not going to bother ... :)

Re:Apple?

[ecotax]

You could win an iMac G5, among other things. If there was a Segway section, it should go under there as well.

Re:Apple?

[Alan Partridge]

That's not actually true. They develop a range of hardware devices and whole load of firmware and software in house. The also had quite a bit of input into PowerPC.

Re:Apple?

[Anonymous Coward]

I bet most people running Linux on PPC or POWER run it on Apple hardware.

HELLO, if you bothered to read the parent, you'd notice the fact that Apple doesn't even sell any hardware based on POWER. So your "bet" would be a losing one.

Re:Apple?

[sethstorm]

At the rate the pSeries POWER5's are going at, go for the top tiers, one could just sell the G5 (on ebay?) or Segway, then go use that cash on a good pSeries. There's a lot of good hardware (GXT series graphics accelerators, for example) that could receive a nice bonus if the Linux [application] support was good enough for it. Apple has done enough to those G5's, now it's time for those black POWER boxes to leverage that horsepower that's been sitting in them.

Re:Apple?

[datadriven]

I think that's the point. IBM wants to position itself against Intel & Microsoft. It already has the achitecture (PPC) & the OS (Linux). What it NEEDS is applications.

Re:Apple?

[smittyoneeach]

Yeah, but he didn't pay for it. Rather like a racing sponsorship, or something.

Re:Apple?

[guile*fr]

newer Amigas for that matter
bwahahaha PowerPC Amigas, the hardware counterpart of Duke Nukem Forever.

Re:Apple?

[Lars T.]

HELLO, if you bothered to read the parent, you'd notice the fact that Apple doesn't even sell any hardware based on POWER. So your "bet" would be a losing one.

Yeah, sure, if we use your dumbass definition of "or" or the parents misinterpretation of the contest's title as a basis. In the real world however, Apple sells more G5s than all other makers combined sell G5s or (sorry, I forgott your dumbass definition, make that "plus") POWER based computers.

Re:Apple?

[FidelCatsro]

;) you do know thez have been avaliable for a couple years now
url:http://www.eyetech.co.uk/search.php?Searc hStr= &SearchCat=AMA1>

Re:Apple?

[Anonymous Coward]

So, like what does your rant have to do with the article?

Re:Apple?

[Billly Gates]

Power is based on powerpc. Its a deritive of it.

You can not run AIX on power hardware because of extra registers on power that are not available on powerpc.

But likewise, I can also compile software that only runs on an Athlon that would not execute on a 386 so its a given.

Re:Apple?

[aichpvee]

I thought that was the Phantom console... or was that just who got the Duke Nukem Forever exclusive rights?

Re:Apple?

[aichpvee]

I don't really see how it matters what hardware you're running Linux on if it gets the job done for you. Aside from the obvious factors of cost and Slackware only being available for x86.

iTunes?

[The-Perl-CD-Bookshel]

*ducking* - don't hit me

Re:iTunes?

[varmittang]

I would think that is something Apple wouldn't mind having ported. I mean, less work for them to do, and they increase their market in digital music. I know that you might think that it would undermind their PC sales, but Linux isn't quite ready for mass desktops yet. So, they could get the real geeks to start using iTunes.

Re:iTunes?

[BasilBrush]

I doubt it would even hurt their Mac sales.

Apple?

[Teknobob]

My bet is that it's listed under Apple since the 2nd tier winners get:

Apple Power Mac G5 and $1,000 cash prize.

Either that or Hemos knows something we have only heard rumors about between Apple and IBM...

Re:Why is this story categorized under Apple??

[Anonymous Coward]

Been done.

G4?

[MetaPhyzx]

If contestants do not have direct access to LinuxPPC64 platforms such as IBM eServer or Apple Power Mac G5 to develop or port on, community-based resources may be found at the University of Portland School of Engineering.

What about on a G4, using the Altivec extensions? Wouldn't this suffice? 64 or 32 bit is OK according to IBM, but optimized for 64. Won't a G4 suffice?

Re:G4?

[FLAGGR]

G4 != G5

AFAIK, there are some of the G$ altivec instructions which will crash on the G5, which is why some OSX apps had to be ported. Plus, they want it for the POWER PPC64 architecture anyway, so no.

"POWER"

[Anonymous Coward]

Ok, IBM marketing monkeys, we get it...you can stop SHOUTING everytime you say "power" now. BTW, why didn't you just go for 'thoroughly annoying' and add an echo to that, i.e., "POWER!...POWer...Power...power"?

Re:"POWER"

[Seehund]

POWER is an acronym. "Performance Optimization With Enhanced RISC", IIRC.

Now go shout at the eejits who shout "MAC" when referring to cute plastic from Apple, Inc. ;)

Re:"POWER"

[gotr00t]

"Enhanced RISC" implies enhancements on an already reduced set of instructions. Dosn't that actually mean complication?

Re:"POWER"

[skingers6894]

Yes, it should be CRISC - Complex Reduced Instruction Set Chip, it only doesn't make sense if you try and think about it...

Re:"POWER"

[m50d]

Maybe it's its RISCness that has been enhanced, perhaps to the point of being OISC?

Contest already over...

[signalgod]

According to the article the winner was somebody from Colorado (won a Prius)?!?

But they are going to annouce the other winners soon (for the G5's)?

So why do we care?

Not that I could have entered or anything, but I'm jus' sayin'....

Re:Contest already over...

[Mr. Sketch]

That may be kinda difficult since the front page says:
Registration begins on March 15, 2005!
Entries are due by July 15, 2005!

Porting wine?

[SeanTobin]

Check out number 99. They want someone to port wine!

Now, porting between OS's on the same architecture is difficult. Porting between the same OS on different architectures can be easy, or insanely difficult. Porting a "not-an-emulator" that "ports" other applications running on a different operating system across a different architecture to run the "ported" application on the non-native architecture... well, the word difficult just doesn't seem to cut it.

But, if anyone manages to do it they deserve a freakin' medal!

Re:Porting wine?

[TheRaven64]

The Darwine project has winelib running on OS X, and aims to tie QEMU to WINE to allow windows apps to run with the binaries in the emulated environments and the wine calls running on the native platform.

Re:Porting wine?

[QuantumG]

I can do this already. We did a little experiment last year. Using the open source decompiler Boomerang you can turn a windows exe into C code. You can then simply recompile that source code on any platform using winelib including non-x86 platforms like PPC. Of course, you then have to test the app and ensure that it still works, which takes a fair bit of effort as winelib isn't exactly that portable and Boomerang isn't that mature just yet. But it is possible, and it's truely the highest performance way to "run win32 apps on PPC".

Re:Porting wine?

[Associate]

Can you run Darwin on something other than a 440BX yet? I couldn't find any documentation.

Re:Porting wine?

[QuantumG]

Man I don't get it. Surely if you were porting winelib to Mac OS X you'd use the native Mac OS X widgets. That's the purpose of winelib, to use the native widgets of X11 on unix instead of the native widgets of win32 on Windows. Now look at the screenshot for Darwine, they've got what look like win32 widgets in Mac OS X, how the hell have they even done that?

Re:Porting wine?

[o_kenway]

That's because they are using the Wine X11 widgets running under X-Windows on OS-X.

Obvious really.

Re:Porting wine?

[TheRaven64]

Wine (and winelib) draws its own widgets, which look and behave the same way the Windows ones do. While, technically, it would be relatively easy to make them appear like native widgets, this would be a horrendous decision for two reasons:

1. It would remove an important visual clue that the application in question is not a native application, and will not behave like one.
2. It would encourage the attitude that having an app running in Wine is `good enough,' and make native ports (with UIs consistent with the rest of the system) less attractive to developers.

Re:Porting wine?

[vaeder]

i don't know, isn't that essentially the same as if you ran the program through QEMU? I mean QEMU using dynamic recompilation and all?

Re:Porting wine?

[alienw]

It's not THAT difficult, you just need to add a CPU emulator. Of course, given that wine has about 2.5 active developers, that isn't very high on the priority list (especially since an emulated windows program will run very slowly).

Re:Porting wine?

[QuantumG]

There's a world of difference between static and dynamic compilation. Besides which, if you have decompiled "source", you can actually do a "real" port to Cocoa.

Re:Porting wine?

[LWATCDR]

Unless you got really lucky you are full of it.
Sorry I just downloaded Boomerang and tried it on a small in house program. It segfaulted. Next I tried putty. I pretty small program only 380k. Blame segfault.
From the boomerang website. "Boomerang will only work for the most trivial programs. "
An dreams of using it to run win32apps on PPC in the near future is fantasy. I do wish them luck it is a great project but it is barley alpha and not a real tool.

Re:Porting wine?

[QuantumG]

Maybe when you downloaded it you should have looked at who one of the two principle developers are. *I* have no trouble decompiling things with Boomerang because I can go ahead and fix what needs to be fixed to get it working on the specific binary that I'm trying to decompile. You need to take your application procedure by procedure and work through the problems to get a good output. Point and click decompilation is still a fair few years off at the moment.

Re:Porting wine?

[LWATCDR]

I suggest that you read your post. You make it sound like it is click and decompile.
I tried it on three programs.
Two we wrote in house and notepad.exe. I got no data from any of them. As I said it is not currently anywhere close to being a useful tool for the average user. Still it is a good project good luck.

Re:FP

[drooling-dog]

How is this "off-topic"?

Re:Timely?

[Mantorp]

Have you heard of the x-price? Some private company will fly in to space and get a bundle of money. Can't wait to read about that if/when it happens.

Taxable income?

[eric_ste]

I know that this is a "contest" but since you kind of get paid (toyota prius) for work (a pice of software that works on PPC), would you include the price as part as your taxable income? What do the IRS people think about that?

Re:Taxable income?

[ocelotbob]

Just like game show winnings, the prizes are considered taxable income.

Re:Taxable income?

[Anonymous Coward]

Considering that it's theirs to begin with I would say that they can do as they wish with it and they certainly wish to take it from you.... though in the case of tangible property I would think you'd pay property tax instead of income tax (unless you sell the car), otherwise what are you gonna do... send them the wheels to cover the percentage they want?

Open to US residents only

[chriseh]

The following contest is intended for viewing in the United States only (except in Puerto Rico) and shall only be construed and evaluated according to United States law. Do not proceed in this site if you are not a resident of, and located, in the United States (except Puerto Rico) at the time of entry.

Unfortunatetly IBM really doesn't get it. The Linux community is international. This contest excludes some of the best kernel hackers (including Linus!).

IBM, get with the program!

Re:Open to US residents only

[Anonymous Coward]

The Linux community is international, but Contest Laws are not.

Re:Open to US residents only

[Anonymous Coward]

This contest excludes some of the best kernel hackers (including Linus!).

Has he moved to Puerto Rico?

Re:Open to US residents only

[dilby]

What page are you reading??? This contest is designed for Open Source Developers world-wide (w/ the exception of Quebec Canada). Please see the official rules.

Re:Open to US residents only

[Maserati]

Linus is a US resident, has been for a few years now. He's eligible, and he is running Linux on a dual G5.

Re:Open to US residents only

[Anonymous Coward]

...that is usually caused by the different tax rules around the world...

Re:Open to US residents only

[ocelotbob]

Unfortunately, laws regarding contests are so sporadic and varied that making an international contest for something like this becomes damn tough to administer. If the laws on these sorts of events were more normalized, you'd see a lot more of these contests opening up to a wider audience. If you want to join so bad, you could always move ;)

Re:Open to US residents only

[supersnail]

Why not exclude Paris, Geneva, Brussels as well?

Its not like a Francophone could ever win but we dont want them polluting our name spaces with le terrible words franglais et le silly technical terms like ordinator, or, those merde language like Eifel.

Re:Open to US residents only

[codemachine]

Poor Quebec, always excluded from these contests.

BTW, does anyone know the reason why this is? From what I understand it is due to them having a far different legal system than the rest of North America, but I don't really know the specifics.

Re:Open to US residents only

[Anonymous Coward]

Q: Why are so many contests void in Quebec?

A: Certain laws in Quebec are in place to protect the consumer in case the company who runs a contest declares bankruptcy. This protection many times ends up stopping companies from offering their sweeps to consumers because of the paperwork and monies involved. The law states that any contest where a prize is over $100 must be reported to a Quebec agency *AND* a certain percentage of the amount of the prize be paid to that agency.

(see http://www.somewhereincanada.com/contests/resource s/faq1.shtml#4 )

Re:Open to US residents only

[Inigo Montoya]

From cnews.canoe.ca:

"While some companies permit Quebec entrants, many are scared away by unique rules that are mandated by the province's gaming agency.

Quebec is the lone Canadian jurisdiction that requires security deposits, charges fees and enforces strict rules about draws valued at more than $100. Some American states also enforce rules that prevent their residents from participating in contests.

In addition to requiring that all documents be written in French, Quebec's agency charges three per cent of the value of all national prizes, even if a Quebecer doesn't claim a prize, or 10 per cent of the value of a contest run exclusively in the province. The agency collected nearly $1.7 million in fees last year.

In the rest of Canada, large contests are governed only by the federal Competition Act, a broad framework for promotional contests.

"People often exclude Quebec just because they're afraid of these rules and don't really understand them," said Sharon Groom, a Toronto lawyer who represents many advertisers that run contests as a marketing tool.

"They're not actually that bad but a lot of our clients will say we don't want to be bothered with doing this, so they exclude Quebec."

Re:Open to US residents only

[Kjella]

It is not like it is exclusively IBM. There are tons of cool contests I'd like to participate in, but that are US only. Basicly, it is a matter of complying with every silly lottery rule anywhere in the world. If they could let foreigners participate on US terms, I'm sure most would have no problem doing that.

Re:Open to US residents only

[chriseh]

When I originally posted this (yesterday), the web page had the previous contest rules which were open to US residents only. The article was then removed from /. until the linuxonpower.com site was updated. So, now my statement is out of context.

The ironic thing is that I live in Quebec. So, while Linus qualifies (I hadn't realized that he was living in the US, but have since crawled out from under my rock), and I'm very happy that IBM has opened their eyes from the last contest, I still do not qualify.

Re:Open to US residents only

[Doc Ruby]

Do not fear their savior faire - it's everywhere. You're apparently not aware how many of your English words come from French - you don't even use the English adequately in your post.

Re:Open to US residents only

[Doc Ruby]

What if we "normalized" all the laws about money according to the US norms?

Re:Timely?

[artifex2004]

This contest ended. It was 2004. The page linked to lists who won the contest.
Why is this here?

It's from the something-to-post dept.

Wow ..

[TheViffer]

looks like mods woke up in the wrong week/year today. Guess they are a little caught up in there current poll.

virtual pc

[millahtime]

I believe that virtual pc does the job. So, it can be done and has been done. Although, porting of wine with hacks may not be the best way to accomplish the goal.

Re:virtual pc

[mollymoo]

Virtual PC doesn't do quite the same thing. It "just" emulates x86 hardware. Wine in an implementation of (some) Win32 APIs which runs on x86 *nixen. With VirtualPC you need a copy of Windows, with Wine you don't.

You need the x86 emulation layer to run Windows executables. Adding hooks for x86 executables running under an emulator to use native PPC implementations of the Wine libs sounds like a distinctly hairy exercise to me, but it would provide the best performance.

With all these dual-core chips coming up, I wonder if IBM would be cheeky enough to stick a little x86 core in the package along with a couple of POWER cores. They have an x86 core design already, even if it is a bit old (the Cyrix 6x86).

Global, not globalist

[Anonymous Coward]

Americans should be global in outlook, not globalist in outreach. It's nice to have fence sometimes.

And, uh, ... Linus is "located" in the United States.

no no no, June 2005

[acomj]

Read the article. Entries due by June 2005.. Registration Now..

Who is moding around here...???

Re:no no no, June 2005

[Coryoth]

This article appeared in the Apple section early today, then vanished. It has now reappeared in the developers section with most of the old comments (and moderation) still attached.

Why does this matter? Because the first incarnation of the article linked to the previous Linux on POWER contest which closed in 2004 and was simply announcing winners. Presumably the Slashdot editors noticed (who would have thought), pulled it, corrected it, and reposted it. Unfortunately all the comments bitching about it that got (reasonably enough at the time) modded up are also still attached.

Ah well, this is Slashdot after all.

Jedidiah.

Re:no no no, June 2005

[gl4ss]

however, they changed the link before taking it down I think.

because damn, through slashdot(through the old article) I was on the site with the 2005 dates.

was amusing that I had a comment on a story I couldn't view.

Re:Timely?

[Tarcastil]

From the article text:
"Registration begins on March 15, 2005!
Entries are due by July 15, 2005!"

Re:Too bad apple can't run latest version of Java

[Shag]

Odd, all my Apples claim to be running 1.4.2.

Mind, I have no idea what the latest version is - 1.4.3? 1.5? 2.0? 5.5? (Well, I wouldn't it past Sun, given Solaris numbers...)

It's been done

[dilby]

Port wine

thinking of joining?

[Neo-Rio-101]

So in order to join the contest I have to pony up some money for a POWER system... ...aye, there's the rub me laddie.

Re:thinking of joining?

[Anonymous Coward]

http://www.linuxonpower.com/faq.php

Straight out of the FAQ:

What if I don't have access to a LinuxPPC64 machine to do a port?

There are community-based LinuxPPC64 machines available.
The University of Portland School of Engineering. Please see: http://www.egr.up.edu to register for an account
The University of Augsburg (Germany). Please see: http://tuxppc.rz.uni-augsburg.de to register for an account.
Apple Power Mac G5s are based on an IBM processor and work fine for porting activities as do many of the newer G4-based systems.

Re:Too bad apple can't run latest version of Java

[michaeldot]

So you win a computer you can't use to develop java with..

Not true, since the winners won't be announced until well after Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger ships in April about 4 weeks from now (if the Think Secret rumors are true, which they're pretty much guaranteed to be, given they have Trade Secrets at their fingertips).

And since Java 1.5/5.0 JDK code is hardly in fullscale deployment yet, if you're using it it's probably for research purposes and for a developer on PPC64 the chances are highly likely you've been using OS X Tiger in pre-release since last year anyway.

So, yes, it could be annoying, but if you're actually a developer, it's not much of an issue and for the wider community it will be rectified very soon with OS X Tiger's release.

give us cheap Linux-based PPC machines

[idlake]

I would be much more inclined to use PPC machines if there were cheap PPC-based machines. And, no, Apple's OSX machines don't count: they have proprietary devices that Apple doesn't release the necessary specs for, Apple will count everybody who buys such a machine as a Macintosh sale (thereby inflating their sales numbers and hurting Linux in market share comparisons), and I don't want to pay an "Apple tax" on PPC machines any more than I want to pay a "Microsoft tax" on PCs.

So, give us the cheap, open PPC-based desktop and server machines, something with better price/performance ratios than x86-based machines, and then we can talk.

Re:give us cheap Linux-based PPC machines

[ltbarcly]

Slow down there. How is there an Apple tax? Let's analyze this.

Apple closely bundles hardware and software => Apple has fantastic quality and loyal customers => Apples sells a bunch of hardware => Apple's PPC hardware is the cheapest available

So the fact you have to get OSX with an Apple is what you're complaining about, since you think you are getting charged more for it somehow.

So this "apple tax" you speak of must be negative, since it directly causes the hardware to be the cheapest available. Or are taking the untenable position that something can be wronged by the conditions which caused it to exist?

Not the sort of tax I would complain about. I mean, feel free to assemble a PPC based computer from non-apple components though, if you have a couple of grand to spare.

Perhaps Apple will someday take people like you into consideration, and let you buy a computer without OSX without the "Apple Tax" (significant markup).

The really sad thing is that you're not much of an outside the box thinker for such a gung ho linux maniac. Here's a hint, buy a second hand mac and nobody will ever know except you and ebay. (Maybe Linus will sell you his G5)

Re:give us cheap Linux-based PPC machines

[JudasBlue]

Actually, the grandparent was complaining about the tied hardware with insufficent released specs. Which isn't likely to change, unfortnuately, since Apple has been doing this pretty much as long as they have existed.

Though I don't pretend to understand what Apple thinks they are gaining by holding back things like full specs on the airport extreme card in my notebook which would allow better development from the open source community with no downside I can see for Apple. But such is the way of the fruit. And I like my little notebook enough, but this is one of the annoyances of going with the Apple platform.

And if someone can tell me why the airport network interface is only brought up AFTER someone logs into the machine, thus making NIS authentication over the wireless card a moot point, I would like to know that, as well. Ah, but that is wandering far off topic.

Re:give us cheap Linux-based PPC machines

[Anonymous Coward]

The Pegasos board runs Linux/ppc and MorphOS (an Amiga-like OS it seems) and others, although they don't seem to provide ppc970/G5s just yet. My bet it they would sell pretty well though..

http://www.pegasosppc.com/

Re:give us cheap Linux-based PPC machines

[MarcQuadra]

BTW, just had the same issue with wireless coming up after login. It totally screwed my plans for wireless AD integration. The workaround is to 'join a specific network' and dial in your SSID in the prefs>network>airport control panel.

This seems to me like it's actually good security. You wouldn't want to be sending out authentication requests over an untrusted network, right?

Re:give us cheap Linux-based PPC machines

[Anonymous Coward]

"Though I don't pretend to understand what Apple thinks they are gaining by holding back things like full specs on the airport extreme card in my notebook which would allow better development from the open source community with no downside I can see for Apple."

Ok...I'll bite. What's to stop a third party hardware developer from taking these released specs and making Airport card knock-offs? Apple would lose money if they allowed this to happen, not to mention the Mac experience of trouble free hardware/software would be lessened with cheap (read: CRAP) hardware infiltrating the market. As a stockholder, I want Apple to make money. Nuff said.

Re:give us cheap Linux-based PPC machines

[idlake]

Apple's PPC hardware is the cheapest available

Yes, Apple's PPC hardware is some of the cheapest PPC hardware available, which is a problem for the PPC chip because Apple's PPC machines are not particularly good deals as far as desktop machines go.

The really sad thing is that you're not much of an outside the box thinker for such a gung ho linux maniac. Here's a hint, buy a second hand mac and nobody will ever know except you and ebay.

I don't need to buy a second-hand Mac, I own a bunch of first-hand Macs (mostly for porting and out of curiosity), in addition to lots of PCs and some workstations, so I can make first-hand comparisons of both the hardware, the performance, and the software.

And my experience is that the Macintosh hardware is more expensive than x86 hardware of comparable quality and performance. That isn't particularly surprising: Apple uses the same contract manufacturers that make PCs, but their volumes are smaller and they have to pay their software developers something.

As I was saying: until we get PPC hardware that is actually cost-competitive with x86 hardware of comparable quality and performance, Linux on PPC just won't catch on. And that isn't even taking into account the fact that the PPC processor doesn't run a lot of software (hence the porting contest).

Re:give us cheap Linux-based PPC machines

[Zeos386sx-16]

Well, Don't think I'd personally call these cheap. But, they are reletivly cheaper than the alternatives. http://www-1.ibm.com/servers/eserver/openpower/har dware/720.html A business might call them cheap. The price/performance is there in any event.

Re:give us cheap Linux-based PPC machines

[Johnny Mnemonic]

Though I don't pretend to understand what Apple thinks they are gaining by holding back things like full specs on the airport extreme card in my notebook

They probably aren't allowed to do so by their agreement with Broadcom, the chip's manufacturer. I think you'll find that Broadcom hasn't released open information on any of their products, so their refusal to allow Apple to do so is in keeping with that position.

So the question becomes: why doesn't Broadcom release info to allow Linux users to use their gear? Who knows. Or, why does Apple choose a manufacturer that refuses to play with OSS? That's probably due to a) historical reasons--the stuff is working now, so it's have to be re-engineered using a different source, and b) there's not enough interest for Linux-on-Apple to warrant the change.

But the bottomline is that if Broadcom released their info, Apple would be more likely to follow their lead.

Re:give us cheap Linux-based PPC machines

[glitch0]

The Airport specs aren't being withheld by Apple, it's a Broadcom chipset which is proprietary.
There's a petition for Broadcom to release opensource drivers on PetitionOnline.com.

Re:give us cheap Linux-based PPC machines

[sapbasisnerd]

This one:

http://www-1.ibm.com/servers/eserver/openpower/har dware/710_browse.html

Is cheaper for the entry config which is significantly beefier than the entry 720. Also keep in mind that there are even cheaper configs possible if you buy through a human salesperson at IBM or a dealer. Supposed entry price for these machines (I haven't seen the details but I assume it's like the entry 720, (only 512MB RAM, 1.5Ghz CPU and smaller disks) is US$3,000.

Re:give us cheap Linux-based PPC machines

[pammon]

So why not buy a Mac with Linux pre-installed?

Re:give us cheap Linux-based PPC machines

[JudasBlue]

Hmmm. And that brings up the network interface on boot if that network is available so I can do NIS for login? I could have sworn I tried that, but I will definitely try it again next time I am in the office.

Thanks

Re:give us cheap Linux-based PPC machines

[idlake]

Because they are still more expensive than comparable x86 hardware.

Linux on PPC is not a good deal right now for anything other than to breathe some life into old Macintosh hardware that is too slow to run current Macintosh software.

Re:Too bad apple can't run latest version of Java

[michaeldot]

On second thoughts I fell into your (flamebait?) trap of discussing Mac OS X, which is actually not relevant here.

The contest is about Linux PPC64 development.

Linus himself uses an Apple G5. Linux has Java 1.5. So your claim of "so you win a computer you can't use to develop java with.." is flat out wrong. End of story.

I Am An Engineer At University of Portland

[goMac2500]

It was odd, they didn't mention this to us. Anyway, we have access to an IBM Power5 cluster. Maybe I should enter this.

Re:I Am An Engineer At University of Portland

[goMac2500]

Sorry, a post higher up noted that IBM was recommending people go through University of Portland for access to a Power based development lab. If I were less tired I would have replied to the post noting that. :)

Porting WASTE?

[koko775]

Interesting how IBM's implicitly endorsing WASTE. Foolish AOL. Foolish, Foolish AOL.

Re:Porting WASTE?

[sH4RD]

Heh.

no need to see it early...

[Anonymous Coward]

I saw this headline on the RSS feed earlier but was unable to read the article without subscription. Atleast now i know i don't need a slashdot subscription ;)

Slashdot got stoned with this one.

[tibor9000]

What's up with this whole apple power linux crap? Did you guys just smoke crack all day?

a segway?

[megabeck42]

So, wait, if I win tier 1, can I elect the tier 2 prize? Who wants a segway anyways? I think a better incentive would have been Apple Cinema displays..

Prizes

[Lord Kano]

I'd rather win 2nd tier than first.
I'm not even a Mac user anymore, but I'd prefer a shiny new Mac G5 to a Segway any day.

LK

Meta: Apple? IBM? Developers?

[Lars T.]

In case somebody wonders about the Apple comments: this appeared in the Apple section yesterday (with an Apple G4 icon IIRC), but was moved to developers.slashdot.org. Which clears up another confusion: this is not a dupe.

Re:Meta: Apple? IBM? Developers?

[downbad]

It's not?

Re:Meta: Apple? IBM? Developers?

[Lars T.]

Yes, it's not. That was the 2004 contest, this is the 2005 contest. Which you can easily tell by the prices to be won.

Whole new meaning to 'IBM Compatable'

[Associate]

Remember when IBM Clone or Compatable meant something running DOS or Windows on and Intel chip? What irony.

Re:Too bad apple can't run latest version of Java

[mollymoo]

You can't develop Java with a Mac? Erm, you can't test for >1.4 (till Tiger, which is coming Real Soon Now), that's true. However, if your app is for distribution and you only develop for the very latest version of a platform, a version which has only been out for 6 months, you're insane.

Coding for the lowest common denominator may mean you miss out on the latest cool toys, but it's a fact of life if you distribute your apps beyond your own organisation and want to reach the widest range of potential users.

Anyway, it's Mac OS X that is currently at 1.4, not the hardware. This is a Linux for POWER hacking contest so I'm guessing the winners may in fact run Linux on their Apple hardware, just like Linus.

What is the award for?

[Nuffsaid]

The contest is designed to award and showcase innovative new open source applications that are designed or optimized specifically for Linux running on the PPC architecture

I don't get it. Are they rewarding the project that comes up with the poorest code portability? I always thought that one of the strongest points of Open Source Software is portability across platforms (OS and CPU architectures). Does IBM (in the role of a strong platform vendor) publicly promote going in the opposite direction? It is understandable from their point of view, but not a big help for OSS development, in my opinion.

Re:What is the award for?

[Amiga Trombone]

I don't get it. Are they rewarding the project that comes up with the poorest code portability? I always thought that one of the strongest points of Open Source Software is portability across platforms (OS and CPU architectures). Does IBM (in the role of a strong platform vendor) publicly promote going in the opposite direction?

I'd expect that since most code developed on x86 can be ported to PPC, the opposite is probably true as well.

But that's the problem - most Linux PPC Linux apps are ports of x86 apps.

The object here, I think, is to promote PPC as a primary platform for Linux development, rather than a platform applications are ported to as an afterthought.

Re:What is the award for?

[Johnny Mnemonic]

The object here, I think, is to promote PPC as a primary platform for Linux development

And to illustrate the advantages of the PPC arch, maybe including AltiVec, through optimization. While you can develop anything for the PPC, I would guess the winning entries would make good use of the benefits of the PPC arch vs. the Intel/AMD archs.

Some things do better on PPC, some things don't, and IBM is likely looking for good examples of the former.

I don't want tier 1 prize!

[kompiluj]

1st Tier Prize: 5 - Segway® Human Transporter
2nd Tier Prize: 50 - Apple Mac G5's
3rd Tier Prize: 50 - $1,000 cash prizes

Well, I think that 2nd tier prize is better than 1st tier, but that's just /me.

Re:I don't want tier 1 prize!

[m50d]

And the 3rd prize is clearly better than the second. Especially since I can't see what it is that belonged to the G5 that we'll be getting.

That's not the purpose.

[Cryptnotic]

The purpose is to use winelib to easily recompile applications designed for WIN32 to a Unix-like environment. WINE (IIRC) implements its own widgets, since native widgets don't behave appropriately for the emulation.

Re:That's not the purpose.

[QuantumG]

Yeah, that's painful. Oh well.

With that new Mac

[Anonymous Coward]

Linus must be gearing to win it. :)

Finally...

[cwj123]

Finally, I can be just like Linus and run Linux on a free PPC!

what up? story yanked on Monday, reposted Tuesday

[Anonymous Coward]

Was this story? It got yanked around noon
on Monday and then reposted at 2:00AM on tuesday?

Notice the response submission times on this thing.

To win

[Ilgaz]

Make sound working on G5. Its the funniest thing ever. If you try linux without reading readme/feedback stuff, you will see first time on history, Apple lost its sound.

disapear/reapearing story..

[acomj]

This is like the ghost slashdot story. GOes away for a day then comes back.... Odd..

point taken- but your missing the irony..

[acomj]

Does ppc linux have java 1.5? Point taken, I bet those prize machines have osx on them though..

I'm not trying to flame, just pointing out the irony of the prizes. I find it funny. Its like a linux programming contest giving away MS visual studio!

Re:point taken- but your missing the irony..

[Johnny Mnemonic]

I bet those prize machines have osx on them though..

Yeah, they probably do. But so what? It's not like PPC Linux is hard to get. And ydl lists the applications that come with their OS, so you can look for Java 1.5, or whatever else your heart desires, there.

But your point remains: it's pretty ironic. I believe it underscores the Apple-IBM relationship, and IBM's interest in moving away from the WinTel desktop computing space.

Re:point taken- but your missing the irony..

[Anonymous Coward]

I bet those prize machines have osx on them though..

You don't have to bet - you can RTFA and find out. It says they're set up to dual-boot OSX and Linux/PPC.

Clear As Mud

[blooba]

The overabundance of new software patent stories on /. shows me that many people are not seeing the big picture. The only thing that all of these worthless patents achieve is to confuse the legal ownership of software concepts to the point at which eventually not even the smartest judge can figure out who owns how much of which idea. Soon no software patent will be defensible in court. This is not necessarily a good thing for us legitimate software developers. But it is a far cry from actually stifling any creativity.

Then again, perhaps I should RTFA. But I'm just so sick of all these software patent rant articles spamming /.

Super Informative

[phorm]

As a Canadian, I have for a very long time wondered why so many contests stated "Entries valid from anywhere in Canada excluding the province of Quebec" etc

I thought perhaps this had to do a lot with all the weird scams that tend to come from there (every summer it seems we get a "scratch and win" where the "winners" call and get put on-hold with an expensive 900 number in Quebec), but I suppose that's a seperate issue.

Here's the details on the Mac

[browncs]

from the Rules on the website:

"The first developers to successfully submit an application port from the Tier 2 Application List (50) will be awarded a dual-boot (MacOS/X and Linux) Apple Power Mac G5 2.0GHz Part number is M9455LL/A. Approximate Retail Value: $2,500 USD as of March 15th, 2005."

IBM OpenPower Linux server line

[browncs]

The correct URL for the OpenPower line is:

http://www-1.ibm.com/servers/eserver/openpower/

Click Here

Re:IBM OpenPower Linux server line

[sapbasisnerd]

I know not how my post became so botched, thank you for the correction...

Welcoming me to Slashdot

[David Rolfe]

Welcome to Slashdot, User 38... Oh.

Hey, thanks for the welcome Seehund. Welcome to Slashdot to you too, User 86... Oh, you've been here for years, too.

(Ok, no more uid posts for a couple months, I swear.)

Re:Welcoming me to Slashdot

[Anonymous Coward]

How DO you people do it? Do you have bots scanning every Slashdot comment for mentions of low uids, or is there some kind of notification built into Slashcode itself?

Re:Welcoming me to Slashdot

[scheme]

How DO you people do it? Do you have bots scanning every Slashdot comment for mentions of low uids, or is there some kind of notification built into Slashcode itself?

Actually yes, any comment that mentions uid is sent to 100 randomly selected users with 5 digit uids or lower.

Re:Welcoming me to Slashdot

[Anonymous Coward]

The sad thing is you are still on Slashdot often enough to notice someone mention "User 38..."

Re:Welcoming me to Slashdot

[w9ofa]

You are right, AC.

Everyone with a low UID should be dead or old and feeble by now.

Re:Welcoming me to Slashdot

[David Rolfe]

Because only ACs live forever!

In other news...

[suitepotato]

...a band of BSD zealots attempted to one up the Linux crowd by porting it to the Apple IIgs. Not to be outdone, Red Hat announced it was officially supporting Linux on the Commodore 64. Meanwhile, Microsoft announced it was dropping support for anything but Intel and compatible chipsets running at 2.5 terrahertz or better and making the minimum memory for the newest version of Windows 4096 gigabytes.

Beast IPC: SimultaneousMultiTaskings?

[Anonymous Coward]

Our future is 3 in 1: SMT + SMP + VMX.

1. SMT (Simultaneous Multi Taskings):
href="http://www-1.ibm.com/servers/eserver/iseries /perfmgmt/pdf/SMT.pdf
http://www.cs.washington.edu/research/smt/

2. SMP (Symmetric Multi Processing) (many cores & CPUs)

3. VMX (Virtualization MaXhine) (many logical machine's clones)

1. Will does Linux64 support SMT, SMP and VMX? and enhanced NPTL?
2. Will does PS3 (with their CELLs & APUs) support SMT, SMP and VMX?
3. Will does AMD64 support SMT, SMP and VMX? (SMT+Toledo+Pacifica+Turion+...)

open4free © : I'm Dr. Throughput. Take a good note for our future!!!

No freaking way.

[WisconsinFusion]

After scoping out the competition, I think I'll sit this one out.

afford?

[Anonymous Coward]

If I could afford to buy a PPC 64 box I wouldn't need to acquire my gadgets by winning lame contests...

Broadcom hasn't released open information

[bani]

Broadcom hasn't released open information on any of their products.

not true. not only have they released information on their gigabit ethernet chips, they also contributed drivers to the kernel.

their wireless stuff is another story, iirc broadcom is under NDA due to some of the technology and core logic they licensed from others.

Re:Too bad apple can't run latest version of Java

[Anonymous Coward]

latest is Java 1.5 aka 'Java 5' (a la Solaris naming convention 8-| ) http://java.sun.com/
is the home of the beast

Re:a segway? Whats Woz got to do with this?

[Anonymous Coward]

The prises are interesting in themselves. IBM, Apple, Segway, am i the only one thinking The Woz (aka the other Steve) is a fairly Notable man in middle of this. Hey just curious did The Woz sign a non-compete when he moved away from Apple, if so might there be a new machine on the cards.