Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Tux Enlisted for U.S. Defense Program

Posted by samzenpus on from the free-as-in-bombs dept.

An anonymous reader writes "Linux is a key part of the Army's massive $200B FCS (Future Computing System) initiative, it seems. RTOS vendor LynuxWorks was chosen to provide the OS for 18 weapons platforms under development, because its LynxOS-178 real-time OS can run Linux binaries -- including the "common operating environment" that Boeing is developing for FCS."

5 of 312 comments (clear)

  1. ARPA-NET by Anonymous+Luddite · · Score: 4, Insightful

    You're shooting for the Funny mod, but think about it.

    - The precursor to the web we're both using right now was pentagon (ARPA) funded.

    --
    http://request-header.info
    1. Re:ARPA-NET by damiam · · Score: 4, Insightful
      Guns don't kill people, either, bullets do. Right? No, the gun contributes to the death by shooting the bullet. Likewise, all military projects, whether they are weapons systems or communications systems, are intended to further military goals, which basically involve killing people. What level the involvement is at is irrelevent, if you want to be idealistic and take a complete no-war stance.

      Or, you could be sane, and realize that the military is going to kill people no matter what, and it might as well use safe, reliable, accurate, well-built systems to ensure that it kills the right people and no more people than necessary. In that sense, Linux is a good thing.

      --
      It's hard to be religious when certain people are never incinerated by bolts of lightning.
    2. Re:ARPA-NET by jonadab · · Score: 4, Insightful

      > to further military goals, which basically involve killing people.

      You've greatly misunderstood the military. Killing people is seldom if ever a military goal. Almost always the goal is to force people to accept certain terms. Killing people is often employed as a way of furthering that goal, but it is not itself the goal.

      --
      Cut that out, or I will ship you to Norilsk in a box.
  2. GNU by MSG · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Since Linux isn't actually involved in this project in any way, shouldn't the summary state that GNU is a key part of the FCS initiative?

    Tux is actually sitting this one out.

  3. Re:is linux guilty of murder now? by LWATCDR · · Score: 5, Insightful

    No more so than cars, truck, aluminum, steel, or coffee is. All of which is used by the military around the world, for good or evil.

    --
    See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.