Torvalds Unveils New Linux Control System

BlakeCaldwell writes "CNet reports: 'Linux founder and leader Linus Torvalds has launched a new tool, called Git, to manage his software project, after a dispute led him to drop the previous system.' He will start using Git instead of BitKeeper to control the flow of updates and track changes in the kernel." We've covered this previously. Relatedly, ChocLinux writes "Jeremy Allison, who wrote Samba with Andrew 'Tridge' Tridgell, is sticking up for his friend in the row over BitKeeper. "

Comments

Git?

[YrWrstNtmr]

Isn't that a bit of a disparaging name in English as it is spoken in the Olde Country?

As in "You daft git!"

wow, that has some rough edges alright

[iggymanz]

maybe the kernel programmers should take 2 weeks and fix the basic flaws of git, like the business of not storing deltas to files

Re:wow, that has some rough edges alright

[PeterBrett]

..like the business of not storing deltas to files

Actually, that's a feature. One of Linus' main objections to existing SCMs was that they're too slow -- and most of that sluggishness comes from the time necessary to calculate and resolve deltas in the ubiquitous RCS files.

As far as I can tell, it's actually working pretty well so far.

Obligatory

[mcrbids]

Now, expect a thundering herd of comments like:

Great! Now, Linus can be helping to build OSS counterparts to commercial software that can be truly trusted, rather than rely on the whims of a commercial vendor.

and

This is just another example of where OSS software is MORE RELIABLE than their commercial counterparts.

The thing is, they'd be right.

The only thing is to remember: The terms of Linus' use of BK was noncommercial which is poison to a commercial entity. The combination of closed-source + no charge == noncommercial. If it was OSS, with a GPL-like license, at least the OSS community could give something back to BK that wasn't money, but it wasn't, and BK had no opportunity to profit in ANY WAY from this move.

I'm not surprised this didn't work out well.

Eh?

[Aldric]

Although Torvalds is revered by many within the open source community as the founder of Linux, he also has detractors among the free software movement. There is even a conspiracy theory on news site Slashdot that the anti-Torvalds rhetoric may have the underlying aim of persuading the open source community to switch to Hurd -- an alternative to the Linux kernel that is being developed by the Free Software Foundation.

Did I miss something? I saw some comments to that effect in the stories, mostly as a joke except for the usual random nutcases that see conspiracies in everything that happens. Terrible journalism from zdnet here.

The rest of the article wasn't any better, being the most heavily biased piece of crap I've read since the last TCO study by Microsoft. Linus and Tridge both have valid points but the article paints Tridge as a villain breaking BitKeeper copyright (which he didn't) and terms of service (which he didn't agree to).

Doubled file size!?

[Anonymous Coward]

From TFA:

Among the differences: Git can't rename a file; users must instead delete one and recreate it elsewhere with the new name, McVoy said. And it doesn't handle space efficiently; a tiny one-character change to a 1MB file in Git will result in a 2MB file, whereas BitKeeper's file will grow only by one byte.

Does anyone know why diff wasn't used here? 1 byte difference (BitKeeper) is excellent, a 100 bytes (diff) is alright, but doubling the file size (Git) seems really insane to the untrained eye..

Erm, name change...

[Xarius]

There is a package manager, make-based one at that, out there called git. Site in german, package in English.

It's a good tool, which basically monitors source-built programs and creates an uninstallation script for them.

Won't this mean Linus' new tool will have to have a name change?

Based on the screenshot of the visualization...

[Svartalf]

I'd say that they are. In fact, several SCM tools are looking at what Linus has been doing with git and are giving the stuff due consideration (ARCH is going to pull all the "good" ideas coming from this- I think several other SCM projects are going to do the same...).

Yeah, I think Larry just stepped in a hornet's nest here- my only complaint about the whole thing is Linus' going on and on about bad ideas, etc. The only bad idea that was going on was his use of BitKeeper in the first place.

Re:Based on Monotone it seems

[Bombcar]

Heh. A quote:

And rsync takes care of the network replication.

So git, which had to be written because of something Tridge did, uses one of Tridge's programs. Whee!

Re:Tridge Speaks

[wct]

He has only claimed to not use the bitkeeper client. There is no EULA governing his use of the publicly facing server. The argument has been that if he used the bitkeeper client to reverse engineer the protocol, he was breaking the terms of using the client. Clearly he wasn't.

Whether it is an abuse of Bitkeeper's servers to try and interact with them without permission is another debate altogether. Does putting a server on the internet with no access restriction mechanism qualify you for legal protection against access?

Re:So is most of the world.

[slashdot_commentator]

I'm sorry, Linus' actions are just plain hypocritical here. I can understand how he was pissed at losing a useful tool. I can't understand how he can promote McVoy at the expense of our freedoms, especially to reverse Engineer.

How is Linus being a hypocrite? He does not introduce himself as an official F/OSS spokesman. He never said proprietary software was intolerable that it never should be used in any circumstance.

I can't understand how he can promote McVoy at the expense of our freedoms, especially to reverse Engineer.

Because you're a Stalinist Communist. You are too mentally limited to listen to other points of view. Linus never attacked Tridgell's right to reverse-engineer. Torvalds attacked Tridgell's unilateral decision to scuttle the agreement he had with McVoy. I have the right to own a firearm (in the US). It doesn't mean I would be justified to conduct target practice at a shopping mall or woods near a highway. You are so concerned about your rights, you think nothing of abrogating Torvald's right to choose what software he wishes to use. Much like a Communist would.

He is NOT indespensible, thanks to the GPL.

Then fork, you loud-mouthed Communist.

With all due respect to him, I think it's one of his biggest blunders in the history of Linux.

Nope, I think his biggest blunder was prematurely releasing 2.4 before he had a stable memory manager. I think it really illustrated the amateur nature or limitations of Linux kernel development philosophy. And I'm not thrilled about many minor decisions he has made. But I equate Torvalds to Democracy. And I'll take him before you anytime, Communista.

It's a shame...

[[Xorian]]

...Linus didn't discover Vesta before he started implementing git. The core of the two are very similar.

• Linus said "git is not an SCM. it's a filesystem designed to host an SCM". The Vesta repository is a filesystem. It has a versioning system (and a builder) built on top of it.
• git's backing store is indexed by a hash of the file contents, just like Vesta's.
• git stores complete copies of files, but only one copy of each file, just like Vesta.

Of course there are some important differences. Like the fact that Vesta's been around for over a decade, and has been in production use for microprocessor design at Compaq and Intel for over 6 years.