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Bob Metcalfe on Open Source, IPv6, IETF
prostoalex writes "The inventor of Ethernet Bob Metcalfe is interviewed by AlwaysOn on current issues. Metcalfe is known for challenging commonly accepted wisdom and this time he's quite confrontational. On open source and operating systems: "If you look at Windows and Linux, both are based on 25-year-old technology. Windows is sort of a GUI version of the Mac's operating system, and Linux is of course Unix, which stems from 1968. These are both old clunkers. So the question is, Where are the new operating systems likely to come from?" On IPv6 adoption and IETF: "Back when you attended the IETF, you all looked down your noses at the ITU (or I guess it was called CCITT at the time)--the entrenched, corporately manipulated, corrupt, competent standards being embodied in IT. We were the IETF--the swashbuckling, institution-oriented, open people, the rebels. That's changed now. The Internet has arrived, and all of those people are now just like ITU: IETF has become the ITU.""
There's no doubt that Mr. Metcalfe is quite bright and has contibuted greatly to the IT world, but I don't understand this rant. If he doesn't see the innovation, I guess he's never compared Slackware '96 to today's distros, or Windows 3.1 to WinXP. Apple certainly can't be ignored here either. Where are the new operating systems likely to come from? I'm going to take a wild guess, and say "probably from the OS's of today." They don't need to be completely rewritten every few years to count as progress. Even the emergence of UNIX itself was evolutionary, not revolutionary.
It's also interesting that he clearly shows a lack of faith in the OSS community, but then digs at the IETF for evolving into elitist and monolithic organization.
Entrepreneur : (noun), French for "unemployed"
Windows is sort of a GUI version of the Mac's operating system, and Linux is of course Unix, which stems from 1968. These are both old clunkers. So the question is, Where are the new operating systems likely to come from?
.NET, and Mono are examples of the market attempting to find a way to combine modern technology with the tech of yesterday. Unfortunately, the results are less than stellar. For example, instead of aligning Virtual Memory along object bounds (a natural fit that could be done without hardware support), these systems must contend with the existing 4K VM implementations. Instead of running the protected code in a flat heap (which CAN'T break the memory model!) these systems must contend with the memory indirection that operating systems throw their way. The results of this poor matchup between machine and software is a performance penalty, both real and perceived.
I hate to break it to Mr. Metcalfe, but most entities lack the resources to do a ground up rewrite of a fully featured Operating System. Simply writing a functional OS isn't the hard part. It's just a platform upon which software will be built. There were hundreds of OSes written between 1960 and 1990. During the '90s, however, computing platforms began to stabalize. Software was written that had a greater than 5 year life span, Operating System began to stabalize on a few "standards" (namely Unix/Vax/CPM derivitives), and massive amounts of time and money were invested into developing these platforms. Now we're standing on the 10,000 ft high towers we call Windows, Linux, and Mac OS X(NextSTEP) and we're looking at how difficult it is to replicate the decades of work that has gone into these systems.
Building a more powerful and "correct" system would mean throwing away software such as OpenOffice, Mozilla, Quickbooks, Photoshop, Acrobat, etc. Software that took decades to build! Thus any future solution based on cutting edge CompSci Technology must either bite the bullet and rewrite these complex apps (good luck) or build in a translation layer that allows them to continue working. Neither choice is very appealing.
The "third road" that is currently being explored is the road of running Virtual Machines on top of today's existing infrastructure. Java,
The Virtual Memory swaps more than it should. Object files are not shared. Memory usage is 20% greater than a native program. So on and so forth.
A lot of research has gone into mitigating these issues (with Sun producing some very impressive results!), but it doesn't change the fact that the machine and software are mismatched. That mismatch discourages companies from writing new applications in these managed environments, where they would be free from the bonds of traditional OS designs.
My gut says that a rather major shift in how we use our computer will have to happen before we can truely replace the systems we have today.
I'd like to point out that two major pieces of infrastructure were left out of the Internet when it was being built--largely because it was built by graduate students (and people like graduate students). They left out security and economics. So we have the spam problem (which can be traced directly to the lack of concern for security), and we have IP rules that are in flux because the Internet doesn't have the right tools for monetizing various activities. So we're busily trying to put security and economics into the Internet.
In all honesty, the Internet never would have been as successful as it was if it wasn't for the freedom it provided. Many other networks offered these features, but they were eventually usurped by the Internet.
Hindsight is 20/20. Had the BSD/ARPANET folks attempted to address these issues back when it was created (which would have been ludicrous given its Military intent), their solutions would have likely been wrong. Keep It Simple Stupid. It may not be the best solution, but it's the most effective solution.
P.S. In case of Slashdotting, break glass
Javascript + Nintendo DSi = DSiCade
Where are the new operating systems likely to come from?
They aren't going to come until we get past "old" technology like monitors, keyboards, and mice.
Actually this is bs. The majority of us OSS folk are writing ***PORTABLE*** tools that work anywhere. This is why you see firefox on mac, win32, bsd, linux, beos, etc...
... and so on ...
This is why you see GCC on mac, win32, bsd, linux, beos, qnx, etc...
This is
Only lame arrogant windows developers think that "linux using folk only write for linux".
Heck some of the places my software has and is being used doesn't even have a proper OS [e.g. PS2 and Gamecube].
On topic again, as the "inventor of ethernet"? What the fuck does that mean? It's not that impressive. I mean it's useful but so is sliced bread and we don't honour that guys name either! He did his part to make the world better. Groovy. Now step aside and stop milking something you did nearly a decade BEFORE I WAS BORN.
Tom
Someday, I'll have a real sig.
"Windows is sort of a GUI version of the Mac's operating system"
As opposed to the non-gui version of Mac's operating system....
"We are all geniuses when we dream"
- E.M. Cioran
You invented ethernet. Even before that, you were THERE, and helped operate, the first big ARPANet demo for Congress. You founded 3Com. You wrote more Inforworld columns than a mere human like me could read. You are the Old Master, Yoda in the swamp.
Don't spoil it now by being Dvorak. Please.
Linux is only Unix on the outside. There's scarcely little code on the inside from 1992. And I believe there is none (zero, nada) from before 1975. I know this because I've looked at the early UNIX code at http://tuhs.org/ and what little survives is not found in Linux.
Windows a copy of the Mac? In the sense that English is a copy of French, maybe [flames >/dev/null]. Some elements are the same, but how you do things with them is quite different.
Asking what the new OS will be is asking the wrong question. Ask instead what new class of devices will need an OS, and the answer would follow from that. I say "would" because I'm not sure even that question is relevant.
sigs, as if you care.
The open source community has some pipe dream that when you can't make money from software, you will contribute your software for free. What actually happens is people stop writing software so they can do something that makes money.
That's such a load of bullshit. I take the free enterprise stack. I sell clients on my ability to develop software that will fix their problems using the free enterprise stack as a base. I discover that the free enterprise stack doesn't have some feature I could really use to more effectively service these clients. So I write the new feature. And I deliver a solution to them that works. Now I've got this new feature in the stack, I can't really sell it to anyone on its own, and if I don't roll it back into the main trunk, I'll have to maintain it if I ever wish to use it again. So I give it back to the community because it's in my best interest to do so. This is how the software gets contributed for free. One itch at a time. And you can spout off all your rhetoric about the "open source pipe dream", but that's all it is, spouting off. It exists, it progresses, it takes market share from the most powerful company on earth, and it appears to be gaining momentum. The existance of the thriving community is PROOF that you are wrong.
-1 Uncomfortable Truth