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Leo Laporte On UNIX As the Future
TractorJector writes "In a well-written interview with Mad Penguin, techmeister Leo Laporte (formerly of G4/TechTV fame) discusses his vision of the future of proprietary and open platforms: 'I think there's a lot of hope for Linux, although I don't think that Linux is the answer. I think that UNIX is the answer, in some form or fashion. It might be BSD, it might be Linux, it might be some third thing. But UNIX is such a well understood and smart to handle the issues that an operating system has to handle that it ultimately will prevail.'"
Unix is very flexible, and it certainly outlive Windows. However, its development will only take it through the near future. In the long term, the very idea of unmanaged code will disappear. As will the traditional concept of the Desktop.
:-)
My predictions are:
1. Desktops will be replaced with Browser simulations of a Desktop that can work anytime, anywhere.
2. The traditional PC will then be replaced by a home server through which all activity will happen.
3. Components for Music, Television, Desktop, and Video Game consoles will (in many cases wirelessly) interact with this server.
4. The server itself will run an OS based on a managed code environment, making remote attacks difficult if not impossible. (Many Unix concepts would probably be reused in this system, but it won't *be* Unix.)
That's my thoughts anyway. Sometime in the near future, I'll get them blogged down in detail.
Javascript + Nintendo DSi = DSiCade
MacOS X and operating systems that can marry the power of a good command line with the ease of an excellent GUI shall inherit the earth. I'm interested in how the new windows command line stacks up.
"In a well-written interview with Mad Penguin..."
;-)
"'But UNIX is such a well understood and smart to handle the issues that an operating system has to handle that it ultimately will prevail.'"
Yep, seems pretty well-written to me
OS X winning would be a huge step back for humanity. Mach is terrible and performs like ass.
Athletic Scholarships to universities make as much sense as academic scholarships to sports teams.
Playstation, XBoxes, Mobile Phones, DVDplayers type of operating system are the future. The OS has been developped far ahead of most people abilities. The future is going towards less and less user control on this OS. Quite the opposite of UNIX.
\u262D = \u5350
PC as a thin client browser?
I don't know about you, but that doesn't satisfy me and I think there will always be room for people who want a traditional desktop.
As a gamer and just fan of controlling the computer in front of me completely without all this abstractness, I don't think that everyone is going to bite on this kind of stuff.
I'm sure it has its place, but for everyone?
Talk about ignoring the elephant in the lounge room.
Drag n' Drop DVD Recommendations
the future is the HURD. Even in the future, the future will still be the HURD.
"Not only is UNIX dead, it's starting to smell bad."
--- Rob Pike
...is that back in the day when really only technically savvy types owned or operated computers, is when MS gained their stranglehold on the market.
We would like to think MS somehow bamboozeled the teeming masses, but that is BS. It was us they bamboozled with MS-DOS of all things.
We did this to ourselves.
I am very small, utmostly microscopic.
But until Linux's GUI developers get a contract with Video Card manufacturers to produce better device drivers, or until GUI developers get their act together and make the GUI's faster and more user friendly, I'm afraid to burst your bubble.
Mac OS X is in a position no operating system has been in for 10 years. In 1995 when Microsoft brought out Windows 95, the operating system shattered the market because it was faster, prettier, and just plain cool. Now, OS X is in the same position. And they're going to have to screw up just as bad as Microsoft did with Windows to lose this creative lead.
On top of this, OS X is based on Unix, meaning that it's going to stay secure for a long, long time. As time goes by, bugs will be found and squashed, as no software is perfect, but UNIX by design has less issues with bugs, and the bugs are harder to exploit.
Linux has promise, but it's being held back by developers that simply don't care, because they aren't paid to care. They're doing their own, individual thing, and not working towards what a User wants, they're working towards what a developer wants. And if they took a minute to have an objective look at things, they're not too different. Mac OS X mastered this with XCode. And the only good IDE I've found for Linux is KDevelop, which requires me to install another set of GUI libraries, just to use it.
It's really past time to have Linux desktop-ready. It's time to replace X with something that renders faster, or to simply get Cairo and the other eyecandy, GL-rendering, bad-ass GUI systems up and running. You guys are five years behind Mac OS X, and about a year or so behind Windows in this department.
"Victory means exit strategy, and it's important for the President to explain to us what the exit strategy is." G.W.Bush
Naive.
... were not in UNIX 40 years ago. Heck ReiserFS is a relatively new addition. I recall using ext2/ext3 and having to "fix up" the drive after every unclean shutdown.
... etc.
ReiserFS and O(1) schedulers and IPv6 and
I have yet to lose a single file to a ReiserFS on a medium that still operates. Even through several blackouts [before I got my UPS] and other shutdowns [emergency and otherwise].
I think you just need to reflect on what is actually in the Linux kernel to realize it is nothing like UNIX of 40 years ago.
Sure the overall design (e.g. monolithic with a touch of micro going on) is similar but that's about it. Sure the userland is the similar [with many UI enhancements!] but why not? Do you know a better way to remove files? What does "rm" lack?
I think in the near future any OS improvements [e.g. new mm or FS or taskscheduler] will just find their way into Linux just like many new compiler breakthroughs find their way into GCC.
What Linux [and GCC in this case] give people is a well studied and tested framework to base new ideas on.
Tom
Tom
Someday, I'll have a real sig.
Merely because something is old does NOT mean it should be replaced. We're still building houses out of wood after thousands of years. Our cars run on internal combustion engines. And after all these years we're still carbon based life forms.
You admit it's "fine," that it "works," and that there is "good stuff" in it. If all of that is true, then why replace it merely because it's old?! That kind of mentally makes no sense.
If someone says he and his monkey have nothing to hide, they almost certainly do.
This is a distinction I do NOT understand.
The underlying code open or not is just the implmentation.
And some implentatoins have different switches on the commands.
Like BSD,Irix,SYS V5, didn't
Sticking to a design (what UNIX standard, POSIX?) is the bigger issue in my opinion.
But the end result is the same.
"Everything is a file" ( read,write,block or char)
Or is there really a major difference ?
This is my opinion based on what little I know and understand of the rumors and lies Thanks, Randal
This just proves that time IS, in fact, cyclical! Consider trends with fashion? The 70s came back, the 80s came back, the 90s are coming back... Remakes of movies and music, too... The same is true with computers! Remember how we used to have these big centralized machines that occupied cabinets or frames in rooms? And people used these things called 'Terminals' to interact with the 'MainFrame'... Now we call it a Server, and the Terminals "Thin Clients", but its the same thing! If this was such a good idea AND the future, why did we abandon it when the PC came out?
Laporte says:
"It's funny, because in the early days of UNIX, the philosophy of a program was, "do one thing well, and then pass the result along and interface with others." We've gotten to the complete opposite, which is do everything kind of okay, and interface with nobody. That was clearly a wrong turn. It's a response to market forces, not computer science forces."
In the case where there is just the CLI and a list of programs spawned from a single input line, having a whole collection of tools that work well together is a must. But when you move to a graphical interface, so huge is the change in interface mechanics that the idea of the end-user setting up a chain of programs to run from one mouse click should be alien.
The UNIX mentality of small, modular programs doing one thing well can still be maintained while a graphical environment is running, but his criticism that "do everything kind of okay, interface with nobody" can't be taken as criticism: it's just the way that GUI stuff appears to the user*. The computer system may be organised so that the GUI program you're using shares a lot of libraries and calls a lot of helper programs to do its work, but the user should only see the graphical interface, making his point moot.
*: Maybe he means something else: that an environment where one program does only one thing, from ground to GUI, does not help people to tinker, develop and hack new features into the software.
Isn't there going to be some sort of Unix failure in like 2038? How can it be the future if that's true?
Although this interview doesn't have the controversial tone of a John C Dvorak article, the content seems to be similarly well thought out.
Whoever corrects a mocker invites insult;
whoever rebukes a wicked man incurs abuse.
--Proverbs 9:7
If there is anything that drives me insane, it's people dribling on about what OS they use. Dude, it doesn't matter like it used to 20-30 years ago, we're past the OS era and what Linux or Unix really needs is some good quality, easy to use applications that complement a great graphics engine. Changing the OS is highly unlikely to change the success of a particular system, but changing how you think will...
Microsoft's platform is the standard because they focused on the business of the software products market. They promised something to independent software vendors and delivered it-- a single platform that any developer no matter how big or small can target. At the same time they pushed hard to get this platform on as many PCs as possible, breaking kneecaps along the way when necessary.
They achieved a form of write once run anywhere. In 1985.
It does not matter what's under the hood, it mattered that the ISV only had to write one binary and not have to spend the money supporting two dozen incompatible platforms. Even Java cannot match this (I know, because I have to deal with it).
Today there must be half a billion PCs that the ISV can generate one single binary for, and with that you've covered what, 90% of the market?
Linux needs to offer big marketshare (doesn't have) and good developer support (has, sorta) for ISVs to care about it, because Microsoft proved that most ISVs won't bother targetting more than one major platform.
One need only look over this book and do six months of desktop end-user support on Windows to see how insane an idea it is that Unix of any kind is going to win in the market over Windows as long as the Unix community remains ruled by sadomasochistic techie dweebs who love things based on how hard they are which is the exact opposite of the attitude that has allowed Microsoft and AOL to prosper and thrive in the common end-user market.
I love my FC3, but once again, don't mistake my technical abilities and the chance to flex them each day on it for meaning that everyone is going to take to it like a fish to water.
Apple's OSX most definitely is the best Unix-ish distribution ever conceived, built, and sold to end-users without any doubt in my mind. But do the Linux geeks get it as to why? No, they try mightily to avoid the BSD-ish ancestry of it and sit there wishing this beautiful *nix-style OS with such wonderful design and construction were a Linux distro.
Won't happen. Linux is dominated by the sort of people on whom it is still lost that ease of use, administration, and support are paramount over everything else for end-users. Windows XP and Mac OSX give them what Linux never will as long as the current crop of leaders and movers and shakers controls the Linux scene.
If my grammar and spelling are off, I am [distracted/tired/careless] (take your pick)
Of course Linux isn't ready for the desktop! But what they don't tell you is that Windows isn't either!
C'mon, Spyware, Adware, Numerous Bugs(My Soundcard driver crashed the other Day. My Microsoft Certified Driver completely crashed. A reboot and it worked, but that's unacceptable as it never has any trouble in *Nix). Crazy Service Packs, bad to no real support.
Hell, you NEED an Anti-Virus just to browse the net and check your email, even if you don't download and open any attachments. Just to protect you from the wild internet. You have to combine XP + Norton + Ad-Aware/Spybot S&D just to get a near usable PC. That's quite a stone's throw away from a desktop.
The problem with it, is Windows IS used as the desktop, even though it isn't ready for it yet. That means it is the standard, however, how often has your mother had to call you over to fix it? Linux wouldn't require the same thing, especially if all they want is browsing and email. They're quite matched at that point. But no, Linux isn't ready. Neither is Windows.
(I can't speak of OSX, I don't actively use it)
While it its old, it adresses the issues associated with current system design. One thing people are overlooking is that the basic architecture of pc's (non supercomputers) has remained relatively static for quite some time. Perhaps in order to see a radical change in operating system design we also need to rethink the hardware architectures that we have used for soo long.
dude.
Unix in the backend, handling all computery stuff(services, servers, etc).
A nice, pretty GUI up front(Macintosh, Windows, whatever you like), that grandma can use.
IIRC OSX does this to an extent already.
Thus, the reverse mullet approach. Party in the front, business in the back.
Some things never change, eh?
Try "Page 2".
Look at the tomato! Isn't it sad? He can't dance! Poor tomato!
Consumer technology follows psychological factors, not engineer's logic. Hence we have iPods dominating the mp3 player market. It will also just be easier to just stick in well-known un*x and let managed code run on top of it. Not really secure, not the best way to do it, but its easy and time-saving and pointy haired managers will like it better than developing an in-house solution.
Is that programmers like to develop for an open source system. It's easier that way, and if they release their code as OSS, it just keeps building. People always ask me, "How do I do X?" where X is a semi-difficult task. I always find myself saying, "Well, I'd do it with this program in Linux, it would take about 5 minutes. The windows equivilent, on the other hand, takes the afternoon to figure out and get right." If there are any moderately useful programs for windows, they are usually cheap payware or annoying shareware. The reason that UNIX/Linux/BSD/OS X will work is that you can do almost anything for free.
Because something is old, it needs to be evaluated for replacement.
On the surface, the criteria for replacing something old is the same as the criteria for replacing something new: is there a better way to do it.
In practice, things like amortizing existing investment, vested interests and training are decisive. These economic and psychological issues cannot simply be dismissed as a failure of imagination since innovations have work in the real world, whatever else their merits are.
Sometimes, like the end of analog television signals, someone just has to legislate change. It is a chicken-and-egg problem. Some things only make sense if every one adopts them at once.
To some extent the reason we still have wood houses and the internal combusion engine is because no government has demanded something better.
It might be BSD, it might be Linux, it might be some third thing
So, its either option A, or option B, or an option C which can be anything.
He has given himself quite a bit of leeway there.
If Marshmallows evolve into the dominant lifeform on this planet, his dying breath will be, I was right I tell ya!!! Its the third thing!!
(yes I RTFA and yes he really says that)
#hostfile 0.0.0.0 primidi.com 0.0.0.0 www.primidi.com 0.0.0.0 radio.weblogs.com
Why does every UNIX article/interview/water cooler discussion have to turn into a fanboi flame war, with people flaming about how OSX is UNIX, and how MacOS already has all the needs of the desktop, etc, etc, ad inifinitum. As much as I love operating systems and product evangelists, the discussions are here are really starting to get out of hand.
::Gasp!:: even start doing it.
What would be nice to have people talk about would be the feasibility of the prediction that is being made, in reference to principles that are desired by the average computer user. Not how a current operating system already has all of these things, and thus should be considered the obvious future choice.
Someone already pointed out that the most technologically sound examples don't neccesarily make it in the industry, and this is illustrated time and again.
Let's start talking about stuff that actually matters, or perhaps
Read the only personal Runyon page out there.
Kind of. While I personally don't find OSX(Tiger) to be the high-performing, uber-intuitive, victoriously user-friendly OS people keep telling me it is, it's impossible to ignore Apple have created an incredibly successful, reasonably brand-loyal consumer base.
And I agree, they are in an advantageous position, however one stricken by a crippling glass ceiling.
OSX simply isn't the kind of platform nomadic OS it needs to be to reach ubiquity. Linux, being non-proprietary, has developed a talent for adaptability innately - arguably a the bulk of Linux kernel development itself is invested in sustaining this critical attribute. While some complain about KDE and Gnome not having the bells-and-whistles of OSX, Linux (if ever one can sum it's parts) has quietly been frying more important fish, and very wisely too.
Nowadays, it's increasingly hard to move data around a network without it being touched by Linux. Now phones, kiosks, ATM's and game consoles.. The word 'Linux', not being publically obliged to carry a brand, increasingly represents the set of robust and future-proof tools a given service provider deploys to get the job done. Now we're seeing it extend to public utility, government and administrative desktops en masse.
'Linux' simply doesn't appear on the kinds of brand-conscious radars we're used to using when tracking technology and culture, yet quietly continues to be the fastest growing operating system in the world. Apple however, is a company built on brand innovation, initially as the 'popular minority'; a vain, techo-arian multinational that has boldy engineered a bridge between the computer (as appliance) and the public space of popular culture. Here, the Apple brand is both a boon and an anchor, something to protect (not just any x86 machine), yet something to wear out (iPod).
In the context of popular operating systems, OSX is thus a social, yet exotic animal. As such it is desired as pet, but quickly dies when transported from it's natural habitat. Comparing OSX to others, outside the context of it's crippling architectural dependence, produces false and unrealistic prospects.
I recall the days when computers didn't network very well at all. Even your IBM mainframes couldn't talk to your IBM PCs without installing some proprietary special-purpose product to make communication possible -- and they were both made by the same company. Once standardized networking began to emerge (IP networking) the industry changed. I do recall the suggestions that the PC could probably run some of the applications that the mainframe was running and how absurd the IT folks thought those claims were... it would never happen. And yet... it did happen. Once computers could finally communicate, a reason for open standards, open systems, and open software emerged.
Zealots like me like the idea of "openness", but I don't think Joe Average Consumer really thinks a whole lot about it. But... I do think that Joe Average does want "interoperability".
A common comment you'll hear from Apple owners is that they perceive their computer spends more time helping them do what they want to do rather than them spending all their time supporting their computer. Taken differently, these (mostly non-technical) people are really just saying that they don't want to care about their computer... they just want it to work.
So far, consumers do still need to "support" their Linux installations. Linux doesn't "just work". Windows still needs too much care & feeding... it doesn't "just work" either -- especially where security is concerned. Mac OS X seems to be the best at just working -- even for people who don't know what they're doing. Yes it happens to be Unix. Yes Unix has a more stable foundation than Windows. But we only know this because we're largely a technical community. Joe Average doesn't know this and doesn't want to know this. Most of them probably have no idea that Firefox is considered to be "open" and that IE is considered to be "proprietary". They run what they run either because (a) it was there or (b) their computer buddy told them that's what they should use or (c) that's what they learned to use at work or school -- and I almost forgot... it works with the sites they need to visit.
Open software tends to be more interoperable - so I think it's tends to slowly erode away at the market share of non-interoperable systems. But I think the real difference is that interoperability wins over non-interoperability... not that open systems win over proprietary ones.
Though I want open software to win out, I must confess that I don't believe the average consumer really cares a whole lot about it.
> No one really likes the command line... plenty of people get by with
> it, but it's obviously the most primitive computer interface.
Speak for yourself, MCSE.
The command line is the most natural interface possible if you are computer literate. Think of it as comparing books to TV. If you are a literate person you might still watch TV to veg out and because it is a totally different medium it can do some things better. But even though seeing the Battle of Helm's Deep was hella cool, the books tell a much more detailed and better story.
Yes, graphical tools are handy for new users and even us old timers can use them for really simple tasks, but dependence on them should be avoided by those seeking mastery. UNIX is a language and you won't ever understand it until you reach a conversational level at the command prompt.
> Do they really believe that *NIX users like their OS because of the
> command line?
Yes, and you will pry it from my cold dead fingers. Command prompts, everything is a file, pipes, redirection. These things are what make *NIX what it is, any attempt to change that will be met with fierce resistence. See resource forks for an example of an idea the graphical dweebs try unsuccessfully to foist off on us every year or so for an example.
Democrat delenda est
More clueless crap, for Unix to really be the future, it needs to get rid of its legacy bagage and truely become "well understood". Frankly a lot of people think they understand unix because they are stuck in a single process/text based enviroment mindset. In reality the "extensions" made to unix to support current programming models are full of holes.
When RAS, threads, async io, multiple processors, and may other things that really are the "future" (or rather the current state of the art) are well understood by the unix community they will understand what needs to be changed in the model from the 1970's the people claim is Unix. When that happens unix will be the future, but it won't be "Unix" as you know it.
Now for some more concrete examples. Lets start with a simple one. What does the system call "close()" do? Thats right, did you know it can fail? Whats the solution? Try again. Now think about what happens in a multithreaded enviroment with open() happening in other threads. I can't find a link to Linus's comments on this but they are ammusing. The bottom line is that in a threaded POSIX enviroment you have to write code that looks like (in psudo code to remove the specifics):
app_open(filename,...)
{
lockmutex(globalopenlock)
rc=open(filename,...)
unlockmutex(globalopenlock)
return rc
}
app_close(filehandle)
{
lockmutex(globalopenlock)
while (close(filehandle)!=EBADF);
unlockmutex(globalopenlock)
}
If such a simple unix concept as open/close is screwed up by threads, just imagine what happens when you write code to trap percise floating point exceptions, deal with async filesystem IO over an unreliable network, the list goes on. Basically unix is good for certain kinds of applications and absolutly blows chunks for other kinds. Everyone doing a lot of these things has tied themselves to a particular Unix implementation and uses system specific knowledge to solve the problem.