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Dvorak Avocates Open Sourcing OS X
xzvf writes "Dvorak claims OS X and Apple in trouble. He suggests open sourcing OS X for an epic battle with Linux. In many ways, this is just insane rambling, but it's certainly entertaining on some levels." From the article: "That would make the battle between OS X and Linux the most interesting one on the computer scene. With all attention turned in that direction, there would be nothing Microsoft could do to stem a reversal of its fortunes. Let's start at the beginning. There's been a lot of fuss over Apple's rollout of the unsupported Boot Camp product, which lets Mac users run Microsoft Windows easily on an Intel-based Macintosh. I got into various levels of trouble when I suggested that Apple was going to gravitate towards Windows since it would be easy to do and there was some evidence that the company might want to do it."
I frequent a message board frequented by members of the gaming journalism press and developers. Upon the Boot Camp announcement, about ten of them immediately bought new Macs.
All of them, to a man, spend all of their time in OSX. They only boot Windows to play games, but do everything else in OSX.
Dvorak still doesn't get it.
They did. They called it "Darwin". It had everything that Linux has and had; it runs GNU software like everything else and is capable of GNOME or KDE. It hasn't performed very well.
Dvorak is trolling again.
The reason Apple is 'so great' is because they control the whole experience. What you are buying is the hardware + apps +OS.
If you sell the OS on any old PC hardware (as many have asked for) then suddenly Apple loses one of the legs or their product.
If you open the OS then you lose another leg.
The reason everyone wants apple to do these things is because the quality they can get when they control all those things. (no they dont control all the apps, obviously, but they provide the basic user with everything they would need in an easy to use package)
I am so tired of people saying: I love apple OS, but i will never pay for it until they sell it for my shitty dell hardware! Well, then it wouldn't be the Apple that is able to be so high quality, and you wouldn't want it anyway!
So, back to my original point: Dvorak is a tired hack, and he is trolling for pagehits. Please stop putting his crap up here and helping him out!
Dvorak != Dvorak keyboard layout
Dvorak's hosted Silicon Spin on TechTV and appears regularly on TV, radio and podcasts.
Zero tolerance equals zero intelligence
Yeah, well, Apple had the same idea several years ago, and that's why OS X is open source.
Perhaps the FSF doesn't consider Apple's source license to be free--I haven't read the latest papal nuncios on that--but it is open.
Dvorak! Pssst! Here it is. Right up to version 10.4.6, fresh, tasty, and just the griddle. Enjoy!
"How to Do Nothing," kids activities, back in print!
... of HW and SW that really makes it. I get an iBook for $800 that just works. No parts to stick out and snap, stock ports to support 90% of the work I'll need, a lid and sleep controls that actually listen to each other, instant wake from sleep, foolproof wireless HW and SW... in short, clean and effective HW, clean and effective SW. The two together are bliss.
"Win treats sysadmins better than users. Mac treats users better than sysadmins. Linux treats everyone like sysadmins."
Don't you remember when he wrote for MacUser?
It's fast enough and bug-free enough that Oolite (written for OS X and Cocoa) runs quite happily on Linux (although admittedly, we ditched GNUstep AppKit in favour of SDL). Certainly, the Foundation (the base Objective-C class library) is pretty fast.
Oolite: Elite-like game. For Mac, Linux and Windows
Two open source software projects aiming at the same market, developing the same product?
I predict that the winner will be the one who goes gold last. All you've got to do is take their version and up the ante! Now, can I run a company or write for a magazine?
Seriously, wouldn't the big winner be the BSD projects?
Get your Unix fortune now!
Opensourcing Mac OS X is the number one way to make the operating system resemble Linux. Some people don't see this as bad, but let me explain. I love Linux.
Mac OS X is much more than the Kernel and UNIX command-line and X11. It's a substantial part, that already is opensourced as Darwin. The real value in Mac OS for developers is the incredibly elegant framework built on very high-level components.
Core Data, Core Image, Core Video, Applescript, XCode, QuickTime, Speech, Finder, Aqua, Quartz Extreme, Cocoa Bundles & NIBS... There's a lot to this O/S and it's not something you can just "open" at any time.
There are innumerable software license restrictions in the video CODECS for QuickTime alone. Display PDF? Unless Adobe wants to open source PDF, that just won't happen. This is one of the nicest features of Mac OS. Fonts and vectors actually render as they'll print. Mac users take it for granted. Windows gets this feature in 2007, but no one's asking Microsoft to opensource Windows or ship a stripped down "free" version.
MacOS stands apart, in part, due to its bullish resistance to what everyone else is doing. Opening the code invites pressure to conform, the absolute worst thing that can happen to this OS. Apple has always been an innovator and is often ahead of the rest of the industry.
I fear that an open source community would pressure Apple to abandon the very things that make the OS unique and cutting edge. Their proprietary solutions make for great software.
I can tell you:
As an Objective C (Cocoa) developer, the memory management woes of C++ are long gone. Network communications are so simple, I feel dumb for ever using sockets. Message delegation is a feature so powerfully simple, it allows me to write a fraction of code for the same functionality.
To use Mac OS effectively, you really do need to "think different." The Frameworks make extensive use of generics and design patterns... something Microsoft has only started to embrace in their new toolsets.
When I look at Linux, it's not even close. It's not an end-user OS and never will be without the very things that makes Mac OS what it is. Linux lacks a decent GUI and productivity tools... even the support of commercial development as a whole.
I don't dislike Linux at all. I use Linux and/or BSD for almost everything... embedded hardware, servers, and even light day-to-day tasks. It's just very raw and continues to be a tad hardcore.
Linux is largely C-based. The talent, Dvorak suggests should be tapped, is composed of mostly C developers. The OS is built completely different than one that uses C++ or Objective C as its primary language.
What makes Dvoraks' comments silly, is that there simply isn't a community of good object oriented developers in open source that aren't already actively working on very important projects. I would much rather that some of them finish Eclipse, instead of helping Apple. I think Apple has a handle on it already.
Dvorak is a militant Windows user. He pokes and prods the Apple community. His predictions are meant only to antagonize Apple users.
I own two Macs. My PowerBook has spent over three months in repair over the last two and a half years. The last repair, they replaced the CPU with a slower one and still didn't fix the problem that only one of the SO-DIMM slots works.. The hard drive on the Mini died just under a year after I got it. It was taken into the Apple Store, where it turned out that they had miss-filed the serial number and so they would not repair it under warranty.
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
In addition to the folklore.org site, note that Apple paid Xerox for the rights to use their ideas (options on 100,000 shares at $10/share, a split or two ago...)
Hmmm it seems Pournelle is still around. I haven't seen a web site like that since 1999!
Even though Byte is dead, their web site continues with Pournelle's column - he even wrote one recently about Boot Camp. Warning, visionary pearls of wisdom inside!