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Apple and Windows Will Force Linux Underground
eastbayted writes "Tom Yager at InfoWorld predicts: 'At the end of the decade, we'll find that Apple UNIX has overtaken commercial Linux as the second most popular general client and server computing platform behind Windows.' That's not a gloom-and-doom omen for the ever-popular Linux kernel, though, he stresses. While Apple and Microsoft will grapple for dominance of client and server spaces, Linux will be 'the de facto choice for embedded solutions.' And by 'embedded,' Yager means 'specialized.' With a push of a button and a flip of switch, he predicts, you'll be able to create a configured database and a mated J2EE server — all thanks to Linux."
Well, it's bad in that it's based on fiction. First of all, Linux was not "made" for the embedded market, because the embedded market didn't really exist in any meaningful way when Linux was created. Linux happens to do well in embedded devices because it's so highly customizable (without cumbersome licensing costs).
He also mentions the idea of "embedded" Oracle and IBM databases. While this idea might work in a limited capacity for small businesses, it just doesn't fly for the enterprise clients, which are those companies' bread and butter. Enterprise clients wants to customize EVERYTHING. Trying to sell them a push-button cookie cutter solution just isn't going to fly. It's been tried, and it hasn't worked. You sell them a cookie cutter solution, and by the time you're done making everything just the way they want it, it would have been far cheaper and easier to just start out building a customized solution to begin with.
As for Apple taking over in the server space, I haven't seen anything to indicate that. No one I know even mentions Apple as a general server solution, much less gives any serious thought to it. Where I work now, we have tens of thousands of servers, 90% of which are running Linux. The remainder are running Solaris and HP-UX, with a very small number running other proprietary Unix-based systems or Windows. None of them are Apples.
Also, all of our systems are sold to us without an OS, and we install our own custom images on to them, so they wouldn't show up in pre-installed system sales. I would imagine most data centers and large hosting environments would be doing the same thing.
"Slower than Linux or Windows? I'd like to see those numbers, please!"
p =1
MacOS X has infamously bad threading, which makes it an absolute dog for many important server apps. Anandtech, what I regard as one of the most trustworthy hardware sites on the Internet, has an article outlining the problems:
http://www.anandtech.com/mac/showdoc.aspx?i=2436&
Unless MacOS X for Intel has gotten miraculous improvements in this area, and I'm not aware it has, you'd be an absolute fool to use MacOS X for any server apps requiring high performance threading.
-Erwos
Plausible conjecture should not be misrepresented as proof positive.
yes, of cource i'm the flaimbait when the parent is the one with many outraged responces due to his FUD, and it's entirely my fault for pointing out that he's posting completely incorrect information http://www.barefeats.com/bootcamp.html OS X is faster than windows http://www.macworld.com/2006/08/opinion/dellmacpro followup/index.php
Macs are in general cheaper or about the same price as equally configured pc's, though this is a hard thing to do if you put some work in to find a truly equally specced machine apples come out cheaper. and the argument about reliable hardware is moot, apple has not switched manufacturers, they still use asus and foxconn, they still use the same high quality pcb and they design all their own motherboards the same as before, the only difference is they order the cpu and chipset from intel instead of IBM/motorola.
Some of those things may of been true of apple 10 years ago, but people need to open their eyes and quit with the blind faith, I run OS X windows and linux and each has their advantages, to label OS X a bloated toy thats not a real option is naive.
Wanna see those numbers? really easy.
install linux on a G3 or G4. Massively faster than OSX on that hardware.
On it's own hardware, ubuntu kicks OSX arse hard.
Graned you dont get the nice-y OSX and I do like OSX. but it takes a killer machine to handle it.
Dual G5 2.5ghz runs it nicely.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
Actually, not so much. Saying you "didn't think about threads" is like arguing that you went with protected multi-tasking OS and "didn't think about DOS". Adding memory protection and compartmentalisation is the only difference between a thread and a "process". In most cases, you just don't care anyway ... all you want is to not block, and threads are the worst fix for that problem.
ustr: Managed string API with ave. 44% overhead over strdup(), for 0-20B
Unix-based OS X is "not a server OS?"
I think OS X Server operations like this disagree with you.
I've yet to see any 'mere mortal' who really can USE Windows without guidance from some friend or relative that happens to know a bit more than this 'mere mortal'. I think it's quite telling that people choose Windows over Mac because they are afraid of problems, and feel more comfortable with an OS that is used by more people (and thus the chance of finding a helpful hand is higher).
I'm not trying to argue that Linux would be more usable, but I think the usability argument is a joke.