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The Great Microkernel Debate Continues
ficken writes "The great conversation about micro vs. monolithic kernel is still alive and well. Andy Tanenbaum weighs in with another article about the virtues of microkernels. From the article: 'Over the years there have been endless postings on forums such as Slashdot about how microkernels are slow, how microkernels are hard to program, how they aren't in use commercially, and a lot of other nonsense. Virtually all of these postings have come from people who don't have a clue what a microkernel is or what one can do. I think it would raise the level of discussion if people making such postings would first try a microkernel-based operating system and then make postings like "I tried an OS based on a microkernel and I observed X, Y, and Z first hand." Has a lot more credibility.'"
Should we all be considered unqualified to comment on anything that we haven't tried? How about capital murder?
There have been plenty of studies comparing the performance of monolithic vs. microkernel architectures. The monolithic implementations always perform better. Sure they aren't as elegant from a CS perspective - but the same could be said of OO code vs. structured for small implementations.
Show me a good microkernel based OS distribution and I'll give it a try. I haven't seen anything yet that outperforms what I'm using.
The best software is the software that, given a reasonable choice, folks choose both choose to write and choose to use. Microkernels are not a new idea, yet few folks have chosen to write them and few have chosen to use the ones that have been written. That speaks for itself.
Besides, what does Andy think, that we're all going to say, "Wow, you're dead on, lets rewrite Linux from scratch with a microkernel?" Linux works. Unless we reach a point where it substantially doesn't (like Windows) there's no value to considering that deep a design change.
Moderating "-1, Disagree" is simple censorship. Have the guts to post your opinion.
We didn't go with a monolithic Linux over the once-Apple-sponsored mkLinux because it was inherently better for every possible task under the sun, we went with it because it was better for some tasks and good enough for others and it had more support from interested parties, i.e. marketplace factors.
Same argument works just as well for Windows (better, actually):
We didn't go with a Proprietary Windows over the open-source Linux because it was inherently better for every possible task under the sun, we went with it because it was better for some tasks and good enough for others and it had more support from interested parties, i.e. marketplace factors. It had better driver support, was more widely adopted, and more familiar to the majority of people. We found that the things which differentiated Linux - better security, higher reliability - were just not important enough to most users to justify the time expenditure of learning a new operating system.
There's no point in re-inventing the wheel if you aren't going to do it right. Granted, I like Linux better than Windows, and it does have some really compelling advantages for those able to benefit, but the Micro-vs-Monolithic kernel argument was lost a long time ago. We know that Linux is suboptimal. But even for its shortfalls, it is still by far the best choice available. It is not merely "good enough" - it is the best option one has for a PC operating system.
And please don't troll about the Windows statement. That was for demonstration purposes only.
The society for a thought-free internet welcomes you.
they should GPL the source but they're pretty much stuck in licensing land as it is. ;)
If they did that QNX would make a huge jump forward, say a 'quantum leap'
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