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Happy Birthday, Linus
Glyn Moody writes "Today is the birthday of Linus. Just under 19 years ago, on the first day the shops in Helsinki were open after the holidays, Linus rushed out and spent all his Christmas and birthday money on his first PC: a DX33 80386, with 4 Megs of RAM, no co-processor, and a 40 Megabyte hard disc. Today, the kernel he wrote on that system powers 90% of the fastest supercomputers, and is starting to find its way into more and more smartphones — not to mention everything in between. What would the world look like had he spent his money on something else?"
How would the world look different? It would be a whole GNU world.
BTW, Linus is 40 today, there seems to be no mention of that anywhere.
What would the world look like had he spent his money on something else?
Not much different, as the people who built Linux distributions would instead have ported GNU to the kernel of FreeBSD.
Maybe without Linux we would use Minix or Hurd today. While Linus caused an crystallization point for hundreds of developers he did not write the thing alone. these people were already there. More or less waiting for something like this to happen. Most of them were already part of the Minix mailing list. So most likely Linux was already waiting to happen then. From my own time as an undergraduate. all the good programmers wanted to write an OS. And when it Linux came into existence everyone said cool. I take it and I do something with it. The same happened later with the browser as well. And if X11 would have had a better programming interface there would have been more different browsers out there. Still. Thanks to Linus for starting it.
The 386SX was a 32 bit processor internally but had a 16 bit data bus. The 386DX was a straight 32bit processor all the way through. There was a third flawed varient that had a problem switching between real and protected mode that could lock up the system. Those chips would be stamped that they were only certified for 16 bit apps. The ones that tested good had a double sigma stamp on them. Neither the 386sx nor 386dx had math coprocessors. The 486 however was a different story. The 486DX had a coprocessor but the 486SX did not.
Some North Americans really do overestimate the penetration of their own popular culture. Globally, most people wouldn't think of anyone at all. On Slashdot - Mr. Torvalds.
From scarped cliff or quarried stone she cries "A thousand types are gone, I care for nothing, no not one."
The point about Linus's machine having no coprocessor is actually true. This made development a little iffy since floating point math had to be done in software. The i386DX actually did not have an FPU, and the coprocessor was the i387 which was not all that popular but was compatible with both the DX and SX models. It was not until the introduction of the i486 that the SX had no coprocessor and the DX had a built-in coprocessor.
Interesting read.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linus_Torvalds#Authority_on_Linux
"About 2% of the Linux kernel as of 2006 was written by Torvalds himself.[13] Since Linux has had thousands of contributors, such a percentage represents a significant personal contribution to the overall amount of code. Torvalds remains the ultimate authority on what new code is incorporated into the standard Linux kernel.[18]"
Do you know how much output that is?! Also, consider for a minute, that Linux isn't like the lightbulb, invent once and the work is done. How far would linux have gone if work quit in 1991, 1995, 2000? It's a work-in-progress.
The world is littered with half-assed and half-finished projects, particularly software. It's far better that Linus brings and continues one project to excellence than do a dozen mediocre projects that quite never get there.
Maybe you should go out and invent something. If it had 1/100 of the impact Linux has, you'll the world for the better significantly.
Everyone knows "42" is the real milestone.
Linus invented 'git' much more recently, in 2005. If you haven't reviewed it for source control, and compared it to Subversion at Subversion's expense, I urge you to do so. It is lighter weight, _far_ faster, allows remote development far more easily, and actually pays attention to security with its far better handling of SSH keys and its built-in GPG signatures for software tags.
I can also attest that you only give up on life at 40 if your first 40 years weren't worth living. And in that case, your age probably wasn't the problem.