Linux 3.0 Will Be Faster Than 2.6.39

sfcrazy writes "While we were thinking that the announcement of 3.x branch was nothing more than Linus' mood swing, it seems there is more to it. Linus wrote on the Linux Kernel Mailing List, '3.0 will still be noticeably faster than 2.6.39 due to the other changes made (ie the read-ahead), so yes, the regression itself is fixed.'"

Comments

Re:Marketing

[hairyfeet]

This is the logical fallacy that seems to bite Linux users in the ass every single time. Windows? minimum 10 YEARS of patches. Windows users don't have to update because they don't get kicked to the curb in 18 months like Linux users do. You don't stay on the update treadmill with Linux you WILL have an unpatched OS, and in this age of zero days isn't just foolish it is dangerous.

And as for the OEMs offering downloads? nobody uses them anymore. Since Vista MSFT maintains most drivers through Windows Update so that the user doesn't do forum hunts all they have to do is let Windows take care of it. Just got my Canon printer updated yesterday by WU. Works beautifully.

With Linux? Often your ONLY indication something is amiss (unless you are a CLI head as I said, by geeks for geeks) is when you try to use hardware, like listen to music or hook to the net, and it simply don't work. Is there a simple "update drivers" button? A simple and easy way that ANYONE, no matter their level of experience, can get the drivers working? Not a snowball's chance in hell friend.

To quote a very old saying "excuses are like assholes, everyone has one and they all stink". The numbers don't lie. read the links I provided. Linux has been free as in beer and freedom for 20 years and STILL the numbers are below the margin for error. Every single B&M that has tried selling your product has ran away. Dell can't even allow repos on their tiny subset of hardware because driver QA is so shitty on Linux that it will cause the Dell machines to shit themselves and die.

Gentlemen this is simply unacceptable. if you want the masses to adopt your product then you have to make a product they can use and NOT expect them to go out and get a CS degree so they can become their own tech guru. There is NO reason why drivers should break, there is NO reason why things should be this big of a mess. If you want to compare yourselves to Windows give us a solid decade of security patches without forcing us to do the upgrade death march, otherwise you should make damned sure that the upgrade death march you force us on won't kill drivers dead.

Look I want Linux to succeed, I really really do. right now I'm looking at 4 boxes that work perfectly fine I'm gonna end up having to send to the dump because the cost of Windows licenses are more than they are worth. I'd love nothing more than to be able to put Linux on these boxes and offer them as low cost machines so those without can have a cheap netbox, but I can't, why? Because in less than a year a new version of whatever distro i put on will come out and they WILL shit themselves and die if they are updated.

Sadly I have found you only get two choices when it comes to Linux at retail, 1.-give away free lifetime support (unacceptable) or 2.-disable ALL updates so the machine don't shit itself and die (unacceptable and foolish) so like the rest of the retailers in the USA I choose the third option 3.-don't carry your product. That means these machines will be going in the garbage, simply because of the POS Linux driver "model". Fix this gentlemen and I'll be happy to have nice new Linux boxes on my shelves, so would a lot of retailers. you think we LIKE paying for Windows licenses? hell no! But until you can guarantee me a MINIMUM of 6 years worth of security patches without causing drivers to shit themselves I simply can't stock your product. As I said I have yet to see a single linux distro even have 18 months worth of updates without a broken driver. this is just insanity and expecting home users to deal with that mess is either arrogance or naivety, I'm not sure which.

Re:Marketing

[hairyfeet]

And YOU insist on not listening. I'll spell it out in little words, okay? Unless I sit these boxes aside and patiently wait for the next LTS I already have LESS THAN 2 YEARS before these machines shit themselves and die. And this of course doesn't take into account the true insanity of software tying itself to the kernel, so if you have kernel 2.6.x and the software wants 3.x.x you are fucked. What is so damned hard to understand about that?

And yes they DO intentionally break sir! If I design a car, to use the world famous /. car analogy, that can ONLY have its oil changed while going 70MPH+ down the road while you balance on the hood then IT IS MY FAULT if you injure yourself changing the oil because my design is bad and it is THAT, that right there, that is the heart of the matter! You have an entire OS ecosystem held hostage by ONE man, that man is Linus Torvalds. Linus said in 1993 he'd never allow a hardware ABI, here it is 2011 and he STILL refuses to change his mind, thanks to a combination of ego and religious dogma, neither of which should be anyway shape or form the basis of OS design!

Now EVERYONE and I DO mean everyone, OSX, BSD, Solaris, OS/2, Windows, they ALL have an ABI and you know what? Their drivers do NOT break! To take Windows for an example the Win2K/XP driver model lasted for over a decade and will continue to be supported until 2014. That is 14 YEARS of drivers that work! The WinVista/7 driver model will most likely get the same or longer, that is another DECADE PLUS of drivers working!

But as long as Linus insists on treating the kernel as his own personal play toy, as long as I said there is NO decent way to upgrade the thing without Linux shitting itself, I just looked up the numbers and guess what? Ubuntu LTS that is currently out dies hard in just a year and a half so again, your answer is...what? Death March or...death march? Because 10.04 LTS as you can see here has less than a year and a half on the desktop. Do you expect me to put these boxes in a closet for a year?

I'm sorry but your driver model is shit sir, and the sooner the community accepts this and has a royal raging shitfit at Torvalds and demands better the sooner Linux will be able to "just look for the penguin on the box" and can be all over retail shelves like Windows is now.

You show me ONE, just one mind you, one single distro where I can get a GUARANTEED 6 years worth of security updates WITHOUT the upgrade death march and I'll be happy to install it this very moment. But you can't, you know why? Because the entire community is based around the new hotness and since upgrades are "free" (except they are only free if your time is worthless) nobody cares about longer than 3 years worth of support, and most don't even care about that. But I have customers to support, and they ain't gonna take CS classes to learn the fucked up Linux broken driver dance.

Fix this problem, and you'll see Linux machines right next to the Windows ones in every B&M across the country. Isn't that what the community wants? The year of the Linux desktop? Well only you can make it happen, and that is by having a royal shitfit and demanding better than the shit sandwich that is the current driver model.