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Test Driving GNU Hurd, With Benchmarks Against Linux
An anonymous reader writes "After last week's news that GNU Hurd is coming, Phoronix set out to install Debian GNU Hurd and to provide GNU Hurd vs. Linux benchmarks. Linux was mostly faster than The Hurd while also having much better hardware support, multi-core SMP support, and other modern functionality."
...now that Duke Nukem Forever has been released.
Have you read my blog lately?
... does it run Linux?
Yes, it's slower, but did they measure how much freedom it achieved?
20 years of development and 10 years behind in almost every aspect. Hardware support basically non existing, no X11, but no SMTP support is what really surprised me. I though better multithread was one of advantages of the Mach architecture. Anyways, even on a single core machine Linux is faster, there wasn't a single test in which Hurd did noticeably better.
I wish them luck, but I don't think I would even be capable of installing it on any of my machines any time soon.
I remember the days when you said, "Linux", there would be an army of zealots that would swarm you and chant, "IT'S GNU/LINUX! IT'S GNU/LINUX!!"
Not trying to troll here, but why would one use GNU Hurd? What does it offer over Linux? The only fundamental technical difference of note I see is that it's got a microkernel, and arguing about monolithic kernels vs. microkernels is like arguing about vi vs. Emacs: I haven't seen anyone do it seriously, instead of tongue-in-cheek, in years. I imagine there are "non-free" parts of Linux scattered about, and maybe that's a reason to use GNU Hurd, but pretty much all of those are due to device drivers, and making a new OS won't help with that. Even rms admits it's a waste of time. Does Debian really have nothing better to do?
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At the risk of being lambasted, I don't understand why everyone is kicking so hard at HURD. Sure, it's nowhere close to Linux in any respect, but then it never attracted the throngs of developers that Linux did. OS/X is proof that the idea of building on the mach kernel can result in a sound and performant OS. I for one salute those that have stuck with or picked up development of what many would consider a lost cause. Eschewing a technology because it's not popular does not engender innovation. Personally, I hope the HURD team begins to attract more developers and eventually begins to catch up with Linux because competition, even in the FOSS arena, is always a good thing.
Sometimes the light at the end of the tunnel is the headlight of an oncoming train.
Actually, Stallman has nothing to do with pushing this project, he thinks it's a waste of time and effort (see Q13). I'm not sure who is fronting this thing, but I want some of their stash.
Dislike the Electoral College? Lobby your state to join the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact.
Hurd is useless. It is the Duke Nukem' Forever of OSes: Released way too late and a relic from the past that isn't work getting.
Nothing software related that is "in development" for that long is going to be worthwhile because things change so fast. When something has a cycle that long it tells you that they aren't doing a good job working on it. They keep changing shit, are not working efficiently and so on. It also means that the end result is going to be useless.
Hurd has no reason to exist these days, particularly since if you need a microkernel and some POSIX, well there's FreeBSD. Back when it was started, it was a useful idea. After all there really wasn't any free POSIX, and that is what drove Linus to make Linux. He said if Hurd has been around, Linux probably would not have come to be.
Well that ship has sailed. Linux is out and all over, and as I noted with FreeBSD there are other options too if Linux itself is not appropriate for your needs.
Phoronix has a history of questionable choices for their benchmark setups. Hardware, versions, and tuning are... cleverly chosen, almost as if there was a preconceived agenda with inevitable results. Not that there is one-- just like it seems like there is. And so colorfully presented! I remember when they tested ZFS on an i386 version of FreeBSD on a 1G laptop! Others have also noticed this Phoronix phenomenon:
http://forums.freebsd.org/archive/index.php/t-16396.html
http://www.kev009.com/wp/2008/12/phoronix-benchmarking-statistically-significant-and-other-performance-concerns/
The whole point of Hurd, at least right now, is tangential to benchmarks. Nothing wrong with testing, of course, but I think the results should not be used for any long term planning. Nobody is planning on launching a business running on Hurd servers... yet.
Hurd might beat bitcoin in a "has practical uses" benchmark. :P
-- "So they told me that using the download page to download something was not something they anticipated." - Bill Gates
The battle will be won once all computer hardware sold has a free device driver available.
Fixed it for you.
I don't mean to be flippant, but I think we'll know that Hurd is growing up when http://gnu.org/ runs on it.
Its not as fast as linux, and doesn't have hardware support. So, there is no bother kicking it out. Because nothing ever gets better. Especially when people start adopting it and taking it apart to see how it works and make it better. I for one, am not building a new computer for it. Nope. Not me.
Fair point, I guess, it has room to improve...
But it's hard not to be cynical about Hurd. It's been present to some extent for as long as I've been aware of Linux, but it's always been sort of a joke. It was supposedly going to do all these amazing things (and maybe now it can actually do some of them) but for year after year after year it was all talk, combined with a failure to deliver. Hey guys, it's going to have this amazing mount structure that will make /usr/bin and /usr/local/bin obsolete! It's going to have a fantastic microkernel architecture with pluggable modules so you can dynamically adjust the shit out of it! It'll be really, really great - oh, but it's not really usable yet. Maybe next year. This has been going on for a long, long time.
Meanwhile, GNU, lacking a usable kernel of their own (more or less) but wanting to have a full system to call their own, laid their brand on Linux... And, you know, I respect GNU and appreciate everything they've given us over the years, and I think they have a reasonable point that GNU software is pretty central to the typical Linux system. But you see "GNU/Linux" even in GRUB - think about that... GRUB is booting the Linux kernel. It's a safe bet that the system, once it's started up, will run GNU software, but they're not booting GNU software in that case: They're booting Linux. (OK, bit of a rant there, but can you see my point here?)
Can't fault 'em too much for limited hardware support, 'cause limitations like that have generally been an issue for Linux as well. The hardware side is less of an issue now only because Linux has exposure and commercial support driving hardware support (sometimes in a non-free or quasi non-free form). They should be able to adapt some of that code to work in Hurd over time (well, as long as they don't have an issue with the code being licensed GPL v2) and get a lot of what's missing.
But, after all that build-up and all that delay, for the system to still be a bit weak - I feel like it hasn't really earned the right to escape the derision it earned in all those years of being steeped in theoretically good concepts, while failing to deliver the goods.
Bow-ties are cool.
it's not a matter of it being fastest, it's about options.
Attacks in the IT world tend to come in the form of software patents or claims of stolen code through a proxy.
all the BSDs, Hurd, Reactos and other such projects only make for more moving targets.
if you use them or not, if you are impressed with them or not, they all still serve a purpose.
there will always be free options.
I agree... but out of interest, why doesn't Linux satisfy that for you? I can see the argument that Hurd gives you a totally different philosophy to look at to Linux - but if you wanted that, why wouldn't Darwin suit you?
I'm all for developing new kernels anyway. But if we're purely looking at use we don't need it (we've got Linux and Darwin) and if we're looking at contrasting designs we don't *need* it (Linux and Darwin)... but it's still a new design so frankly all power to it. Just I doubt I'll use it myself, at least not for production.
I graduated college before any of the free operating systems had been introduced.