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GNU Hurd 0.7 and GNU Mach 1.6 Released
jones_supa writes: Halloween brought us GNU Hurd 0.7, GNU Mach 1.6, and GNU MIG 1.6. The new Hurd comes with filesystem driver improvements, provides a new rpcscan utility, and the Hurd code has been ported to work with newer versions of GCC and GNU C Library. The Mach microkernel has updates for compiler compatibility, improvements to the lock debugging infrastructure, the kernel now lets non-privileged users write to a small amount of memory, timestamps are now kept relative to boot time, and there are various bugfixes. MIG 1.6 is a small update which improves compatibility with newer dialects of C programming language. Specific details on all of the updates can be found in the full release announcement.
jrepin adds some more details: The GNU Hurd 0.7 improves the node cache for the EXT2 file-system code (ext2fs), improves the native fakeroot tool, provides a new rpcscan utility, and fixes a long-standing synchronization issue with the file-system translators and other components. The GNU Mach 1.6 microkernel also has updates for compiler compatibility, improvements to the lock debugging infrastructure, the kernel now lets non-privileged users write to a small amount of memory, timestamps are now kept relative to boot time, and there are various bug-fixes.
Systemd is ported
Probably for much the same reasons that things like Haiku, OpenIndiana, DragonflyBSD, and etc., exist.
Who are you to question what is interesting to someone? I don't mean that in a rude way, but honestly, something doesn't have to have millions of users to be someone's pet project or interesting to a small niche audience. After all, how do you think Linux got started?
This might come as a shock, but the World does not revolve around you!
It provides an alternative to the traditional monolithic UNIX kernel architecture by replacing it with a multiserver microkernel. Hurd is actually pretty interesting and useful project in my opinion. They just need much more developers if they want to actually go to the moon.
"This might come as a shock, but the World does not revolve around you!"
Straw man, no one said it did. You could have simply said "the Hurd guys probably do it for fun." and be done with it. That admission would OTOH arouse the question why this is news for nerds and why it matters.
if it takes them decades to catch up to Linux.
How can you catch up to something that's moving by going slower than it? I mean I appreciate the extreme challenges of what they are doing, but they can utterly write off any idea of "catching up" at the rate they are going.
Probably for much the same reasons that things like Haiku, OpenIndiana, DragonflyBSD, and etc., exist. Who are you to question what is interesting to someone? I don't mean that in a rude way, but honestly, something doesn't have to have millions of users to be someone's pet project or interesting to a small niche audience. After all, how do you think Linux got started? This might come as a shock, but the World does not revolve around you!
But that's the thing. If you look on the homepage, it states it's a complete replacement for Linux as a kernel - but it fails miserably at that. Its application compatibility is extremely low, driver support is absolutly abysmal, and you can't even install it on its own - it depends on the very thing it's supposed to replace!
It's such a shame too, because I think there's a big potential for a microkernel system nowadays. It'd be more secure than a mono kernel, much more reliable, much easier to extend, and the only cost is the overhead involved. I don't knock it for being a hobby project - but then GNU should stop pretending like it has some Linux killer on its hands and that it's an official and supported project, because it's become very clear over the last 30+ years (!) that no one wants to work on it. Imagine what it could be if it got some real support, though....
"Set a man a fire, he'll be warm for the rest of the night. Set a man afire, he'll be warm for the rest of his life."
It's news for nerds and matters because nerds like obscure difficult to understand projects that will never be popular with "7|-|3 l0$3rs".
Why does the HURD exist?
To prove that the clean design of a micro kernel architecture enables the development of more features than can be achieved with an old-fashioned monolithic kernel, and that these features can be delivered on a faster schedule.
Too late, the desktop doesn't exist anymore.
Achille Talon
Hop!
I think it's mainly maintained by Stallman fanatics who still bare death grudges against Linus for stealing their thunder, to be honest.
They gather at the gnarled roots of his wretched toes, surviving on Jolt cola and Stallman's beard fungus as they furiously translate their eldritch acid dreams into holy code all the while gnashing their teeth at any mention of the dread thief Linus.
LINUS!!! That thief of dreams, murderer of hope, that foul bandit who ran off with their sacred GNU!! His every fetid caress of the GNU corrupts it with corporate appeasance!! HE MUST BE STOPPED!!
.... and so they chitter in binary under the caressing shade of Stallman's girth, preparing for the day of their triumph... they need not success, the accolades of the masses, those putrid sheeple!... they have their purity..
Probably for much the same reasons that things like Haiku, OpenIndiana, DragonflyBSD, and etc., exist
Haiku exists because people liked BeOS but BeOS was proprietary and largely abandoned. OpenIndiana exists because the phrase 'Oracle Solaris' just makes people sad. DragonflyBSD exists because Dillon wanted a playground where no one would disagree with him on project direction. But HURD? It had two reasons for existing: to build a microkernel-based OS and to provide a UNIX-like kernel with a license that made it a good fit for the rest of the GNU system. The former objective has been done better by things like Minix 3. The latter by Linux (at least, until GNU moved everything to GPLv3). HURD isn't that interesting as a research OS - the interesting project like L4 HURD died. It's not that interesting as a production OS. The only thing that it really has going for it at this point is the 'GNU' stamp on the top, and that doesn't matter unless you really want to build a complete GNU system (but are happy with X.org not being a GNU project and being more code than the kernel).
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
Don't worry. At the rate they're going, they'll be up to 1.0 by 2030.
Or maybe 2059? Obligatory XKCD.
If it weren't for deadlines, nothing would be late.
And here's the link for that: https://www.gnu.org/software/h...
I have been browsing the web with Debian Iceweasel on a Hurd VM in Virtualbox for about two hours now (this is the no-joke part of the post, I even watched a couple of clips on youtube) and I've done a little bit of research on the state of the project. About 80% of Debian packages actually run...
I have not attempted to compile Wine, but I hear it's been working since 2013...
OpenGL support is being worked on, of course...
You know what that means.
Yes. It will happen. As the prophecy foretells.
Someone will eventually play Duke Nukem Forever on Hurd.
According to the release:
This is not a typo. Wiring memory means pinning it in memory so it cannot be paged out. This is potentially important both for security and real-time applications. On the security front, memory containing keys and passwords should be wired to prevent it going to disk. On the real-time front, if you can fit your working set in wired memory, you can be guaranteed you won't suffer a paging fault while you stay within that working set.
In Linux / POSIX systems, this is what mlock accomplishes.
Being able to write to memory, in contrast, isn't particularly noteworthy. You've been able to do that since pretty much the beginning...
Program Intellivision!