Slashdot Mirror
Google Working On New 'Fuchsia' OS (digitaltrends.com)
An anonymous reader writes: Google is working on a new operating system dubbed Fuchsia OS for smartphones, computers, and various other devices. The new operating system was spotted in the Git repository, where the description reads: "Pick + Purple == Fuchsia (a new Operating System). Hacker News reports that Travis Geiselbrech, who worked on NewOS, BeOS, Danger, Palm's webOS and iOS, and Brian Swetland, who also worked on BeOS and Android will be involved in this project. Magenta and LK kernel will be powering the operating system. "LK is a kernel designed for small systems typically used in imbedded applications," reads the repository. "On the other hand, Magenta targets modern phones and modern personal computers with fast processors, non-trivial amounts of RAM with arbitrary peripherals doing open-ended computation." It's too early to tell exactly what this OS is meant for. Whether it's for an Android and Chrome OS merger or something completely new, it's exciting nonetheless.
The OS space has really dwindled to just Unix based OS's and Windows of late. You have QNX still in the embedded space and Contiki and FreeRTOS but noting really interesting in general use area for a while. A new kernel could be really interesting. Of course the apps will be the issue.
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
Imagine what would happen if goog put its energy into developing groundbreaking products, instead of tracking, exporting, profiting from users.
Fix the typo at least please
WebOS was made under a big set of shady dealing. With it designed to trick iTunes to think it was a different model iPod. Causing Apple to fix their iTunes which caused a back and forth fight between the two companies causing WebOS users to be the real victims.
A big company like Palm advertising iTunes support makes people figure they got some sort of license with Apple. No they just hacked Apple thinking that Apple wouldn't do anything about it.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
They want to throw out a Linux kernel outa android and gpl compliance matters with it. Qualcomm already has a unit that writes a HAL midware for it.
I'm just waiting for version 1.0 of ReactOS. Linux, Fuschia, *BSD, OSX etc. are all great in their own right but what about huge existing base of code that's been written for Windows, that isn't open source but people like me still use ?
And more importantly the data that's been produced by these programs which is held in closed source, binary formats ?
I'm got 30 years worth of data that I've produced in various utilities on the Windows platform (mostly audio and video related) and I'd love to be able to convert it to a new, open, format or even to be able to load it in something that ran on Linux. Sadly this isn't possible (believe me I've tried) so I'm stuck still using the old programs.
I am not installing Windows 10 and becoming a subservient, monitored node in the Microsoft botnet but it would be wonderful if I could still run the original programs (I have all the installers on CD or on disk) on something other than my aging XP machine (which is now disconnected from the 'net)
And Fuschia will no doubt be another system in the same vein. e.g. a locked down, semi walled garden offering where you have to sign in, where you're allocated unique IDs which are used to crapvertise at you and where you don't have the root password. No thanks.
So as far as OSes are concerned the only one I'm interested in is ReactOS !
Hello,
Consulting for several large companies, I'd always done my work on Windows. Recently however, a top online investment firm asked us to do some work using Linux. The concept of having access to source code was very appealing to us, as we'd be able to modify the kernel to meet our exacting standards which we're unable to do with Microsoft's products.
Although we met several technical challenges along the way (specifically, Linux's lack of good universal wifi support and the fact that we were unable to defrag its ext4 file system), all in all the process went smoothly. Everyone was very pleased with Linux, and we were considering using it for a great deal of future internal projects.
So you can imagine our suprise when we were informed by a lawyer that we would be required to publish our source code for others to use. It was brought to our attention that Linux is copyrighted under something called the GPL, or the Gnu Protective License. Part of this license states that any changes to the kernel are to be made freely available. Unfortunately for us, this meant that the great deal of time and money we spent "touching up" Linux to work for this investment firm would now be available at no cost to our competitors.
Furthermore, after reviewing this GPL our lawyers advised us that any products compiled with GPL'ed tools - such as gcc - would also have to its source code released. This was simply unacceptable.
Although we had planned for no one outside of this company to ever use, let alone see the source code, we were now put in a difficult position. We could either give away our hard work, or come up with another solution. Although it was tought to do, there really was no option: We had to rewrite the code, from scratch, for Windows 10.
I think the biggest thing keeping Linux from being truly competitive with Microsoft is this GPL. Its draconian requirements virtually guarentee that no business will ever be able to use it. After my experience with Linux, I won't be recommending it to any of my associates. I may reconsider if Linux switches its license to something a little more fair, such as Microsoft's "Public License". Until then its attempts to socialize the software market will insure it remains only a bit player.
Thank you for your time.
As a fellow consultant, the fact that you didn't bother to research the license, don't know ext4 doesn't need to be defragmented by design, and primarily targeted the newest version of an OS that hasn't reached much penetration in the enterprise market yet makes me question the quality of your work. Being caught by an obscure corner in the license is one thing, but not to have done even the most basic research is pretty bad for someone who's entire job is based around that aspect - you also don't appear to separate your personal from your professional feelings, nor are you willing to take responsibility for your own mistake.
You might want to consider leaving the field of consulting, or at the very least, seriously work in these points - there is no purpose in performing a job who clearly either have no interest in doing or lack the support to carry out effectively, and you don't want to be miserable your whole career.
Can this be an OS for their D-Wave Quantum computer?
... is watching you!
How to mix colors:
First, start with at least 2 colors. (NOTE: "pick" is *NOT* a color!)
Rant:
They have: 1) Chrome OS, which is basically Chrome browser and a few extensions 2) Android, can run Chrome browser aswell 3) Android Wear, a small OS seeking a market.
Now they've already shown Chrome OS running Android apps, which is the dumbest thing ever, when Android is perfectly capable of running the Chrome browser why would you run a browser under Android under another browser! What is the f-ing point of Chrome OS to an Android user? And to the Chrome OS market (basically schools who want locked down minimal machines), what is the point of Android to them?? Do you think they want their Bejeweled on their school laptops?
Then we have Android, it is a big win for Google, but doesn't scale to large tablets. It's been held back by the lack of side-by-side apps. FINALLY they're adding multi-window support this month in Android Nougat... like only 4 years after Samsung introduced it on their Note range..
Big heap? I should be able to consume 90% of memory on a single app if its needed. Yet Big Heap limits me to 512MB on a 3GB tablet.
Limited stylus support. Samsung did a good job years ago, the only support on generic Android tablets is the mouse handler. If you pull out a stylus on Android, on most non-Samsung devices it looks to the program like a mouse pointer. With no information on when the stylus has been pulled out of the holder, or when its been removed from the screen. Because the software thinks its a mouse.
Crapware, every device loaded with unwanted surveillance crapware, some of which is yours. Don't ever ask me again if I "Agree" to send Wifi data to Google for a better location calculation, the answer is "Disagree", just like the last 50 times your shitting spyware app asked.
I have money, I want a powerful Android tablet to upgrade from my Galaxy Note pro 12.2.... if Google can't deliver a decent Android someone else should. Really Apple are the slowest at software development, yet their iPad Pro was out last year and Google can't even keep up with Apple, let alone Samsung. /rant
we were unable to defrag its ext4 file system
That's funny
The concept of having access to source code
Yeah. Imagine that.
Imbedded? Is that like what I do to your mom every night, or did you mean "embedded"?
A new OS from an advertising company, I'll jump right on that!
https://fuchsia.googlesource.c...
the consequences that we've seen from google's failure to use a self-protecting license includes:
* companies incorporating GPL'd code into Android (particularly video players) and not releasing the source
* performing DRM or other lock-downs ("Tivoisation") and in the case of qualcomm ending up with 900 million devices that are basically landfill
* causing confusion in the minds of corporations over the fact that the linux KERNEL (and u-boot) is still GPL'd
do i need to continue the list? i don't but i believe a reference to mjg59's list is appropriate:
http://www.codon.org.uk/~mjg59...
google seems unable to comprehend the severe detrimental consequences of its actions, and the effects that their decisions have on the rest of the software libre community. i appreciate that they're an advertising company so are required to maximise the effective distribution of devices so that they can thus maximise the number of devices through which they can advertise, but pissing all over the free software community that MADE IT POSSIBLE FOR THEM TO HAVE A BUSINESS AT ALL is completely unethical, not to mention the detrimental consequences and money that users have to throw away when devices turn out to have major security flaws that the designers CAN'T FIX IN THE FIELD. http://arstechnica.com/securit...
I hope they do a better job stewarding this thing than they did with Android. Todays Android is repeating all the same mistakes that Microsoft made with earlier versions of Windows. They gave way too much power to developers, so now Android may be an extremely flexible and powerful mobile OS, but it also requires every user to act as a sysadmin, constantly monitoring resources, manually killing apps, etc etc. Battery life is abysmal, and malware is ripe in the android ecosystem. And that's on top of the myriad landfill android devices which are so breathtakingly shotty that they arn't even fit for purposes as simple as a basic e-reader.
The fact is, is that you can't trust developers to code properly. Whether by design, lack of competence, or due to time crunches that result in taking short cuts, an OS *must* guard against rogue applications. Google's finally starting to understand that, based on what I'm reading in the release notes for Android 6 and 7, but they still have a ways to go.
If they don't correct this mistake while creating Fuscia, it won't matter how excitig and awesome it is. It will already have a major uphill battle, competing against established systems, so it will need to be solid right out of the gate just to compete.
It's too early to tell exactly what this OS is meant for.
New OS from biggest behavioral and personal data aggregator on the planet... Actually, I think we do know what it's meant for.
Thanks for encouraging me to visit the project page.
Now I can see that it's pure vapor.
wow did I just get time-warped back to 1995 or so? Tell us more of this strange GPL license you speak of...
... its attempts to socialize the software market will insure it remains only a bit player.
Bit player?! Do a thought experiment dude - imagine that Linux suddenly popped out of existence at this moment, and picture what would be left of the Internet and the www. As for the rest of your comment, you've already been modded down to hell - so just fuck off, shill.
'The Economy' is a giant Ponzi scheme whose most pitiable suckers are the youngest among us and the yet-unborn.
So, in typical Google fashion, rather than fix Android, they just walk away from it like every other Project, and create ANOTHER OS, but this time with a brand new luster of Vulnerabilities.
What a bunch of arrogant, ADHD children are Google...
I see you finally caught and fixed the ext2 reference.
Il n'y a pas de Planet B.
Although we had planned for no one outside of this company to ever use, let alone see the source code, we were now put in a difficult position. We could either give away our hard work, or come up with another solution. Although it was tought to do, there really was no option: We had to rewrite the code, from scratch, for Windows 10.
So, my question is: Why didn't you simply port it to OS X? It would have been infinitely simpler than rewriting from scratch, and a far better decision than subjecting the company to the spyware horrorshow that is Windows 10.
And please don't EVEN try to talk about the cost of replacing hardware with "expensive Macs". That (already suspect) argument would not have stood up against the immense cost of starting from scratch, rather than making a few simple tweaks to run under OS X.
Heck, even if your software was married to X11 in some way, you could have had that under OS X/macOS, too.
So, did you even ONCE stop to think of this ready alternative to the tyranny of the GPL?
BTW, this is why Apple never uses the GPL to license it's own F/OSS Projects (of which they have several).
Now this, gentlemen, is what a well crafted troll looks like.
Butt fucker!
Yes, take the advice of "macs4all" and port your enterprise system to OSX. No way that "macs4all" would have any motive other than what's best for your product. And lastly, let's test "macs4all"'s assessment of Windows 10 privacy because what the hell, "macs4all" would never try to bullshit you into using a Mac.
No worries, they will all go to Hell for 9/11.
If you aren't aware of the privacy issues in Windows 10 then you need to leave this field immediately.
Ohhhhhhhh you just reinstall the factory OS for your friends and family, you really have no idea how a computer works. My bad.
And everyone complains I use M$.
I don't know WHY Google is doing this. That description doesn't sound like it will do anything significantly better than an existing OS. QNX is a Realtime Operating System that also runs on a small hardware footprint, Android and Chromium already scale to mobile devices and desktops, what niche will this Fuschia run in?
The GPL is only tyrant to tyrants. Tivoisation should have no place in this world.
Hop in the DeLorean DMC-12 and we'll go back in time, flirt with our own moms and prevent android ever being created.
Please abandon Android while there is still time. Android came from trying to clone Blackberry by Java developers and then hamfistedly copy parts of iOS so it's the worst of everything.
If you're going to create a new OS, start by avoiding the mistakes Linux, and by extension Android made.
1) Don't break ABI with every new version (Hello, you can still run Windows 2.x and 3.x apps on 32-bit Windows 10 16-bit WoW if you wanted to), while there hasn't been a single version of Linux that hasn't broken ABI.
2) Create a universal binary format (eg arm, x86, x86-64) for both programs, drivers and firmware. Allow the OS to copy the binary parts it's compatible with into a secured cache so that compromising the filesystem doesn't compromise the OS even upon reboot. Allow the kernel to binary patch updates without restarting.
3) Keep user-space out of hardware space. You should not need to "su" to run everything that interfaces with hardware, which is the problem linux and unix-likes have, you should be able to just have a user-mode driver shim that interfaces with the kernel-mode driver and intelligently decides if the hardware can be shared in that way, and if it recognizes/authorizes that hardware-software pairing. The first time you run a game for example, it needs to communicate with the "vulkan" interface, not the nVidia CUDA interface. If something else is using the Vulkan interface (Eg desktop compositing) then the OS needs to create a virtual "compositor" device that is supported by the driver instead of trying to "soft render" a translation like what happens on every OS currently.
4) Stop using the web browser as a platform. This needs to be said, but all the tricks in the world is not going to create native performance inside a web browser. The web browser should support downloading and running universal signed binaries seamlessly once authorized. If the binary hash changes, it then needs to be re-authorized, and still remain cached.
The key thing here is a "universal binary" that can run on all platforms, not Java-style, but rather compiled to a statically compiled specification that requires no third-party libraries (eg statically compiled), and uses only Vulkan/OpenGL/OpenAL/OpenCL/OpenTCPIP/OpenUI/etc interfaces that the universal runtime has.
Right now there is no "universal runtime" because compiling software for one platform often requires UI wizardy and network/sound hardware initialization that is completely different on every platform.
Furthermore, after reviewing this GPL our lawyers advised us that any products compiled with GPL'ed tools - such as gcc - would also have to its source code released. This was simply unacceptable.
This is news to me... /eyeroll
We're accelerating to Plaid!
defrag for Linux
#!/bin/sh ..."
echo -n "Defragging all disks, this may take up to 2 minutes
sleep 120
echo " done"
Now this, gentlemen, is what a well crafted troll looks like.
Agreed. It pushes all the right buttons.
I am armed because I am free. I am free because I am armed.
FOSS drivers is the problem, not the OS. They should sit with all HW makers and find a way to release FOSS drivers for everything while protecting their IP and even standardize interfaces. This problem is what impedes OS research and new OSes. Nothing else.
Relevant:
http://imgur.com/gallery/A9Hv4
actually, yes: https://linux.slashdot.org/com...
!sig
CIA Psychology 101 -- Fuchsia is FUCK CIA
... It was brought to our attention that Linux is copyrighted under something called the GPL, or the Gnu Protective License. Part of this license states that any changes to the kernel are to be made freely available. Unfortunately for us, this meant that the great deal of time and money we spent "touching up" Linux to work for this investment firm would now be available at no cost to our competitors.
Furthermore, after reviewing this GPL our lawyers advised us that any products compiled with GPL'ed tools - such as gcc - would also have to its source code released. This was simply unacceptable.
Your Lawyer got one thing right. Yes, if you are using the work done by Torvalds and many, many other people, you are doing so on the condition that your improvements are shared with them, just as their work and improvements are shared with you.
It is a "common work" system. Everyone works together to make the whole thing a little better. If you really improved Linux? Then lots of people around the world -- not just your competitors, but everyone who uses Linux -- will benefit from this.
That's not a "Gnu Protective License", that's a "Gnu Public License".
Now, not only did you get the title wrong, but the whole "it was compiled by gcc, therefore must be made public" is false. If your lawyer told you that, then your lawyer is an idiot.
It simply is not true.
Your improvements to Linux must be shared with everyone else; that's the condition of a no-cost, relatively bug-free, operating system with access to the source.
Your personal programs, even if compiled with Linux tools, are your personal programs.
Recently however, a top online investment firm asked us to do some work using Linux. ... Unfortunately for us, this meant that the great deal of time and money we spent "touching up" Linux to work for this investment firm would now be available at no cost to our competitors.
YES! That is exactly it.
You were asked by this firm to use Linux.
You did so.
Now your improvements benefit both this firm *and the rest of the world*.
Bill your client for the work that includes helping others. That is the nature of Linux.
*Warning*
While there is nothing wrong with using Apple's systems to work on, develop, and deploy your systems, *do not use any Apple technology in your system*.
Apple is full of discarded/dead enterprise-level technologies. Just look at Web Objects/EOF. Now consider what came before it. Now consider that you cannot even run those older OS's/systems inside virtual machines -- I think 10.7 was the first one that you could legally license for use in a virtual machine, and every Apple-specific technology was dead by then.
Now, to address the parent:
BTW, this is why Apple never uses the GPL to license it's own F/OSS Projects (of which they have several).
No, it is because of the changes in GPL 3.
In GPL 2, it was possible to have full access to the source code, and the ability to compile it, but be unable to install the new version on the device. This was called "tivoing", after it was discovered that Tivo did this -- the software to be installed had to be signed and approved by the firmware in the box. Since it was not possible to replace the system and update the software, this was technically compliant, but against the spirit of the license.
GPL3 made changes for two major reasons: one, some of the terms used in 2 had legal definitions in some jurisdictions that did not match the intent of the Gnu team (solution: new terms with precise definitions in the license), and two: *making sure that you can actually change the software on a device if that device is using GPL software*. This is the part that Apple, and others, cannot stand.
Apple is full of discarded/dead enterprise-level technologies. Just look at Web Objects/EOF. Now consider what came before it. Now consider that you cannot even run those older OS's/systems inside virtual machines -- I think 10.7 was the first one that you could legally license for use in a virtual machine, and every Apple-specific technology was dead by then.
Every OS is full of discarded/dead "enterprise-level" technologies, FFS! OS X/macOS is, on balance, pretty much the same as every other modern, overbloated OS (Linux included).
I don't think you've even been able to buy WebObjects for over a decade; and if OS X/macOS SERVER still includes a limited license for it (which it very well may not at this point), that's about the extent of continuing WO support.
But WO was some pretty cool stuff in the day; too bad it didn't see wider adoption.
You are dead wrong about the virtualization licensing for OS X/macOS: it is actually worse than you misstated. Unless Apple has recently changed their Virtualization stance, there is only ONE version of OS X that is allowed to be virtualized: OS X SERVER 10.6.8 You can actually STILL order a DVD Install disc of that version from Apple Tech Support. And you can install it on a VM.
Oh, I thought Apple had made it "All server versions from now on can be vitualized".
Only the 10.6.8? Not 10.7.5?
Well, at least you can have a virtual Rosetta :-).
===
As for discarded Enterprise-level stuff: Microsoft, for all it's ... behavior, manages to keep things in Windows long past any reasonable expiration date, because there are things out there that depend on it.
Linux? What part of the OS (and we're talking about distributions at this point) contains enterprise-level tools that cannot be installed on a current system?
===
EOF: EOF used to be a standard part of the operating system. Then, it was bundled as part of Web Objects, again part of the operating system. Then it was moved to Java, and Java was a 'first-class language'. Then the toll-free bridge died, Java became less than first class, and EOF/WO became a pure java library. Then it just ... died.
Later, there came out a Core Data system, which had most of EOF for non-database apps. But ... well, apparently there was no way to actually implement persistent storage, despite Apple providing an API that should have permitted it, but after a couple of years, several developers said it was demonstrably not possible in a real-world application. It isn't clear that Apple ever provided a sample, working, tested usage of that API.
As a fellow consultant, the fact that you didn't bother to research the license, don't know ext4 doesn't need to be defragmented by design
Yes it does: e4defrag
Nice choice of name for when your OS crashes.
(Credits to Annie M.G. Schmidt for the Dutch song text Do you want a cutting of the fuch, fuch, fuchsia" )
I dont think they threw out Linux out of Android because of GPL, the problem Google had with Android is Java. Linux has worked fine for a decade in Android. I think the reason they discard Linux is something else. Maybe some technical reason.
The Magenta kernel's use of ref-counted "kernel objects" and handles is straight out of NT. Except that Magenta uses fugly_function_names.