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IBM is going to support Linux
Well, according to this report,
IBM is going to fully support Linux, and Sell PowerPC based machines
(low end RS/6000) bundled with Linux. Its about time.
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Because we still don't have IBM making nice affordable ATX mobo's for us. Oh well, it's a start.
It would be nice to see something in the workstation range, rather than starting with $15,000 servers like Compaq
$15k U.S.? I can get a lot of Sparc/Solaris for
that kinda money!
Nonetheless, this is good news. As others have
noted, it'd be nice to see some efforts towards
lower-end PPC machines. I'd love to see an
affordable (i.e.: sub- US$2.5k, let's say?)
workstation-class PPC machine running Linux.
i want a print driver for linux for the damn
IBM 4019 L printer...its old ancient and I'm stuck with it. It doesnt have postscript and I cant get the filters to do jack.
I guess I will have to stick with my iMac running Linux. But all they have to do is produce mother boards that support the latest PPC chips. The rest will happen on its own I think.
Now that M$ is using the Linux defence.
Of course this is probably beyond the scope of this lawsuit. I believe it extends only to x86 architecture, which is where M$ has a monopoly.
It's all about standards. Anyone not complying
to the standards that have been layed out (open
standards, I might add) is doomed to fail.
IBM just gets it now. In a few years, not
supporting linux (or derivatives) will be like
not (ahem) supporting HTML now.
Linux is the de-facto base for developement.
Think back to when you were growing bacteria in
Biology 101.
Actually we already have some proprietary clustering and high availability products on the AIX platform. If our regular customers demanded these products on Linux, I don't doubt that they would be ported.
The one point I am personally unsure of is how IBM can fit into the Open Source movement. That is, we pulled down some 14 BILLION dollars in software sales alone last year. How can we maintain those numbers with "free" software solutions? Our customers are happy to buy binaries-only at this point so there is no need to change.
In other words, just about anything is possible. But there has to be a clear picture of where the money is going to come from and that sum of money has to be bigger than what we can pull down under the current arrangement. Some here will doubtlessly call this "corporate greed". I am no bean counter, personally, but I call this "good business".
How can IBM make "good business" and support Open Source projects like Beowulf?
screw 4.3, linux will be my next OS upgrade..:)
ive been haveing wet dreams about linux on our
F50 for a long time, good to see that dreams
do come true...:)
Kether
Here's a question for IBM people reading.
Now that IBM is supporting Linux, where can we ask
to get detailed technical information for the IBM
Wireless LAN Entry (PCMCIA) card released. IBM
no longer sells the card, so I can't imagine that
it is so important to keep this information
private anymore.
IBM doesn't have to support the card under Linux,
they just need to put the information out there,
and the Linux driver will get developed.
I want a *free* machine. Seems to me that Linux is getting destroyed with all this properitery hardware and software.
Everything should be GPL.
IBM, by charging for their products, is limiting my god-given right to free speech. How can I express myself I can't use products to express my opinion?
for unix?
Kinda odd as I just reading Slashdot.com from a R6/6000 earlier today.. AIX is definitley not as good as Linux.
How about "Iron Penguin"? 8-)
what reasons do you have to make that claim?
-gng
IBM, why you (_only_) sell Intel Pentium II in laptops and desktops? If you make a new computer, not necessarily Mac OS compatible, but a consumer chosen OS, giving it a different try :) get pay to sell _basic_ hardware (0)
:) get pay to support OS and software.
add services and support options for _hopefully_ different OS, like Linux and Be OS and NetBSD and OpenBSD. Like even _different_ Linux distributions as build to order option
Hardware with OpenFirmware (OpenBoot), that worked...while I think it is easier to make money on hardware for IBM. I'm not saying IBM software sucks. Most software in general is incomplete and it is hard to make money even with sponsors. Sell software you _can_ support, learn of, and succeed to innovate upon.
You were reading what?
I also worked there very recently.. Middle and upper management are terminally brain-dead. I sat near a bunch of the sysadmins, they were all contract guys, and everyone was working on their MSCE, the way to riches, or so they think.. There were no Motorolans doing 1st or second level support. Only the plant backbone was run by real employees. Talk about security holes.. Most of the MSCE-wannabes are junior-college dropouts working for body-shops like Hal Kinyon or other contract shops. Moto needs a IBM-style meltdown to remove all the weasels and no-ops in management. Right now Somerset is in complete meltdown, Intel is snagging designers right and left. The guy who runs the place is so busy trying to create his little empire and help the homeland, he doesnt see that his staff is rapidly leaving. I had to get the hell out of there to keep my sanity. The place is 100% dilbert-zone wierdness. There was a manger who went around and checked your foils for improper fonts and bullet colors in powerpoint, this was for a weekly meeting! You'd have to spend hours doing the damn things, and then sit in the meeting for another couple of hours, stupid!
...as Linux. It is a very proprietary *NIX. However, it is quite scalable. Excellent administration tool (SMIT). And we could really use the Journalling File System.
Unfortunately everything that is worthwhile on AIX is proprietary. Maybe this embracing of Linux by IBM will force them into porting parts of Linux back up to AIX and making it a more open system.
Support
IBM has Terrific support available,lot of people need it even expert,you could recap the money there.
The "Linux Defense" never really applied anyway since the whole trial is basically dealing with Windows software. The Microsofties would love for you to think otherwise though....
Who cares about your opinion MS Flunky?
IBM does a very good job providing support to its large customers who can pay for it. However, IBM is losing out big to Intel in the small hardware market where OEMs assemble cheap, fast machines and provide the support. Intel makes certain that plenty of cheap x86 motherboards that use standard components and add ons are always available to these vendors. In doing so, Intel sells a lot of higher margin microprocessors. A great number of these OEMs are now providing Linux as an option on their machines, including even some big shots like DELL (see www.linux.org for a partial list.) A wonderful thing about Linux, as you know, is that it is cross platform: x86, alpha,PPC, sparc, mips, etc., etc. All these OEMs offer fast, cheap x86 machines, some offer fast, cheap Alpha machines, and virtually none offer fast, cheap PPC machines.
Cheap PowerPC motherboards would create a demand for IBM's PowerPC chips running an operating system that is cross platform and can be easily upgraded or modified by IBM or any OEM who wants to support IBM's hardware.
like the 390 in the toronto lab that the summer intern ported linux to, to the astonishment of all the PHB's? boy did that project get kill quicker than a cockroach in a clean room or what?
I would love to see one of these run BeOS. I'd buy one right away since BeOS won't run on an Apple G3.
I'd dual boot LinuxPPC and BeOS.
So what else is new?
In 1981 I sent letters (well, it was a long time ago) to all the then-manufacturers of the new "16 bit processors," asking for data sheets and programming data.
Most of them sent the usual vaporware and slicksheets, but two were remarkable.
Intel sent (via UPS) a good-sized cardboard box full of goodies, including just about every data book partially relevant to computer building. This, you understand, was to a private address, not a business.
Motorola sent a price list for their data books.
Ever wonder why so many people picked Intel in the beginning?
Ric Locke
warlocke@wf.net
True. Another thing to consider is that a lot of the Linux as well as OSS development is coming from *OUTSIDE* the US. That means as Linux and the other OSS software take hold in the 2nd and 3rd world countries you will see an entirley new generation of people working on/with the software who will be familar with OSS concepts
I knew it was an impressive fart, but
to have someone in cyberspace feel it...
I am impressed.
Easy.
Right now you have hosts of people working on, i.e. around the problems with, NT, Solaris, and others. Most of those people can be taken off that duty, and put to work on something that actually makes money. CATIA, for instance; one of your crown jewels.
You have a lot of other stuff like that. Stuff that's world class, that you can pretty much charge what you want for. Why are you paying Danegelt to somebody else for the right to run it on the various machines? When you can do it for--well, not free, see below, but cheaply?
The operating system is like the cabinet the machine's in. The customer doesn't give a rat's whatever, as long as it looks nice and the software runs on it. Given that, why spend perfectly good money making your own, when there's a way to get good stuff nearly free?
A small number of those NT-supporters and similar dead losses can be allowed to work on contributions to "free" i.e. open source software. After all, you only have to work on (and pay for the work on) part of the OS, but you get it all. Any bean counter ought to love that; if one tells you it isn't good business, ask to see his MBA. It'll be harder to convince the lawyers, but persevere.
Small but measurable benefit: suddenly every Linux programmer out there (not me, unfortunately) is at least potentially part of the IBM support staff! OS support could even be contracted out in some cases. Remember that there are Linux fanatics in some odd corners of the globe. It might be cheaper in some cases to put a local on contract than to export a high-dollar IBMer. It might not, too; that requires thought.
Add to that what's been suggested elsewhere: start supporting Linux on consumer-grade (high-end consumer grade, needless to say) hardware. That starts pumping money into the PowerPC hardware folks, who (as has been remarked) are going nowhere despite having an excellent product.
You won't be increasing software revenue--top line numbers--but you'll be decreasing the cost of producing that software, decreasing support costs, and increasing hardware revenue; and you'll no longer be hostage to whatever idiocy they dream up in Redmond. After IBM got burned so bad, I'd think that would be at least a minor priority around there.
Ric Locke
warlocke@wf.net
Well, they have to start somewhere. It's not like a big company like IBM goes from no-Linux to Linux-everywhere overnight (especially after they've just spent big dollars retraining their Global Services consultants on NT.) What better than a small set of obscure models sold to a specific market (edu).
This could be the rebirth of IBM's CHRP strategy. A company like IBM can't stand paying Intel to make computers for them, and would love to have it's own alternative. Linux could make that happen where Apple wouldn't (licence) and Os/2 could'nt (port).
I'm commenting from the perspective of a low-end user.
IMHO, as we already know, IBM has made a mistake in the past by virtually "giving" the PC market to MS. What IBM do is to ignore the PC market when it is just been formed. Now the PC market has grown so huge that MS is in a comfortable position to use their resource to venture into other areas, notably the server and hand-held market. If you look at the MS revenue, you'll notice that even with 15-25% of the PC market, there is still good money to be earned.
With MS monopoly, it is no longer possible for other proprietary desktop OS to challenge Windows. Only an Open Source OS, ie. Linux, stand a real chance. The unique quality of an Open Source project is that it is not owned by any single vendor, thus is more likely to become an open standard acceptable to all party. The customers will also have less worry of being locked by a vendor.
So IBM can make money by providing what is lacking in the Linux environment, either in open source or in binary form. Some suggestions:
- OS/2 has a good GUI? Why not port it to Linux?
- Easy to use administration tool that is able to handle single PC up to entire network of PC.
- Productivity tools such as spread sheet, word processor etc.
- User friendly database front end to DB2 to compete with MSSQL.
- Speech and hand writing recognition.
- Device drivers for all IBM hardware.
- Other IBM innovations.
Because Linux is already a strong server OS, many of the Linux desktop products would also be able to sell to small business to large enterprises. Consider, which company don't use a word processor? IBM should actively help to develop the Linux market instead of just waiting for it to grow.Linux provides a route for IBM to re-establish it's PowerPC line. The Unix market never really depended on CPU A versus CPU B - it really comes down to price/performance ratio, and it's the same with Linux (due to it's portable nature and open source). IBM could potentially make some PPC boxes that blow away Intel and in addition, IBM will keep the profit.
Look at Compaq/Digital - they are keeping Alpha as an NT solution because their's plenty of money in selling the things and supporting them. They probably don't see a dollar from software (which goes to MS).
For those that don't remmeber CHRP was the hardware specification for PowerPC's that would standardize the hardware made by Apple, IBM, and others that would make PowerPC computers. The iMac was the first CHRP computer to see the light of day. Motorola made one a year before but it never made it out of the lab.
I, too, would jump on any consumer-priced PPC based machine if you would just offer it. I hope you are reading these comments, I think there just might be some serious potential here.
--SONET
As I understand it, the next linux file system (ext3?) is journalled - I remember hearing something about Steven Tweedie at Red Hat working on it.
A Logical Volume Manager is currently available for Linux, which is independent of whether the file system is journalled. It was developed in Germany, and is patterned after the HP-UX LVM - same commands, same syntax...
Look under the bridge, troll.
I understand that these are probably expensive, but what about these boards from Motorola?
t s/boards/ppcmtx.html
http://www.mcg.mot.com/WebOS/omf/GSS/MCG/produc
I'm pretty sure General Dynamics / Electric Boat facility is running catia on NT. I know for a fact they run it on SGI stuff.
Has anyone ever bothered to consider the Redmond based giant, Microsoft, is behind this latest push for Linux which dramatically increased during the DOJ US VS. M$ Trial, and is most likely a successful attempt to facilitate competition, as is Intel's interest in BeOS. To prevent Microsoft from being recognized as a monopoly, Microsoft cleverly timed the release of the halloween documents, and then hyped Linux, BeOS, and other underdog operating system support strongly, so their defense could include those operating systems as developing competition. ``The hand is no diffrent than what it creates''
You're looking at the problem from customer's perspective. Sure, GM can start making free cars and all the customers will be happy. Billions in sales instantly. But it would be a bad business model just as writing OSS is a bad business model.
If you subtract that (i.e. replace all current x86
PC client and server Windows products with
Linux), and then add a full PPC line targeted at
the same market segment, with NCs, desktops,
servers, and laptops, all using Linux; might that
be able to make up for any loss in your software
sales?
If IBM supports Linux, then let's see the specs for the MWAVE audio... It'd be nice to finally have Linux drivers for that (once-)cool hardware.
Some potatoes could turn out big, esp coupled with mass volume. I believe some applications on Linux may be worth IBM's while, its up to them to judge which.
Hell, when is M$ bashing ever off topic here?
Ha! As far as I can see, I'm merely stating facts instead of bashing MS. So, when will useful desktop applications available on Linux as well as on Windows?
interoperability, of course, will be a requirement)....And if it were easy to move between whatever W2K foists on the world, even better
That's the point of following open standards.
Have you considered turning off X-Files? Hell, turn off tv for that matter. It's turning your nerual net to spaghetti.
I hate RMSbots.
I don't want to make the bean counters put off by linux, but is it Legal to port linux to some new archetecture, and not release it?
Well said! Your post here and others at deeper levels of this thread are some of the most lucid and thought-provoking that I've seen with regards to the OSS movement and the effects that it may have on the industry in quite some time.
/.
Thanks for reminding me why I read
-posting anonymously because I forgot who I am
What do I need for running Linux on RS6k? I have plenty of 43Ps that are bored most of the time.
IBM lost it chokehold on the industry in part because they during the 10 year antitrust battle stopped or downplayed anything that could fuel the antitrust suit, because they were afraid of loosing.
It's the same thing here. The problem is that the party that stops being agressive will eventually loose no matter what.
The trials will go on for years - if Microsoft loose, you can be sure they'll appeal. If we are going to ask everyone to put Linux on hold in order to make sure it isn't a viable defense for Microsoft, then it won't be a viable defense for Microsoft simply because Linux will seize to be competition for them at all, and whither away.
We can't be afraid of giving Microsoft ammo for their defense - after all, they will have to constrain themselves for a long time during the trial. This is the time to attack, and attack them hard, to make sure that no matter whether they win or loose the trial, they loose the market.
Who cares if Microsoft wins the trial, if they do it because Linux really have become a powerful competitive force, and Microsoft loose their monopoly that way?
Can't you tell the guy is being sarcastic when complains about not having the IBM machines free of charge?
The hack documented in the Linux readmes gets you only 8-bit sampled audio. Not even close to good enough.
I thought NT only ran on "PREP" (the predesesor to CHRP), and not CHRP. Plus there's no USB support in NT.
It would make more sense to chalk it up to the economics of the computer industry vs. the lack of laws and precedents governing its development. IBM's battle with the DOJ some years ago cost it time, money, and finally its throne atop the industry _even though_ they won the case. I'm sure that competitors began making major advances while IBM was occupied, and the same will happen now with M$.
The easy way I would guess would have been to compile a kernel to run in the OpenEdition enviroment - it's a UNIX Spec1170 complaint runtime env for UNIX applications. Works rather like WINE - UNIX calls get translated into OS/390 calls as far as I know. That way you have OS/390 'under' the Linux kernel and even if Linux dies the OS/390 can start a new VM can keep Linux running.
I don't think you want Linux to have complete control of the S/390 - OS/390 still has a lot that Linux lacks, and until mainframe hardware get into pocket range I don't think Linux will get there - too few developers...
Just my 0.02 - flame way!
...this is why I won't buy a Netwinder. When they came out, I asked Corel where I could download the source code to peruse. They declined. They said the source was not available. I could not find it anywhere.
Nobody made a big stink. Everyone was singing high praise of Corel and their wonderful port of Linux to the StrongARM. But nobody demanded the source.
What good is the GPL if we don't enforce it?
There is *no* love lost between Microsoft and IBM. All those BILLIONS of dollars Microsoft is pulling in on NT were originally supposed to be IBM's. IBM would be a much bigger company today if it weren't for Microsoft's shady business practices. Everybody at IBM knows it.
This is just an opportunity for IBM to attempt a jihad.
By the same token, what interest could AIX (i.e. mission citical highly scalable OS) possibly have in an OS like Linux? If the custom wants to be able to run another OS, for whatever reason, they ought to be able to without receiving critcism, even if it doesn't make sence to you.
Just because some customer has different interests than what you might have doesn't mean they are less important or that their request is less legitimate. BeOS is a much better desktop than Linux. Linux is a better server than BeOS. If you want a box for running an alternative server why not let another customer voice support for an alternative desktop?
To me, it makes more sense to want BeOS than it does to want Linux. You already have a great server OS with about every feature a server OS could ask for. Linux in this space would seem a bit humble (for mission-critical highly-scalable uses that is) in the glass house. On the other hand, there is no good desktop OS available for RS/6000s right now. BeOS is about as good a desktop OS as you could dream up so it stands to be a better compliment to the AIX than what Linux might be.
And the space shuttle is definately not as good as my brand new Yugo. It kind of depends who you are and what you want to do with it doesn't it? After all, most people who buy RS/6000s buy them to run mission-critcal stuff on, not to download and run the latest Linux port of the "Barney's Great Adventure" game.
Put Linux on your hardware, and then package it with a proprietary, usable-by-mortals web database package.
All of us end users are just crying for some high priced hand holding. After dBase and Paradox were killed off, there's nothing for us, absolutely nothing.
Come on man, wake up and join the world. The Fortune 500 isn't the only group that keeps track of things.
they may be elite, but they's slow as dogs and waaaay overpriced..
Why'd you think IBM got out of the Unix laptop market? They initially retailed for over $10000, and they aren't supported in the newer versions of AIX..
Gimme a Pentacle-based linux laptop anyday..
You don't understand....
... Linux can be configured easily for desktop apps, or server apps, or a combination. It's open, you can build it any way you like. And if you don't want something (like SMP in a kernel for a UP box) then _DON'T BUILD IT IN_! OSS gives you that freedom!
Linux is indeed both a floor wax and a dessert topping..
funny, they've been pretty good about my laptop.. had it sent back twice, both times service was prompt (if a bit clueless and scripty) and thorough.. That's on my Inspiron 3000, not even their top-of-the-line.. And it runs Linux, XFree, KDE, etc very comfortably in 144MB/6.4GB.. ;)
Cheers,
- Matt
Question: Did IBM buy CATIA from Dassault? Last I heard IBM just had the USA distribution rights..
;)
btw: AIX is pretty big in France.. They even named a town after it!
(but seriously, check out www-frec.bull.com, they offer lots of pre-lpp'd GNU AIX tools, and Bull sells AIX-compatible boxes)
You mentioned that CHRP was killed...dude you really need to pay a little more attention to what's happening in the Apple scheme of things. They're using standard AT and ATX sized motherboards now, ZIF sockets for their chips, they removed the ROM from the motherboard, began using cheaper IDE drives, etc. Even the RAM type has changed to a PC standard, and the newest G3's use a standard VGA connector for the monitor. Apple never killed CHRP, they implemented it slowly and cautiously over time to make sure everything worked 1oo%. If only more companies took so much care of their hardware/software implementation we might see a higher standard of quality industry-wide.
And I for one would LOVE to be able to build my own PPC system from the ground up and save a bundle (powerpc chips alone have always been cheaper and more power efficient than Intel). However, my current system I'm building will have an overclocked Celery 300a at it's heart. Maybe next year...
The PowerSeries workstation wasn't _that_ expensive... And it could run AIX, Solaris or NT.. (and now Linux)..
In fact, part of why IBM killed it was because it undercut the price of its RS6k equal pretty badly..
I should be able to download it by FTP. I do not own a Netwinder. I do not want to buy a Netwinder. However, they have modified GPL source and the code is supposed to be readily available for free, right? By only shipping it with the Netwinder and not putting it up for anonymous FTP they are denying me something that they are legally obligated to provide.
And don't forget fixdist.
THE best patch download system.
Comparing all the AIX tools, smitty, jfs/lvm, fixdist, dynamic kernel makes the other commercial proviers (sgi,sun,compaq,hp) look like amateurs.
Amen!
The F40 (and I would assume the F50 also) is supposedly a CHRP machine. Anybody want to try booting MacOS on one?
AIX a good system. Get Real !!!
/etc/rc.nfs, smit it, then comment back in ypbind (commenting out ypbind seems to help us as smit often fails to make the correct changes). This seems to be the safest way for us.
It sucks big time.
I admin many types of Unices (SunOS, Solaris,AIX, HP-UX, IRIX, Linux) and the AIX machines cause many more problems than the others. SMIT is not a good tool. It is a tree based admin tool. For non Unix people it is hardly intuitive. You have to leap up and down levels to do anything, there is no logical progression through it for any specific task (just try adding a disk with the logical volume manager, you really have to know what your doing). Compare with NT's disk admin (as much as it troubles me to say), maybe not as powerful but does 90% of what you might want to do.
Most Unix people I know would prefer to just hack files in vi. This is not easy in AIX as everything tends to be in nonstandard places and in nonstandard formats (the shadow password file leaps straight to mind not just a bit different totally different). I cannot believe you have to non trivially have to port scripts for this so called standard Unix. I would say IRIX has the edge in user friendly and GUI like admin tools as well.
How on earth do you change IP address on the damn thing when ypbind hangs the boot. On Solaris (say) boot -s and vi the hosts file. What is the equivalent on AIX boot from CD comment out ypbind in
Also typical IBM you have to pay lots of cash to allow more than 2 users to rlogin into the back of the thing. It actually stops you (Doesn't Digital Unix do this too).
When the thing detects a disk error it spams email to root every few seconds telling him about it. Which jerk made that the default. And while we are on error logging. What was so wrong with syslog why invent a whole new error logging system.
I can give you loads more examples. We can always hope it gets better with the SCO/Sequent/IBM alliance.
I so agree with the Red Unix Admin Bible that says "IBM, backwards as ever, flogs a weirdo product called AIX, which they deny stands for Ain't UNIX ".
Lotus R5 could be the program that has the possibility of smacking MS upside the head if it were to be ported to Linux. The industry strength of IBM along with the trendiness of Linux could really be something cool. MS cant port Office to Linux because that hurts their Windows market. IBM can port Lotus to Linux because it ultimately means selling more units. AIX does not have the hype that Linux does. Linux does not have the apps that AIX does. They are in perfect compliment.
There already was an article that they have it
running in the lab. The exec said they haven't
got any requests for it.
As an IBM shareholder and son of a 30-year employee, I watch the company a lot. I don't think IBM needs to worry to much about losing revenue from software sales by supporting open source. The company's shift to being a "solutions provider" during the 90's is the SOLE reason for its resurgence of late. Right now services and consulting account for somehting like 60% of the company's revenue.
I think Gerstner and the boys learned their lesson from the clones that destroyed their dominance of the PC market in the 80's and they are aware of the problems that producing software alone will entail.
For IBM, the new solution is this: Don't make it, make it work. If open source and linux will do the job, an IBM tech will be there to help you do it right.
No, I'm looking at it from the market's perspective.
Sorry, there is no such thing. Market is determined by a combination of producers' perspectives (supply) and customers' perspectives (demand).
If the market dictates that the average price of a car is dropping, GM better find a way to make cheaper cars.
Doesn't follow. AMD did this and guess what, they are expected to announce a loss this quarter. And there is a big difference between "cheaper" and "free."
Likewise, computer companies might want to keep selling closed source software at high prices, but OSS is going drive the price down.
OSS will cease to exist without a thriving closed source software market. Don't believe me? Look at where Linus and Gimp guys are working.
It makes no difference if IBM decides to contribute to the free software movement. They still have to react to it. IMHO, they are going to be better off leading the way, rather than having the market force the change upon them like what happened in the late 80s/early 90s.
There are millions of possible business opportunities out there. Unfortunately, most of them are not very profitable (like OSS). Only a suicidal company would lose its core business and dive into unknown without a really close examination of it before making a change.
If licensing was hurting Apple's profits, I'd say it was good for them to pull the plug. I want to see an alternative OS out there, and Mac and Linux are the two biggest players. Apple needs to survive.
I do think it was stupid for them to make it so impossible for the Be folks to get any details on the architecture, though. Making their hardware popular is going to help make the MacOS popular, too. More potential Mac boxes around. Sure, you or I may buy this PPC to run Be, but in two years I may sell it to someone who wants to run MacOS. Now if only Apple would see it that way.
Why dont you jump on an aix box w/4019 installed and go into the virtual printer and hack it into a printcap file...
Granted. But I glossed over...
Don't support the W2K bug!
NT support ends at IBM with NT4 (and whatever Service Packs Redmond delivers. Future products will be based on Linux.
Put the AIX people to work on OSS
This will be hard and will cause much wailing and gnashing of teeth, but I'm suggesting that IBM get ahead of the wave, like it used to be, instead of behind. OS is not a profit center, it's a cost center. That's not the way it is now, at this instant, but it will be soon, and you can write that on the wall and check back with me.
If you can cut cost out of the OS you can either (1) reduce the price of software to the end user [they can use the savings to buy ski tickets in Hell] or (2) increase the profit margin of the IBM-unique, crown-jewel stuff.
Tell the truth, if you know: how much does it actually COST IBM to put AIX on a box? If you could cut that significantly, wouldn't it look good on the bottom line?
And here's another write-it-on-the-wall-and-check-back item: W2K is going to cost you a bloody fortune to support. It's the world's biggest BASIC program. If you don't cut out support for that, you're going to find yourself throwing scads of money down a hole, not to mention the not-small checks to that guy in Redmond.
Ric Locke
warlocke@wf.net
the OCO bitterness has continued in a low-key way on the mainframe mail lists and newsgroups. They aren't getting out shotguns or such, and are usually (not always!) pleased with the support IBM provides, but many/most of these are sysprogs and they aren't happy with the "binaries only."
You really think it's that easy to become the next RedHat?
it's all about branding, m'boy. RedHat has a killer brand. And what's more, all the hardware manufacturers looking to make some money off Linux are discovering that all paths lead to RedHat.
best rethink your position.
> SMIT is not a good tool
;-) Other than that, IRIX isn't much to have. It's great for hacking with stack-exploits. Been there, done that, bought the T-shirt and got bored of it.
.44! You really haven't explored SMIT much have you? Why do I even bother with you.. It's all in the config
Ok, for starters: I have to agree here in some extent. There are some things that are too simple to be done via SMIT and therefore IBM has left the user (luser in your case) the option to use low-level commands to do the tasks. The example you mentioned: adding a disk. This obviously shows that you have no idea of AIX systemadministration! Why not just run cfgmgr -v or if you're in a hurry try cfgmgr -v -l
And please, do not mention the M$ mousedriver and AIX in the same article in the future, OK?
> Most Unix people I know would prefer to just hack files in vi. This is not easy in AIX...
Ok, that's one of the #1 reasons NT has gained market, and you see _that_ as a good thing.. I guess you just happened to click the wrong link at some M$ friendly site... poor you. I agree that the ODM can get messed up sometimes, but that's usually because of admins like you and our beloved vi editor. The non-standard files/places is in fact true most of the time, I'll give you that,
so the score's now...?
> I would say IRIX has the edge in user friendly and GUI like admin tools as well.
Don't get me started on this one! I guess if you consider root access for all local users (dumb and smart) + some smarter external users to be user friendly, then you just raised your score a little
> How on earth do you change IP address on the damn thing
What about SMIT or even something as simple as:
chdev -l 'en0' -a netaddr='1.1.1.1' -a state='up'
Might need some ifconfig down/detach before, but
you get the idea (I hope..)
> when ypbind hangs the boot.
For starters, a competent sysadmin plans his AIX
downtime so when you take down your system, ever thought about stopping NIS?? A competent sysadmin also has no need to reboot his system unless for a hardware change or some extensive fix install (kernel etc..). After all, we're not talking the M$ mousedriver here.
> commenting out ypbind seems to help us as smit often fails to make the correct changes
Could be a bug. Get the latest bos.net.tcp.* filesets. Also upgrade SMIT (bos.sysmgt.smit)
> Also typical IBM you have to pay lots of cash to > allow more than 2 users to rlogin into the back of the thing.
OK, someone just blew their foot off with a Magnum
> When the thing detects a disk error it spams email to root every few seconds telling him about it. Which jerk made that the default.
Let's see.. Wait! I know the answer.. ehh.. Oh yes! That would be the jerk who installed/configured/admins the machine! Can you spell jerk? I bet you can't! I have never been spammed by the errdemon (it is correctly spelled!) so it's obviously not a default since I've installed and administrated and supported enough AIX systems to last a lifetime. And never heard or seen the kind of spamming you mentioned.
> And while we are on error logging.
..and the subject "Morons who type before they think"...
> What was so wrong with syslog why invent a whole new error logging system.
Geez! That's a tough one. I run *.debug on my AIX but strangely enough, I've never seen any tape or disk errors show up in it. Neither HACMP, SP, ADSM, network cards any kind of HARDWARE errors. Or any specific software errors with sensecodes etc... All this can be viewed with errpt -a, but that's probably too much for you to comprehend.
> I can give you loads more examples.
And so can I, but I, unlike you, have a real job to get on with. One which involves learning and thinking and actually using my AIX knowledge for a good cause.
> We can always hope it gets better with the SCO/Sequent/IBM alliance.
We surely live in interesting times. The result of that alliance remains to be seen.
Well, I have ranted enough for a while. If I could reach out and LART someone, you'd certainly be the first one in line. Hopefully the next time you let your fingers run amok on your coffee stained keyboard (with the cute little extra M$ keys) you'll be in some forum that isn't actually being read by people who know their bussiness.
The GPL does not force you to redistribute changes. However, if you *do* redistribute changes, they must be in open source form. One of RMS' major complaints about the NPL (which requires you to re-release all changes back to Netscape) was that the GPL gives you the freedom to redistribute, but also the freedom *not* to redistribute. The NPL forces you to redistribute.
> Firstly I so so hate when debate like this drops to the level of personal abuse.
c al.
Ok, I admit it was kinda below the belt. But your previous post wasn't exactly fair to AIX as you may notice afterwards, I hope.
You should've been more specific about the whole disk thing, because as you say, there's no logical path for the whole add_disk/add_to_vg/create_lv/create_jfs procedure. Logical path in the sense of "Do-it-all-at-once-in-once-simple-procedure"-logi
I assume you have noticed that there are help menus available in SMIT? Those can actually be helpful at times. I'm only asking this because I know many people who just won't realise that they are there. They may not be the best help available, but they're worth a look.
> As to changing the IP address 90% of the time someone will disconnect a machine from the network take it to another building...
Ok, I know this one. The machine will come 90% of the time, even if it's configured with the wrong IP. It just takes quite a while. AIX will wait for a timeout on every network call it does. If I remember right it's usually something like 30-45 minutes. Then you can just do a Minimum configuration of TCP/IP and you're up & running.
Also, if your machine has a key (Normal, Service and Secure modes) you can try to turn it into Service and seeing if that works.
> The machines that spam us with disk errors were installed by which jerks. Oh yes it was IBM that installed AIX on those machines for us.
Ok. This is still weird... I've _never_ heard/seen anything like that. The only thing I can think of that send mail is a script in the cron that analyzes the errorlog (can't come up with the script name since I don't have it running on any machine nearby, sorry). This runs once a day, though, so it shouldn't cause more than one mail/day.
> I am afraid my desk has a Sun on it before you leap to conclusions.
I can live with that... Good for you!
> IBM courses for the 10 machines out of 300 that actually run AIX.
Basically one or two courses will give you the basics of AIX. If you need a good handbook for AIX, I recommend The AIX Survival Guide (ISBN 0-201-59388-2). It covers mostly AIX4 (not 4.3) and some 3.2 specifics. It's really worth a read if you're interested in improving your AIX skills.
Well, I hope we can now but this little incident behind us. As you can see, it doesn't _have_ to get personal
Dear IBM,
Ten grand for a nicely opted out rs/6000 running a 332Mhz 604e processor may make sense in the blue blooded environments in which 6k's currently run. However, I would love to see the PowerPC architecture become more mainstream. Current pricing levels prohibit this. Perhaps if IBM could convince Apple to sell its G3 line, minus the "MacOS Tax"?
PowerPC Fan (but really only of the new POWER3 line)
write some driver source for IBM printers :)
Lessee...
IBM owns Catia, right? A port of that CAD/CAM software to Linux would get a _lot_ of peoples' attention.
I am certainly glad to see major players like IBM, Compaq, Dell and HP adopt Linux. They can sell the hardwarem, bundle Linux with it and cash in on support, making money on the free software. But who develops the software? Certainly not the people who sell it. In fact none (or very few) of the Linux developers get any kind of financial gain from it. What really bothers me that one day the Linux development may stop because of this.
I run Linux at home, as I am sure many of slashdot readers do. But how many of those who *use* Linux actually *contribute* to it?
Of course this makes me wonder how Linux made it this far. There must be some kind of paradox here. As I see it, there is no real incentive for anyone to contribute to free software. But yet somehow it just gets developed. Can somebody please enlighten me?
Ah relief...
...this stuff has been going on internally for so long. We've got Linux running on some cool hardware. Of course, we have to be able to make money in order to put this stuff out there which is why you aren't likely to see some of the higher end Linux ports.
IBM has some really cool Linux stuff going on. It's just a matter of convincing the bean counters that we can make a profit off of free software, and convincing the blood sucking lawyers that we aren't going to get sued by Gnu or something.
As for some of the pricing complaints I've read here... yes, valid concerns. I think what you are missing here is the support that is included in that price tag. IBM support is about the best in the business. Unhappy customers can actually escalate all the way up to Gerstner but rarely do. Nothing like 24x7 support, where you can actually get the attention of the engineers that designed your hardware and software.
If some of the other stuff gets out the door next month that I think is coming out the door, this may be the final catalyst towards Linux dethroning NT in the server room. The technology is there in our labs. You just have to ask your marketing rep for it. No, make that *demand*. And you have to be ready to back that up with $$$.
Now where can I buy one? I want one of those cool PPC Thinkpads
Well, as others have already noted, the price is not what I consider 'low-end'.. at least, not from a Joe Consumer point of view.
;-)
It's good that there is a cost savings for those who might not have previously been able to afford the systems, but it's definitely not at the level I'd like to see..
I've always wanted to get a PPC system, but the costs have always been too high.. One of these days..
Anyway, I think it would be absolutely great if IBM (or some other entity) could start selling decently-priced motherboards and systems based on PPC.. Apple has pretty well cornered that architecture (at least at the consumer level), and I'd like to see some new stuff come out of it. This would be especially good for people who want PPC, but don't want to upgrade their entire systems when they upgrade the processor.. This is something that works well for the PC industry (swap in a new mobo every so often at a few hundred bucks, rather than an entire new system at over a thousand..)
Go look at IBM's hardware page. Look at the 43P series of servers - these are the entry level systems (and the newer ones are REALLY nice). While this page makes them out as a workgroup server, they tend to be used as workstations. Even better, they start at under (US)$6000 (with AIX). From what I understand, PPC Linux slides very easily into these boxes.
Of course, this is a basic box with no video, but they have PCI slots. I think we will see a lot of IBM / Linux workstations in the near future, especially if Lotus ports the Notes client. At any rate, I see myself buying a new IBM later this year.
It makes sense for those wanting to buy a PPC clone with Linux to contact Motorola and point out the existence of this market. Saying, of course, you would be first in line to buy a machine equiped as: ..., in this price range: ...
If enough letters were sent, perhaps sanity would return.
I will not be one of the letter writers at this point, because I am not lusting for a PPC machine. Perhaps after seeing one, my view may be altered.
I believe Dell has been supporting Linux on their servers for longer than IBM and Dell sells more PC's.
finally-one-more-big-one dept would be more appropriate.
If you can read this message, your threshold is too low.
Especially the MTX604-071 (dual 400MHz 604e) and the MTX604-003A (300MHz 604e).
It's far easier to forgive your enemy after you get even with him.
Personally, I think IBM could make money selling
_hardware_ at the low-cost workstation level that
linux was very compatible with, perhaps with
linux installed, and then selling (for instance)
speech-recognition software for it. Although there
is a loud minority that doesn't want commercial
software on linux, look at Applixware to see that
it can be successful. And by positioning linux on
the desktop, it should compete less with AIX
servers. Stop abandoning the desktop (see OS/2) to Microsponge!
(currently testing something about signatures here)
Making money off of open source may not be a hard thing, but it will probably require different strategies than those traditionally used with software.
Assuming that the business benefit of open source is the incentive to have access to the source code , we can begin from there while trying to "balance out" the needs to make money with the social needs of free software, namely the encouragement of "freedom" of modification and of "fewer defects" that naturally arises out of a bazaar development model.
The OSD requires free distribution of that source code - meaning that a competitor could easily adopt the source code and perform a "creative imitation" strategy with ease... this invalidates many of the traditional software business assumptions: creative imitation is no longer valid, because as soon as a competitor extends the product, you have access to THEIR code and hence can incorporate it into YOUR product. (By product, I mean a "branded" product, i.e. RedHat Linux vs. SuSE Linux)
So, from what I currently see, the way to make money will probably require A) a new licence other than the GPL (for reasons I will explain) and B) different (but not new) entrepreneurial strategies.
for A), basically, the FSF believes that encouraging freedom to modify & use software is paramount, but also that "Software should have no owners".
I find it highly unlikely that a company will "give up" ownership of its software in the near to mid future, and find it much more likely that they'll retain ownership through a license similar to the MPL or QPL.
The other issue is that of pricing. There has to be a way of encouraging free distribution of source, BUT to be able to charge a fee of some sort to buy the software (most enterprise software packages are > $50,000). This of course is futile with a traditional open source licence because nothing can stop a competitor from selling your product at $5/pop. I also seriously doubt that services can cover the losses of this magnitude.
So, I don't know what to do here. All my current ideas break the OSD... A runtime licencing fee, for instance, makes a lot of sense: it creates a community of developers that work in companies that use the product - hence increasing the freedom of the softare, BUT it also somewhat limits the audience because joe six-pack wouldn't really want to modify the code because he can't afford the $90,000 runtime licence. Of course, this model would only work with very "business"-orineted applications, and , unfortunately would probably irk a lot of open source purists....
So A) to me is still in the air.
B) on the other hand is becoming clearer.... since "creative imitation" is no longer a viable strategy for competition, the real competitive strategies have to do with
- Being first to the punch.
- Branding.
Being "first" is a traditional strategy, but in this case it has to do with ramp-up time in grokking software. Basically, "Creative imitation" is marginalized, but when one adds a new feature to a software product, you still have a "lag time" before the competition can read & understand your code (assuming A LOT of code). The key to this strategy is to release a new set of enhancements by the time the competition has just caught up to the old enhancements. Pretty simple, but it remains to be seen if this will work because I'm probably underestimating the speed of which an average programmer can grok a fairly long piece of code.
The other strategy basically says, "IF I can't compete based on features, I have to compete based on reputation." RedHat knows this one. There is relatively little difference between Stampede Linux, SuSE Linux and RedHat linux in terms of features.... but Redhat is king because it has A BRAND. I know technical people will hate this one because it's so illogical, but it's really the only clear way to differentiate products in an arena where the source code is all "open kimono".
Of course, some might say that open source isn't about competition and profit, it's about sharing... Well folks, the economy is based upon organizational performance through profits... and if you can't make profits comparable to yesteryear, there's no economic reason to jump over to open source. Capitalism will not just roll over and die.
Personally, I think it can be done - but it will require customers to DEMAND open source first, because there's going to be a hell of a lot of intertia to change our industry to this model.
-Stu
The problem with this additude is that the market can just pass you by. It is just this additude that cost IBM dearly in the late '80s and early '90s and why DEC, at one time the second largest computer comany, is now owned by a PC manufacture.
There are many reasons why Open Source Software is taking off, but one of the clear ones is lower cost of ownership. Not just because OSS is "free" (as in beer), but more importantly because it is "free" (as in speech). A business can control its own destiny with OSS software. If they need a feature, they can decide if it is worth the cost to add it, they don't have to beg some other company to do it for them. If an obscure bug bites them hard and few other people, they can choose to fix it, instead of pleading with some other company who might not even be able to reproduce it. Instead of writing a custom system from scratch, or paying some other company to, in effect, write a custom version of their software, they can leverage an OSS system.
Expect the total cost per machine to drop because of OSS. It doesn't matter if IBM is involved or not, they will get hit by this lower cost either way. If they don't get on the front wave of the OSS in business movement, they are going to have a hard time catching up.
I hope IBM doesn't make the same mistake that they made in the '80s and try and preserve there current cash-cows only to see their cash-cow fade away.
There is a chance that even though the total software dollars per machine may drop, the number of machines sold will increase enough to offset this. Of course, this point is irrelevant. You can't change the effect that OSS will have anyway.
Our customers are happy to buy binaries-only at this point so there is no need to change.
Your customers might not be complaining too loadly now, but I bet everyone of them would love to have access to, and possibly modify the source to every peice of software they run.
You don't have to want to "improve" the software for you to really need the source. Every time HP-UX or NT gives me some weird error that isn't well decribed in the doc, I'm in a tough place. When BSDI (which we have source to) gives us problems, we can read the source or even put debug statements in to try and figure out what the real problem is. Last I knew (mid '80s), IBM's mainframe OS's came with source on microfiche for similar reasons.
SPF support for most open source mail servers can be found at libspf2.
Yes, this happened in the late '70s. For example, IBM's product ASP (Automatic Spooler Program" was modified by the University of Houston and became "HASP", which was later rolled back into an IBM product called JES. Or at least that's what I recall. Some of the details are kind of fuzzy after all these years.
I also have the impression that, at one point, IBM decided to go with "object code only", and that some customers didn't like this; if my impression is correct, I'm curious what what the history of that was, what the motivation for OCO was, and whether OCO turned out to be a good or bad idea overall.
Again, it has been 20 years, so I don't remember clearly, but yes, the customer base screamed like hell about going object code only. That is when they started to release the code on microfiche.
In so many ways, the early-mid mainframe era had a lot of similarities to what the current/future OSS movement hopes to become. Many large businesses and Universities payed people to develop code that was useful for them. This code got released to the world, and modifications can back to the original users. Since the original people could justify the work based off of their immediate benefits, the added features/bug fixes that came back were just a bonus.
One of the key differences is that with the GPL, no one can take it back to being a closed system.
I think what really caused IBM to kill the freely available source code was that it allowed "Plug compatible" companies (think "PC Clone manufacture") to compete too easily with them. Competition is such a horrible thing, ya know.
The mini-computer industry had a lot of source code floating around too, but I don't think they had the resources to actively send tapes and such around the country/world like the mainframe people did, nor did as many people get to go to conferences. With the Internet, this cost has obviously dropped to almost zero.
SPF support for most open source mail servers can be found at libspf2.
"Well, according to this report" - what report? where is it?
I do like the fact that Compaq, Dell, IBM, SGI, HP, Apple, others now offically support Linux in some way. But the way makes me wonder. Dell won't do a kernel for duals, Apple doesn't make getting a "MkLinux" box easy, it's a "do it yourself" kind of thing. The IBM report linked seems to be WAY on the high end for a typical user (Heck, even the box that runs SlashDot can't be worth $15,000, is it?).
My hopes now are with companies like VAResearch. Hopefully someone will come along soon that will sell boxes that truely span the $700 to $2000 range, that come with Linux professionally configured, with good support, and offer some hardware choices like Motorola, AMD, Cyrix, Alpha, MIPS, etc... But, as the "Big Names" come into the Linux ring, I thought that would happen, and in truth, it's getting farther from the truth it seems...
Battering about the term "Server" to justify the high price tags of new brand name (DEC, Compaq, IBM, Dell, etc) Linux boxes doesn't hold well in my book. I know people who keep thier workstations load peged for weeks at a time doing calculations, rendering, etc. And I see servers that couldn't handle workstations loads that easily handle massive server loads (Alpha box in ND-HECN that has well over 1000 users, but my K6 will outrun for pure CPU power, the CDROM.COM FTP server that holds records for transfer in a day that is a dual PPro, and wouldn't hang for massive rendering or number crunching quite as well as some workstations sitting around my department).
The primary diffrance that "they" are suggesting makes a server a server is RAID, multiple network interfaces, etc... But, at the same time, not all of thier "server" offerings have these features standard (What makes Dell's Linux server a server anyway?).
I think they don't want to do Linux workstations (IMHO) because they fear the "My Big Gulp won't fit in my new 20X Cup Holder" phone calls. Slashdot is a Dual Pentium II 233 for crips sake, and it's a "server," and no one would argue that it's really just a workstation, and not a server.
I guess, in my mind, no one has doubted Linux's ability to be a server for a couple years now, but it seems that's where it ends. And, to me, that's not news. Saving a few thousand dollars on a high end server by choosing Linux insted of DEC-UNIX or AIX on your server may be big news to some people. But it's not big news to the general population, because, more people use PC's/Home Office/Workstations that actually run thier own server. And, today, Linux is make BIG inroads in the workstation market, and that's where it's truely starting to shine. It has always shined as a server. But now that it's shining in the scientific labs doing numbercrunching, theoretical predictions, and data analysis as a WorkStation. Now it's shining in CAD/Rendering/Media arenas as a WorkStation. That's a bigger market. That's bigger news. That's where I would like to see some of the big "brand names" take notice and become active in support.
And, as far as that goes, a "entry level" server would be great to see too. I guess this is happening with Corel's Netwinder, and the Qube... But, I think buisnesses that have 5-20 people in the office could benifit soo much more substantually from Linux than they realize. If there were a commercial solution with ONE server running 10-20 Xterminals (like Mechanical Engineering Dept. at the University of Minnesota has done), That would turn heads, and make news, and prove that the idea of "workstation" vs. "server" is a very blurry line, and you have to think more in terms of "networked solutions" than "My Workstation" and "our company's server." Sometimes the server only needs to be a little 486, and the workstations need to be quad Xeons... but sometimes the workstations only need to be 486's, and the server needs to be the quad Xeons or RS/6000 systems. How can anyone draw such lines as "workstation" and "server" and use that to defend what market and price range they are focusing on?
I need a thinkpad 800 (the R/S6k thinkpad, very elite) running linux.
Oh yeah.
if they're really PPC's and IBM plans to use linux on the architecture. The article doesn't mention what specific issues remain w/linux on R/S6k.
I guess you should talk to the LinuxPPC (www.linuxppc.org, distro's sold by www.linuxppc.com) people about this.
linus should get a macarthur fellowship so he can do linux fulltime.
__
Scott Draves
The trade pubs like to refer to IBM's mainframe offerings as "Big Iron." It would be kinda neat if they dubbed these boxes as "Open Iron." :-)
-- P.J.
Unless I am mistaken, the $15,000 mentioned was the price for the Compaq boxes mentioned. The IBM PPC boxes never had a price mentioned.
Otherwise, COOL!
One recent issue of Newsweek had a picture of Linus. KDE is being incorporated into many systems. Lotsa people depend on Samba for cross platform compatibility.
What incentive do those people have to create all this wonderful software? I'll give you two reasons.
First, the person will be forever be synomous with that software if it is useful. If people like it, then that person will have a good reputation.
Second, that person can put that achievement on his or her resume and put that reputation to work. Worked on Samba? KDE? Mozilla? What employer wouldn't love a great programmer on their staff!!!
In a way free software DOES rake in money for the developers.
Sanity.html - Error 404 not found
Seems to me Motorola has a PERFECT oppurtunity here to market their own line of PowerPC boxes running Linux. They did like becoming a vendor, until Apple pulled the OS plug. Here is a way for Mot to controll "their own OS", and at a penny too.
Unfortunately, since Apple killed the clones the Motorola IT departments have been on a search and destroy missions... to the point of replacing all their Motorola- based Mac's with INTEL-BASED NT boxes. How stupid is that? It's like Pepsi putting a Coke machine in the break room! Duh..
It would be nice to see some real CPU competition, and Linux gives at least a chance of that. x86 is as bad technology as Microsoft is for an OS, and it would be nice to see competing CPU's and OS-agnostic expansion boards for PCI...
I have thought about this and the possibility does exist IMO. I have even entertained the idea that MS has paid off the press to say nice things about Linux as well. Perhaps I'm being paranoid, but MS has a reputation of cunning, and based on their prior tactics it wouldnt surprise me one single bit.
OTH, I can see where a lot of people are simply getting sick and tired of Microsoft and the lack of alternatives. Linux is the result of some damn good software engineering, and it truly does live up to all the hype spread about it in the rags. Also all the announcements of late from some really big names in the computer world, offering Linux products and support cannot be ignored. MS has clout but not that much. So in the end, I think I have been overly paranoid. It's a side effect from my OS/2 days when it really looked like OS/2 was going to be a good alternative to Windows. It never happened of course partly because of dirty underhanded Microsoft tactics, and partly because of complete stupidity on IBM's part (for which I have never forgiven either company for these sins). With that said, perhaps a lot of us old hand OS/2'ers are a paranoid lot because we have experienced first hand the Microsoft standard operating procedures with regards to competition.
I really think Linux can stand on it's own two feet, given the opportunity to do so. And now it looks like the 'window' of opportunity is here for Linux. Therefore I'm taking the cautious route acknowledging that Microsoft is more than capable of doing things like this to promote its own evil products, but also that Linux really is a rock solid, stable OS that can very easily compete in the marketplace. However I think it's only a matter of time before the press starts doing an about face and jumbs back onto the Windows bandwagon at linux's expense. Hope I'm wrong, but I've seen it before.
You have been assimilated.
It might not be what you have in mind (first of all, it does not come with a monitor), but the new G3 "Pro" systems (the Blue and White mini-towers) start at $1599, and I've seen them a hundred or so dollars less. Granted, if you're looking into Alphas, you'd want more memory, etc -- but it would still make quite a nice Linux box.
I don't disagree with your complaint that Macs at least seem significantly more expensive than "comparable" PCs. I do think that CHRP's demise is a big loss. At least they seem to be using more and more "standard" parts -- UltraDMA, USB, (I believe) VGA out, PCI, etc. The more they use, the cheaper they can afford to sell computers for.
Russell Ahrens
And we thought 1998 was a big year...
I think 1999 will be much more spectacular yet.
maybe they'll breathe some life back into the PPC chip for PCs and there will be a market for lower cost workstations. i hope so. competition is good.
Have you seen Ironstayn vs Supergovernment yet?
This is great news, and i hope IBM makes a lot of dough in the Linux server market, but what would REALLY be cool would be a OS/2-style window manager and full ports of its Lotus SmartSuite...
-- adraken
So THAT'S what the force is that Obi-Wan was talking about....;-)
IBM making "low" priced PPC boxes is good for everyone. It brings the PPC platform out of the MacOS world, and will hopefully encourage Apple to produce boxes with Be or Linux for sale. It also brings more respect for the PPC processor since it isn't so limited to one OS anymore. Maybe Be will start supporting PPC like it was before Apple (unwisely) discontinued licesing.
I would certinly like to see stronger multiple-os support for PPC so more people can take advantage of it. Definitly the future is going to be about multiple OS's. One size does not fit all.
So I echo, this is good for everyone. Lower prices for PPC boxes will surely come. Broader OS support is likely. Respect is created for the PPC. And, hopefully some good influence on Apple.
Speaking as one tired of Wintel...
I love my computer -- You make me feel alright (Bad Religion)
that come with Linux professionally configured
all that means is that they put their own silly background on your fvwm session.
hmmm... anyone got any clues on this one:
NDLUG (Notre Dame Linux Users Group) got a donation of about 10 IBM Power Series 400 machines. 601 processor, 48 megs of ram each, PReP-ish machines, currently running AIX. They've got some sort of experimental motherboards... anyway, we want to make 'em run linux, and possibly cluster them. currently, we can get it to boot off a disk, but as soon as it displays the "booting the kernel" message, it hangs... anyone out there done any kinda work witht his? linuxPPC page hasn't been too useful...
damn bolsheviks..
<^>_<(ô ô)>_<^>
These are embedded motherboards, doesn't that mean they are not usefull for pc's?
No. It means that is how Moto is marketing them. The embedded market is seen as one of their "core competencies" (or some other such business-speak buzz word).
How can IBM make "good business" and support Open Source projects like Beowulf?
By selling support services. As you point out, IBM support is the best in the business. If I could afford it, and IBM would sell it, I would buy all mission-critical resources (hardware and software) from IBM, because of the quality of support. That's regardless of whether or not the software is open-source. There are a lot of people in the industry who think like that, and who can afford it: many of them are IBM customers already. Some of what IBM already sells to these people is already open-source (sendmail, BIND, apache, etc), because the open-source solution is the best available. That is going to increase as open-source comes to prevail in more niches. Beowulf (in the scientific computing Unix clustering niche) might be a good example, I don't know. As you point out, a lot of these people don't care about sources, but they do care about quality, and so increasingly they are going to want open-source solutions. IBM just has to be ready to sell those to them, for whatever the market will bear.
Just a question from an AIX point of view... Does Linux have support for Journal File Systems?
Being able to change filesystems sizes on the fly is very cool.
-wilkinsm
About time IBM notices our tiny little OS.
-matt
RedHat writes free software. And they think that they're making millions! Somebody tell them they're not!
OSS is a very good investment, especially by a company that also makes hardware on which it runs. This is why Intel has invested in RedHat. Linux makes their machines run fast, allows people to customize their machines, and it allows people to spend more on hardware and less on software.
Anyone who can't see that the person who posted that was ironic should.. check him/herself :)
Sadly, Microsoft jointly owns much of the code of Presentation Manager with IBM, so they can't opensource it. They could, however, opensource the Workplace Shell. It's just not gonna happen with PM, although I personally am thinking about writing pmtk--an implementation of the Presentation Manager API (with binary-level compatibility) for X11.
Easy to use administration tool that is able to handle single PC up to entire network of PC.
IBM doesn't have this product unfortunately (at least not IMO.)
Productivity tools such as spread sheet, word processor etc. User friendly database front end to DB2 to compete with MSSQL.
OS/2 Query Manager (from OS/2 EE or DB2/2 1.2) would be a great thing. Opensource it please IBM!
Speech and hand writing recognition.
IBM needs to do this now. It is stupid to port this products to Windows when you could be gaining critical market share among those who will be making important changes in the information technology field over the next 20 years.
Device drivers for all IBM hardware.IBM is so stuck up about releasing hardware specs it isn't funny. Try getting databooks for the Mwave DSP and adapters--you have to sign this horrible NDA and pay all those ridiculous licence fees. We need some high-powered IBM execs to simply bring some sanity to those situations; the IBM 2780DSP is dead, and releasing the specs isn't going to reveal any top-secret information.
Cheers,
Joshua Rodd.
--jon. Postel is dead. May we all mourn his, and our, loss.
Feel the thunder.
-Master Switch, one more element in the machine
rs/6000 machines are not nicely configured for ANY small amount of money. the last one we got was just over $30k (with academic discount) and still only had 32 mb ram... get an alpha!
"All that glitters is not gold"
as i stated above, rs/6000 are ANYTHING but a good deal for the money!! $15k would be a rinky dink rs/6000
"All that glitters is not gold"
you ever wonder why people use IBM/AIX in mission critical stuff?? its because it rocks over linux in support for clustering, mirroring, disk configuration...etc stability. now i said "stability" of these things...not just simple support for them. people dont spend $5 million on IBM systems when they could get the same thing from linux systems. (go look at ibm.com under S390 and look at the on-board hardware encryption) and you'll know why corps. use IBM/AIX.
"All that glitters is not gold"
Of course they are - by publishing the halloween documents they sent a signal to every publisher that Linux was the next big thing and that Microsoft would not complain if they talked about it. The only question is whether Microsoft will be able to, erm, disuade the media attention back after the trial. My guess is that they will be able to - if nothing else, linux is not ready for the joe average that the magazines are targetted at. 2004's my guess for when everything will really take off.
Apple NT? Oh sure, just what Apple needs for its (barely growing) credibility. Let's announce YET ANOTHER OS strategy change and tell every Mac programmer who has been looking at Carbon for the last year that Win32 is where it's at (after they looked at the OpenStep APIs for a year, and before that spent a few years looking at the Copland APIs and pretty pictures).
What the heck is the advantage for Apple to put a nice GUI on a server OS, and a buggy, sluggish one at that.
-jon
Remember Amalek.
how does it stay afloat? well i can't speak for everyone, but when ever i make something, fix something or kludge something together i always post it for anyone else to use and i think thats one way how it all stays afloat.
there are millions of programmers. it only takes a few thousands programmers to write all of Gnu/Linux. some people find programming easy --and fun. I think the proprietary software vendors have sold the public the notion that only a large company has the resources to develop truly useful software. not necessarily true.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but since when did the term "Free Software" mean no cost software?
Under GPL, I thought the point wasn't cost, but open-ness of source? Even if I don't entirely agree with it, if IBM or anyone else wants to do GPL business, there would be no problems to selling the software, selling the source, yadda yadda, but that in some sense the source had to be accessible. So if IBM supports Beowulf, Linux, Apache, and any other number of Open Source products/projects, they could charge whatever they wanted for the software and support, and make profit on it, just that the source had to be available...
Of course, without the proprietary hardware, the source is only useful when it is ported... And when ported to non-supported hardware, IBM still has to option to get profit from support and services without having to port themselves, if the Linux/Free software community wants to port it so badly. I don't know that this is a good or bad idea, but this is what I understood about "Free Software"...
Louis
What are people thinking here... AIX, LinuxPPC, what flavor?