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IBM Announces Linux Support
Ilya Berdnikov writes "IBM has finally announced its full support for Linux! Here's the story. "
Most interesting is the comments about IBM supporting
Caldera and SuSE in addition to Red Hat, as well as a bit
about DB2.
they support gnulix too.
go blue
Boy am I glad now that I'm on this team. AIX makes my brain pee.
One of the biggest mistakes people make when betting on games is forgetting to consider anything other than the star players. Microsoft has made billions in large part by pushing the support cost for their product downstream. If you have problems with your system it is nearly unheard of that you actually get an answer from MS that isn't already in their help system. Instead, you call the company you bought the machine for application from. This has allowed MS to collect money, without incurring the ongoing cost of support.
But, the situation has been changing in the past year. Companies have started to realize that Microsoft is an animal that eats its young. IBM, Compaq, Dell, HP, etc, cannot be happy with the current state of fealty the almighty Bill of Redmund. Linux offers these companies a level playing field. It is in their best interest. With Linux Compaq will not have to get a 'letter' in order to modify the boot sequence. With Microsoft as overlord, Compaq is just anoter PC clone. With Linux they can work to differientiate(sp?) their systems from HP, IBM, Dell, etc.
Will Linux beat Microsoft. With the current state of affairs, of course. MS could learn to play nice and not try to completely own EVERYTHING, but how likely is that. In any other event, hardware vendors are going to scoot from under Bill's heel by supporting Linux and eventually dis MS completely.
There's just a whole heck of a lot of good news for Linux these past few days! This is GREAT! Now that IBM is seriously backing Linux, I think we've got critical mass... what can stop us now?
:o)
Sounds to me like all the major computer company is using Linux to fight against the evil giant.
Man I certain hope that Nightmare Technology will die soon!
Our company started to look at laptops. With Linux ;)
being supported on Thinkpads, it is without a doubt
we'll be going IBM
This is like rad or something! Remember when IBM used to be the evil empire? Boy have they ever made an image about face to the geek community. Could Microsoft ever perform this miricle? Naw... But I remember a time not so long ago when I thought of IBM as the greatest evil. Oh well. Here's a big cautious WooHoo!!
In other words, this is but the tip of the iceberg.
Can be reached at http://www.ibm.com/linux
or http://www.ibm.com/is/mp/linux
I thought Suse is still a GmbH? Have I missed
something?
What about S L A C K W A R E?
I smell a rat. Do you?
Fragmentation seems to be a threat only with respect to desktop enviornments - KDE vs. Gnome vs. what-ever-is-next. But if all these desktops remain popular, at least only the desktop integration part of the code base will have to be different.
You can go gnulix yourself, dillweed!
Can't wait to see what this will be like :) Hope they train good at Dell :)
Natas
http://www.mp3.com/pedophagia
You are welcome to look on www.transarc.com for further information on the Andrews File System.
What, no support for Yggdrasil, nor Toms rtbt? How dare they leave these important distros out? Boo..
When are we going to get some voice recognition software? Personally, I like DragonSystems, but they don't seem to respond to my emails about a linux port? Has anyone else asked them?
BTW, I forgot my passwd. I'm Ensign Nemo.
Do you really think IBM will let Linus and his merry band of volunteers keep their role as the kernel developers, with Linus at the top? I think not. I think IBM (and Oracle, and so on) are going to expect to be able to "make suggestions" and "have input" and so on, and I think Linus is going to get squeezed out.
The only thing between Linus and the exit is his ownership of the Linux trademark, which he hasn't been policing very effectively...
(Incidently, I hope I'm wrong about the above, but I want to stimulate discussion about what heavy industry involvement is going to do to our little cottage industry OS.)
True enough, we could change the GPL and specifically exclude Microsoft.
When the Linux OS finally conquers most countries and reaches most houses
on earth, we might find ourselfs unable to express our pleasure.
And yet I think we must give second thoughts about the GPL,
we might deliver to ourselfs not more, but less pleasure. Leave the GPL
alone! Nothing is more pleasing than Linux running at every
desk, and at every cubicle, inside the Microsoft Building.
AFS is not too well known, but is used by Charles Schwab (finance) and Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratories.
PHB's can spend the money they saved on buying the OS and spend it on support. Should be quit a bit on money.
If all debian users are as mature as you, I can see why you guys were snubbed.
What has IBM done to Apache since they began involvement? What is it about Linux that would make them act different?
You supply the names of servers in a certain format (not too tricky) in a plain text file located in the /etc/apt/ directory. apt then goes out and searches those directories for updated stuff or extra stuff that you want to get.
Peronaly I run debian 2.1 aka Slink on my server. It hosts both debian.org archive mirror and it hosts the kernel.org mirror for the us in http and ftp. I run updates on a weekly basis to keep on top of the explout patches. it's a REALLY handy feature to have if you want low-maintenance servers.
I average about 65Kbytes/sec network use and i have around 10 or so users online at any one time in a shell. i have never had the server hiccup because of apt-get upgrade.
I find that debian fits my needs perfectly.
ahzz (forgot password 8-P)
http://www.terrabox.com
Slackware _is_ commercial.
Why is everyone so hyped up about the corps expressing interest in Linux? I've been using the OS for a bit over a year and it's always done what I wanted it to do. Granted, you might say there's a lack of apps in a particular niche, but the OSS/distributed model has worked well so far in developing a great application base while preserving the cooperative, not-for-profit, evolutive nature of Linux.
Do we, as users, really need an IBM or MS (MSLinux, hell, why not, especially if MS gets broken up) corrupting the existing paradigm? Do we really want non-commercial develpers sidelined by the Linux departments of the major corps? I'm pretty positive the vast majority of Linux users would ditch an open source implementation of a particular program if a "better" version came out shrink wrapped. A diminishing user base for open source apps would invariably stifle their further development, locking Linux into a commercial framework within a relatively brief time.
On another note, I find it ridiculous that a company like VAR would blow >$1 mil. on linux.com when so many GNU based project could use these funds. Doing it for the community or simply doing the community?
You are most likely the only one who wants to see anything from Mircosoft running on linux. As far as I'm concerned it'll be a cold day in hell before I install anything created by Mircosoft for linux on my systems. Remember their Robin Hood comments people. Mircosoft is not and will never be a friend to people who choose to use Linux.
Maybe because you are acting like a jerk?
What if Microsoft "incorporates" the Cygnus unixish stuff, U/Win, etc., and some sort of Win32-linux (i.e., linux front-end runs on top of Win32) barfomatic compatibility layer, say, called DirectLinux, that provides some sort of cheap hole through WinX (WinNT/9x/2K) to allow Linux executables to sort of run natively, but the OS, with some clever VxD work, grabs the KDE/Gnome/X calls and uses the Windows GUI.
My other idea was they coopt some old 1.x version of the kernal, say, and throw NTFS on it, their own C library (glibC + MFC?), and basically dare GNU, ELF, et al., to sue them...
Hey, if the same kind of thinking worked for Windows on DOS, then it should work for Linux in Windows.
In your brief opener you overlooked Pacific HiTech as one of the four distributions supported by IBM. PHT is the only distribution in English AND Chinese, Japanese. Let's not be too America-centric here. And they had a rock on cluster demo at Linux World. They're pushing Linux performance, not just republishing other people's hard work and making lots of PR noise about deals.
If you saw Linus Speak, you saw his slides. He said thanks to Caldera, Pacific Hi-Tech, Red Hat and S.u.S.E. NOT Debian or Slackware....
AIX is three time slow than Linux because of filesystem, device drivers, swapping and kernel.
Lotus :-P port SmartSuite to unix.
Just ain't so, pup. Caldera may be used by only one percent of people who would end a message with "blow me", but in the World in General, it's doing quite well.
But don't worry--you'll most likely grow out of your ignorance. Eventually.
Grow up, crybaby.
You expected them to support ever single distribution ever created? Wow. Why don't I make my own distro. I'll call it the "Fart Distribution" in honor of your odor. Now IBM should support me because they gotta support them all or none at all! I'm ashamed to think you're a fellow Linux user (actually, more like ashamed to think you're a fellow human being)
Every other distribution calls the Linux kernel
based OS Linux.
Debian by calling it GNU/Linux is preaching
RMS politics, which is not popular in todays
commercial software world.
Heh, instead of "the glass is half empty/full" debate, you're bitching that the glass is 1/3rd empty.
I, for one, share the sentiment of others in being thankful for a glass that's 2/3rds full. Better 2/3rd's full than an empty glass.
This is made with no disrespect to Debian. I can't fault IBM on their decision. If all the companies involved get bogged down trying to deal with every distribution on the market, this is going to get nowhere fast.
I can't say I've ever used Debian yet, but I'm sure its a good distribution. Hell, I might try it out after this. But again, I can't fault IBM on their decision, and I do hope one of the big companies comes into the Debian corner and sticks with them.
-- Just an Anonymous Croward.
As far as I know VisualAge Java is written in Smalltalk like VisualAge C++. If so the port isn't big deal since it would use a smalltalk VM.
There's already smalltalk vm's out there for Linux. Not that they would be fully compatible of course but I think you'll see some of the VisualAge stuff for Linux in the future.
For enterprise rock solid systems -pick AIX.
What I'm hoping is that IBM will bring the AIX toolset to Linux. Then we're talking one heck of a killer.
Yep, OS/2 should have replaced everything.
I considered it years ago. The desktop is better, the compiler tools were great (drag and drop library tool in CSet).
But where did it go ?
The key to which distributions get support is which have corporations behind then that can legally enter into a contract. Last time I checked there was not a corporate entity behind debian
IBM, you seriously cant be this fucking stupid.
caldera?!?! like 1% of people run caldera, who gives a shit about that.
debian has nearly 30% of the linux market and you leave it out.
ibm can blow me.
no, linux is not being fed anything. redhat, caldera, suse and pacific hightech are being fed.
get your facts straight, moron.
It's great. For instance
apt-get install communicator-smotif-45 netscape-java-45
that would install communicator+java.
and to keep your packages current
apt-get update
apt-get dist-upgrade
best thing since sliced bread
How the fuck does IBM make money? By saying "wow, way to support your customers redhat". I doubt that, they can make just as much money supporting debian.
--
--
Just lurking, thanks!
Umm... IBM has announced that they will support major Linux distributions. So whether Slackware (or Debian, which is also a major distribution) is commercial or not shouldn't matter. Red Hat, SuSE, PHT, and Caldera don't have global support networks, so IBM will have to do the support themselves, anyway.
The slightly fuller press release is here
M
Why not Deep Blue? Now that running on Linux, on a Beowulf cluster of course, would rock!!!
If it ever gets created, they might support it.
Oh great Penguin, grant that these LinuxWorld announcements never end!
:wq
This seems to match previous posts where preinstalled Linux is pretty much limited to their UNIX boxes ( without AIX, that is ).
I am not knocking these statements of support, only I thought I read about each previously other than multi distributor support ( though it was a rumor ) and the global point-of-contact . The latter puts IBM much further out front than any entity supporting Linux, i.e. world wide support. Is that what I was missing?
Let me first state that my comments are not meant to be a nasty retort, so if some of the words may seem harsh they are not intended to be heard with a snarl.
... anything from Microsoft ..."
/. effect at so early a period ( at least 6 months ago ).
First let me be more explicit about my encounters with IBM and the animosity I held for them for years. In the late 80's I was on one of my early consulting assignments where the MIS director was an ex-IBMer. At the time I was having some sort of hardware problem with a luggable unit I owned. The director gave me an internal number where he thought I would get some advice how I might handle the problem. While the issue now escapes me the tone and nastiness of the IBM employee is not forgotten! Despite my not being a hardware person, my advice was to avoid IBM and their products. I was dead set against PS/2 machines.
Years later, and partly because I thought early versions of Windows were worthless, I made an inquiry by phone using a public number about a early version of OS/2. My call was pushed up the ladder to an obviously astute technical person that would respond civilly to any and all of my ill informed questions. [I had to end the call because I felt guilty taking so much time to sell one copy of OS/2.] But that's when my view of IBM began to alter.
I now routinely recommend IBM laptops, perhaps not top-of-the-line but a step down even to those not planning to use Linux. Moreover, I will be doing the same when it's time to replace my current laptop.
Now let's review your opening comment: "You are most likely the only one
Well you don't get around much, do you?
It happens that I ran across a link where users were requested to vote software they wanted ported to Linux. I was shocked to see how many requested MS packages. Moreover, the packages desired: VB!?!? Let's assume some were MS shills, still too many to be explained by a reverse
I would suggest too that you check out the WINE project again to see that many of the tested packages are MS products. [Again, this cannot be explained away by MS interference, because the results are not overly favorable - unless this is meant to discourage Windows users!] Why, I do not know, because I could do without Word or Excel (and a myriad of others) without any sense of loss. However, what you may not know is many so called in-house MS products began as external purchases and some are still quite good.
I will not burden you with my reasons for displeasure (under statement) with MS. Nonetheless, the point is while past behaviour may be a good predictor of current and future actions - we all have the ability to change, even Microsoft.
...that linux will eventually run on the Thinkpad PowerSeries 820 (RS/6000) gathering dust under my desk at work.
One percent of the people who participate in Slashdot polls use it, but it's quite widely used for internet servers.
TedC
Hey, they let me run OS/2! Win95 was not required. Besides how can you run Linux when it is standard at the company to keep Notes open all the time?
if AIX dies, we get
^ ~~^~
better working utilities like NFS2 etc...
CATIA, and other high end drafting
All sorts of Electical Engineering Packages
mmmmm high end software,
^~~^~^^~~^~^~^~^^~^^~^~^~~^^^~^^~~^~~~
With IBM behind Linux the FUD of "no support" has finally died a deserved horrible flaming death.
Good news for me, as Linux will now be taken seriously as an OS on the ol' resume. Bad news for my employer (the foolish NT heads), as my worth to them just shot past what they're willing to pay.
Linux has arrived, when my commitment is up, I am leaving.
Does this mean IBM will finally port Visual Age for Java to something other than AIX, OS/2, and (of course) Windows? Neato!
Since Linux is free and Windows isn't, does that mean that a computer will cost less if it has Linux preloaded instead of Windows? Somehow, I doubt it.
--
Timur "too sexy for my code" Tabi, timur@tabi.org, http://www.tabi.org
I think the Linux-preloaded computers will be better for OS/2 users. For one thing, you won't have to pay for a copy of Windows. Also, since Linux HW support is more like OS/2 than Windows (e.g. Winmodems don't work, 3D HW isn't supported), it should be easier to get a computer that's compatible with OS/2.
--
Timur "too sexy for my code" Tabi, timur@tabi.org, http://www.tabi.org
I don't get it.
It's Linus' OS, we have kept him in charge of the kernel. If we think he sucks, he goes. He doesn't claim to be perfect. If we think he is no longer trustworthy, he'll step down.
Do you think this is worth having him step down for? If yes. Tell him yourself. If no. cork it!
and no windows
A RedHat user wishes to know.
The secret to enjoying Slashdot is to realize that it should not be taken too seriously.
IBM's support will benefit Debian because the companies mentioned, in particular RedHat, have a commitment to open sourced software. Anything that benefits open-sourced software on Linux benefits Debian.
The secret to enjoying Slashdot is to realize that it should not be taken too seriously.
Why the **** couldn't IBM have supported OS/2 like this...or get started with it, even now?
Beware of IBM, Linux fans...they don't give a damn about operating systems, software or anything else if it isn't selling itself and raking in profits. If enterprise customers don't shell out the big bucks for it, Linux will get dropped from the IBM catalog faster than Monica Lewinski leaving the White House...
evolutionary
.
IBM is brain dead. There are WAY more distros than just these 4. Debian is most prominant, but is not the only one they left out.
This is the same thing as pcdos/msdos. Both the same, yet slightly different; both can be serviced however by one company providing 'dos' support. Linux is the same way.
This from a company that less than 6 months ago was *mandating* Win95 with Lotus Notes client and VPBuddy (an ICQ knockoff) and wouldn't allow desktop Linux inhouse (I had to run it on the sly).
We'll see. The dinosaur's legs may be twitching, but that doesn't mean that it's ready to move.
-- Cerebus
-- Cerebus
http://www.ibmlink.ibm.com/uspress&parms=P_1999030 203
Says IBM will be 'delivering' he AFS* enterprise file system for Linux.
What exactly is the AFS file system?
This sig is false.
There is a free implementation of AFS on http://www.stacken.kth.se/projekt/arla/
We should realize that this is not neccesarily a Good Thing -- IBM will no doubt start trying to add Proprietary Extensions to something called IBM Linux... Just you wait and see.
- "History shows again and again how nature points out the folly of men" -- Blue Oyster Cult, 'Godzilla'
HOD is pretty and has lots of function, but it is HUGE. It makes Win2000 look svelte!
The fact that IBM is preparing pcomm for Linux is good, however, because that means that think Linux is a client platform. You don't need emulators on service-only machines. =)
--jon. Postel is dead. May we all mourn his, and our, loss.
If Micrografx announces support for Linux, then I know that we really are all doomed. Long live PM Chart (hi Timur).
Cheers,
Joshua.
--jon. Postel is dead. May we all mourn his, and our, loss.
Microsoft may be the 800-pound gorilla, but IBM is King Fscking Kong. I guess it really is true: Be careful what you wish for; you may get it. World domination, here we come, if we aren't squashed in the process. It's going to be an interesting year.
Watch this page
(And that's a pun, not an error.)
-- Blame any errors on your own stupidity. All wrongs reserved.
Until linux has that, (and the buggy Linux LVM is the closest I've seen) AIX is still better. Runtime manipulation of the filesystem and volume groups is a must for an enterprise based system.
No.
One thing I noted on the URL that was in the article was the extension at the HTML page: .phtml
Here we use exactly the same extension for our PHP generated pages... So it looks like IBM, besides Apache, uses more open/free source tools, even at their corporate website. That is a long way from what I would call the 'IBM philosophy' a few years back. Some things do change.
"Fix it? It has been disintegrated, by definition it cannot be fixed!" - Gru in Despicable Me.
Let's see what the PHB's have to say NOW!
:'-)
Gosh. It's only Tuesday, and this is the second high I've had this week. (first was SGI going open-source)
Our little OS is growing up so fast... *snif*
iSKUNK!
What is this? And why would I want to emulate LINUX? The real thing works just fine and is very portable? Anybody know more?
Guy Cole (KQ6J) * "Expert Plain And Fancy Bit Twiddling" * gsc@acm.org
Now, if I can only keep us from getting stepped on by IBM like a bug...
I'm sincerely happy to see a heavy-hitter like IBM getting behind Linux with this level of commitment. I'm a Linux lover first and foremost. However, the entrepreneur in me can't help but worry. I hope this doesn't spell the end for my company.
Regards,
Bill Kocik, Blackspring Communications
http://www.blackspring.com
-BK
Chemical Blog
... in a galaxy far away, around the time of the first Star Wars Trilogy, UNIX was freely distributed. Then a big, bad company decided they owned it. Now we have more UNIX flavors than Bill Clinton has scandals (I counted), and none of them (sans Linux) are free.
Is this going to happen to Linux?
IBM had a link to slashdot?
http://www.software.ibm.com/is/mp/linux/
-D
Another great upshot of IBM going with Linux is
that were all one step closer to a world without AIX.
Now I think they have to supply enterprise solutions based on Linux, to go further and show the way.
Who aren't supporting a Linux dist. these days?
;-)
Best regards,
Steen
Of course, "the others" will have access. That's good!
Before, customizations was limited to, say, a OEM logo on the system.cpl i Control Panel, a wallpaper and a logo in a few other spots.
Now Dell, HP or who ever can build a real "look" or "feel" into their products.
Everyone can copy, but who can use the ideas in the best way?
I also think that this ongoing development will simply speed up things quite a bit. It'll give us a better and perhaps a friendlier competition.
Just imagine which wild and delicious themes for Enlightenment, We'll see...
Best regards,
Steen
Hopefully this will mean that IBM will write drivers for the MWave modem/soundcard (it trys) combo so that it will work better with Linux.