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New Compaq Servers (with Closed Source Libs)

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the that-ain't-so-cool dept.

pmsyyz sent us a news.com story that talks about the new alpha based Compaq Servers. Lots of interesting tidbits (and hardware specs to drool over) but it reveals that the compiler and libs will not be open source, although they will be cheap. Just read it- its interesting, but frusterating to read about putting Digital's excellence and Compaq's marketing together, and stirring in a PHB decision like a closed source compiler.

3 of 87 comments (clear)

  1. Jon "Maddog" Hall does not have pointy hair by Bruce+Perens · · Score: 4
    Let's remember that the pointy-haired boss in this case might be the head of Linux International, who rather than being pointy-haired, bears a strong resemblance to a department-store santa, or Jerry Garcia on a bad day. Or at least he knows the people involved.

    Bruce

    --
    Bruce Perens.
  2. Just Which libraries won't be Open? by Bruce+Perens · · Score: 4
    The Math library (libm)...

    Thanks, Jim, that makes sense. I wish the original message had been clearer. Some people got their dander up because they thought some GPL-ed library would be closed.

    Of course the usual GCC libm would co-reside on the same machine.

    Compiler hackers will take this as a challenge.

    Bruce

    --
    Bruce Perens.
  3. Just Which libraries won't be Open? by Bruce+Perens · · Score: 4
    The libs won't be open-source is a pretty broad statement. Which ones? The C library? Possible, but doubtful, they'd have to use their own, breaking compatibility rather badly. Some run-time library that provides ALPHA low-level facilities for the compiler? Sure.

    So, make EGCS better. We've known for a long time that GCC couldn't stand up to DEC's compiler on the ALPHA.

    Bruce

    --
    Bruce Perens.