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Metcalfe claims Linux Can't Beat Win2000
Bruce Inglish writes "InfoWorld Pundit (and
inventor of Ethernet) Bob Metcalfe
just posted his 99/6/19 column entitled: "Linux's
'60s technology, open-sores ideology won't beat W2K, but what will?"
in which he predicts that "Linux will fizzle against Windows" and compares
the Open Source community to communism and the Back-to-the-Earth Movement.
"
The main failure of the self proclaimed "communist" and "socialist" states the world has seen so far has been that rather than getting rid of class divisions etc., they have increased them, and enforced an extreme top-down command chain, instead of bottom-up, that is the foundation of marxist political theory.
But I agree with your conclusion: He doesn't understand what went wrong in the states he see as communist (probably because he mixes them up with "proper" marxist theory on communism, and compare the ideals of that, with the result of the flawed implementations of socialism).
Sure, there are elements of the open source movement that are close to the marxist ideals of communism, but the movement has hardly anything in common with the self proclaimed "socialist" states.
If anything, commercial, closed source, software development is what is closest to stalinist economy:
So, open source may seem like marxism, but then closed source seems like stalinism... If those are the ones I get to choose from, I'd prefer marxism any day...
Why do I think Linux won't kill Windows? Two reasons. The Open Source Movement's ideology is utopian balderdash. You mean that you like your dependence on upgrades which don't fix bugs? Are you sure that Microsoft's products are secure? Sheesh, we already have holes in Win95, Win98, and NT 4! You have to pull patches to lock 'em down and be secure on the net, and yet still not be able to be fast enough to keep up with the continous hits on the Internet. Server software it isn't. It wasn't designed to be server software. I doubt Win2K will be server software. Besides, Linux and the Open Source Initiative is not just theory, it is fact. Alot of security patches go out for Linux and it's utility programs. Linux had a fix for the Pentium FOOF bug within a week, and that's not with Intel's help. Microsoft brushed it off, saying that it's products are for single users only!
And Linux is 30-year-old technology. Relibable 30 year old technology that's secure, and recoded, reapplied, and rewritten for current hardware. Also, many components such as GTK, GIMP, and IMlib are new software and toolkits, not 30 year old technology.
A Soviet Linux lies ahead, with successive five-year plans every three. Nope, we haven't had any shootings yet...
OK, communism is too harsh on Linux. Lenin too harsh on Torvalds. It's actually Socialism, not communism (which the two get so mixed up it's suprizing you even mention it). Socialism, by Karl Marx, dictates that everyone, not the government(that's Communism), owns everything. Marx also states that it will be a slow progression into Socialism. Communism got screwed up by Lenin et al trying to speed things up. Guess what Russia got into now?
If North America actually went back to the earth, close to 250 million people would die of starvation before you could say agribusiness. When they bring organic fruit to market, you pay extra for small apples with open sores -- the Open Sores Movement. Negative. My local Giant supermarket chain carries organic, "Back to earth" style apples. They're the same size and with no open sores, no defects, no bugs as the ones treated with chemicals. They taste the same too. Try one. They're in the next same-size pile over. Brought in from local farmers. And do some better research next time.
Stallman's EMACS was brilliant in the 1970s, but today we demand more, specifically Microsoft Word, which can't be written over a weekend, no matter how much Coke you drink. Multinational corporations are themselves technology invented to get big things done, things that sustain us in the complicated modern world. I find alot of users tripping over Word myself here in college, and I suggest to them more control in the form of Corel WordPerfect. Don't you know? WordPerfect been ported all over the place. Macs, Win3.1, Win9x/NT, Solaris, Linux, insert your favorite operating system here.... There's also alot of other good programs out there similar to Word.
The Open Sores Movement asks us to ignore three decades of innovation. Three decades of security enhancements, TCP/IP implementations (remember, Unix had the first implementation!), web servers (NCSA httpd), ftp servers, and more. Even e-mail was origionally on Unix. And before the Internet, before the first router, there was UUCP. These are innovations.
NT, now approaching 23x6 availability, is already overpowering Linux. Linux is 24/7. Virtually no maintance needed once properly set up. I have computer labs here that require me to reboot every few days just because NT's about to die. Every few weeks we have to put down a new image on a few NT computers. 23 hours/day, 6 days per week? No, we can't have that in a 24/7, we never close computer lab. It's on all the time or it's dead.
Let's hope there's something coming soon that's better than both Linux and W2K. What would that be? Java or what? Let's be looking. I'm looking, but all I see is a penguin giving me source code and saying "BBBBWWWWAAAAPPPPP!!!!"
Bob Metcalfe, you forget your computing history. Back to the university library with you.
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Bob Metcalfe sounds like one of those National Enquirer prophets: "I correctly predicted that internet stocks would collapse! That proves my track record, now I predict the demise of Linux". Substitute the collapse of internet stocks with the assasination of John Lennon and the demise of Linux with the second coming of Elvis and its virtually identical with supermarket tabloid predictions and backed up by just a valid an analysis.
His first premise: The Open Source Movement's ideology is utopian balderdash. Alright, maybe Richard Stallman is a bit over the top with some of his talk, but he's not the entire Open Source movement. There are other advocates, such as Bruce Perens, who have done work in getting existing companies such as Netscape or Apple to at least test the Open Source waters. Then he goes on to take a Linux Torvalds' quote out of context as proof that the Open Source community is a band of raving pinko commies. Oh, scratch that, it was just hyperbole. However, if Open Source succeeds a quarter billion people will die or some other such drivel. Oh, and the only means of writing a document under Linux is with EMACS doncha know! I guess Applix, Word Perfect etc. are just communist propoganda and don't really exist.
The second premise: Linux is 30 year old technology and as such is senile. It's an interesting sentiment, but not correct. Linux is built up from concepts that are 30 some years old but only because technology often builds up on the past. Pre-emptive multitasking and protected memory are just good ideas, no reason to throw them out. In the mean time the kernel guru's have added in multi threading, multi processor support as well as support for late nineties hardware. On top of that there are a number of decent GUI overlays that can make normal day to day stuff just as easy as it is under NT (as well as some of the more complext administrative tasks as well). NT is no different in that regards, its really built up from thirty year old technology and doesn't really offer any new features. Linux performs well now. If Microsoft gets its act together maybe NT will work well tomorrow. Maybe. If given the choice between shipping something that doesn't works but people will buy or shipping something that works as advertised a little bit late guess which one will win?
In a way this is the biggest evidence that Linux (as well as other operating systems) is relevant. If Microsoft was truly indominatible they could delay their operating system release until it actually worked and not worry about releasing expensive (to the consumer) bug fix patches as Windows 98 or Windows 99 etc.
Is Linux going to kill Windows? No, I don't think so. I do think that things will be a lot closer to how they were in the eighties though. Windows will have the majority, but more like a 60 or 70% majority overall. A bit more on the desktop and a bit less in the server space. Linux and other operating systems will have that 30 to 40% market share segment. It won't dominate but will ensure that applications are ported to capture that segment of the market.
Old gurus never die, their opinions just (in some cases) become obsolete or bought and paid for.
Well, you have to remember just how fast Linux is progressing. It's a much different beast than it even was a few months ago. There is far more support from game companies and 3d card vendors, there is far more multimedia support than before.
As a matter of fact, the pieces are coming together more and more for Linux on the desktop. Sure, it's not here today for a lot of uses, but who's to say that the momentum behind Linux isn't still building? I don't think we're anywhere near the point of inflection.
As far as fragmentation, I don't think users really see it as a problem. As long as something is branded Linux and will run all the neat and nifty software, users appreciate not being told what's best, and getting to decide for themselves. A lot of people coming from the Microsoft camp have exactly this problem with MS products.
Linux may not be there on the desktop today, but the Linux of today is not the Linux of tomorrow.
Don't confuse the method of distribution (cash money sales vs. free downloads) with the overall philosophy guiding the two software models.
Open Source is much more like capitalism than marxism -- ideas that are strong gain support based upon their inherent strength, not because XYZ supports it. If enough people have an interest in some feature (and it doesn't seem to take too many), that feature seems to get added and supported. The guiding goal is increasing functionality, just as capitalism has the goal of increasing capital. And sometimes it's the the detriment of the overall usefulness of the product (eg. lots of features vs. poor documentation).
Closed source is much more Fascist/Stalinist -- an idea is pushed by the marketing/PR propaganda mill (think of a 70-foot Stalin on the wall, and now think of an MS billboard). Attempts to question the technology/leadership/wisdom of closed source vendors and you are quickly banished/ignored. (How many times have you been kicked off of a vendor forum for complaining about bugs?). The guiding prinicipal is the glorification of the state/company. Software functionality is only added to the extent it furthers glorification of the software company, otherwise it is not added. Just as in a closed economy, capital expansion is only taken to the extent that it serves the needs of the state.
Oh, dear. Wasn't Metcalfe the guy who predicted the collapse of the Internet? If he is, I wonder why he still has credibility with anyone. Oh, well.
The best thing to do with something like this (vague, unsupported pronouncements) is probably to ignore it. Personally, I'm very tired of loudly justifying myself and Linux. I intend to just continue doing what I do now -- getting amazing work done more quickly than any of my cohorts who use another OS that shall remain nameless...
Bob,
w/r/t the personalities in the Open Source movement, you know not whereof you speak. ESR and RMS are good friends, I know them both socially, I've seen them together on many occasions, and whatever sniping they may do at each other in public over the details of this or that open-source license, they get along fine in person.
Richard is, as you say, a commie; but in holding that view, he is certainly in the minority among contributors to open-source projects. I'm about as hard-line a capitalist libertarian as they come, but I use open source software, and I contribute to it because I want the quality.
I don't give away code that I could turn into the next killer app, but I do give away bug fixes amd feature additions to code that many other developers use. The motive is much like being a member of a volunteer fire department, or helping to build a park or playground in my neighborhood. It improves the world I live in: the world of software development.
As for UNIX: if, as you say, UNIX is senile, then NT is a retarded child, suffering from crippling congenital defects in its brain. It's the biggest naked emperor to hit this industry since OS/2, and where the rubber meets the road, in high-volume web sites and database servers, any sysop worth his salt knows damned well that NT doesn't offer the reliablility (and yes, securability is part of that) to stay up for months on end.
In production, at the USPS.gov website, I know that the sysops have determined empirically that to keep the site up, they have to set one machine to the task of re-booting all the NT hosts once every four hours. For security, they depend on the configuration of their router, because they know through hard-won experience that NT itself is not secureable.
All that being said, UNIX does indeed suck, and the fact that it sucks far less than NT is no excuse. If you care about such things, there is a project done at U. Penn, called the Extremely Reliable Operating System (EROS) which has the potential to not suck. Check it out at http://www.eros-os.org
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
Let's think about a piano. It's a rich and complex instrument that takes many years to master. Someone without experience on it is virtually useless. Compare this now with a wind-up music box. Obviously the music box is more convenient for beginners to use. So what? Just because there's a place for a music box doesn't mean that there isn't a place in this world for a piano. Which one is more powerful, more expressive?
Not everything should be optimized for use by complete idiots. The CLI is infinitely more powerful than any GUI I've ever seen, because it tolerates and encourages communication between programs in ways never dreamt of by their authors. The Unix command line provides the developer with a broad set of powerful but flexible features that the creative mind can use to produce a custom design uniquely crafted to the particular demands of the situation.
Go out and find someone who has been at this game for many years. Now just sit back and watch them at work. They have created out of base components their own IDE, possible with SUI or GUI components, but probably not. But I guarantee you that it will be one that suits their own tastes and aptitudes. Quietly observe them edit files, move them around, compile them, debug them, test them, etc. The entire development is integrated, like a top-of-the-line German sports car: functional, powerful, and elegant. You will be absolutely astonished at the speed and ease exhibited by the native speaker of Unix in his home territory.
As on a piano, the art and skill of a CLI virtuoso can only be seen to be believed. That is the path to mastery -- all these cobbled little GUIs are expensive toys designed to sell a flashy demo using cheap tricks, and being optimized for immediate but shallow understanding rather than enduring use, are but a dim palimpsest of real tools.
Those without creative minds and agile fingers are of course welcome to hurry up with my fries. And they'll probably use a GUI to take my order, too.
Linux is not about technical superiority - it's about choice - freedom. Of course Linux isn't perfect - Linus et al keep working on it - knowing their history, they will always be working on it, improving it.
No - what we have is an movement that can't be bought, stolen or steamrolled. We have a choice - we can try something, on our own, and exercise some free will in deciding our own course.
And one more thing - technology that has been around for 30 years is there for a reason - it works. I have a radio sitting on my desk (early 1900's), I'm using a QWERTY keyboard (1920's), I'm looking a cathode ray tube monitor (1920's), and I'm setting under an electric light bulb (late 1800's). How old are you Bob?