Hmm, ok, you're right. People shouldn't call Mozilla a faillure YET.
But, they are right when they say it is crappy. I do understand that writting a browser is a huge task, but, if you look at other projects like KDE and gnome (other HUGE tasks), they are delivering something.
I also think that the reason nobody wanted to contribute is that the sources they first gave us where awfull. And, it is true, they didn't even compile. I even remember a comment explicitly saying they've made a deliberate mistake and they wanted compilation to fail for a particular file.
Now, I don't know what good this did, but it sure violates a lot of coding style rules.
Papi
Not everybody is fit to use Linux...
on
UNIX for Moms
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· Score: 1
Well,
I guess everybody makes mistakes. I did some pretty stupid things to my box too. But, what matters, is that I don't make them anymore, or if I still make them, I know how to fix them fast.
It must have been embarassing, espacially since you've just started. But, that's a bit why it is so great to have Linux at home. At least, you've probably fixed this very quickly because you had practice on some kind of UNIX before, as root.
Papi
What about the Motif project ??
on
UNIX for Moms
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· Score: 1
I've read (in a motif book) that motif was the project that invented many of these concepts.
Like beleveled buttons, scrolling menus etc. Does anyone know how much of that is true ???
This might be true, but keep in mind that it is the mother who wrote the article.
Also, I beleive that as a matter of fact, in general, women are not as intersted in computers than men.
Therefore, this means that they spend less time in front of a screen. This gives them less experience with computers. This brings us to the point, that, in general (with some exceptions, but very few), women are less comp... hmm, well.. goo... Hmm, no.. knowl... oh, you know what I'm trying to say...
This is not due to the fact that they are an inferior beeing, but to the fact that they don't care about computers (and other electonic devices). If there is one (good looking) woman out there that spends as much time as me in front of a computer (not chating and playing games) I WILL MARRY HER!!!!
This is not a stereotype. It is a fact that can be mesured by serveys.
Hope not to many feminists will read this. They might lay some we-are-not-blablabla-we-should-be-treated-blablabl a-and-be-able-to-pee-standing-blablabla stuff on me...
Papi
Not everybody is fit to use Linux...yup
on
UNIX for Moms
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· Score: 1
Don't worry, we still have our health
(you're not sick, now are you, because if you are, I'm sure you have something that would be worth not giving up for, or do you.. Arghhh!!!! My brain is swelling and those spiders won't stop walking all over me....)
Anyways, It's just that some people shouldn't be allowed to use the word root. As for microsoft, they don't need to be clueless to crash they're products. I guess they will stick to that because that way, they can always blame windows...
Papi
Not everybody is fit to use Linux...
on
UNIX for Moms
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· Score: 2
Well, it's true. Maybe this wil sound rude, but... some people are just plain stupid (with computers).
I have a buisness of Linux installation/configuration in exchange of beer (lots of it). And, I've lived to regret installing it for some people. Just to give some examples, one morning the phone rings, and this guy tells me he couldn't log in. I've created him a user, but I said to myself, he must have forgotten his password or something, so I tell him to log in as root to change the password back.
So I tell him to type root at the login prompt (and I hear some pencil writing) and then to type qwerty (the root password, for people worring about security, he uses a slirp connection to get on the net, so no harm can be done).
And, he kept telling me this didn't work, so I go to his place to realize he didn't press enter after typing root. Now, I don't know about you guys, but I have a lot of trouble to explain such simple matters without it getting on my nerves.
And this is just an example, I have a friend who first started using Linux 5 years ago, and still can't keep it for 2 strait weeks without doing something to demolish it (once he blamed the partition beeing full, so Linux must have written over the master boopt record...).
I also recall a guy typing echo "loging::502:502::/home/login:/bin/bash" >/etc/passwd. Ok this isn't fatal, but, without a boot disk it is. Especially when the guy reboots his machine because he realizes that he cannot log in as root anymore.
Once, this guy just felt like changing his root uid and gid (for whatever reason), so he just edited/etc/passwd and/etc/shadow and just changed the numbers... There are also some classics like:
rm -rf / home/login/somefile
(as root of course, since these begginers are always logged in as root). There is also a variant with chown|chmod -R that does a very nasty job also.
And don't even think of telling these people how to use mount. No, for some reason, it is too abstract for them to understand. So they call you all the time to tell you that they've cd to/mnt/cdrom or/mnt/floppy and their stuff isn't on the device anymore, Linux must have erased it somehow....
Anyway, I feel a lot less pressure now.....
Papi
All I heard is that it's not Windows...
on
UNIX for Moms
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· Score: 1
So, the woman seemed a little confused about the diffrence between Linux and UNIX.
She said that NetBSD was a UNIX clone. Isn't it a UNIX member of the BSD familly ?
Anyways, the point is that it is possible for beginners to use something else than windows, and that makes me happy.
It is not very complicated to understand. They just want to make more money.
Over the years, it seems that no one has ever stopped buying from them no matter what they did. Why would they change now ? You don't know, maybe some bugs where kept in the software and the fixes where already working.
They just might have planned to sale the bug fixes in the future. This is exactly the king of behavior that would not happen if Microsoft had enough competition (but we are not competititive enough yet...).
maybe one of them is a little clueless. But, ones worked as a sys-admin for 6 years beofre he decided he was more into programming, and the other was a sys-admin on an sgi router for a while (part time).
As for me, I do not consider my self clueless in UNIX. It is just that I don't feel like staring at a "welcome to solaris" (written in a wide array of languages) screen for 3 minutes.
Also, I'd use themes with olwm, it's just that sun using risc processor, and all the executables in my account are huge (bash takes a little over 3M stripped). Also, the only uglier window managers I am aware of (and I used quite a few) are mwm antd twm (maybe fvmw, but, it's a close one).
You must also consider that it costs over 12 000$ a year to maintain a network of sparc stations. This money could easilly be used to upgrade a fwe PCs that could run under Linux.
Of course, sun's computers are more powerfull that PCs, but, they cost so much and new PCs are becoming more and more powerfull, that after a year or two, you just realize that you would have been better off buying a PC in the first place.
first of all, I've worked with solaris on sparc stations, and I'm not very impressed. A couple of my friends that use Linux at home call the OS slowlaris. For some reason, it has a very slow X (but, it never crashes).
Solaris of course offers better support and maybe the best kind of on-line documentation, but the interface is ugly, and the OS is slow.
Also, Linux beeing behind windows-nt is ridiculous. First of all, win-nt doesn't offer multiuser facilities. It broadcasts too often and they're is no way to know why it does so, and they're is no way to change it's behavior. It just keeps on eating the bandwidth for no reason and denies real packets the chance to go where they should.
It is also a router by default. OK, it is easier to configure as a router, but just imagine a sales person comming in, plugging it's computer to demonstrate a piece of software (using an available or even a used IP). Then, the win-nt broadcasts thet it is now routing all packets, and, your whole network goes to the bit-bucket.
Papi
Read the report before making judgements.
on
WSJ Says Linux Lags
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· Score: 1
OK,
maybe they worked ward on the report. But, the report is still wrong (some people are incompetent at their job, you know...).
First of all, accton is a very complete logging utlitie, but it lacks a GUI. Most commercial UNICES have a more user-friendly interface.
Also, these guys probably havenM't heard of smp support for Linux. This is pure FUD.
OK, a compiler could be written in a semester by some students. But a C compiler ?? I don't think so.
Also, sementic check isn't a trivial task at all. When you look at all the implications. Sure, C's sementic is fairly simple, but consider the sementic check of ADA (I know that ADA is addition by gnat, but heck it must be hard to implement all of the static checking it does...), or C++. You must know that gcc doesn't compile just C. And, for some reason, I don't think the gnu people used bison, or flex to implement gcc, what do you think ??
So maybe a compiler could be written in a trimester by a bunch of students. But, I know the kind of compiler you are talking about. The kind that bearly understands 3 instruction and stuff. Hmm, now ask those students totake their 3 instruction compiler, stess it out a bit, and ask them to make it a cross compiler (that can compile code for half the platforms that gcc supports) with 9 levels of optimization, and half the features of gcc and make it compile on half the platforms gcc compiles on. They'll probably take over a year to finish.
When I was talking about bash, I was just trying to point out the fact that most of the gnu tools have a UNIX equivalent. And in most cases, the gnu version is completly compatible with it's UNIX version, but, it adds features. If you compare bash, with sh.. I just could have mentionned gmake, gawk, etc, etc. The point is that gnu produces some of the best software around (depending on what you look in a piece of software, of course), and is all free.
About tcsh, it is not a standard UNIX shell. I think it now comes even with commercial UNICES, but, the standard is, UNIX uses 3 shells, sh, csh and ksh. All others are additions, just like pico isn't shipped with solaris, but you can install it. The official editor under UNIX is vi.
Hmm, that might be true and I must admit that I've never used they're compilers.
But, try again with -O2 (the best level, as higher ones might screw up, at least before 2.8.* versions). Gcc is a little odd on this. For instance, if you declare a variable register, it will not consider it unless you explicitly ask for optimization. And, it doesn't inline functions if no optimisation is asked for.
The reason for this is quite simple. You want to debug your code before really using it, and some times, during debug, you have to recompile a few (mabe many) times. That way, compiling takes less time, and you can spend more time actually working, instead of waiting for gcc all the time.
If you still think that your other compiler is better, please tell my where how to get one for my self. And in this case, I want it to be clear that I was not bad mouthing other products, just trying to bring some light on gcc's high quality and value as a working tool..
Good point. Also, I would like to point out the fact that writting a compiler, even a cheap one is a task much greater that writting a kernel.
Just try writting a program that dies basic semantic checks. It is not a trivial task. And you should keep in mind how many languages gcc can compile, and all the optimisation it does.
You should also realize that most compilers available for windows have grater limitations. Like, turbo c. It cannot handle more that a few global variables. Because that would require it to use too many segments. Keep in mind also that the intel architecture has MANY odd limitations to keep backward compatibility.
If you like to take a test, take any compiler you know (other than gcc) and check the assembly output that it produces (this can be achieved with the -S flag under gcc, and SUN's cc). You will soon realize that gcc produces the best output (less stupid instructions like movl eax, eax) especially with wierd algorithms and interminable data structures.
The reason Linus used gcc is probably because IT IS JUST THE BEST. I've heard dozens of people with PhDs saying it is the best, and to my experience, it is the best. Gcc is not the only tool that should be valued. Take bash for example. Compare it with any other shell. As a command editor, and for scripts, it creams them all.
I think you are right about the lack of client side applications. But, you don't realy need to surpass anybody with those applications.
I've realized something over the years, people are kindda stupid. If you sell them a pile of shit that looks good, or that has a recognized name attached to it, they will by it, even if your competitor offers high quality products.
Take Beta vs VHS. Beta was a supperior machine. Take Apple vs IBM (in the older days). Apple has a better machine (I know, I switched from an apple II to a 80086, and even though my Apple I cost less, it was faster).
What needs the most work, to my opinion, is the look of certain applications. For us, it doesn't matter, but for users who don't know any better, looks might be the only feature they can recognize.
Although I hate Microsoft (and I have been boycoting them for over a year now), I must admit, they have a very nice office suit. This is to me the main reason that more companys stay with MS. I don't see anything Windows has to offer to a company that linux can't provide (and in most cases do better).
Hmm, I think you've missed something on the PII architecture. It isn't just an i386 with mmx support.
Did you know that the PII and pentium-pro can process up to 3 instructions an the time ? It does so by splitting instructions into microinstructions that are sent to a pool of instructions.
Then 5 processing units execute microinstructions at the same time (if they are independant, of course).
This is just A feature of the processor, but a big one that shouldn't be neglected. If you want to learn more (and speak french) here is a link to more information on the processor.
Well, I understand that you mustn't know everything. But, some HOWTO's aren't that bad. Also, you must know that not all documentation is written by gurus.
I think it would be a good idea for you to write some documentation on what you know. I used to be a beginer, and some friend's helped me out to understand more and more.
Now, I feel that I am a prety knowladgable person on Linux (and other UNICES). The thing is, that if you write down a document, there is at least one person out there that would appreciate reading it. And, if you write it, it will save some time to gurus that just don't feel like writing documentation for begginers.
As for Linux beeing complicated, I don't think so. It very easy to understand once you got the hang of it. It's just that it permits so much control over your hardware that knowing everything is almost impossible. For basic opperations, it is not worst that dos.
For an example, my brother doesn't know anything about computers. But, he can do anything he wants to with my box. I've just set up a few aliases, and explained him how to configure Window Maker, and now, he can do everything he feels like doing as if he was working with windows.
I guess this must be true for most crap you can get for win-95 and friends.
But have you checked out the documentation that comes with a comercial version of UNIX ? The man pages are far more readable and contain clearer and better written documentation (at least in solaris).
The utilities for administration are much better than ours. Installation is a breaze, and it comes with books and books of documentations.
Of course, you cannot pick it up on some "shelves of CompUSA".
First thing I'd like to say. I like programming, and, some day I hope to make a living off it.
Don't get me wrong, I use free software, and I like to peek at the code from time to time, and I like to recompile some to better fit my computer and stuff.
But, some of it HAS to be comercial. Also, I beleive that it is perfectly normal that comercial software shouldn't come with sources.
First of all, think of all the expenses paying a whole team of hackers costs. We don't work for 5$ an hour, you know... If they release they're code, use code and algorythmes expressed in the code for free. And, many people out there don't give a rat's ass about licenses. How many of you don't know at least one person who has an illegal version of office (or windows)???
Also, even if I like free software, and have a few projects in mind to release some (when I have a less hectic schedule), in many cases, comercial software is far supperior.
The reason is simple. People are paid to do it, and impelment evry feature (not just about 70%-90% of them), even if they don't feel like it. They are also paid to provide adequate documentation about it. Therefore, it more usable to the "naive" user. They can't just go to they're bosses and say "I don't feel like it".
Also, I feel that Linux cannot grow much more if there aren't more companies that port comercial versions of they're software to it. For some reason, when something costs a lot, poeple think it is better. For an example, I hate doing web pages. But, some times, I have to. When I started to charge more (a lot) for them (higher prices = less customers), for some reason, I kept getting more contracts, and I suck st html "programming".
Maybe Linus doesn't have time to write about the kernel. But, if you are really intersted in design issues, you can pick up a copy of "The linux kernel" from ldp.
This book is written by a kernel hacker that made the port to alpha possible. It's not Linus, but he is a very knowligeable individual, and he explains design issues very well. Plus, there are pointers to files in the source tree so you can read the code while following his book...
I beleive that he was talking about main memory management. As you know, to be able to perform multitasking, the kernel must share memory between precesses.
To do so, the hardware must do some work for us (like being able to translate virtual adresses to phisical ones and vice versa). It does so by spliting the total amount of memory into pages (4K on i386, 2K on alpha).
What he meant (to my opinion) handling requests to static pages is that when a process wants to get memory for himself (when is is started, or by a malloc call or so), it asks the kernel for a certain number of pages. Then, the kernel gives him descriptors to these pages, and alocates them when the process actually uses them (so if you malloc(10000000) and don't use it, you won't realy waste memory).
Also, when he was talking about "sane architectures" and page handling, he meant (I think) that all basic architectures use such schemes. It's just that the number of levels of page caching changes (3 for alpha, 2 for intel).
Maybe you already knew all that, or maybe I suck at explainig stuff, but, if you want to know more about this, go get "The linux kernel" from ldp. Or even better, if you understand french go get "programmation linux 2.0 api système et fonctionnement du noyau" by Rémi Card (author of the ext2 file system) and the only good french computer book I've ever read.
Slashdot Mirror
Hmm, ok, you're right. People shouldn't call Mozilla a faillure YET.
But, they are right when they say it is crappy. I do understand that writting a browser is a huge task, but, if you look at other projects like KDE and gnome (other HUGE tasks), they are delivering something.
I also think that the reason nobody wanted to contribute is that the sources they first gave us where awfull. And, it is true, they didn't even compile. I even remember a comment explicitly saying they've made a deliberate mistake and they wanted compilation to fail for a particular file.
Now, I don't know what good this did, but it sure violates a lot of coding style rules.
Papi
Well,
I guess everybody makes mistakes. I did some pretty stupid things to my box too. But, what matters, is that I don't make them anymore, or if I still make them, I know how to fix them fast.
It must have been embarassing, espacially since you've just started. But, that's a bit why it is so great to have Linux at home. At least, you've probably fixed this very quickly because you had practice on some kind of UNIX before, as root.
Papi
I've read (in a motif book) that motif was the project that invented many of these concepts.
Like beleveled buttons, scrolling menus etc. Does anyone know how much of that is true ???
Papi
This might be true, but keep in mind that it is the mother who wrote the article.
l a-and-be-able-to-pee-standing-blablabla stuff on me...
Also, I beleive that as a matter of fact, in general, women are not as intersted in computers than men.
Therefore, this means that they spend less time in front of a screen. This gives them less experience with computers. This brings us to the point, that, in general (with some exceptions, but very few), women are less comp... hmm, well.. goo... Hmm, no.. knowl... oh, you know what I'm trying to say...
This is not due to the fact that they are an inferior beeing, but to the fact that they don't care about computers (and other electonic devices). If there is one (good looking) woman out there that spends as much time as me in front of a computer (not chating and playing games) I WILL MARRY HER!!!!
This is not a stereotype. It is a fact that can be mesured by serveys.
Hope not to many feminists will read this. They might lay some we-are-not-blablabla-we-should-be-treated-blablab
Papi
Don't worry, we still have our health
(you're not sick, now are you, because if you are, I'm sure you have something that would be worth not giving up for, or do you.. Arghhh!!!! My brain is swelling and those spiders won't stop walking all over me....)
Anyways, It's just that some people shouldn't be allowed to use the word root. As for microsoft, they don't need to be clueless to crash they're products. I guess they will stick to that because that way, they can always blame windows...
Papi
Well, it's true. Maybe this wil sound rude, but... some people are just plain stupid (with computers).
/etc/passwd. Ok this isn't fatal, but, without a boot disk it is. Especially when the guy reboots his machine because he realizes that he cannot log in as root anymore.
/etc/passwd and /etc/shadow and just changed the numbers... There are also some classics like:
/mnt/cdrom or /mnt/floppy and their stuff isn't on the device anymore, Linux must have erased it somehow....
I have a buisness of Linux installation/configuration in exchange of beer (lots of it). And, I've lived to regret installing it for some people. Just to give some examples, one morning the phone rings, and this guy tells me he couldn't log in. I've created him a user, but I said to myself, he must have forgotten his password or something, so I tell him to log in as root to change the password back.
So I tell him to type root at the login prompt (and I hear some pencil writing) and then to type qwerty (the root password, for people worring about security, he uses a slirp connection to get on the net, so no harm can be done).
And, he kept telling me this didn't work, so I go to his place to realize he didn't press enter after typing root. Now, I don't know about you guys, but I have a lot of trouble to explain such simple matters without it getting on my nerves.
And this is just an example, I have a friend who first started using Linux 5 years ago, and still can't keep it for 2 strait weeks without doing something to demolish it (once he blamed the partition beeing full, so Linux must have written over the master boopt record...).
I also recall a guy typing echo "loging::502:502::/home/login:/bin/bash" >
Once, this guy just felt like changing his root uid and gid (for whatever reason), so he just edited
rm -rf / home/login/somefile
(as root of course, since these begginers are always logged in as root). There is also a variant with chown|chmod -R that does a very nasty job also.
And don't even think of telling these people how to use mount. No, for some reason, it is too abstract for them to understand. So they call you all the time to tell you that they've cd to
Anyway, I feel a lot less pressure now.....
Papi
So, the woman seemed a little confused about the diffrence between Linux and UNIX.
She said that NetBSD was a UNIX clone. Isn't it a UNIX member of the BSD familly ?
Anyways, the point is that it is possible for beginners to use something else than windows, and that makes me happy.
Papi
Well,
IBM produces AIX, and sco sucks (I've seen only one box, but I almost throw it out the window).
Maybe sco just realized how bad they sucked, or IBM bullied them around a bit.
Papi
It is not very complicated to understand. They just want to make more money.
Over the years, it seems that no one has ever stopped buying from them no matter what they did. Why would they change now ? You don't know, maybe some bugs where kept in the software and the fixes where already working.
They just might have planned to sale the bug fixes in the future. This is exactly the king of behavior that would not happen if Microsoft had enough competition (but we are not competititive enough yet...).
Papi
Hmm,
maybe one of them is a little clueless. But, ones worked as a sys-admin for 6 years beofre he decided he was more into programming, and the other was a sys-admin on an sgi router for a while (part time).
As for me, I do not consider my self clueless in UNIX. It is just that I don't feel like staring at a "welcome to solaris" (written in a wide array of languages) screen for 3 minutes.
Also, I'd use themes with olwm, it's just that sun using risc processor, and all the executables in my account are huge (bash takes a little over 3M stripped). Also, the only uglier window managers I am aware of (and I used quite a few) are mwm antd twm (maybe fvmw, but, it's a close one).
You must also consider that it costs over 12 000$ a year to maintain a network of sparc stations. This money could easilly be used to upgrade a fwe PCs that could run under Linux.
Of course, sun's computers are more powerfull that PCs, but, they cost so much and new PCs are becoming more and more powerfull, that after a year or two, you just realize that you would have been better off buying a PC in the first place.
Papi
OK,
first of all, I've worked with solaris on sparc stations, and I'm not very impressed. A couple of my friends that use Linux at home call the OS slowlaris. For some reason, it has a very slow X (but, it never crashes).
Solaris of course offers better support and maybe the best kind of on-line documentation, but the interface is ugly, and the OS is slow.
Also, Linux beeing behind windows-nt is ridiculous. First of all, win-nt doesn't offer multiuser facilities. It broadcasts too often and they're is no way to know why it does so, and they're is no way to change it's behavior. It just keeps on eating the bandwidth for no reason and denies real packets the chance to go where they should.
It is also a router by default. OK, it is easier to configure as a router, but just imagine a sales person comming in, plugging it's computer to demonstrate a piece of software (using an available or even a used IP). Then, the win-nt broadcasts thet it is now routing all packets, and, your whole network goes to the bit-bucket.
Papi
OK,
maybe they worked ward on the report. But, the report is still wrong (some people are incompetent at their job, you know...).
First of all, accton is a very complete logging utlitie, but it lacks a GUI. Most commercial UNICES have a more user-friendly interface.
Also, these guys probably havenM't heard of smp support for Linux. This is pure FUD.
Papi
OK, a compiler could be written in a semester by some students. But a C compiler ?? I don't think so.
Also, sementic check isn't a trivial task at all. When you look at all the implications. Sure, C's sementic is fairly simple, but consider the sementic check of ADA (I know that ADA is addition by gnat, but heck it must be hard to implement all of the static checking it does...), or C++. You must know that gcc doesn't compile just C. And, for some reason, I don't think the gnu people used bison, or flex to implement gcc, what do you think ??
So maybe a compiler could be written in a trimester by a bunch of students. But, I know the kind of compiler you are talking about. The kind that bearly understands 3 instruction and stuff. Hmm, now ask those students totake their 3 instruction compiler, stess it out a bit, and ask them to make it a cross compiler (that can compile code for half the platforms that gcc supports) with 9 levels of optimization, and half the features of gcc and make it compile on half the platforms gcc compiles on. They'll probably take over a year to finish.
When I was talking about bash, I was just trying to point out the fact that most of the gnu tools have a UNIX equivalent. And in most cases, the gnu version is completly compatible with it's UNIX version, but, it adds features. If you compare bash, with sh.. I just could have mentionned gmake, gawk, etc, etc. The point is that gnu produces some of the best software around (depending on what you look in a piece of software, of course), and is all free.
About tcsh, it is not a standard UNIX shell. I think it now comes even with commercial UNICES, but, the standard is, UNIX uses 3 shells, sh, csh and ksh. All others are additions, just like pico isn't shipped with solaris, but you can install it. The official editor under UNIX is vi.
Anyway, anough said...
Papi
Hmm, that might be true and I must admit that I've never used they're compilers.
But, try again with -O2 (the best level, as higher ones might screw up, at least before 2.8.* versions). Gcc is a little odd on this. For instance, if you declare a variable register, it will not consider it unless you explicitly ask for optimization. And, it doesn't inline functions if no optimisation is asked for.
The reason for this is quite simple. You want to debug your code before really using it, and some times, during debug, you have to recompile a few (mabe many) times. That way, compiling takes less time, and you can spend more time actually working, instead of waiting for gcc all the time.
If you still think that your other compiler is better, please tell my where how to get one for my self. And in this case, I want it to be clear that I was not bad mouthing other products, just trying to bring some light on gcc's high quality and value as a working tool..
Papi
Good point. Also, I would like to point out the fact that writting a compiler, even a cheap one is a task much greater that writting a kernel.
Just try writting a program that dies basic semantic checks. It is not a trivial task. And you should keep in mind how many languages gcc can compile, and all the optimisation it does.
You should also realize that most compilers available for windows have grater limitations. Like, turbo c. It cannot handle more that a few global variables. Because that would require it to use too many segments. Keep in mind also that the intel architecture has MANY odd limitations to keep backward compatibility.
If you like to take a test, take any compiler you know (other than gcc) and check the assembly output that it produces (this can be achieved with the -S flag under gcc, and SUN's cc). You will soon realize that gcc produces the best output (less stupid instructions like movl eax, eax) especially with wierd algorithms and interminable data structures.
The reason Linus used gcc is probably because IT IS JUST THE BEST. I've heard dozens of people with PhDs saying it is the best, and to my experience, it is the best. Gcc is not the only tool that should be valued. Take bash for example. Compare it with any other shell. As a command editor, and for scripts, it creams them all.
Papi
Ok, we could do that, but there is an issue left. Male or female. Maybe we should ask him first.
Papi
I think you are right about the lack of client side applications. But, you don't realy need to surpass anybody with those applications.
I've realized something over the years, people are kindda stupid. If you sell them a pile of shit that looks good, or that has a recognized name attached to it, they will by it, even if your competitor offers high quality products.
Take Beta vs VHS. Beta was a supperior machine. Take Apple vs IBM (in the older days). Apple has a better machine (I know, I switched from an apple II to a 80086, and even though my Apple I cost less, it was faster).
What needs the most work, to my opinion, is the look of certain applications. For us, it doesn't matter, but for users who don't know any better, looks might be the only feature they can recognize.
Although I hate Microsoft (and I have been boycoting them for over a year now), I must admit, they have a very nice office suit. This is to me the main reason that more companys stay with MS. I don't see anything Windows has to offer to a company that linux can't provide (and in most cases do better).
Papi
Hmm, I think you've missed something on the PII architecture. It isn't just an i386 with mmx support.
Did you know that the PII and pentium-pro can process up to 3 instructions an the time ? It does so by splitting instructions into microinstructions that are sent to a pool of instructions.
Then 5 processing units execute microinstructions at the same time (if they are independant, of course).
This is just A feature of the processor, but a big one that shouldn't be neglected. If you want to learn more (and speak french) here is
a link to more information on the processor.
Papi
Well, I understand that you mustn't know everything. But, some HOWTO's aren't that bad. Also, you must know that not all documentation is written by gurus.
I think it would be a good idea for you to write some documentation on what you know. I used to be a beginer, and some friend's helped me out to understand more and more.
Now, I feel that I am a prety knowladgable person on Linux (and other UNICES). The thing is, that if you write down a document, there is at least one person out there that would appreciate reading it. And, if you write it, it will save some time to gurus that just don't feel like writing documentation for begginers.
As for Linux beeing complicated, I don't think so. It very easy to understand once you got the hang of it. It's just that it permits so much control over your hardware that knowing everything is almost impossible. For basic opperations, it is not worst that dos.
For an example, my brother doesn't know anything about computers. But, he can do anything he wants to with my box. I've just set up a few aliases, and explained him how to configure Window Maker, and now, he can do everything he feels like doing as if he was working with windows.
Papi
I guess this must be true for most crap you can get for win-95 and friends.
But have you checked out the documentation that comes with a comercial version of UNIX ? The man pages are far more readable and contain clearer and better written documentation (at least in solaris).
The utilities for administration are much better than ours. Installation is a breaze, and it comes with books and books of documentations.
Of course, you cannot pick it up on some "shelves of CompUSA".
papi
First thing I'd like to say. I like programming, and, some day I hope to make a living off it.
Don't get me wrong, I use free software, and I like to peek at the code from time to time, and I like to recompile some to better fit my computer and stuff.
But, some of it HAS to be comercial. Also, I beleive that it is perfectly normal that comercial software shouldn't come with sources.
First of all, think of all the expenses paying a whole team of hackers costs. We don't work for 5$ an hour, you know... If they release they're code, use code and algorythmes expressed in the code for free. And, many people out there don't give a rat's ass about licenses. How many of you don't know at least one person who has an illegal version of office (or windows)???
Also, even if I like free software, and have a few projects in mind to release some (when I have a less hectic schedule), in many cases, comercial software is far supperior.
The reason is simple. People are paid to do it, and impelment evry feature (not just about 70%-90% of them), even if they don't feel like it. They are also paid to provide adequate documentation about it. Therefore, it more usable to the "naive" user. They can't just go to they're bosses and say "I don't feel like it".
Also, I feel that Linux cannot grow much more if there aren't more companies that port comercial versions of they're software to it. For some reason, when something costs a lot, poeple think it is better. For an example, I hate doing web pages. But, some times, I have to. When I started to charge more (a lot) for them (higher prices = less customers), for some reason, I kept getting more contracts, and I suck st html "programming".
Papi
Vi is said to be the only text editor for UNIX gourus. Probably because it is so old, and that really good unix users used it for like 15 years...
Switch to nedit instead....
Papi
Maybe Linus doesn't have time to write about the kernel. But, if you are really intersted in design issues, you can pick up a copy of "The linux kernel" from ldp.
This book is written by a kernel hacker that made the port to alpha possible. It's not Linus, but he is a very knowligeable individual, and he explains design issues very well. Plus, there are pointers to files in the source tree so you can read the code while following his book...
Papi
Good thing. Now, the only thing left for us to do, is burn all windows cds and kill (or making him suffer very much) Bill Gates...
Now, all the pieces fit....
Papi
I beleive that he was talking about main memory management. As you know, to be able to perform multitasking, the kernel must share memory between precesses.
To do so, the hardware must do some work for us (like being able to translate virtual adresses to phisical ones and vice versa). It does so by spliting the total amount of memory into pages (4K on i386, 2K on alpha).
What he meant (to my opinion) handling requests to static pages is that when a process wants to get memory for himself (when is is started, or by a malloc call or so), it asks the kernel for a certain number of pages. Then, the kernel gives him descriptors to these pages, and alocates them when the process actually uses them (so if you malloc(10000000) and don't use it, you won't realy waste memory).
Also, when he was talking about "sane architectures" and page handling, he meant (I think) that all basic architectures use such schemes. It's just that the number of levels of page caching changes (3 for alpha, 2 for intel).
Maybe you already knew all that, or maybe I suck at explainig stuff, but, if you want to know more about this, go get "The linux kernel" from ldp. Or even better, if you understand french go get "programmation linux 2.0 api système et fonctionnement du noyau" by Rémi Card (author of the ext2 file system) and the only good french computer book I've ever read.
Papi