MacOS X is a server OS... what desktop OSes are there? Windows 95 and MacOS. Do any of us really take them seriously? No. Why not run MacOS X on it? You could try NetBSD on it if you're willing to run a "server OS". Not sure Linux really qualifies for that title yet.
While yes, MacOS is half-emulated, as someone who uses it along side LinuxPPC, I must say that the MacOS seems to contain fewer annoying/show-stopping bugs by now than does LinuxPPC, which is one of the weaker Linux distros in existence.
Quite. The original poster also conveniently overlooked the fact that there are those of us who are just not impressed with commodity Pee Cee hardware in the first place. The hoops you have to jump through to get the simplest hardware configurations working satisfactorily can be nothing short of nightmarish.
The great advantage in paying the extra couple hundred bucks for a Mac is that you don't have to say prayers and make offerings to get the bloody thing running.
You don't *have* to use Objective C to write for GNUStep. It may still be preferred, but GNUStep will follow Apple's lead and you can do it in Java (if you must).
The same people tend to not like Objective C who don't like Smalltalk... there's a lot of lip service given to OO lately, but most folks have forgotten about the OO-est language that ever was.
FWIW, despite its popularity, there are some bogglingly-good coders out there who find that C++ is hackish and unreasonable, whereas Objective C is closer to being something usable. In terms of really being OO/providing the advantages that OO is meant to provide, Objective C is (arguably) a better solution. C++ is much more widespread, and (arguably) easier to learn. I guess it's all a matter of taste.
Either way, trying to turn C (portable assembler) into a messaging, OO language is one of those "impossible" computer science problems that will probably never be adequately solved. To wit: OO and compilers don't mix. First person to come up with a weakly-typed, late-binding, polymorphic cross-compiler, wins.
Apple did a Linux distribution, MKLinux... LinuxPPC and MKLinux teams worked very closely together. So I think maybe Apple doesn't dislike Linux as much as you might imagine.
It's not clear whether you are worried about running out of disk space or feeling a "performance hit". Linux is pretty fast (one of the many reasons we all use it). If you are doing desktop-oriented things with your desktop system, you might not even notice a performance hit.
Drives are so cheap now you might not need to worry about logs taking up lots of space, either.
It would probably be worth investigating journaling file systems even if your primary use is fairly userly. ext2fs is fast, but it is also one of the most fragile file systems I have ever encountered. IMHO, ext2fs is one of the things about Linux that is mostly likely to deter people from using it in high-end servers. I have lost entire ext2fs file systems irrevocably after power outages or developer-kernel crashes. It's good news indeed that more alternatives are on the way.
The poster expressed a desire to continue running MacOS and BeOS in addition to Linux.
You're not trying to suggest e can do that with a cheap peecee...?
Honestly, unless your only interest is running a super-tweaked server, what possible advantage exists in a PII/450 over a G3 tower? Both have far more processing power than most individuals can readily take advantage of. Although, the PII is clearly the better choice if your computer needs to double as a space heater.
With reference to the original post, it seems this is more of an issue of compatibility with installed software and feeling good about choosing alternatives than of having the faster hot-rod.
For a CS student, I'd go with a RISC machine. The x86 instruction set doesn't have much life left in it.
I don't know about conversions... but if you already have LinuxPPC installed you can get Debian going from a tarball on a separate partition without too much hassle. I did it several months ago and it was good aside from feature-incompleteness and random crashing one would expect from an early development build. This could be a very nice PPC distro if they ever finish it.
Why not stick to your guns and get another Mac, since you seem to want one so much?
You could get an old 7x00 mainframe and drop in a G3, overclock it, add a good SCSI card and be pretty stylin' for less money than you're talking about.
You're asking us all to support alternatives but you're going to buy a peecee... man, who needs a warranty? If you get that 7x00 you can replace whatever you need to for very little money and you won't have the kinds of problems associated with Apple's crappy IDE-based systems.
Have courage! You don't need that warranty if you pick your hardware carefully.
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MacOS X is a server OS... what desktop OSes are there? Windows 95 and MacOS. Do any of us really take them seriously? No. Why not run MacOS X on it? You could try NetBSD on it if you're willing to run a "server OS". Not sure Linux really qualifies for that title yet.
While yes, MacOS is half-emulated, as someone who uses it along side LinuxPPC, I must say that the MacOS seems to contain fewer annoying/show-stopping bugs by now than does LinuxPPC, which is one of the weaker Linux distros in existence.
Quite. The original poster also conveniently overlooked the fact that there are those of us who are just not impressed with commodity Pee Cee hardware in the first place. The hoops you have to jump through to get the simplest hardware configurations working satisfactorily can be nothing short of nightmarish.
The great advantage in paying the extra couple hundred bucks for a Mac is that you don't have to say prayers and make offerings to get the bloody thing running.
You don't *have* to use Objective C to write for GNUStep. It may still be preferred, but GNUStep will follow Apple's lead and you can do it in Java (if you must).
The same people tend to not like Objective C who don't like Smalltalk... there's a lot of lip service given to OO lately, but most folks have forgotten about the OO-est language that ever was.
FWIW, despite its popularity, there are some bogglingly-good coders out there who find that C++ is hackish and unreasonable, whereas Objective C is closer to being something usable. In terms of really being OO/providing the advantages that OO is meant to provide, Objective C is (arguably) a better solution. C++ is much more widespread, and (arguably) easier to learn. I guess it's all a matter of taste.
Either way, trying to turn C (portable assembler) into a messaging, OO language is one of those "impossible" computer science problems that will probably never be adequately solved. To wit: OO and compilers don't mix. First person to come up with a weakly-typed, late-binding, polymorphic cross-compiler, wins.
Apple did a Linux distribution, MKLinux... LinuxPPC and MKLinux teams worked very closely together. So I think maybe Apple doesn't dislike Linux as much as you might imagine.
What about Squeak?
http://www.squeak.org/
I've never used any software, OS or application, that doesn't leak some memory, however slowly.
It's not clear whether you are worried about running out of disk space or feeling a "performance hit". Linux is pretty fast (one of the many reasons we all use it). If you are doing desktop-oriented things with your desktop system, you might not even notice a performance hit.
Drives are so cheap now you might not need to worry about logs taking up lots of space, either.
It would probably be worth investigating journaling file systems even if your primary use is fairly userly. ext2fs is fast, but it is also one of the most fragile file systems I have ever encountered. IMHO, ext2fs is one of the things about Linux that is mostly likely to deter people from using it in high-end servers. I have lost entire ext2fs file systems irrevocably after power outages or developer-kernel crashes. It's good news indeed that more alternatives are on the way.
"weird" isn't in the ispell dictionary... or is it? :-)
Performance is nice, but it's not everything.
The poster expressed a desire to continue running MacOS and BeOS in addition to Linux.
You're not trying to suggest e can do that with a cheap peecee...?
Honestly, unless your only interest is running a super-tweaked server, what possible advantage exists in a PII/450 over a G3 tower? Both have far more processing power than most individuals can readily take advantage of. Although, the PII is clearly the better choice if your computer needs to double as a space heater.
With reference to the original post, it seems this is more of an issue of compatibility with installed software and feeling good about choosing alternatives than of having the faster hot-rod.
For a CS student, I'd go with a RISC machine. The x86 instruction set doesn't have much life left in it.
I don't know about conversions... but if you already have LinuxPPC installed you can get Debian going from a tarball on a separate partition without too much hassle. I did it several months ago and it was good aside from feature-incompleteness and random crashing one would expect from an early development build. This could be a very nice PPC distro if they ever finish it.
Why not stick to your guns and get another Mac, since you seem to want one so much?
You could get an old 7x00 mainframe and drop in a G3, overclock it, add a good SCSI card and be pretty stylin' for less money than you're talking about.
You're asking us all to support alternatives but you're going to buy a peecee... man, who needs a warranty? If you get that 7x00 you can replace whatever you need to for very little money and you won't have the kinds of problems associated with Apple's crappy IDE-based systems.
Have courage! You don't need that warranty if you pick your hardware carefully.
Why isn't CLOS practical? There's a CLOS on just about every platform; Allegro Common Lisp can even target Nintendo 64 and Sony Playstation...
Objective C fits nicely for those who like real objects (a la Smalltalk) but need a compiled language. For those who don't, Squeak is spiffy.
There are choices, and some of them are superior to Java.