If heat is a problem, then an RISC based solution would probably be better. Linux is supported on MIPS, ARM, Hitachi and PPC, which all have embedded processors that will beat hands down an x86 processor. Not sure how well supported they are, mind, on embedded platforms.
Having purchased the right to use/read/view some copyrighted material, don't I have the right to make copies for personal/backup use?
When you recieve copyrighted material, it is the contents of the material that is copyrighted, and not the medium it arrives on. I should therefore be able to view the contents from any medium I choose.
By not allowing me to copy the contents from the medium, earn't they blocking my rights?
The claims refer to displaying on something called X-Windows. This obviously doesn't apply to me, as my Linux and Solaris box run something called "The X Window System", which specifically ISN'T X-Windows.
Would a technicality like this render the patent invalid for "The X Window System"?
Using phrases such as "ungainly Solaris box". What the hell do you mean by "ungainly"?
multiple Pentiums are much more economical and also advantageous from the point of view of scaling
That's right, those Pentiums (pentium II?) scale really well. Just look at all those super cheap, scalable 8 and 16 way Pentium II machines available.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but Pentium II only supports glueless SMP to 4 CPUs, right? After that, we're back to custom ASICs (expensive,) losing the benefits of the economies of scale of available chipsets.
BTW, why are SCSI devices cheaper on Intel boxes? SCSI is SCSI is SCSI. I've used SUN CD-ROMs on my PC, and generic CD writers on both SUN and PC hardware.
There is no question that in the future we will see more and more SMP Intel machines (especially with Merced) taking over the work of ungainly and expensive Sun, HP and Alphas.
That "ungainly" word again! Can't wait for those cheap Merced processors to come out.
I beleive that there were some issues with the RAID controller being used in the Dell machine?
In this case, as the Mindcraft chose the hardware (to use a poorly supported controller,) I still see this as a rigged test.
A better test would be: "We've spend xxxxx$ on this box from Dell, which has these features. Come up with an equivalent priced box, and go head to head with us."
But it actually found the controller no problem! OK, it found it as a 53c810, but these controllers are backwardly compatible. Having found the controller, it should surely have found the devices off the controller.
A SCSI hard disk is a SCSI hard disk, and likewise for a CD-ROM. That's the point of SCSI!
Afterall, it's MS that has been spouting the BS about how Linux has less device support than NT4.0.
In the past 3-4 weeks, my toy machine has had: 1. Linux (RH6.0) 2. BeOS R4.51 3. FreeBSD 3.2 4. NetBSD 1.4 & 5. Windows NT Installed, or attempted to install.
Linux, FreeBSD and BeOS went flawlessly. NetBSD was a bit hairy, but installed and booted no problem (not familiar with raw BSD, so it came off again.)
NT couldn't even find my cd-rom drive, which is a standard SCSI2 device sitting off a Symbios 53c876 based board (NT did find the board, as a NCR53x810.)
If NT can't even handle this common and simple peice of kit, I'm damned if I'm going to persist in trying to install it.
I think the benchmarks show how poorly Direct3D scales, as a well written OpenGL based game (Q3) scaled with the hardware and driver quality available, and Direct3D requires the next version of Direct3D to make use of any new enhancements.
If the Sunray is a crap games machine, people JUST WON'T BUY IT!!!
Why do people try to tar Sun with the same brush as MS, just because they're big.
Remember, Sun have been a big contributer into the UNIX community since before Linux was out of nappies. Sun are one of the most open computer companies there are!
If Sun break the MS monopoly (even if it needs Linux's (or any other free OS, like *BSD,) then the field is open to EVERYONE. Sun got their (arguably) dominant UNIX position because they're good, not bullies.
When talking about 'free' hardware, a classic example is the IBM PC. The clone makers churned them out by the bucket load, and all they had to license was the BIOS code (that is till Phoenix came along.)
Microsoft today announced Windows for Neurones, the brand new Microsoft operating system for life critical operations. No release date has been set yet, but Microsoft hope to have a release version on the shelves by the fall of 2000.
It is thought that Microsoft have been working on this product for several years, early alpha versions of which can still apparently be seen in institutions around the US. "We had problems with the initial cooperative multitasking that we tried. Processes would sometimes end up in a loop, and not release the processor for other tasks." an insider said. "The results of these early tests can be seen as high up as ex-president Ronald Reagan. He was an early alpha tester, but developed problems. Unfortunately, the uninstall wasn't available then."
Microsoft site several advantages to using the OS: 1. Your brain is no longer dependant on old proprietry systems, some of them as old as several million years! We've learnt a lot in all those years. Windows for Neurones (sometimes referred to as Windows Neurones Technology, or just WinNT,) uses such modern features as pre-emtive multitasking, and virtual memory. 2. Your brain can now use cheap, off the shelve productivity software. Studies have shown that a lot of people have to have productivity tools (calanders, addressbooks etc.) as external programs or peripherals. WinNT has all this built in. It is also easy to use, "it's as if it knows what you are thinking," an insider said.
Some people have expressed concerns over the scalability of the new WinNT. While older systems (such as AT&T Metabolism Control and HP Coordination) have exploited the natural parallism in the typical brain, WinNT's new visual system appears to process data in a serial fashion, limiting the ability to exploit the brain's parallel capabilities.
"Rubbish," said a MS insider, "It has been shown in independent studies that our approach is upto 300% faster in processing visual data, for example." he said, quoting a recent study by Mindcraft Inc., a service-oriented, independent test lab. The visual aspects of the OS, what the person sees, has been controversial in recent discussions.
Existing OS providers in this critical industry also slam WinNT's reliability, based on test observations. "We have systems with a mean time before critical failure of 100+ years. I don't understand why anyone would want to upgrade. While brains running our OS consume ~20% of the bodies metabolic rate, we estimate WinNT brains to use upto 30% of the bodies metabolic rate, as it has no power saving facilities. Existing systems have the ability to sleep, saving power, but I've heard WinNT can keep you up all night. This can cause real problems." said a rival brain OS provider. Even if people think the visual aspects are better, which is debatable, a nice visual interface is a waste of time if your heart stops beating! Some things are simply more important than good visuals.
Microsoft refused to release licensing details, but it is said not be following the recent trend of open source software, and open API's and protocols. It is said to include a new licensing agent, called 'Paranoia', which prevents third parties from getting too close and examining it's workings, or 'reverse engineering' as it is known.
Of course, had the code been closed source, it would not have been analysed at all except by people with source code access. The bugs may then not have been found at all!
There I was, working away, when suddenly, the console just froze. No blue screen, nothing. "OK", I thought, "It may have just locked up the GDI bit."
Sure enough, I was able to ping the machine etc. So I went to one of the domain admins, sitting behind me, and asked him to do a remote reboot of my machine (as the responsible computer user does.)
Up pops his admin tool, he enters my machine name, and presses the button to tell it to shut down.
"Haha, I bet Word will pop up a dialog saying 'Are you sure you want to exit?', to which I won't be able respond."
Sure enough, the machine doesn't shutdown, that is exactly what happened.
We laughed, and tried again. Up comes the admin tool, and this time he presses the 'shutdown with prejudice key' ie. processes are killed unconditionally.
Except he forgot to change the machine name, and HIS machine goes crashing down, losing all his unsaved work.
It get's worse.
When his machine finally came back up, he opened the admin tool, changed the target machine to mine, and pressed the 'shutdown with prejudice' button.
Nowt, nothing!
We summised that the monitor on my machine, which listens for shutdown requests, had itself SHUTDOWN first time round, and hence my machine ignored subsequent shutdown requests!
It is such a shame that MS (and customers!) put such little value on reliability. Only yesterday (25/06,) I had problems with my bank, who have gone completely to NT. Account records were down for hours! If it hadn't been for the irony of the situation, I would have been furious, as I had issues I had to resolve.
That said, as we approach these highend hardware configurations (OK, mid-range to UNIX people,) I would rather spend the money on a full UNIX box, like an Sun E250. I am quite confident one of those could match the NT/PC based equivalent for the same price. Certainly price/performance.
I looked up the list price on the Dell site. The closest configuration to the test machine was > 36,000 USD! I'm sure if you gave that much dosh to VA Research, they could knock together a demon.
I could even get a 2xUSparcII Enterprise Server 250 from SUN, with 2GB of mem (should be plenty,) and 45.5GB of RAID storage. And still have ~4000 USD to spare. So much for low cost Wintel!!
When the video-driver-in-the-kernal thing gets dredged up, I always wonder if it really matters.
Servers generally run really generic SVGA or S3 drivers, which don't crash on NT 4, and from a normal user perspective, if your video driver crashes, you pretty much hosed anyway. (Unless the normal users you know like a command prompt.)
If it's a server, why not just not bother? That is the whole point, with NT, you have no choice.
Linux doesn't have video drivers in the kernal pretty much only because Unix has never done it that way and Linus doesn't want it. But video on Unix has always been an afterthought, whereas on a client OS like Windows, it's practically the most important thing.
Not strictly true. SGI for example, put minimal drivers in the kernel. Even newer versions of Linux do. It is not a good idea to give user space processes direct hardware access. The hardware drivers should therefore be in the kernel.
I would just like to state that Matrox deserves a lot of credit for releasing their COMPLETE specs(2D & 3d) for their video card. They are the only graphics company with enough of a clue to do this so far...
Cirrus logic have released the full specs to their Laguna (cl546x) chips. Shame they've started to fall behind in the gfx world as their chips were always good value for money with solid 2d performance.
Slashdot Mirror
I'll have to check, but I believe that glibc 2.1 is GPL.
Debian uses glibc 2.0, if I'm not mistaken.
what's www.activewin.com
If heat is a problem, then an RISC based solution would probably be better. Linux is supported on MIPS, ARM, Hitachi and PPC, which all have embedded processors that will beat hands down an x86 processor. Not sure how well supported they are, mind, on embedded platforms.
Having purchased the right to use/read/view some copyrighted material, don't I have the right to make copies for personal/backup use?
When you recieve copyrighted material, it is the contents of the material that is copyrighted, and not the medium it arrives on. I should therefore be able to view the contents from any medium I choose.
By not allowing me to copy the contents from the medium, earn't they blocking my rights?
Or is this not the case.
The claims refer to displaying on something called X-Windows. This obviously doesn't apply to me, as my Linux and Solaris box run something called "The X Window System", which specifically ISN'T X-Windows.
Would a technicality like this render the patent invalid for "The X Window System"?
Using phrases such as "ungainly Solaris box". What the hell do you mean by "ungainly"?
multiple Pentiums are much more economical and also advantageous from the point of view of scaling
That's right, those Pentiums (pentium II?) scale really well. Just look at all those super cheap, scalable 8 and 16 way Pentium II machines available.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but Pentium II only supports glueless SMP to 4 CPUs, right? After that, we're back to custom ASICs (expensive,) losing the benefits of the economies of scale of available chipsets.
BTW, why are SCSI devices cheaper on Intel boxes? SCSI is SCSI is SCSI. I've used SUN CD-ROMs on my PC, and generic CD writers on both SUN and PC hardware.
There is no question that in the future we will see more and more SMP Intel machines (especially with Merced) taking over the work of ungainly and expensive Sun, HP and Alphas.
That "ungainly" word again! Can't wait for those cheap Merced processors to come out.
I was going to moderate your post to flaimbait.
But it was much more fun taking the bait.
Get a clue.
I beleive that there were some issues with the RAID controller being used in the Dell machine?
In this case, as the Mindcraft chose the hardware (to use a poorly supported controller,) I still see this as a rigged test.
A better test would be:
"We've spend xxxxx$ on this box from Dell, which has these features. Come up with an equivalent priced box, and go head to head with us."
But it actually found the controller no problem! OK, it found it as a 53c810, but these controllers are backwardly compatible. Having found the controller, it should surely have found the devices off the controller.
A SCSI hard disk is a SCSI hard disk, and likewise for a CD-ROM. That's the point of SCSI!
Afterall, it's MS that has been spouting the BS about how Linux has less device support than NT4.0.
In the past 3-4 weeks, my toy machine has had:
1. Linux (RH6.0)
2. BeOS R4.51
3. FreeBSD 3.2
4. NetBSD 1.4
&
5. Windows NT
Installed, or attempted to install.
Linux, FreeBSD and BeOS went flawlessly. NetBSD was a bit hairy, but installed and booted no problem (not familiar with raw BSD, so it came off again.)
NT couldn't even find my cd-rom drive, which is a standard SCSI2 device sitting off a Symbios 53c876 based board (NT did find the board, as a NCR53x810.)
If NT can't even handle this common and simple peice of kit, I'm damned if I'm going to persist in trying to install it.
That security tip was magic:)
I think the benchmarks show how poorly Direct3D scales, as a well written OpenGL based game (Q3) scaled with the hardware and driver quality available, and Direct3D requires the next version of Direct3D to make use of any new enhancements.
Um, I hope Intel never has a 64-bit SPARC. It would be rather unseemly to steal the trademark and architecture from another company.
Intel could quite legitimately produce a SPARC chip, and call it a SPARC chip (subject to conformance testing.)
Check out SPARC International
If the Sunray is a crap games machine, people JUST WON'T BUY IT!!!
Why do people try to tar Sun with the same brush as MS, just because they're big.
Remember, Sun have been a big contributer into the UNIX community since before Linux was out of nappies. Sun are one of the most open computer companies there are!
If Sun break the MS monopoly (even if it needs Linux's (or any other free OS, like *BSD,) then the field is open to EVERYONE. Sun got their (arguably) dominant UNIX position because they're good, not bullies.
Christian
When talking about 'free' hardware, a classic example is the IBM PC. The clone makers churned them out by the bucket load, and all they had to license was the BIOS code (that is till Phoenix came along.)
'Nuff said.
Redmond, Wash. Wed. September 8 1999.
Microsoft today announced Windows for Neurones, the brand new Microsoft operating system for life critical operations. No release date has been set yet, but Microsoft hope to have a release version on the shelves by the fall of 2000.
It is thought that Microsoft have been working on this product for several years, early alpha versions of which can still apparently be seen in institutions around the US. "We had problems with the initial cooperative multitasking that we tried. Processes would sometimes end up in a loop, and not release the processor for other tasks." an insider said. "The results of these early tests can be seen as high up as ex-president Ronald Reagan. He was an early alpha tester, but developed problems. Unfortunately, the uninstall wasn't available then."
Microsoft site several advantages to using the OS:
1. Your brain is no longer dependant on old proprietry systems, some of them as old as several million years! We've learnt a lot in all those years. Windows for Neurones (sometimes referred to as Windows Neurones Technology, or just WinNT,) uses such modern features as pre-emtive multitasking, and virtual memory.
2. Your brain can now use cheap, off the shelve productivity software. Studies have shown that a lot of people have to have productivity tools (calanders, addressbooks etc.) as external programs or peripherals. WinNT has all this built in. It is also easy to use, "it's as if it knows what you are thinking," an insider said.
Some people have expressed concerns over the scalability of the new WinNT. While older systems (such as AT&T Metabolism Control and HP Coordination) have exploited the natural parallism in the typical brain, WinNT's new visual system appears to process data in a serial fashion, limiting the ability to exploit the brain's parallel capabilities.
"Rubbish," said a MS insider, "It has been shown in independent studies that our approach is upto 300% faster in processing visual data, for example." he said, quoting a recent study by Mindcraft Inc., a service-oriented, independent test lab. The visual aspects of the OS, what the person sees, has been controversial in recent discussions.
Existing OS providers in this critical industry also slam WinNT's reliability, based on test observations. "We have systems with a mean time before critical failure of 100+ years. I don't understand why anyone would want to upgrade. While brains running our OS consume ~20% of the bodies metabolic rate, we estimate WinNT brains to use upto 30% of the bodies metabolic rate, as it has no power saving facilities. Existing systems have the ability to sleep, saving power, but I've heard WinNT can keep you up all night. This can cause real problems." said a rival brain OS provider. Even if people think the visual aspects are better, which is debatable, a nice visual interface is a waste of time if your heart stops beating! Some things are simply more important than good visuals.
Microsoft refused to release licensing details, but it is said not be following the recent trend of open source software, and open API's and protocols. It is said to include a new licensing agent, called 'Paranoia', which prevents third parties from getting too close and examining it's workings, or 'reverse engineering' as it is known.
In this case, a third party upgrade company could simply write an openboot firmware monitor, and Bobs your uncle etc.
Or is this being over simplistic?
Christian
Of course, had the code been closed source, it would not have been analysed at all except by people with source code access. The bugs may then not have been found at all!
Implementation of an API using an OO language does not make the API OO.
MFC is simply a thin wrapper around Win32. That is why MFC and Win32 are consistent!
In short, C++ code is not necassarily OO code.
If I remember rightly, speccies were still going till the early 90's. The Spectrum had a very long life, in it's various guises.
.. a funny incident I had when working with NT.
There I was, working away, when suddenly, the console just froze. No blue screen, nothing. "OK", I thought, "It may have just locked up the GDI bit."
Sure enough, I was able to ping the machine etc. So I went to one of the domain admins, sitting behind me, and asked him to do a remote reboot of my machine (as the responsible computer user does.)
Up pops his admin tool, he enters my machine name, and presses the button to tell it to shut down.
"Haha, I bet Word will pop up a dialog saying 'Are you sure you want to exit?', to which I won't be able respond."
Sure enough, the machine doesn't shutdown, that is exactly what happened.
We laughed, and tried again. Up comes the admin tool, and this time he presses the 'shutdown with prejudice key' ie. processes are killed unconditionally.
Except he forgot to change the machine name, and HIS machine goes crashing down, losing all his unsaved work.
It get's worse.
When his machine finally came back up, he opened the admin tool, changed the target machine to mine, and pressed the 'shutdown with prejudice' button.
Nowt, nothing!
We summised that the monitor on my machine, which listens for shutdown requests, had itself SHUTDOWN first time round, and hence my machine ignored subsequent shutdown requests!
Big red switch time.....
It is such a shame that MS (and customers!) put such little value on reliability. Only yesterday (25/06,) I had problems with my bank, who have gone completely to NT. Account records were down for hours! If it hadn't been for the irony of the situation, I would have been furious, as I had issues I had to resolve.
I'm dreading Y2K.
BTW, the bank was NatWest (www.natwest.co.uk.)
That said, as we approach these highend hardware configurations (OK, mid-range to UNIX people,) I would rather spend the money on a full UNIX box, like an Sun E250. I am quite confident one of those could match the NT/PC based equivalent for the same price. Certainly price/performance.
I looked up the list price on the Dell site. The closest configuration to the test machine was > 36,000 USD! I'm sure if you gave that much dosh to VA Research, they could knock together a demon.
I could even get a 2xUSparcII Enterprise Server 250 from SUN, with 2GB of mem (should be plenty,) and 45.5GB of RAID storage. And still have ~4000 USD to spare. So much for low cost Wintel!!
When the video-driver-in-the-kernal thing gets dredged up, I always wonder if it really matters.
Servers generally run really generic SVGA or S3 drivers, which don't crash on NT 4, and from a normal user perspective, if your video driver crashes, you pretty much hosed anyway. (Unless the normal users you know like a command prompt.)
If it's a server, why not just not bother? That is the whole point, with NT, you have no choice.
Linux doesn't have video drivers in the kernal pretty much only because Unix has never done it that way and Linus doesn't want it. But video on Unix has always been an afterthought, whereas on a client OS like Windows, it's practically the most important thing.
Not strictly true. SGI for example, put minimal drivers in the kernel. Even newer versions of Linux do. It is not a good idea to give user space processes direct hardware access. The hardware drivers should therefore be in the kernel.
gcc is not threaded because each stage is a different process. It makes no sense for gcc to be threaded.
For further performance improvements, use gcc -pipe, so data is pipe'd between stages rather than using temporary files.
I would just like to state that Matrox deserves a lot of credit for releasing their COMPLETE specs(2D & 3d) for their video card. They are the only graphics company with enough of a clue to do this so far...
Cirrus logic have released the full specs to their Laguna (cl546x) chips. Shame they've started to fall behind in the gfx world as their chips were always good value for money with solid 2d performance.