[clug] Speculation about Longhorn

[Sam Couter]

Andrew Roudenko <aroudenko at optusnet.com.au> wrote:
> Is it possible that the VERY long release cycle for MS Longhorn is due to them 
> incorporating a BSD kernel? 

Possible? Yes. Likely? Probably not. It would be a nightmare for lack of
backwards compatibility if nothing else. We all know that Wintel users
won't stand for not being able to run their obsolete software on their
new systems.

> There could be a number of advantages to this.  They finally get the "secure" 
> operating system they have been talking about without having to either totally redo 
> Win or start from scratch.  

The Windows NT kernel isn't so bad, really. It's the crappy architecture
that the system that runs on it is built with. The services are
insecure, not (so much) the kernel, and will continue to be so,
regardless of what kernel Microsoft ports them to.

Although the decision to make the microkernel not so micro by including
video drivers in it was pretty fucked up. That accounts for a lot of
instability, but not for the general lack of security.

> And could a move like this stop GNU/Linux dead in its tracks when it comes to 
> commercial takeup?

If Longhorn isn't released until 2006, the game will be more or less
over. The business model of selling proprietary, closed-source operating
systems is not going to be viable for all that much longer. And with the
pro-open {source,format} push that's happening in many legislatures,
2006 is going to be *way* too late for Microsoft to block open source.
-- 
Sam "Eddie" Couter  |  mailto:sam at couter.dropbear.id.au
Debian Developer    |  mailto:eddie at debian.org
                    |  jabber:sam at teknohaus.dyndns.org
OpenPGP fingerprint:  A46B 9BB5 3148 7BEA 1F05  5BD5 8530 03AE DE89 C75C
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: not available
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 189 bytes
Desc: Digital signature
Url : http://lists.samba.org/archive/linux/attachments/20031030/9b3a93b2/attachment.bin