[clug] Kernels are easy, ls is the hard part!

steve jenkin sjenkin at canb.auug.org.au
Sat Sep 15 15:50:35 GMT 2007


Sam Couter wrote on 15/9/07 9:53 PM:
> Maybe because it's good fun? I can't really tell you what motivates the
> individual developers because I don't know, but I've looked at and tried
> the Hurd a few times and it was very interesting.
>
> And of course as we all know, microkernels are the way of the future.
> Linux was already obsolete by January 1992.
>   
The HURD folks answered my question themselves:
<http://www.gnu.org/software/hurd/hurd-and-linux.html>
> Given the years of work we had already put into the Hurd, we decided
> to finish it rather than throw them away.
> If we did face the question that people ask---if Linux were already
> available, and we were considering whether to start writing another
> kernel---we would not do it. Instead we would choose another project,
> something to do a job that no existing free software can do.
I understand their second statement:
     why waste resources/time just duplicating something that's already
done and done well?

It's not like there aren't enough other hard problems crying out for
attention.


As for 'microkernels', they've been promising big things since 1985.
Which is why Microsoft chose to license Mach as the base for Windows
NT... Not just NeXT.
Perhaps they'll morph into VM hypervisors.

-- 
Steve Jenkin, Info Tech, Systems and Design Specialist.
0412 786 915 (+61 412 786 915)
PO Box 48, Kippax ACT 2615, AUSTRALIA

sjenkin at canb.auug.org.au http://members.tip.net.au/~sjenkin



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