Lately, I've noticed an upsurge in interest about GNU's Hurd OS. Arch has extended support to Hurd, i.e. www.archhurd.org, and Debian has been doing so for years. Over the past 5 years, I've grown tired of monolithic kernels like the one included in Linux. Evidently, I'm not alone... thankfully. I've been tracking both Minix 3 and GNU's Hurd and both are rapidly progressing into usable operating systems.

So ... if Pat eventually releases a version of GNU's Hurd, I vote for the name, SlackHurd.

Pat, give us SlackHurd!

Linux is a kernel, not an OS. Don't confuse things. Hurd is also a kernel.

Slackware Linux is an OS.

So, the name would be Slackware Hurd (if the Hurd will ever become usable).

Obviously ... no confusion exists at least to me. For the uninitiated, Hurd uses the Mach micro-kernel and GNU/Linux uses the bloated Linux kernel...

Nah, I want SlackHurd ...

Bloated? Compared to what?

I don't think the Linux kernel is bloated. It simply supports a hell of a lot of stuff, which is necessary if you're going to compete in the real world.

Hurd supports next to nothing, and hence is less "bloated".

The Hurd project is an interesting one, and I hope for its success. But it does not, IMHO, belong anywhere near the Slackware brand, yet.

Oh, and why have you grown tired of monolithic kernels? If it works, then what is there to grow tired of?

I am always interested in whats going on or not going on in our world... the demise of Open Solaris by the evil Oracle is interesting,especially when there are two forks emerging,illuminos and Openindiana...

ps I have been waiting for a sign of HURD for donkeys years.

Not really, its just Arch.
Highly doubt Pat himself will start a project like that. All other ports are efforts of other individuals, even x86_64 which has been made official eventually, but thats entirely different.

hurd may be ready shortly after grub2 is... been waitin' 10 years already.

I don't mean to start a flame war, but is GNU Hurd just an attempt to get rid of the name Linux, since GNU has always been bitter as long as I can remember that the majority of people do not call Linux OS's GNU/Linux, but simply Linux, since Linux can mean the kernel, or a distribution?

Which will we see first: HURD or Duke Nukem Forever?

If you look at the L4linux project, it aims at porting the Linux kernel to the L4 µ-kernel API. It is a "(para-)virtualized Linux running on top of a hypervisor."

http://os.inf.tu-dresden.de/L4/LinuxOnL4/


I haven't tried it or know what would be involved in converting a Gnu/Linux OS to use it, but it says it's "binary-compatible" with any x86 gnu/linux distribution.

But really, what would be the advantage of this? The linux kernel would still be running as it self. Unless the L4 hypervisor can relaunch the linux kernel if it crashes, I wouldn't see any extra stability.

Duke Nukem Forever.

@ lewis,

as I understand it, GNU's original intent was for the Hurd kernel to be the kernel used in GNU operating systems (those things we now so often tend to refer to inappropriately as "Linux" operating systems ) - but for whatever reason(s), the Hurd kernel wasn't ready for mainstream use (or any use?) while the Linux kernel had been created and was becoming usable and was under active development and attracting more developers. People began creating operating systems (or maybe 'application suites would be a better term) around the Linux kernel. So, the Linux kernel became the kernel for the many GNU operating systems.

So, it isn't merely a name thing - it's actually a kernel thing. There's a link around here, I believe it was a story that appeared in the News forum on LQ, posted by LXer magazine, which leads to a recent interview with Richard Stallman, wherein he (Stallman) talks a bit about the early days of the GNU OS and of the FSF (Free Software Foundation) and about the situation regarding Linux vs Hurd as the kernel in our OS's - have a look around for it; if you can't find it I'll have a look for it later on. In the article, he says something like (I'm not quoting except for the words, works OK), "The Hurd kernel was intended to be the kernel for GNU OS's, but the Linux kernel works OK meanwhile".

The attempt to get rid of the name linux seem to have started at a very early point:
from here:
http://www.gnu.org/software/hurd/hurd-talk.html#int

Microkernels "appear" to be superior way to go but if you look at the development -- everyone tries to make a true microkernel then several years later the development ceases. It's almost like development reaches a point and then the problems in microkernels are too difficult to overcome and the project ceases.

It kind of reminds me of communism vs. capitalism. One sounds really good in theory but only one works well in practice. One is always way behind and it looks like it will never work as good, in reality, as the other.

@ GrapefruiTgirl

Fair enough explanation. I realize that GNU wrote the majority of the tools in a CLI only Linux environment. Other organizations wrote tools/software also though. And in a graphical environment, there are tons of orginizations/individuals writing the software, can we give everyone credit in the name of the OS? Linux is just a name that stuck, it's not taking a way credit from anyone in my opinion.

Ok, I secede now, instead of Slackware, we should give everyone credit who wrote software, lets call it: GNU/KDE/Fluxbox/OpenOffice/wicd/Linux.

Do you see my point, Linux is just a cool sounding name. When I use the term Linux for OS instead of for kernel, I am not trying to give Linus all the credit, or I am not trying to withhold credit from anyone, it just works, is easy to say, and sounds cool. Instead of talking to my buddy and saying, you should run "Genoolinux" on your PC.

Ok, I am going to quit now, :-)