Yea thats what I meant sorry.

How about other microkernels like the L4 family? Aren't they more advanced technology wise (and in more common use)?

There is no practical reason for HURD, at all. Supporters of microkernels may argue that they are more secure than monolithic kernels (in theory), but the fact of the matter is Linux is legendary for its stability. Compare it to a "hybrid" kernel like the one used by Windoze and... well... you see my point.

If you ask me, GNU has created some extremely useful projects vital to FOSS and Linux, but they have failed at their original goal. They use an elitist, "cathedral" model of open source development on a lot of their projects-- sure, it's open, but only a few people can work on it. Case in point is EGCS, the community fork of GCC (which quickly surpassed the latter and was adopted as the "new" GCC by GNU).

Linux and HURD were born at around the same time. (HURD was earlier, but we'll give Stallman a few years as a handicap). Linux was created by a computer science student as a hobby, GNU HURD was supposed to be better than UNIX and lead us to a world of free software.

20 years later, Linux is widely in use and is legendary for its stability among other things. HURD is barely usable. Actually, not usable in many regards.

I would be perfectly happy if someone created replacements for GNU userland utilities so we could be done with the whole "I use Slackware as my distribution of the Linux kernel of the GNU operating system" fiasco.

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That's sort of silly. For one thing, those of us who use Slackware are using "Slackware Linux." That's its name. To be correct then, Slackware Linux is a distribution of GNU/Linux. See? That's easy.

More to the point, the GNU userland utilities are pretty darned good. The only reason I'd want to see them replaced is if better ones come along.

I guess CMake is making a run on the GNU build system (autotools, make, etc.) for certain applications, but I'm not sure it's better.

Regards,

It's easy, but it's stupid. GNU shouldn't be forcing the term "GNU/Linux" simply because they can't write a functional kernel. I understand that most of the userland is GNU and that Linux is the kernel, but what does that leave us with? GNU/BSD, GNU/Hurd, GNU/OpenSolaris, the list could go on. Open source software is meant to be shared. Let Linux be Linux, BSD be BSD, etc.

GNU utilities are some of the best-- because entities outside of the FSF are working to improve them. The only reason I would like to see GNU utils replaced is so I no longer have to deal with Stallman's ego. I'm afraid I've lost all respect for the man recently, no matter how many tetris-playing text editors he's created.

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Hey now! I like the Tetris-playing text editor a lot. But you're right. I browse the Emacs developer's list from time to time and it's a bit stuffy there. OTOH, Stallman isn't very actively involved in Emacs development these days.

Regards,

It is kind of cool. Still not a fan of Stallman or his ego.

I don't think you can write off all microkernels based on the HURD disaster. Perhaps GNU was being too ambitious, but there are microkernels out there that aren't a complete disaster. MINIX 3 looks like a nice system based on a microkernel, and certainly there are advantages to microkernels that go beyond security. With Linux, you must reboot into a new kernel, and if you don't update the kernel then you are vulnerable to bugs and security vulnerabilities that may have been fixed. In order to remain secure and bug-free, you now have mandatory reboots. For a desktop, probably not an issue, but for a real server it is less than pleasant to watch your uptime fall to 0. Assuming there is no update to the bare bones microkernel, you can essentially upgrade and restart vital kernel code with security/bug fixes without rebooting the whole computer. I think this is a large advantage.

That said, I am OK with the Linux kernel for now (though it is getting more and more bloated every day...), but I certainly wouldn't knock the entire concept of a microkernel just because GNU can't get their act together with HURD.

I don't have anything against microkernels in particular. Like I said, in theory (and practice, in the case of MINIX 3) microkernels have some nice advantages.

You're right, Linux is becoming bloated... bloated with security fixes and increased hardware compatibility. The beauty of Linux is it can run on just about anything.

I booted Arch Hurd's latest LiveCD last night. It's only the second time that I've tried booting the Hurd. This time with Arch's LiveCD, it booted well. However, I still haven't installed the system yet, but it looks promising. I'll keep this thread updated to see if the Hurd is ready to bear the Slackware name.

You conveniently overlooked the bugs. There's a difference between "can" and "does" run if Linux even boots at all. (#23)

Hardware compatibility issues on your end by the looks of it. Everyone else was running "unbootable" Linux at the time.

"Everyone else" running my particular VIA chipset ...

Then... switch to Windows? Linux is far from perfect and stupid crud like this is bound to happen. Otherwise I'm not sure what you want me to say.

How did HURD run on that chipset, by the way?

Debian is essentially the FSF's OS, so of course they have a Hurd-powered version of the distro.

What makes you grow "tired" of monolithic kernels? Do you port the kernel into embedded devices? Do you use it in small, memory-limited situations? Because, for all of the ideological claptrap about microkernels, a microkernel will all of its accompanying daemons up, as they would be 99.9999% of the time in a server or desktop environment, is essentially the same thing that a monolithic kernel is . . . it's just flowed out differently.

Please . . . nobody post some benchmarks showing how "fast" Hurd is . . . as has already been pointed out, it supports next to nothing.

In my opinion, there is really no need for Hurd . . . it has no real "calling." The only reason for its continued existence or development is that Richard Stallman and various other FSF nomenclature extremists hate the word "Linux" and are on a never-ending quest to stamp it out . . . for no reason. (These are the same people who actually care about the vapid Linux vs GNU/Linux "controversy.")

If there was a need for Hurd, people would work on it and get it serviceable, as they have continued to do with the Linux kernel, FreeBSD, and all the other OSes out there which are actually useful, as opposed to letting it forever remain the next best thing if you can't get your hands on a copy of AmigaOS or Macintosh System 7.

I highly doubt that Pat will ever do this.

I vote against that name, even if he were to.