5 ms·

Well, since I worked on the team moving NeXTstep to the i386 family at NeXT, I can say with certainty that Linux played no role at all. We had copies of ATT UNI

by MrTonyD 10y ago

Well, since I worked on the team moving NeXTstep to the i386 family at NeXT, I can say with certainty that Linux played no role at all. We had copies of ATT UNIX and BSD UNIX which had portions already running on Intel (so we didn't have to completely reinvent the wheel.) There was some discussion about which UNIX we should be using on Intel in order to move it all to Mach - but the easy path was to build on some earlier work with the existing BSD port to i386 (in particular, memory management had been done in one of the ports, and using that as a starting point was very helpful.) As for GNU - we spent an incredible amount of time fixing bugs in both the C and C++ compilers. Really, GNU wasn't really considered "production worthy" before the NeXT project - and it was more of a toy until we fixed it. Steve was committed to using GNU to try to to compete with Apple based on low cost open source. As a programmer, it wasn't open source that helped us, - we were fixing and helping open source. I've always found it ironic that the open source community ignores the role of the rich and powerful in allowing them to succeed. (Ironically, I was later involved with the team at Oracle that converted Linux from a toy into a functioning kernel. It was missing many system calls and a lot of functionality. Speaking as a kernel engineer, Linux was almost useless. Larry decided to use Linux as a way to price compete against Microsoft - shouldn't be too surprising since Larry and Steve were good friends and shared ideas. I wrote the original white paper for Larry analyzing the state of the Linux kernel.)

ktRolster 10y ago
Ironically, I was later involved with the team at Oracle that converted Linux from a toy into a functioning kernel. Seriously?
- k__ 10y ago
  so full of himself...
- kazinator 10y ago
  In 1994 I did contract work for a serious businesses that ran commercial pay-for-click information website that ran fabulously on Linux, 1.2.x kernels. Since I first started using Linux in 1993 (0.99 patch level 12), it has always been a functioning kernel.
  - feld 10y ago
    Anyone can write a functioning kernel. The question is if it provides all the functionality required to run complex modern software -- especially big databases, which was pretty much your defacto benchmark back then. "Linux doesn't provide these syscalls or anything comparable" might mean you go from "runs reasonably well" to "can't run on this hardware at all because the kernel doesn't know how to do these tricks with memory, etc"
    - varjag 10y ago
      I personally know at least a dozen Linux kernel contributors. Some of them are among the most competent, prolific and enthusiastic developers out there who would code until their fingertips bleed. Most work or worked at the usual suspects, yes, including Oracle. It's the first time however I hear anyone claiming as much credit. Oracle didn't even start dabbling with Linux until 21st century, and it was already a decade old project dominating Internet server deployments at that point.
      - MrTonyD 10y ago
        It certainly wasn't my intent to criticize any Linux contributor. I think that there are a lot of people doing the right things for the right reasons. They do that work in a social context, though. And I think that we need to understand how our society really works in order to make the right decisions moving forward.
    - MrTonyD 10y ago
      Exactly. When I started doing the port of Oracle to Linux I had been reading the newsgroups - and they had been claiming POSIX compatibility. But system calls were missing many options, and entire sections of library code were missing. I'd run POSIX compatibility testing, so I knew that something didn't make sense. I kept posting to the news groups - mentioning that I was trying to port some software and hoping that they would notice my Oracle email address and take me seriously. Eventually, after trying several branches, somebody admitted that they had never actually run the POSIX suite, since it was too expensive. As long as you only wanted to do simple programs, Linux was fine. It was nowhere near being able to run Oracle, and it was nowhere near being able to run it well (with any of the then-modern features such as async I/O or direct memory paths or scheduling for long runnning processes or efficient large memory allocations.) It was a toy.
- MrTonyD 10y ago
  It's easy to forget the early days of Linux. If you go back and read the articles of the time they often pointed out that Linux made a good print server. But that was about all it could do - get lpr-style requests and talk to a printer driver. I did a test port of Oracle to Linux and wrote up a white paper for Larry. Larry was trying to figure out how to get Bill to kill important features in SQLServer. So Larry and Scott and IBM and HP had a couple of floors of kernel engineers at Redwood Shores fixing Linux and submitting the changes until Bill agreed to make SQL Server work more poorly stop competing so aggressively. But by that time we had already submitted enough to make Linux into a functioning product.
  - tobltobs 10y ago
    > Bill agreed to make SQL Server work more poorly stop competing so aggressively. I might have been living under a rock and everybody but me already heard about this story. But I would expect that every HN reader would drop his coffee cup reading this for the first time. Is this true? Why had I never heard about it? Why should Bill do that?
  - varjag 10y ago
    Curious what other things, aside from GNU and Linux, you fixed in passing on your corporate assignments.
    - MrTonyD 10y ago
      I'm just a geek who grew up in Silicon Valley. I soldered and wire wrapped chips I picked up from Haltek/Halted and the sales offices of local chip manufacturers, and taught myself programming using switches to enter binary codes (before I bought a broken teletype and fixed it - paper tape was a huge improvement after using switches to program.)
  - nikanj 10y ago
    I'm super curious about this. When was this, mid-90s?
  - patates 10y ago
    well, it probably saved some lives by telling people that their printer was on fire
vidoc 10y ago
> I wrote the original white paper for Larry analyzing the state of the Linux kernel. Would you mind sharing a link by any chance?
- MrTonyD 10y ago
  At the time it didn't seem like anything significant - nobody really wanted to do a Linux port of Oracle. But I did a test port and wrote up the many missing system calls and many incomplete system calls and many missing library implementations. Larry read it and I didn't really think about it again. Guess I should have saved a copy. And this was definitely an internal white paper - not something for circulation.
YeGoblynQueenne 10y ago
>> I've always found it ironic that the open source community ignores the role of the rich and powerful in allowing them to succeed. I don't think anyone ignores anything, it's more like the OSS community (of which I'm not a part, btw) simply doesn't feel that their freedom is a good price to pay for - anything, really. Also, to be fair, the "rich and powerful" mostly get into peoples' way when we try to live our lives in a meaningful way, and that includes OSS folk, who just like to write and exchange software. If the "rich and powerful" decide to patent everything, which is the real sticking point for the OSS community, then the OSS folk have no toys to play with. Understandably, they are not happy with that.
microDude 10y ago
You sir, have some interesting stories to tell.
- scrollaway 10y ago
  After browsing that user's comment history, it certainly seems like he's trying very hard to have some interesting stories to tell. Make of that what you will.
  - pasxizeis 10y ago
    I second that.
johnsu 10y ago
"open source" didn't exist during the time period you're talking about.
visitor2035 10y ago
I visited the NeXT factory in Fremont when it was making cubes. For fairly obvious reasons at UCB Sun workstations were everywhere. I was asked by some of the people giving the tour what it would take to get departments to go with their boxes. I said access to source was something we had come to expect but it was out of the question.
- MrTonyD 10y ago
  Yeah, that factory sure was impressive, wasn't it? I would sometimes go out of my way just to visit - hoping that they were running (it took a long time to get it started, and after that it took a long time to get it stable. Really, it was Sony and their manufacturing expertise that finally got us working.) I remember sitting up in the "control room" while they used the GUI to directly control the robots on the factory floor - watching the robots move in the dimly lit factory. It may be common now, but at the time that was "state of the art".

by MrTonyD 10y ago

ktRolster 10y ago

Ironically, I was later involved with the team at Oracle that converted Linux from a toy into a functioning kernel. Seriously?

k__ 10y ago
so full of himself...
kazinator 10y ago
In 1994 I did contract work for a serious businesses that ran commercial pay-for-click information website that ran fabulously on Linux, 1.2.x kernels. Since I first started using Linux in 1993 (0.99 patch level 12), it has always been a functioning kernel.
- feld 10y ago
  Anyone can write a functioning kernel. The question is if it provides all the functionality required to run complex modern software -- especially big databases, which was pretty much your defacto benchmark back then. "Linux doesn't provide these syscalls or anything comparable" might mean you go from "runs reasonably well" to "can't run on this hardware at all because the kernel doesn't know how to do these tricks with memory, etc"
  - varjag 10y ago
    I personally know at least a dozen Linux kernel contributors. Some of them are among the most competent, prolific and enthusiastic developers out there who would code until their fingertips bleed. Most work or worked at the usual suspects, yes, including Oracle. It's the first time however I hear anyone claiming as much credit. Oracle didn't even start dabbling with Linux until 21st century, and it was already a decade old project dominating Internet server deployments at that point.
    - MrTonyD 10y ago
      It certainly wasn't my intent to criticize any Linux contributor. I think that there are a lot of people doing the right things for the right reasons. They do that work in a social context, though. And I think that we need to understand how our society really works in order to make the right decisions moving forward.
  - MrTonyD 10y ago
    Exactly. When I started doing the port of Oracle to Linux I had been reading the newsgroups - and they had been claiming POSIX compatibility. But system calls were missing many options, and entire sections of library code were missing. I'd run POSIX compatibility testing, so I knew that something didn't make sense. I kept posting to the news groups - mentioning that I was trying to port some software and hoping that they would notice my Oracle email address and take me seriously. Eventually, after trying several branches, somebody admitted that they had never actually run the POSIX suite, since it was too expensive. As long as you only wanted to do simple programs, Linux was fine. It was nowhere near being able to run Oracle, and it was nowhere near being able to run it well (with any of the then-modern features such as async I/O or direct memory paths or scheduling for long runnning processes or efficient large memory allocations.) It was a toy.
MrTonyD 10y ago
It's easy to forget the early days of Linux. If you go back and read the articles of the time they often pointed out that Linux made a good print server. But that was about all it could do - get lpr-style requests and talk to a printer driver. I did a test port of Oracle to Linux and wrote up a white paper for Larry. Larry was trying to figure out how to get Bill to kill important features in SQLServer. So Larry and Scott and IBM and HP had a couple of floors of kernel engineers at Redwood Shores fixing Linux and submitting the changes until Bill agreed to make SQL Server work more poorly stop competing so aggressively. But by that time we had already submitted enough to make Linux into a functioning product.
- tobltobs 10y ago
  > Bill agreed to make SQL Server work more poorly stop competing so aggressively. I might have been living under a rock and everybody but me already heard about this story. But I would expect that every HN reader would drop his coffee cup reading this for the first time. Is this true? Why had I never heard about it? Why should Bill do that?
- varjag 10y ago
  Curious what other things, aside from GNU and Linux, you fixed in passing on your corporate assignments.
  - MrTonyD 10y ago
    I'm just a geek who grew up in Silicon Valley. I soldered and wire wrapped chips I picked up from Haltek/Halted and the sales offices of local chip manufacturers, and taught myself programming using switches to enter binary codes (before I bought a broken teletype and fixed it - paper tape was a huge improvement after using switches to program.)
- nikanj 10y ago
  I'm super curious about this. When was this, mid-90s?
- patates 10y ago
  well, it probably saved some lives by telling people that their printer was on fire

vidoc 10y ago

> I wrote the original white paper for Larry analyzing the state of the Linux kernel. Would you mind sharing a link by any chance?

MrTonyD 10y ago
At the time it didn't seem like anything significant - nobody really wanted to do a Linux port of Oracle. But I did a test port and wrote up the many missing system calls and many incomplete system calls and many missing library implementations. Larry read it and I didn't really think about it again. Guess I should have saved a copy. And this was definitely an internal white paper - not something for circulation.

YeGoblynQueenne 10y ago

>> I've always found it ironic that the open source community ignores the role of the rich and powerful in allowing them to succeed. I don't think anyone ignores anything, it's more like the OSS community (of which I'm not a part, btw) simply doesn't feel that their freedom is a good price to pay for - anything, really. Also, to be fair, the "rich and powerful" mostly get into peoples' way when we try to live our lives in a meaningful way, and that includes OSS folk, who just like to write and exchange software. If the "rich and powerful" decide to patent everything, which is the real sticking point for the OSS community, then the OSS folk have no toys to play with. Understandably, they are not happy with that.

microDude 10y ago

You sir, have some interesting stories to tell.

scrollaway 10y ago
After browsing that user's comment history, it certainly seems like he's trying very hard to have some interesting stories to tell. Make of that what you will.
- pasxizeis 10y ago
  I second that.

johnsu 10y ago

"open source" didn't exist during the time period you're talking about.

visitor2035 10y ago

I visited the NeXT factory in Fremont when it was making cubes. For fairly obvious reasons at UCB Sun workstations were everywhere. I was asked by some of the people giving the tour what it would take to get departments to go with their boxes. I said access to source was something we had come to expect but it was out of the question.

MrTonyD 10y ago
Yeah, that factory sure was impressive, wasn't it? I would sometimes go out of my way just to visit - hoping that they were running (it took a long time to get it started, and after that it took a long time to get it stable. Really, it was Sony and their manufacturing expertise that finally got us working.) I remember sitting up in the "control room" while they used the GUI to directly control the robots on the factory floor - watching the robots move in the dimly lit factory. It may be common now, but at the time that was "state of the art".