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I first met Mr. Stallman at Budapest, Hungary in 1993 Fall, sorry I can't remember the exact date perhaps October? He was talking about Hurd. He was not giving

by chx 10y ago

I first met Mr. Stallman at Budapest, Hungary in 1993 Fall, sorry I can't remember the exact date perhaps October? He was talking about Hurd. He was not giving a ... fiery ... talk on software freedom, just talking about Hurd. It was very exciting as it was by far not clear that Linux will win and the sci-fi like vision of Hurd will never happen. At this time Linux looked like a bit of a joke with version numbers like 0.99pl10... we are _almost_ 1.0 but not... not yet. Two months later? 0.99pl11. It was hard to take that seriously. Yeah X Windows existed but it was not a good experience compared to a Sun or DEC workstation. Who would've thought then that not only Linux 1.0 will indeed happen early 1994 and five years later freakin' IBM will embrace it and Hurd 1.0 won't ever be released?

yupyup 10y ago
Just an example of "Worse is better"? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Worse_is_better https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Worse_is_better
- digi_owl 10y ago
  Possibly, but one that the recent generation of userspace devs are unwilling to acknowledge. Just watch them throw out workable, if gnarly, code in some attempt at reaching programming nirvana.
- tyingq 10y ago
  I believe a fair amount of the Linux success story was available drivers. That is, as compared to any other unix like x86 OS. Even if they weren't the best drivers, you could get Linux up and running, and supporting your NIC, video card, etc.
  - digi_owl 10y ago
    That, and it was free (beer), and was unaffected by the AT&T vs BSD lawsuit.
    - tyingq 10y ago
      Those seem important as well, but from my memory, weren't really differentiators after 1994 or so. I don't think the war was really over at that point. I do remember having a much easier time getting Linux to work on various PCs than either Minix, FreeBSD, or NetBSD in the mid 90s. If I could pick all the components by hand, it wasn't an issue. But all that stuff was expensive, so Linux won out for me early because it mostly worked with whatever pile of motherboards, UARTS, used NICS, hdd driver boards, video cards, sound cards, etc, I had laying around. And as it happens, I had some influence on corporate decisions sometime after all that. I knew that BSD was better in many ways. But I was also more comfortable/familiar with Linux.
      - chx 10y ago
        Sound cards? In the mid 90s? Are you kidding me? Next up you will say that printers just worked. NICs, aye those did and that was glorious.
        tyingq 10y ago
        I said "mostly worked" across that broad list, relative to the competition in the same space. Summarizing that as me saying "just worked" for everything isn't really fair.
      - digi_owl 10y ago
        It may not have been over, but that starting point allowed Linux to develop momentum as people worked on it while BSD languished in legal purgatory. And come 94-95 the parts that would make up the LAMP came to be.

by chx 10y ago

yupyup 10y ago

Just an example of "Worse is better"? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Worse_is_better https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Worse_is_better

digi_owl 10y ago
Possibly, but one that the recent generation of userspace devs are unwilling to acknowledge. Just watch them throw out workable, if gnarly, code in some attempt at reaching programming nirvana.
tyingq 10y ago
I believe a fair amount of the Linux success story was available drivers. That is, as compared to any other unix like x86 OS. Even if they weren't the best drivers, you could get Linux up and running, and supporting your NIC, video card, etc.
- digi_owl 10y ago
  That, and it was free (beer), and was unaffected by the AT&T vs BSD lawsuit.
  - tyingq 10y ago
    Those seem important as well, but from my memory, weren't really differentiators after 1994 or so. I don't think the war was really over at that point. I do remember having a much easier time getting Linux to work on various PCs than either Minix, FreeBSD, or NetBSD in the mid 90s. If I could pick all the components by hand, it wasn't an issue. But all that stuff was expensive, so Linux won out for me early because it mostly worked with whatever pile of motherboards, UARTS, used NICS, hdd driver boards, video cards, sound cards, etc, I had laying around. And as it happens, I had some influence on corporate decisions sometime after all that. I knew that BSD was better in many ways. But I was also more comfortable/familiar with Linux.
    - chx 10y ago
      Sound cards? In the mid 90s? Are you kidding me? Next up you will say that printers just worked. NICs, aye those did and that was glorious.
      - tyingq 10y ago
        I said "mostly worked" across that broad list, relative to the competition in the same space. Summarizing that as me saying "just worked" for everything isn't really fair.
    - digi_owl 10y ago
      It may not have been over, but that starting point allowed Linux to develop momentum as people worked on it while BSD languished in legal purgatory. And come 94-95 the parts that would make up the LAMP came to be.