9 ms·

I came here for a technical discussion about Fuchsia and it's microkernel approach instead this is mostly fill with complains about Google as a company. Is the

I came here for a technical discussion about Fuchsia and it's microkernel approach instead this is mostly fill with complains about Google as a company. Is there a social justice forum I can visit where I may be able to have a technical discussion about Fuchsia?

kerneis 5y ago
For what it's worth, a few Google engineers are hanging around so if you have any specific technical question I think we'd be glad to answer it :-)
- hutzlibu 5y ago
  Could you say something, how the kernel is different from linux for example? Why would I want to choose Fuchsia for a smartphone, for example. Where is the advantage?
  - kerneis 5y ago
    The key concepts are documented here: https://fuchsia.dev/fuchsia-src/concepts https://fuchsia.dev/fuchsia-src/concepts Some things that Fuchsia was able to do thanks to starting from scratch: - The system is based on capabilities, a security model which is based on explicit tracking of permissions. It wouldn't be possible to change Linux to be capability-based because the ambiant-authority model has been used pervasively since it was conceived 30 years ago. - Fuchsia provides a stable binary interface (like Windows, but unlike Linux). This lets you update your system while keeping some components unchanged, eg. binary drivers from a hardware manufacturer that wouldn't provide updates for them anymore. I think Linux could technically change this, but they have historically been unwilling to, and it is unlikely to change in the future.
    - the8472 5y ago
      > Fuchsia provides a stable binary interface (like Windows, but unlike Linux). Linux does provide a stable binary interface, to userspace. > eg. binary drivers from a hardware manufacturer that wouldn't provide updates for them anymore That can be seen as much as a downside as an upside, because it makes life a lot easier for hardware manufacturers to ship more binary blobs
      - fragileone 5y ago
        > That can be seen as much as a downside as an upside, because it makes life a lot easier for hardware manufacturers to ship more binary blobs Which is essentially the point of this approach for Google, to exert greater control.
        hutzlibu 5y ago
        Or just convinience. When the goal is, to support a broad range of devices - and the vast majority of hardware manufactors are not into open hardware - it is probably easier, to convince them of supporting Fuchsia by writing firmware and drivers - if they do not have to deal with the GPL and the kernel driver integration, like it is the case with linux. They just write their driver once against a stable API. That makes things easier. And google are not driven by free software ideals - but rather buisness pragmatism. But I don't see this design choice as an attack on free software.
        ac29 5y ago
        I dont know about that. The Linux/GPL model has had mixed success in the embedded space - most vendors still ship their code as binary blobs making it difficult or impossible to update the LInux kernel, which has security and other implications. But, there have been some vendors embracing the open source model to some extent at least, and a lot of third party work in supporting upstream kernel development of drivers. I dont think it would be fair to call Fuchsia a step backwards in this respect - vendors that ship closed source binaries for Fuchsia are almost certainly shipping closed source binaries for Linux as well.
    - LucidLynx 5y ago
      The micro-kernel architecture is definitely a game changer for this, compared to Linux... Linux tried different things to reload dynamically the drivers & core stuff, without rebooting the computer, but I always had diverse issues after some hours... Thanks for the link + info :)
    - trasz 5y ago
      Implementing capability-based security in a typical Unix (and thus Linux) is definitely possible, see FreeBSD's Capsicum.
      - kerneis 5y ago
        I don't know a lot about Capsicum, but from what I remember (and see from their website) it adds capabilities to FreeBSD but doesn't make them mandatory. As such, it is a tool to build compartimentalized applications. It does not provide a comprehensive solution to sandbox existing applications, and does not remove the ambiant-authority model. It is a better, safer chroot(). Fuchsia, on the other hand, is built on top of capabilities from the ground up, ensuring that you don't even have a concept of "file descriptor" or "centralized filesystem" to begin with.
        trasz 5y ago
        To put it differently, in FreeBSD the application has to explicitly enter the capability mode, while in Fuchsia it doesn't have that choice.
    - thu2111 5y ago
      - Fuchsia provides a stable binary interface (like Windows, but unlike Linux). Does it? Fuchsia is a brand new OS, at least from the perspective of the world. One reason my interest in it died quite early on, despite being an aficionado of new operating system designs my entire life, was finding stuff like this in the docs: https://fuchsia.dev/fuchsia-src/development/components/v2/migration https://fuchsia.dev/fuchsia-src/development/components/v2/mi... It's brand new and there are already migration guides for core parts of the design. Also: https://fuchsia.dev/s/results?q=deprecated https://fuchsia.dev/s/results?q=deprecated That's a lot of deprecated stuff for a project that started with a blank slate.
      - hutzlibu 5y ago
        Well, I think it is no surprise that in the beginning things change. Everytime you do something new and big - you do find things that do not work out as designed. So you change the design. Which is allright for me, with a prerelease. But now with the official release - I do expect some stability.
edent 5y ago
The personal is political. And the technical is political. You cannot separate a work from the context in which it operates.
- macspoofing 5y ago
  >You cannot separate a work from the context in which it operates. Why not try?
  - Spivak 5y ago
    Because then work just becomes a more boring riff on the Nuremberg defense. You can't just be like "I'm just paid to write code and so will completely ignore any and all ethical issues with what my company does with it." There's a reason the ACM code of ethics has "everyone is a stakeholder" and "avoid harm" as the top two overriding principles. I can understand arguments about keeping political issues unrelated to your work and working relationships out but you this isn't that.
    - tester34 5y ago
      it's ok there's dont be evil
    - macspoofing 5y ago
      >Because then work just becomes a more boring riff on the Nuremberg defense. Writing code to build Fuchsia OS does not involve great violations of morality and ethics that call out for something like the 'Nuremberg defense'. >I can understand arguments about keeping political issues unrelated to your work and working relationships out but you this isn't that. Where's the dividing line? Wasn't it Basecamp that had a large portion of their workforce quit because they couldn't be activists at work? Was that them mitigating the 'Nuremberg defense'? What about the recent issue with a principle of an elementary schools calling on parents to boycott Israel [1]. There are very few jobs in modern America that have these great ethical dilemmas. There are, however, plenty of people that are willing to engage in hyperbole and politicize every space they can. That's a much bigger problem. [1]https://nypost.com/2021/05/24/nyc-principal-apologizes-for-anti-israel-email-to-staff-amid-outrage/ https://nypost.com/2021/05/24/nyc-principal-apologizes-for-a...
cpach 5y ago
Please post your thoughts and questions about Fuchsia! I wonder where Fuchsia will be in 5-10 years. Will it thrive? If so, in what space will it thrive?
tempest_ 5y ago
It should at the very least tell you how aggressively google has been burning its goodwill as of late. Google offers things with the left hand while slapping you with the right and you seem surprised that people only want to talk about the slapping.
raxxorrax 5y ago
I think the discussion cannot be really detached, since Google has strong ambitions that will undeniably influence features and capabilities of their OS. But as for the microkernel approach, I think the advantages are on the table, but they are theoretical. Until now, no OS with a micro architecture was successful at getting significant market share. What would your requirements at an OS like this be? For me, it would be extensibility and the minimalist approach. Don't know the implementation details, but it sounds a lot like a time when people loved OOP too much, or later disliked it just as much.
- pjmlp 5y ago
  Look outside of the desktop into embedded platforms. QNX, Switch OS, INTEGRITY OS, L4. To a certain extent, all Android OS services after Project Treble.
  - raxxorrax 5y ago
    I work in the embedded area and it is true that these approaches are more successful here. But I think that is due to real pressure for memomy and speed or real time applications. That isn't really the case for general purpose devices like PCs. Those have an unlimited amount of memory and CPU power. I might try it for embedded devices some day.
    - pjmlp 5y ago
      The irony is that hypervisors and containers have basically taken away whatever benefits monolithic kernels might have. OS X and Windows are much better in this regard than GNU/Linux/BSDs with their ongoing efforts to move all drivers to userspace, even though they will never be fully pure microkernels when done with it.
      - raxxorrax 5y ago
        He, true. Although I wonder if microkernels tend to expose more lower level function in user mode that could be relevant to overall system security. The big problem is probably memory access, which would be prohibited in user mode, but maybe there are other security implications (I couldn't answer that question). Other than improved security that may also be protected by a hypervisor, you might still gain more stability when pushing drivers to user mode. Or your hypervisor has a bug and allows a guest to gain privileged kernel access. Not a security expert, so this is mainly guess work.
surajrmal 5y ago
We have several mailing lists you can converse on. We're happy to answer any technical questions. https://fuchsia.dev/fuchsia-src/contribute/community/get-involved?hl=en#join_a_mailing_list https://fuchsia.dev/fuchsia-src/contribute/community/get-inv...
- smklein 5y ago
  Congrats on the launch! I see iterating on Banjo is still on the roadmap - always more work to do :)
jeffbee 5y ago
I think the cause of this phenomenon is that most HN readers are not qualified to comment on Fuchsia, are ignorant of any and all facts about it, but are also compelled to comment. So you get this thread, and most threads here. Actual technical exchange between people who are both not obviously wrong is rare here.
- rejectedandsad 5y ago
  Googlers thinking non-Googlers are unqualified to comment on anything seems like a fairly common theme to me. I really wonder what caused this kind of ideological entitlement. Was it a company culture that never said "no"? Was it the constant talk of how Googlers are just smarter and more brilliant than everyone else? Genuinely curious.
  - lacksconfidence 5y ago
    It was the part where people decided to ignore what was actually being presented, and instead derailed every possible conversation about google into their predetermined track. Not you specifically, but this entire fuschia thread. What is someone to think when every time their work is presented publicly the comments are all completed unrelated to what was presented? You too would conclude that group is unlikely to present meaningful feedback or thoughts. (I have never, and will never, work for google).
    - rejectedandsad 5y ago
      I agree, actually, but that's fundamentally different from saying people aren't "qualified".
    - KozmoNau7 5y ago
      Perhaps it would useful for Google and googlers to "read the room" - as it were - and consider why a lot of people have such strong reactions to Google's conduct and methods, why a lot of people are distrustful of anything that comes out of Google (and FAANG in general), and why the reactions are so strong from privacy advocates and the open source/free software crowd in particular, in context of where and how Google started and where it is now.
canadianfella 5y ago
Ironic that you decided not to comment on anything technical.
arthur_sav 5y ago
Fuschia forums? People are discussing the news of a new OS release and its implications.
phendrenad2 5y ago
Hacker News is still the best place for such discussions. There's just a lot of low-effort noise from people who force every topic to conform to their existing knowledge areas.
- ehsankia 5y ago
  > Hacker News is still the best place for such discussions In general it is, but I too have noticed this trend more specifically in Google-related threads. Most other subjects don't suffer from this as much, but almost every Google one devolves into jokes about when X will be canceled.
zentiggr 5y ago
Unfortunately, every new project coming from Google now has a couple of decades of baggage, directly caused by the unexpected / manipulative cancellation of projects. While I am not Google-free at the moment, especially email, I have long ago learned to avoid trusting any Google product to stay stable, or even available. And that doesn't even scratch the surface of the decades of "everything we do is tuned to collect as much data as we can steal without getting caught, and using it to our benefit in any way we can hide from you, our users." Cynicism is pretty much the norm now, and is going to color everything Google does forever. I'm sure there are forums and github sites with actual technical details, but that's only a fraction of what gets traded here. YMMV.
dqpb 5y ago
There’s no clear line here - it’s systems all the way down. When a new component is added to the critical path, its vital to ask “What happens if my account gets flagged? How much of my life can Google shut down with a single bit flip?”
e12e 5y ago
Has anyone done a comparison with Minix 3? What are the (dis)advantages to a new microkernel rather than building on Minix 3?

kerneis 5y ago

For what it's worth, a few Google engineers are hanging around so if you have any specific technical question I think we'd be glad to answer it :-)

hutzlibu 5y ago
Could you say something, how the kernel is different from linux for example? Why would I want to choose Fuchsia for a smartphone, for example. Where is the advantage?
- kerneis 5y ago
  The key concepts are documented here: https://fuchsia.dev/fuchsia-src/concepts https://fuchsia.dev/fuchsia-src/concepts Some things that Fuchsia was able to do thanks to starting from scratch: - The system is based on capabilities, a security model which is based on explicit tracking of permissions. It wouldn't be possible to change Linux to be capability-based because the ambiant-authority model has been used pervasively since it was conceived 30 years ago. - Fuchsia provides a stable binary interface (like Windows, but unlike Linux). This lets you update your system while keeping some components unchanged, eg. binary drivers from a hardware manufacturer that wouldn't provide updates for them anymore. I think Linux could technically change this, but they have historically been unwilling to, and it is unlikely to change in the future.
  - the8472 5y ago
    > Fuchsia provides a stable binary interface (like Windows, but unlike Linux). Linux does provide a stable binary interface, to userspace. > eg. binary drivers from a hardware manufacturer that wouldn't provide updates for them anymore That can be seen as much as a downside as an upside, because it makes life a lot easier for hardware manufacturers to ship more binary blobs
    - fragileone 5y ago
      > That can be seen as much as a downside as an upside, because it makes life a lot easier for hardware manufacturers to ship more binary blobs Which is essentially the point of this approach for Google, to exert greater control.
      - hutzlibu 5y ago
        Or just convinience. When the goal is, to support a broad range of devices - and the vast majority of hardware manufactors are not into open hardware - it is probably easier, to convince them of supporting Fuchsia by writing firmware and drivers - if they do not have to deal with the GPL and the kernel driver integration, like it is the case with linux. They just write their driver once against a stable API. That makes things easier. And google are not driven by free software ideals - but rather buisness pragmatism. But I don't see this design choice as an attack on free software.
      - ac29 5y ago
        I dont know about that. The Linux/GPL model has had mixed success in the embedded space - most vendors still ship their code as binary blobs making it difficult or impossible to update the LInux kernel, which has security and other implications. But, there have been some vendors embracing the open source model to some extent at least, and a lot of third party work in supporting upstream kernel development of drivers. I dont think it would be fair to call Fuchsia a step backwards in this respect - vendors that ship closed source binaries for Fuchsia are almost certainly shipping closed source binaries for Linux as well.
  - LucidLynx 5y ago
    The micro-kernel architecture is definitely a game changer for this, compared to Linux... Linux tried different things to reload dynamically the drivers & core stuff, without rebooting the computer, but I always had diverse issues after some hours... Thanks for the link + info :)
  - trasz 5y ago
    Implementing capability-based security in a typical Unix (and thus Linux) is definitely possible, see FreeBSD's Capsicum.
    - kerneis 5y ago
      I don't know a lot about Capsicum, but from what I remember (and see from their website) it adds capabilities to FreeBSD but doesn't make them mandatory. As such, it is a tool to build compartimentalized applications. It does not provide a comprehensive solution to sandbox existing applications, and does not remove the ambiant-authority model. It is a better, safer chroot(). Fuchsia, on the other hand, is built on top of capabilities from the ground up, ensuring that you don't even have a concept of "file descriptor" or "centralized filesystem" to begin with.
      - trasz 5y ago
        To put it differently, in FreeBSD the application has to explicitly enter the capability mode, while in Fuchsia it doesn't have that choice.
  - thu2111 5y ago
    - Fuchsia provides a stable binary interface (like Windows, but unlike Linux). Does it? Fuchsia is a brand new OS, at least from the perspective of the world. One reason my interest in it died quite early on, despite being an aficionado of new operating system designs my entire life, was finding stuff like this in the docs: https://fuchsia.dev/fuchsia-src/development/components/v2/migration https://fuchsia.dev/fuchsia-src/development/components/v2/mi... It's brand new and there are already migration guides for core parts of the design. Also: https://fuchsia.dev/s/results?q=deprecated https://fuchsia.dev/s/results?q=deprecated That's a lot of deprecated stuff for a project that started with a blank slate.
    - hutzlibu 5y ago
      Well, I think it is no surprise that in the beginning things change. Everytime you do something new and big - you do find things that do not work out as designed. So you change the design. Which is allright for me, with a prerelease. But now with the official release - I do expect some stability.

edent 5y ago

The personal is political. And the technical is political. You cannot separate a work from the context in which it operates.

macspoofing 5y ago
>You cannot separate a work from the context in which it operates. Why not try?
- Spivak 5y ago
  Because then work just becomes a more boring riff on the Nuremberg defense. You can't just be like "I'm just paid to write code and so will completely ignore any and all ethical issues with what my company does with it." There's a reason the ACM code of ethics has "everyone is a stakeholder" and "avoid harm" as the top two overriding principles. I can understand arguments about keeping political issues unrelated to your work and working relationships out but you this isn't that.
  - tester34 5y ago
    it's ok there's dont be evil
  - macspoofing 5y ago
    >Because then work just becomes a more boring riff on the Nuremberg defense. Writing code to build Fuchsia OS does not involve great violations of morality and ethics that call out for something like the 'Nuremberg defense'. >I can understand arguments about keeping political issues unrelated to your work and working relationships out but you this isn't that. Where's the dividing line? Wasn't it Basecamp that had a large portion of their workforce quit because they couldn't be activists at work? Was that them mitigating the 'Nuremberg defense'? What about the recent issue with a principle of an elementary schools calling on parents to boycott Israel [1]. There are very few jobs in modern America that have these great ethical dilemmas. There are, however, plenty of people that are willing to engage in hyperbole and politicize every space they can. That's a much bigger problem. [1]https://nypost.com/2021/05/24/nyc-principal-apologizes-for-anti-israel-email-to-staff-amid-outrage/ https://nypost.com/2021/05/24/nyc-principal-apologizes-for-a...

cpach 5y ago

Please post your thoughts and questions about Fuchsia! I wonder where Fuchsia will be in 5-10 years. Will it thrive? If so, in what space will it thrive?

tempest_ 5y ago

It should at the very least tell you how aggressively google has been burning its goodwill as of late. Google offers things with the left hand while slapping you with the right and you seem surprised that people only want to talk about the slapping.

raxxorrax 5y ago

I think the discussion cannot be really detached, since Google has strong ambitions that will undeniably influence features and capabilities of their OS. But as for the microkernel approach, I think the advantages are on the table, but they are theoretical. Until now, no OS with a micro architecture was successful at getting significant market share. What would your requirements at an OS like this be? For me, it would be extensibility and the minimalist approach. Don't know the implementation details, but it sounds a lot like a time when people loved OOP too much, or later disliked it just as much.

pjmlp 5y ago
Look outside of the desktop into embedded platforms. QNX, Switch OS, INTEGRITY OS, L4. To a certain extent, all Android OS services after Project Treble.
- raxxorrax 5y ago
  I work in the embedded area and it is true that these approaches are more successful here. But I think that is due to real pressure for memomy and speed or real time applications. That isn't really the case for general purpose devices like PCs. Those have an unlimited amount of memory and CPU power. I might try it for embedded devices some day.
  - pjmlp 5y ago
    The irony is that hypervisors and containers have basically taken away whatever benefits monolithic kernels might have. OS X and Windows are much better in this regard than GNU/Linux/BSDs with their ongoing efforts to move all drivers to userspace, even though they will never be fully pure microkernels when done with it.
    - raxxorrax 5y ago
      He, true. Although I wonder if microkernels tend to expose more lower level function in user mode that could be relevant to overall system security. The big problem is probably memory access, which would be prohibited in user mode, but maybe there are other security implications (I couldn't answer that question). Other than improved security that may also be protected by a hypervisor, you might still gain more stability when pushing drivers to user mode. Or your hypervisor has a bug and allows a guest to gain privileged kernel access. Not a security expert, so this is mainly guess work.

surajrmal 5y ago

We have several mailing lists you can converse on. We're happy to answer any technical questions. https://fuchsia.dev/fuchsia-src/contribute/community/get-involved?hl=en#join_a_mailing_list https://fuchsia.dev/fuchsia-src/contribute/community/get-inv...

smklein 5y ago
Congrats on the launch! I see iterating on Banjo is still on the roadmap - always more work to do :)

jeffbee 5y ago

I think the cause of this phenomenon is that most HN readers are not qualified to comment on Fuchsia, are ignorant of any and all facts about it, but are also compelled to comment. So you get this thread, and most threads here. Actual technical exchange between people who are both not obviously wrong is rare here.

rejectedandsad 5y ago
Googlers thinking non-Googlers are unqualified to comment on anything seems like a fairly common theme to me. I really wonder what caused this kind of ideological entitlement. Was it a company culture that never said "no"? Was it the constant talk of how Googlers are just smarter and more brilliant than everyone else? Genuinely curious.
- lacksconfidence 5y ago
  It was the part where people decided to ignore what was actually being presented, and instead derailed every possible conversation about google into their predetermined track. Not you specifically, but this entire fuschia thread. What is someone to think when every time their work is presented publicly the comments are all completed unrelated to what was presented? You too would conclude that group is unlikely to present meaningful feedback or thoughts. (I have never, and will never, work for google).
  - rejectedandsad 5y ago
    I agree, actually, but that's fundamentally different from saying people aren't "qualified".
  - KozmoNau7 5y ago
    Perhaps it would useful for Google and googlers to "read the room" - as it were - and consider why a lot of people have such strong reactions to Google's conduct and methods, why a lot of people are distrustful of anything that comes out of Google (and FAANG in general), and why the reactions are so strong from privacy advocates and the open source/free software crowd in particular, in context of where and how Google started and where it is now.

canadianfella 5y ago

Ironic that you decided not to comment on anything technical.

arthur_sav 5y ago

Fuschia forums? People are discussing the news of a new OS release and its implications.

phendrenad2 5y ago

Hacker News is still the best place for such discussions. There's just a lot of low-effort noise from people who force every topic to conform to their existing knowledge areas.

ehsankia 5y ago
> Hacker News is still the best place for such discussions In general it is, but I too have noticed this trend more specifically in Google-related threads. Most other subjects don't suffer from this as much, but almost every Google one devolves into jokes about when X will be canceled.

zentiggr 5y ago

Unfortunately, every new project coming from Google now has a couple of decades of baggage, directly caused by the unexpected / manipulative cancellation of projects. While I am not Google-free at the moment, especially email, I have long ago learned to avoid trusting any Google product to stay stable, or even available. And that doesn't even scratch the surface of the decades of "everything we do is tuned to collect as much data as we can steal without getting caught, and using it to our benefit in any way we can hide from you, our users." Cynicism is pretty much the norm now, and is going to color everything Google does forever. I'm sure there are forums and github sites with actual technical details, but that's only a fraction of what gets traded here. YMMV.

dqpb 5y ago

There’s no clear line here - it’s systems all the way down. When a new component is added to the critical path, its vital to ask “What happens if my account gets flagged? How much of my life can Google shut down with a single bit flip?”

e12e 5y ago

Has anyone done a comparison with Minix 3? What are the (dis)advantages to a new microkernel rather than building on Minix 3?