The LWN.net 2002 Linux Timeline

And I personally refuse to use inferior tools because of ideology. In fact, I will go as far as saying that making excuses for bad tools due to ideology is _stupid_, and people who do that think with their gonads, not their brains.

-- Linus Torvalds didn't sign the petition.

MySQL AB is denied a preliminary injunction against NuSphere; MySQL had asked that NuSphere be deprived of its ability to distribute the MySQL software due to alleged GPL violations.

A petition against use of BitKeeper by kernel developers is circulated (announcement).

If you want me to continue to work on 2.5.5, back it all out. Otherwise Martin Dalecki is your NEW IDE Maintainer in the Development tree and beyond.

-- Andre Hedrick, more prophetic than he knew.

Martin Dalecki's "IDE cleanups" begin to cause concern in the kernel development community.

Bdale Garbee, Raphael Hertzog, and Branden Robinson run for Debian Project Leader.

Security holes in PHP, OpenSSH, and zlib expose most Linux systems to attack. Crackers fail to take the bait, however, and armageddon is avoided once again.

Richard Stallman claims that the GNU HURD kernel will ship by the end of the year. Little details like the 2GB filesystem limit and the need to switch to a new microkernel are not mentioned.

Since MandrakeSoft's revenue continues to grow and the company remains on target to become profitable at the end of 2002, it would be a real loss and a great disservice to the huge community of users for us to cut positions to meet short-term goals when the future looks so bright.

-- MandrakeSoft release

MandrakeSoft pleads for donations to keep the company going during a cash crunch (plea here).

LWN.net also pleas for donations to keep things going. [GTK]

GTK+ 2.0 is released (announcement).

Playstation 2 Linux is offered in the United States (announcement).

Mission Critical Linux lays off 90% of its staff.

Red Hat announces a "pro forma" $1 million profit, though that turns into a $29 million actual loss in the fine print. The results also show that the company's embedded systems business is shrinking. (announcement here).

JFS, NAPI, and ACPI are merged into the 2.5 kernel, along with many other things.

Anton Blanchard compiles a Linux kernel in 7.5 seconds, setting a record that has proved hard to beat since (announcement). [Mandrake]

Mandrake Linux 8.2 is released (announcement).

The ability to rip, mix and burn in a protected manner is not piracy, it is simply fair use of content as permitted by law.

-- Intel VP Leslie Vadasz

The FSF launches the "Affero General Public License" for web services (announcement).

Rob Page takes over as CEO of Zope Corporation, letting former leader Paul Everitt go off and do fun stuff (announcement).

Microsoft loses in a preliminary against Lindows, which, it claims, violates the "Windows" trademark.

Lineo lays off more staff; the once 300+-employee company drops to below 80 people.

The term "digital media device" means any hardware or software that: (A) reproduces copyrighted works in digital form; (B) converts copyrighted works in digital form into a form whereby the images and sounds are visible or audible; or (C) retrieves or accesses copyrighted works in digital form and transfers or makes available for transfer such works to hardware or software described in subparagraph (B).

CBDTPA definition. And it better implement copy protection.

U.S. Senator Ernest Hollings submits the "Consumer Broadband and Digital Television Promotion Act," otherwise known as "Consume, But Don't Try Programming Anything." The CBDTPA would, for all practical purposes, make free software illegal. (Bill text).

Red Hat Linux Advanced Server is launched; it is billed as "the first enterprise-class Linux operating system" (announcement).

CodeWeavers releases "CrossOver Office", which enables the running of Office and other Windows applications on Linux (announcement).

Microsoft and Unisys launch their "We have the way out" campaign to encourage companies to leave Unix and Linux behind. Unfortunately for them, WeHaveTheWayOut.com turns out to be running on FreeBSD. An attempt to make a quick switch to Windows leaves the site offline for several days.

Gentoo Linux 1.0 is released (announcement).

MandrakeSoft makes StarOffice 6.0 available - to Mandrake Club members only (announcement).

<== February

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GNU Hurd (late again :) details clarification

Posted Jan 6, 2003 2:19 UTC (Mon) by coriordan (guest, #7544) [Link]

> Richard Stallman claims that the GNU HURD kernel will ship by the end of
> the year.

End of year was a bit ambitious but development is really speeding up.

> Little details like the 2GB filesystem limit

Still not done, doesn't cause me any problems.

> and the need to
> switch to a new microkernel are not mentioned.

Huh?
I'm guessing your talking about a port to L4. This is not in the
pre-release plan, in fact it's only in the suggestion/discussion phase.

The move from gnumach-1.3 to gnumach-2.0 occured in november, it went
very well after Marcus Brinkmann wrote the new console server.

Ciaran O'Riodan
Happy GNU year.

The LWN.net 2002 Linux Timeline - March