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He focused on the wrong lawsuitHe focused on the wrong lawsuitPosted Nov 17, 2011 22:31 UTC (Thu) by JoeBuck (subscriber, #2330)In reply to: Heh by khim Parent article: Interview with Andrew Tanenbaum (LinuxFr.org) It certainly is true that the lawsuit crippled BSD at a critical time, but the part of the suit that attacked BSDI over the phone number was inconsequential. What mattered was the lawsuit against the University of California over their release of BSD source code. At the time, the BSD code was a lot more mature and complete than Linux was, and had the free software community built on top of that instead of on top of Torvalds' kernel, the world might have turned out differently (but not terribly differently; we might still see a split between a pure BSD world and a GNU/BSD world with userland based on glibc and the GNU tools, which already existed in the critical 1993-4 timeframe). The lawsuit wasn't the only factor; Linus welcomed outside participation while the core BSD people spurned it. That might have been more important, but on the other hand a more bazaar-oriented team might have forked BSD instead. But the fact that Linux was clearly not derivative of Unix made it a legally safer choice for many.
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He focused on the wrong lawsuit Posted Nov 17, 2011 23:37 UTC (Thu) by job (guest, #670) [Link]
BSD would still have forked, and Linus would still have realized the distributed development process that kept forks in line.
Most companies would still prefer to contribute to copyleft projects when it matters to avoid playing a losing game against competitors.
So my guess is that it wouldn't make much of a difference at all for Linux world domination...
He focused on the wrong lawsuit Posted Nov 18, 2011 15:17 UTC (Fri) by pboddie (subscriber, #50784) [Link]
There was still plenty of time for BSD to become dominant, but it just didn't happen, and although some people still insist that BSD is the platform of choice for companies (even namedropping organisations like Juniper Networks and IronPort), it's clear that a combination of licensing and collaborative factors have helped Linux to thrive where various BSDs have withered away from the opportunities.
And with regard to the timing, back in around 1994, I remember people explicitly choosing one of the BSDs - NetBSD, in fact - as the focus of a replacement operating system project for the Acorn Risc PC, which shipped with Acorn's proprietary microcomputer operating system, RISC OS, that many people were increasingly fed up with (Acorn having given up on UNIX). For reasons of maturity and portability, NetBSD was preferred over Linux, and sure enough the project did indeed deliver "RiscBSD". Meanwhile, Russell King managed to port Linux to ARM.
I'm sure there are some readers who are more familiar with this topic than I am, but although you can still get NetBSD for a range of ARM devices (including various Acorn machines), it's some variant of Linux that is dominant on ARM. Although the RiscBSD people tried to get the likes of Oracle to use their work (and IBM was apparently shipping BSD on top of Workplace OS), all that is ancient history now.
So, no, I don't buy the argument that a lawsuit ruined things for the BSDs and in a narrow window of time in the early 1990s Linux explosively filled the vacuum completely. There's a good part of a decade to account for, as well as the situation today.
He focused on the wrong lawsuit Posted Nov 18, 2011 20:46 UTC (Fri) by man_ls (subscriber, #15091) [Link]
Especially since in 1995 (after all the lawsuits) Linux was not invincible nor established. In fact NeXT used *BSD code in their kernel. The real battle started after all the lawsuits and the *BSDs lost, plain and simple, in every market. Funny how fictional history can be rewritten so easily.
He focused on the wrong lawsuit Posted Nov 19, 2011 15:27 UTC (Sat) by vonbrand (subscriber, #4458) [Link] The whole point is that if it hadn't be for the pre-95 lawsuits, there might have been no Linux contender afterwards. And I shudder thinking of what would have happened then with the BSDs fading away as they did, and something else taking over...
Linux vs BSD Posted Nov 19, 2011 15:41 UTC (Sat) by man_ls (subscriber, #15091) [Link] That is not Tanenbaum's argument: he saysI think Linux succeeded against BSD, which was a stable mature system at the time simply because BSDI got stuck in a lawsuit and was effectively stopped for several years.However the wikipedia article states that the lawsuit was settled in 1993. The BSDs might have overtaken GNU/Linux easily. Why would have Linux disappeared anyway? Linus started his kernel in 1991 before the lawsuit, and his inspiration was rather the Hurd than the BSDs. What fundamental change might have happened anyway, but for the lawsuits? It is not credible. In fact it's only now that I have read the interview itself, and it is true that the guy misses the point so widely that Microsoft would be envious.
Linux vs BSD Posted Nov 20, 2011 19:30 UTC (Sun) by Wol (guest, #4433) [Link]
I think you miss the point. Linux wouldn't have disappeared, it would never have appeared.
Linus couldn't get a cheap Unix-like (or even just a cheap) OS for his new 386. If BSD had been easily available (thanks to the lawsuit it wasn't) then he might never have started Linux.
Cheers,
Linux vs BSD Posted Nov 20, 2011 19:39 UTC (Sun) by mjg59 (subscriber, #23239) [Link]
USL vs BSDi wasn't filed until after the first release of Linux. The lawsuit may have delayed the development of BSD for home machines, but it's not the reason that Linus wrote his own kernel.
Linux vs BSD Posted Nov 20, 2011 20:23 UTC (Sun) by vonbrand (subscriber, #4458) [Link] Linus himself said in 1993 that if 386BSD had come out before (0.0 came out in 1992) Linux would never have happened. I did compare roughly contemporary MCC and 386BSD versions from the 1992-1993 timeframe, and 386BSD sure was a much more polished system. I was using 4.1 BSD during my PhD studies in 19984 to 1987, it wasn't exactly a long shot imagining porting most of that to a PC in the starting 1990s. But the lawsuits and concurrent assorted wild claims of infringement did make people somewhat nervous about ending up stranded with BSD, and so looked around for alternatives.
Counterpoint Posted Nov 20, 2011 20:26 UTC (Sun) by man_ls (subscriber, #15091) [Link] Yes. Notice that Linus in his seminal message spoke about the Hurd as the competition, not about BSD. And even that "big and professional" kernel did not stop him from starting his pet project. So your point is not too credible, that is my point.
Linux vs BSD Posted Nov 21, 2011 14:23 UTC (Mon) by spaetz (subscriber, #32870) [Link]
> Linus couldn't get a cheap Unix-like (or even just a cheap) OS for his new 386.
This motivation is far from certain. Linux started out as a terminal emulator and increasingly got extended until it was a full fledged kernel. It essentially was a research/hobby project, and it is far from certained that it wouldn't have happened if somehand had handed Linux a free Minix CD at that time.
Too much speculation :-)
Linux vs BSD Posted Nov 22, 2011 21:25 UTC (Tue) by JanC_ (guest, #34940) [Link]
Linus was actually using Minix while developing that terminal client & later the kernel now known as Linux... (The Minix filesystem was also the first Linux filesystem, as Linus needed to be able to read files from his development system's disk.)
He focused on the wrong lawsuit Posted Nov 18, 2011 15:58 UTC (Fri) by ccchips (guest, #3222) [Link]
This reminds me of the difference between Peter and Paul. Paul wanted everyone to be Christian, and Peter wanted the Jews to become Christian. When the knife came down from Rome, the more universal branch survived.
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