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The monoculture of meritocracyThe monoculture of meritocracyPosted Nov 14, 2012 5:39 UTC (Wed) by dlang (✭ supporter ✭, #313)In reply to: The monoculture of meritocracy by aryonoco Parent article: Crowding out OpenBSD
maintaining portability to different systems can also end up resulting in better software for every system.
I'll point you to the Linux kernel and it's support of many different CPU types. This requires layers of abstraction, just like supporting different *nix flavors. But, even with this cost, Linus is on record as saying that the kernel is significantly better than it would be if it had remained x86 only. The comment I am thinking of (from several years ago) was that modern kernels are not designed for any existing CPU, they are designed for some theoretical 'perfect' CPU with arch specific helpers to fill the gaps that all existing CPUs have (along with carefully constructed layering violations for the most performance critical sections)
This makes it rather easy for Linux to be ported to a new CPU.
I would like to think that while portability has it's costs, it should also have it's advantages. If the userspace software is modularized properly, just about all of the differences between different *nix (and similar) systems should be out in the periphery of the modules, not in the core logic.
This should not only help them be portable to the BSD family, but also to be better able to take advantage of new features in Linux (and for that matter for people to notice that a lot of programs are implementing similar work-arounds and then propose new features for Linux to avoid the need for them)
I wouldn't be surprised to see that this leads to improved portability to things like Android as well.
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The monoculture of meritocracy Posted Nov 14, 2012 9:45 UTC (Wed) by ortalo (subscriber, #4654) [Link]
IMHO, the Linux monoculture prevents sometimes from adressing specific problem areas (at least it slows down things enough to miss the target).
Linux is not yet totally ubiquitous - the most recent example is the Android "port" (which involved a lot of domain specific hacks). It will probably never be because it's probably impossible - nothing wrong per se by the way, it has already gone a long way towards the general usefulness goal.
But some areas may benefit from the immediate availability of an alternate (possibly less versatile) free software solution: security box, wifi boxes, GSM phones (look at the "OS" selected for OsmocomBB), home automation devices, networking equipment; possibly: supercomputers, industrial control systems, industrial embedded systems, etc. [1]
Sounds like political movements are needed: bringing up an alliance between all the "freedom" partners should be on the table, with the objective of settling on a long lasting treaty. It seems to me that this is necessary to refuel some allies again, up to the task.
[1] IIRC, sometime in the 90s, the Fermi lab linear accelerator needed an OS for a VAX. Only a BSD fitted there seriously. That's a single computer in production, but well... only two such scientific equipements have ever been built in human history (Fermi Lab and CERN) so... point gained.
The monoculture of meritocracy Posted Nov 14, 2012 10:05 UTC (Wed) by nhippi (subscriber, #34640) [Link] IMHO, the Linux monoculture prevents sometimes from adressing specific problem areas (at least it slows down things enough to miss the target). Linux is not yet totally ubiquitous - the most recent example is the Android "port" (which involved a lot of domain specific hacks).I don't see how Linux monoculture prevented anything. Quite the opposite, Google was able to leverage Linux when creating Android. If anything, Android proves Linux is not a monoculture.
The monoculture of meritocracy Posted Nov 14, 2012 14:42 UTC (Wed) by ortalo (subscriber, #4654) [Link]
I was speaking of Android modifications only to illustrate the fact that there are no totally ubiquitous OS (or kernel in that case). Alternatives *may* have been a better base.
A BSD was not even considered for projects like Openmoko [1]. They are still not considered for the FreedomBox project even though they share obvious concerns with one of them.
Of course I cannot guess what would have occured for these projects if a BSD had been given a try and if these projects would have been more successful.
[1] However, it seems to me that the BSDs should have been interesting candidates for a smartphone (full networked OS in a single source tree, focus on maintainability, etc.).
The monoculture of meritocracy Posted Nov 15, 2012 16:59 UTC (Thu) by pboddie (subscriber, #50784) [Link]
The issue of which platform to use is mostly concerned with what most of the potential contributors are likely to know and which platform is covered best by most of the available documentation and shared knowledge, so if it's easier to find people who know how to write a Linux driver for some hardware, then a project will choose Linux first and foremost. That hasn't stopped other operating systems being ported to such devices, though:
http://wiki.openmoko.org/wiki/Category:Distributions
And it's perfectly possible that other platforms can take advantage of the work done by Linux developers to get driver support for hardware even if they refuse to port the actual drivers. I'm aware of at least one "from scratch" operating system project for the Ben NanoNote that has presumably been able to take advantage of the fully documented hardware and Free Software drivers already written for Linux, so it's not as if the Linux community is denying others opportunities. In fact, it's very much the opposite of that.
The monoculture of meritocracy Posted Nov 16, 2012 8:35 UTC (Fri) by ortalo (subscriber, #4654) [Link]
I totally agree with the importance of knowledge you outline.
However, I also think alternative OS do not take so much advantage of Linux work (or cooperation) as they suffer from the fact of being considered second class or second hand implementation (and not the full solution, i.e. "maybe better than Linux").
BSD for a smartphone OS Posted Nov 16, 2012 10:11 UTC (Fri) by pboddie (subscriber, #50784) [Link]
Actually, isn't the OS for at least one of the Danger products based on BSD? According to the Wikipedia entry for the Danger Hiptop/Sidekick, they supposedly use NetBSD. Of course, vendors don't have to do anything more than reproduce licensing information for such permissively licensed software, and maybe only in obscure places even then, and so the awareness of a technology in the industry never reaches a point where everyone wants to try it out.
Some people praise permissive licensing and may refer to software licensed in such a way as their "secret weapon" or "competitive advantage", but if they're not willing to share their changes, any wider growth of such technologies is likely to lag behind things like Linux where there is a requirement to share and a resulting culture that does so extensively.
The monoculture of meritocracy Posted Nov 17, 2012 16:53 UTC (Sat) by Jandar (subscriber, #85683) [Link]
> And specifically, Linux should *stop* claiming these targets (because they are for the BSDs).
If anyone using linux has an itch to scratch in these areas, should it be forbidden for him/her to improve linux? Do we patronazingly say: go away, linux has to be awful in this so that *BSD can shine a little?
The monoculture of meritocracy Posted Nov 24, 2012 22:02 UTC (Sat) by mfedyk (guest, #55303) [Link]
I think we should call this initiative "no os left behind".
Unions for the developers would be good too.
The monoculture of set theory Posted Nov 24, 2012 22:28 UTC (Sat) by neilbrown (subscriber, #359) [Link]
> Unions for the developers would be good too.
I prefer intersections. They let you work together without forcing you to.
The monoculture of set theory Posted Nov 25, 2012 3:50 UTC (Sun) by Trelane (subscriber, #56877) [Link]
Personally, I prefer complements. Because I'm a contrarian.
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