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AdTI's Minix FUD Rises From the Swamp at a MS Conference - Where Else?
Friday, July 02 2004 @ 01:45 PM EDT

AdTI's misinformation continues to circulate, and amazingly enough, it shows up on ZDnet. Where else would anyone print such claptrap after it was so thoroughly debunked?

"At Microsoft's Tech Ed conference in Amsterdam on Wednesday, a session was devoted to how, according to one Microsoft fan at least, the Linux kernel is beginning to resemble, well -- Windows.

"The talk, given by Mark Russinovich, chief software architect for Winternals Software and co-author of Inside Windows 2000, 3rd edition (published by Microsoft press), was clearly delivered to a home crowd, and its message was clear: Linux is paying catch-up with Windows and the gap is narrowing. . . .

"Meanwhile Linux, noted Russinovich, owes a great deal to the work of Andrew Tanenbaum, who created the Unix-like Minix operating system for educational purposes. Although Linux creator Linux Torvalds readily admits that he based his work on Minix, both he and Tanenbaum refute claims that Torvalds borrowed more than he admitted."

So when Microsoft said the Samizdat book wasn't helpful, they didn't really give up the ghost. They are still pushing the Minix nonsense, it appears. Linus did not base his work on Minix. He didn't admit to borrowing anything. He wrote on a machine running Minix. If I write this article on my Mandrake box, does that mean I borrowed code from Linux? How stupid does that sound?

The article links the "readily admits" phrase to an article that doesn't say one word about Linus readily admitting anything. Instead it says that Linux and Minix are two different types of kernels:

"No, most of Torvalds' enemies are to be found closer to home. For instance, the first to have his hackles raised by Torvalds was Minix operating system author Andrew Tanenbaum, who did not like the monolithic approach to the Linux kernel."

Uh, duh. Two different kinds of kernels means one isn't based on the other. And Linus and Tanenbaum are not enemies, either, if accuracy means anything to anybody any more.

What makes this unforgiveable is that the second link takes you to an article about the AdTI book -- by the same journalist -- that talks about the accusation about Linus stealing code from Minix and states as clear as clean water that it isn't true:

"In an email interview, Torvalds disputed the study's conclusions. 'Linux never used Minix code... We never credited anybody else's code, because we never used anybody else's code,' Torvalds said. . . .

"Minix, he said, was simply a platform on top of which Torvalds did his programming work. The study suggested that Torvalds might have gradually replaced Minix code with Linux but Torvalds denied it. 'I didn't "write the Minix code out of Linux",' Torvalds said. 'I was using Minix when I wrote Linux, but that's in the same sense that you are using Windows when you write your columns. Do your articles contain Windows source code because you use Windows to write them?'"

The list of those who have proven that there is no Minix code in Linux and never was is a long one. Why then do they persist in repeating this slander? Your guess is as good as mine. Actually, it's probably identical to mine.

That isn't by any means the only idiotic thing to be found in this article. I've never seen such negative feedback on any article in my life. Usually there are at least a few comments that support the author, even if they are only trolls. But on this article it was consistently negative when I went to read it. It's bad enough that the author showed up and made one very obviously needed correction, but the rest is still festering over on ZDNet.

Poor things. Maybe they have to write such things.

And Russinovich? You can read his his history of NT if you wish. Here is his funny conclusion to the similarities between the Windows kernel and Linux: that "the gap between the two operating systems will continue to narrow to a point where their underlying kernel becomes irrelevant. 'Layered services will become more important,' he concluded." Aside from the fact that this makes no sense, since Linux is only a kernel, they don't get it that we want the Linux kernel. We don't want Windows with anything on top. First, it works better, and second, Linux comes to us with a license we can live with, the GPL. For that reason alone, it will never be irrelevant and Windows will never be able to compete with it.

Also, the folks who bring us Linux don't do FUD. We like that about them, that they don't attack and tell lies about the competition. In fact, they don't even care about competition. That's why we trust them.

And there is another major difference. Nobody has to pay anyone to say bad things about Microsoft.


  


AdTI's Minix FUD Rises From the Swamp at a MS Conference - Where Else? | 388 comments | Create New Account
Comments belong to whoever posts them. Please notify us of inappropriate comments.
AdTI's Minix FUD Rises From the Swamp at a MS Conference - Where Else?
Authored by: brenda banks on Friday, July 02 2004 @ 03:12 PM EDT
M$ is getting desparate
governments are turning away from them
businesses are aware there is choices now thanks to scox.we cant see the counts
but M$ can see who isnt renewing licenses so this tells them
reading all the news stories the story is there just not all together.they
extended support for OS that they had said was ending.but people are still not
upgrading to the newer OS
it is almost laughable while being so sad that M$ stoops so low .

---
br3n

irc.fdfnet.net #groklaw
"sco's proof of one million lines of code are just as believable as the
raelians proof of the cloned baby"

[ Reply to This | # ]

AdTI's Minix FUD Rises From the Swamp at a MS Conference - Where Else?
Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, July 02 2004 @ 03:12 PM EDT
Was this a keynote/invited speaker, or some anonymous bod?

Putting too much weight on this is the same as tarring the whole Linux community
with the brush of those who may or may not have had any interest in Linux, who
attacked the SCO website. Unless the speaker was a Respected Figure in M$-land.

[ Reply to This | # ]

Time to let Ziff Davis know how I feel
Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, July 02 2004 @ 03:20 PM EDT
I have a subscription to Ziff Davis's PC Mag. I find some of it useful and informative, but find it increasingly pro Microsoft and pro Windows. I am unhappy.

I imagine I am not the only Groklaw reader that has a subscription. My plan is to cancel it on Tuesday at 4 PM EDT (1 PM PDT). Perhaps some other Groklaw readers want to join me at that time and let Ziff Davis that we aren't happy with their polices.

[ Reply to This | # ]

AdTI's Minix FUD Rises From the Swamp at a MS Conference - Where Else?
Authored by: HawkEye on Friday, July 02 2004 @ 03:21 PM EDT
And there is another major difference. Nobody has to pay anyone to say bad things about Microsoft.

Now there is an understatement if ever there was one :)

---
Regards

Neil

[ Reply to This | # ]

OT: Sun doesn't like Linux forking
Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, July 02 2004 @ 03:25 PM EDT
From an article on wired. Sun wants to limit the problems caused by forking by keeping a tight grip on Java.

[ Reply to This | # ]

AdTI's Minix FUD Rises From the Swamp at a MS Conference - Where Else?
Authored by: dispensa on Friday, July 02 2004 @ 03:25 PM EDT
Russinovich doesn't work for MS, AFAIK. He's certainly a fan of the Windows
architecture, of course, and he's a MS Press author, but I'd stop short of
assigning responsibility for his comments to Microsoft.

-sd

[ Reply to This | # ]

AdTI's Minix FUD Rises From the Swamp at a MS Conference - Where Else?
Authored by: dkpatrick on Friday, July 02 2004 @ 03:26 PM EDT
"'Layered services will become more important,' he concluded."

Microsoft doesn't layer, it embeds. He doesn't get it.

Rather than have a well defined API into the kernel, Microsoft tunes its
'kernel' to support added functionality. I don't think Microsoft has met an
application that it doesn't want to own and embed in the heart of their
operating system.

Like the old move "The Blob", Microsoft expands its definition of
"customer expectations" to include everything of value. Like the blob,
it grows bigger and bigger and more voracious. Let's embed search engines! Let's
embed multimedia! Let's embed ... well, the list is endless.

Oh, and this is called 'innovation' ...

---
"Keep your friends close but your enemies closer!" -- Sun Tzu

[ Reply to This | # ]

AdTI's Minix FUD Rises From the Swamp at a MS Conference - Where Else?
Authored by: robobright on Friday, July 02 2004 @ 03:28 PM EDT
"the Linux kernel is beginning to resemble, well -- Windows"

I bet that the MS Windows kernel is starting to resemble the Linux kernel.
Would not be surprised if Longhorn is based on Linux with only the names of
files changed to protect the guilty. Might be the only way to make MS Windows
stable and secure.

[ Reply to This | # ]

AdTI's Minix FUD Rises From the Swamp at a MS Conference - Where Else?
Authored by: peragrin on Friday, July 02 2004 @ 03:31 PM EDT
MS has 90% of the market and is running scared. Damn If any other compnay had
90% of the market and it's competitor doubled it's considered a good thing.

Actually the DOJ kissing MS's arse, is working out in Linux's favor. If MS was
broken up we would have MS all over the place. Being limited as a single
company(though large) MS can't compete on so many levels at the same time. IBM
can, but IBM is designed for competitive markets. Microsoft is so big it can't
get out from underneath it's own feet.

People need a choice, It's why tyranny's don't last, choice is taken away. By
the time Longhorn comes around expect to see 20-30% Linux share. Simply because
if people have a choice in their lives they are happier for it. Apples got
turned down by bad management in the early 90's. Linux and Apple will grow the
future out. All we need is a Choice and MS will lose it's dominance. It's
happening already and you can see the knee-jerk reaction MS has done. Also
watch that knee-jerk reaction backfire on them.

---
I thought once I was found but it was only a dream.

[ Reply to This | # ]

Does anyone trust ZDNet?
Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, July 02 2004 @ 03:35 PM EDT
No one would miss it if ZDNet died. I stopped reading them
several years ago. The shallowest stuff I've ever seen.


[ Reply to This | # ]

Stories aren't adding up
Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, July 02 2004 @ 03:36 PM EDT
Eric Raymond said Minix was the "scaffolding" used to create Linux in
his breakthrough book. Linux had the same file system as Minix too, right?

[ Reply to This | # ]

OT and URL Repository
Authored by: Anonomous on Friday, July 02 2004 @ 03:42 PM EDT
Here...

[ Reply to This | # ]

AdTI's Minix FUD Rises From the Swamp at a MS Conference - Where Else?
Authored by: eamacnaghten on Friday, July 02 2004 @ 03:46 PM EDT
I find the amusing thing about the article was the way Mark Russinovich "assumed" that the "Microsoft Kernel" was somehow ahead and the "Linux Kernel" was catching up.

The Windows 95/98/ME were disasters IMHO! Linux (after the 0.x series) was always better than them - Although now - ironically enough - Windows 98 SE is a favourite amoungst some of my customers in so far as much it runs the MS apps they need and it does not have the bloat and junk that comes with XP now!

NT/2000/XP came from the people who wrote VMS. Microsoft seems to have subsequently taken that code and made it insecure and bloated!

The fact of the matter is Windows 95/98/ME is different to Windows NT/2000/XP which is different from Linux. As Linux was designed ground up with POSIX in mind it scores over all windows operating systems as far as stability and security is concerned (a reason NOT to put the GUI in the kernel). This seemed not to be mentioned in the article very much.

I am not syaing Windows does not have it's advantages over Linux - it is superior in it's client application interoplay and interface, though as mentioned, this has nothing to do with the kernel. Speaking of kernels, Linux is now more scaleable, secure, versitile and functional than any of the Microsoft offerings. Who has the catching up to do now?

Web Sig: Eddy Currents.

[ Reply to This | # ]

AdTI's Minix FUD Rises From the Swamp at a MS Conference - Where Else?
Authored by: John M. Horn on Friday, July 02 2004 @ 03:47 PM EDT
PJ wrote:

"And there is another major difference. Nobody has to pay anyone to say bad
things about Microsoft."

ROFLMAO!

There are, I think, only two types of people saying good things about Microsoft,
those that are paid and those that are unaware (or unfamiliar) with alternatives
such as Linux.

Rock on, PJ.

John Horn

[ Reply to This | # ]

Funny quote.
Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, July 02 2004 @ 03:49 PM EDT
"The talk, given by Mark Russinovich, chief software architect for
Winternals Software and co-author of Inside Windows 2000, 3rd edition (published
by Microsoft press), was clearly delivered to a home crowd, and its message was
clear: Linux is paying catch-up with Windows and the gap is narrowing. . .
."

ANd I thought it was Windows who was playing catchup, and the gap is anything
BUT narrowing.

[ Reply to This | # ]

How's it MS and cohorts act like Linux experts?
Authored by: jkondis on Friday, July 02 2004 @ 03:51 PM EDT
More and more MS and the people they fund (AdTI, Rob Enderle, Laura DiDio, now
Russinovich) come out and try to speak with authority on Linux. The reality?
They have little such authority. They only have incentive, financial incentive
to spread FUD to protect their obscene market dominance.

Read history and follow the money.

---
Don't steal. Microsoft hates competition.

[ Reply to This | # ]

V++M++S++: The '70s era technology that became WNT
Authored by: tz on Friday, July 02 2004 @ 03:51 PM EDT
== WNT. Windows NT has far more in common with VMS (including all the
annoyances and errors) than Linux does with Minix. There are several histories,
but I worked on a VAX during the period leading up to NT and when I first saw it
I was very curious because I noticed the similarities.

So Windows "New Technology" wasn't. VMS goes back into the '70s - in
fact I was working alternately on VMS and UNIX platforms and noticed VMS had
some nice features, but was complex and cumbersome and had too many features and
settings and tweaks in comparison (ESR's book on the Art of UNIX programming
details why UNIX is right and got it right).

Not only that, since "The Browser is part of the OS" mentality,
layering isn't really there (so there are no convienient places to put security
borders, portculli, etc.). The Linux Kernel loads the root filesystem and a lot
of helper programs start up, then X windows comes up, bringing up your desktop,
and then your browser, and you can change almost any of these layers (FreeBSD
below, Gnome, Framebuffer or Qt/Embedded instead of X, Mozilla - Opera -
Konquerer...). Samba is just another service like NFS or WebDAV.

Windows? It takes forever starting up even though it is monolithic in a sense
far worse than Tannenbaum criticizes, and none of the parts are interchangable.
You can execute something (Cygwin and/or XWin, even K desktop) atop this
DissUnixNextGen heap, but that isn't really layering. How do you remove IE?

Lest people think I'm being excessive, you can run X atop Darwin on a Mac, and
Mac OS X has X windows available, and Darwin works fine standalone - running
Quartz atop LinuxPPC might eventually happen or even LinuxPPC binaries on Mac OS
X. Maybe not the full flexibility of Linux, but OSX is layered and modular.

Maybe Torvalds should rename it LMN - three letters in order for "Linux's
Not Minix?". No, even that won't convice them, nor would they get the
joke.

It is bad enough when a think tank writes a hit piece, but worse when a
journalist repeats FUD unchecked.

[ Reply to This | # ]

Who owns ZDNet and what is the owners real business
Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, July 02 2004 @ 03:58 PM EDT
As allways it is quite obvious that some big business seems to be made by
spreading FUD. My question is what the products are that secure the ZDNet owners
income. I would be delighted not to support these Antijournalists by not buying
any of the products they are offering.

Just remember Reuters sold the Yankee Group when it has been made public that
they have been the owners behind the scene. Public relations is a quite
sensitive business for those who try to invent their own reality.

[ Reply to This | # ]

courage
Authored by: pyrite on Friday, July 02 2004 @ 04:11 PM EDT
It takes a lot of courage to break away from things that you "believe"
that you believe, primarly, or most likely, due to the fact of who your friends
are and what type of environment that you have been spending time in.

I disagree with this article because Linux is not anything like Windows; sure,
there is a very large movement to try to make it as easy to use, as friendly,
and as mainstream as Windows, but that's not where Linux is really coming from,
if you asked me.

I think that if there is a widespread adoption of Linux, and/or there is a wider
adoption of OS X, and/or there is a significant move where Windows moves to
Unix-type technology, what we will see is that there will be new ways of doing
things because our machines will learn how to talk to one another.

The layer we all see, the layer that gets much attention is the layer performing
the interaction with a living, breathing human being. The more Unix-like, or
POSIX-compliant, the more compatible the underlying mechanics of the hardware
and software, the more transparent they will be to the human being using the
computer. So perhaps all we will see (on the desktop, that is) is the layer that
interacts with the human being, not the lower-level kernel.

I am not sure what to think, but I can't blame people for not understanding
Linux, or trying to simplify it down to a few paragraphs, which is impossible -
the simple truth is that there are vast differences between Linux and Windows,
and unless Windows does what Apple did and moves their fancy human interface and
their exclusive software over to a Unix-like core, there will be distinct
differences that will continue to persist.

The "Microsoft" camps are simply going to have to get used to the fact
that people are going to continue to use Linux, and that some of their present
customers are going to switch to using Linux. This is going to affect Microsoft
in a not so very good way, and Microsoft might continue to try to lash out in
every which way they can possible imagine, but people are still going to
continue to use Linux, and there is nothing... yes, nothing.. that Microsoft is
going to be able to do to stop people from people continuing to switch over to
Linux. It's just the way it is.

Just a little courage, and anyone who loves Microsoft could easily see their way
to loving Linux. The courage to seperate yourself from your engrained thoughts
and beliefs and try to see the world from a more objective viewpoint. It takes
courage. Lots of folks can't do it.

And what about me? Well, I am writing this from a FreeBSD machine, on a Firefox
browser that is compiled specifically for FreeBSD. And yes, it took courage to
give up the Linux at first, but you know what, BSD is real nice... it's a great
OS, and I highly recommend it. Not to "newbies", of course, though.

Linux is all about hardware. Talk about layers. In many implementations, Linux
fits on a floppy or two. It's just a kernel. It's all about hardware. Let's see
the Windows kernel run on an IBM mainframe. Let's see the Windows kernel run on
a Linksys router. Or a G5 PowerPC from Apple. Or a 512-processor Itanium
machine. Linux and Windows kernels are very different when it comes to the
variety of hardware they run on, and this is probably one of Linux's greatest
strengths.

In my case, for instance, FreeBSD runs very well on the i386 architecture, but
if I had an Apple, I would be running Linux. Comparing Linux and Windows on the
"PC clone" architecture is only showing a very small slice of the
hardware that Linux runs on. Windows, on the other hand, doesn't run on much
else - although that is probably going to change in the future, and has already
been changing with handhelds, and other devices.

Linux is all about hardware. Kernels are all about hardware to begin with, but
Linux has the portability, the scalability, the momentum, the compatibility -
new hardware, old hardware, big hardware, little hardware. And it not only runs,
but it runs extremely well. That's what Linux is about, and there is no point in
the near or distant future where Windows is even going to try to come close.
Linux's greatest strength is in the wide variety of hardware that it supports.
Looking at it from a human-being perspective, as far as interfacing with an
application-level or user-interface-level layer, a Linux machine might very well
look like a Windows machine, and run many of the same, or similar apps to boot.
But that has little to do with the kernel.

It's all about the hardware. Hardware, hardware, hardware. Multi-million dollar
hardware. Hardware that fills up entire rooms. That's where some of Linux's
greatest strenghts lie. Getting the last ounce of performance out of roomfulls
of hardware. This is not Windows territory.


[ Reply to This | # ]

AdTI's Minix FUD Rises From the Swamp at a MS Conference - Where Else?
Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, July 02 2004 @ 04:21 PM EDT
I've just remembered something I read a few years ago (sorry, I don't have the
reference) from an MS employee who worked on Windows (I think one of the first
versions).

Apparently, all development was done on Xenix (a version of Unix for the Intel
architecture that MS had a hand in developing AFAIK) using the venerable Vi text
editor (a Unix staple application). I'd be grateful if anyone can confirm or
deny this.

But does this mean that Windows is based on Unix code? Were they breaking
licensing agreements? ;) Given the above arguments about Linux being based on
Minix, surely then Windows is just a hacked together collection of Unix code?

[ Reply to This | # ]

Nah - it's wishful thinking
Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, July 02 2004 @ 04:25 PM EDT
The gap between Linux and Windows narrowing? They should be so lucky..

If a 56k modem user doesn't have to worry about having enough bandwidth to keep
up with patches (securityfocus.com), when simply browing the Net doesn't give
you an infection (latest IE vulnerability), when the OS doesn't force you to
forever score the news for new reasons to worry about it (ever since MS
discovered they couldn't ignore the Net) - I can go on, the list is endless.

The MS problem is one that is fundamental to the way the OS is built, and unless
they start from scratch it'll remain as flawed as it is. They have enough
talent to do it, but I can't see them snapping out of the spin habit long enough
to make it happen.

So, as I said - they're dreaming aloud...

[ Reply to This | # ]

Men in suits
Authored by: Nick_UK on Friday, July 02 2004 @ 04:47 PM EDT
Trouble is, men in suits read these press releases/go to the shows/get taken out
to dinner.

These men in suits are politicians (UK's Chancellor of the Exchequer
recommending AND getting an honour for Bill Gates ->
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/3428673.stm) and people that own the
Country/businesses/people - take any 3 and mix.

FUD to them in the real world of IT isn't - salesman bollocks and look after
each other - so there is not a lot can be done to smother the FUD to those that
are paid to hear it and use it.

Unless you say you will resign if ordered to run a M$ IIS server like I have
done, there is not a lot us subordinates can do.

I am still employed though with no M$ IIS server running - in fact, just
deployed 2 RH Linux boxes for DHCP/DNS :-)

The only

[ Reply to This | # ]

  • Men in suits - Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, July 02 2004 @ 10:45 PM EDT
  • Men in suits - Authored by: Anonymous on Saturday, July 03 2004 @ 08:03 AM EDT
OT: More patent madness
Authored by: Tim Ransom on Friday, July 02 2004 @ 04:49 PM EDT
Lin k

---
Thanks again,

[ Reply to This | # ]

OT: Anyone besides me think IE is finally going to die?!
Authored by: ray08 on Friday, July 02 2004 @ 04:53 PM EDT
By now, I'm sure everyone's heard about the latest IE security hole. When I read about the level of bank theft that had occurred, I immediately switched to Mozilla, both at home and at work, and then changed my bank password. I read the average amount of theft for each victim was $1200!

Surely, this will cause a rapid abandonment of IE?! Check out this link . The govenment is recommending to switch off IE. Lights out!

---
Caldera is toast! And Groklaw is the toaster! (with toast level set to BURN)

[ Reply to This | # ]

The catch-up game
Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, July 02 2004 @ 05:09 PM EDT
"Linux is paying catch-up with Windows and the gap is narrowing...."

If MS-Windows and Linux are starting to look more similar, it's not Linux that's
changing, it's MS. (Note that this guy only talked about the kernel, and didn't
address the similarities in the GUI, which isn't technically part of Linux
anyway.) Linux is only the kernel, and the MS kernel is definitely getting more
like Linux. Multi-user support, multi-filesystem support, more stability,
better performance... These are all features that Linux had first.

The article goes on to say, "the only major difference between the two
operating systems is how windowing is handled. "Windows has kernel
windowing. When it wants to perform a graphics operation, it does call into the
kernel." Which is a fairly obvious problem, and one that MS could probably
fix. (This explains why my windows freeze when the system is busy, and why a
user application can force a blue-screen-of-death.)

I'm not trying to accuse Microsoft of stealing anything from Linux, because they
can get most of these things by studying BSD (or Xenix). My point is that if
anyone is playing catch-up, it's not Linux.

[ Reply to This | # ]

Who is Russinovich?
Authored by: darthaggie on Friday, July 02 2004 @ 05:29 PM EDT
Well, you can start by checking out his company, Winternals, and the company history has this jem:
While pursuing their doctoral degrees in computer and electrical engineering at Carnegie Mellon University, Mark Russinovich and Bryce Cogswell began writing articles for Dr. Dobbs Journal - the computer press leader in covering practical technology.

Ah, good, they do have PhD's, and they worked for the same professor.

Googling on "Mark Russinovich" pulls up a lot of hits for Windows books and magazines, and he seems to be a prolific author.

Unless taken woefully out of context, you should know better than to repeat the Minix->Linux crud, Dr. Russinovich.

[ Reply to This | # ]

The folks who bring us Linux don't care about the competition?
Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, July 02 2004 @ 05:50 PM EDT
There is no day where we don't have Gnome/KDE, Linux/BSD, Emacs/XEmacs,
Emacs/vi, MySQL/PostgreSQL, Free Software/Opensource, GPL/BSD and a large
variety of other flame wars.

[ Reply to This | # ]

A critical point needs to be made; AdTI's Minix FUD Rises From the Swamp...
Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, July 02 2004 @ 05:59 PM EDT
I haven't read all the posts that are up at this point in time, but one critical point that *has* to be made is that sadly, what passes for "journalism" these days is really nothing more than a thinly veiled troll that is soley designed to generate page hits, click-through, and eyeball time.

Editors and publishers these days care almost not at all about the accuracy of content: witness the several, recent instances of utter fabrication at major national news houses.

Decades ago, when news was print only, articles such as this were published to generate letters to the editor, the statistics of which were then trotted off to the sales department to help sustain and increase advertising rates.

(My father was a newspaper reporter in Los Angeles in the mid-50's, and even as far back as then, he often described much of what he wrote in exactly these terms).

The *exact* same thing is taking place at this moment, except it's not letters-to-the-editor that's the valuable commodity, but web page hits.

As far as ZDNet goes, and PC Magazine, and Ziff-Davis when such a thing existed, the accuracy of content is meaningless and irrelevant.

Even parroting the Micro$oft party line is secondary to the fundamental need to generate page hits, which is just what this sort of tripe does to perfection.

Don't play along.

My advice: DO NOT, under any circumstances, visit any ZDNet web site that publishes such tripe, and if you can't resist just peeking at the actual article (as I wasn't :-/ ) DO NOT under any circumstances do anything else than just exit immediately.

All they want is page hits, all they want is click-through, all they want is eyeball time.

Don't give it to them...

t_t_b

---
Release the missing Exhibits!

[ Reply to This | # ]

AdTI's Minix FUD Rises From the Swamp at a MS Conference - Where Else?
Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, July 02 2004 @ 06:50 PM EDT
Id just like to note that I think your comments insinuate things about
Russinovitch that are somewhat unfair.

Winternals has provided for years a set of "power tools" for the
windows community that are extremely useful and valuable to Win32 programmers.
For Free. And in most case With Source Code. Its almost impossible to do
serious development with Win32 and not to benefit from these tools.

I think the idea of free software is an idea Russinovitch understands well and
that frankly he is a more active participant in (on a literal level) than many
of the folks posting here. Including you PJ. (www.sysinternals.com)

His comments about Win32 and Linux, well I would read them far more carefully
than you have and then discuss them with someone with good technical knowledge
and with no axe to grind.

As for the stuff about Linux->Minix, and the way you play on "based
on", I think you are unfair as well. I see his comment in a more abstract
level like a hard core systems programmer would make in a design discussion. Its
a pity that for other reasons our community is extremely sensitive to this
comparison because coming from a guy like him it probably has some technical
merit. There is a big difference between the interpretation of "based
on" in the context of "applying lessons learned" versus
"deriving code from". To me the former is the obvious intended
meaning. Especially given the context.

I think you should offer Russinovitch the chance to respond to your comments.
And also be prepared to apologize to the guy. I think you probably will have to.








[ Reply to This | # ]

Uhhh... yes, it makes sense.
Authored by: Nathan Hand on Friday, July 02 2004 @ 07:21 PM EDT
"the gap between the two operating systems will continue to narrow to a point where their underlying kernel becomes irrelevant. 'Layered services will become more important,' he concluded." Aside from the fact that this makes no sense,

What Russinovich is talking about is perfectly sensible in IT circles. He's pointing out, as is common industry knowledge, that many software designers (possibly more than half) don't really care about the OS and the kernel anymore. We care about things like J2EE, .NET, SOAP and PHP. These are so-called "layered services" because they exist as a layer of software above the OS and applications interface the layer, not the OS.

Consider a J2EE deployment; the application couldn't care less if the underlying OS is Solaris, Linux, or Windows. Depending on the customer you might deploy on Solaris (if you need a whopping 170+ CPU box) or Windows (if that's the best fit for their existing skills) or Linux (if they want to use inexpensive x86 servers and a UNIX-like OS). I use the word "Linux" to mean the whole OS, which is the common vernacular, even though the proper meaning is just the kernel. Disagreeing with somebody over that nit is a game for n00bs as far as I'm concerned.

Layered services are also (in theory) OS independent though Microsoft's layered services like .NET are always somehow tied to Windows. Typical Microsoft. Sun's J2EE and everything from the Apache foundation are much better at being OS independent. Take note that layered services are not just "libraries". A typical GNOME program will still use read(2) and write(2) which are POSIX (aka OS) calls. A layered service provider completely abstracts itself away from the OS. Often this is enforced by using a runtime virtual machine (eg, PHP uses Zend, J2EE uses JVM, .NET uses CLI).

Now that's not to say the OS is unimportant. Of course, it's very important. You still have to license it and administer it! Depending on the version of Linux you use there might even be costs associated with the licensing (many customers seem quite content to pay $$$ for RedHat licenses, and now there is the additional issue of OSRM insurance). But the OS is increasingly irrelevant. What he's saying, and it is completely true, because it's not actually his idea, is that you will be able to choose OSs based on criteria that matter (like cost, skills, etc) rather than being forced into an OS because the application requires it.

Note that "layered services" isn't a Microsoftism. IBM, Sun, and Novell also use this phrase heavily in their technical literature and sales brochures.

That isn't by any means the only idiotic thing to be found in this article. I've never seen such negative feedback on any article in my life. Usually there are at least a few comments that support the author, even if they are only trolls.

Yes, well, that's because Russinovich has a habit of saying the right thing but for the wrong reasons. In this case the anger against his comments was when he said Linux was becoming more like Windows. We all know this is a nonsense. But it's true that the gap is closing. So where's the disagreement? It's because Linux is actually becoming a lot more like Enterprise UNIX, and Windows is also becoming a lot more like Enterprise UNIX. We're both converging towards the same goal at the same time. So to a Windows fanatic like Russinovich it seems that Linux is playing catchup. The reality is that both Linux and Windows are playing catchup to UNIX.

Interestingly MacOS is also playing catchup to UNIX (after Apple purchased NEXTSTEP to form the basis of MacOS X). It's fascinating that the entire industry is converging on UNIX as the de-facto OS, nearly 20 years after some of us were saying that was inevitable :-)

[ Reply to This | # ]

Corrections and typos...
Authored by: pogson on Friday, July 02 2004 @ 07:23 PM EDT
And Russinovich? You can read his his history of NT if you wish.
One "his" is enough.

---
http://www.skyweb.ca/~alicia/ , my homepage, an eclectic survey of topics: berries, mushrooms, teaching in N. Canada, Linux, firearms and hunting...

[ Reply to This | # ]

Let's not get TOO paranoid!
Authored by: xtifr on Friday, July 02 2004 @ 08:04 PM EDT

Ok, I'm a Debian developer, a former Minix user, and one of the first few hundred people in the world to try Linux. And I've been basically Microsoft-free since 1998. And I would say, as a general principle, that it is very hard to be too paranoid about MS. Nevertheless, I think this article may, in fact, be a little too paranoid.

Linux is based on Minix in the same sense that MS-DOS is based on CP/M. Nothing wrong with that. Furthermore, GNU/Linux systems are borrowing more and more from Windows, and vice versa. Nothing wrong with that. As for the ideas about layered systems leading to greater compatibility, that's a fine notion, definitely not the MS party line, and I'm pleased to see someone in the MS camp articulate it. I wish and hope that they'll listen to him.

Overall, I think this Russinovich guy sounds like a pretty smart cookie, if biased. On the other hand, I agree that there's plenty of room for misinterpreting what he said (as PJ seems to have done), and we should be alert for people on the other side (or even neutral parties) misinterpreting it. But I don't think it's appropriate to attack Russinovich himself. Maybe chide him slightly for not being clearer, and for his obvious bias in ignoring MS's borrowing from CP/M, Apple, Xerox, Unix, VMS and others.

I think we should be cultivating this guy, and trying to persuade him to cooperate with us (insofar as his Overlords will allow him too). We want people on the MS side who say things like, "[the] underlying kernel [will] become irrelevant." For someone in the MS camp, that's an amazing breakthrough revelation, and we should encourage it!

---
Do not meddle in the affairs of Wizards, for it makes them soggy and hard to light.

[ Reply to This | # ]

OT: Daimler Reply On Summary Disposition?
Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, July 02 2004 @ 08:19 PM EDT
Anybody got Daimler's reply memo in support of their summary disposition
motion?

If you have it, please post a link

Thanks in advance

Quatermass

[ Reply to This | # ]

AdTI's Minix FUD Rises From the Swamp at a MS Conference - Where Else?
Authored by: entre on Friday, July 02 2004 @ 08:19 PM EDT
change paying catch-up to playing catchup





"The talk, given by Mark Russinovich, chief software architect for
Winternals Software and co-author of Inside Windows 2000, 3rd edition (published
by Microsoft press), was clearly delivered to a home crowd, and its message was
clear: Linux is paying catch-up with Windows and the gap is narrowing. . . .

[ Reply to This | # ]

AdTI's Minix FUD Rises From the Swamp at a MS Conference - Where Else?
Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, July 02 2004 @ 08:29 PM EDT
Odd. I remember on ADTI's "open source tip of the day", they made an
absurd claim (without being direct) that linux fans read pirated WSJ content off
Linux Today. Interesting enough, the link to linux today was a summary that
linked to a Lee Gomes story on ZDnet.

I thought this was something that ZDNet may be interested in, since it amounted
to slander in my view, and let ZDNet know about it. I actually got a reply from
the VP who basically stated that he thought about calling them up and mixing it
with the ADTI people, but decided not to because they've been seeking media
attention with their attack on Linux, and it would only add more fuel to the
fire.

His suggestion was to just ignore them, as he has, and let them quickly fade
away. It's sad to see one of their reporters feels like drumming up their FUD
again. Of course, keep in mind he probably had a deadline and his assignment was
to cover the speech, but unfortunately, although he DID try to counter the
claims with the public statements by Torvalds and Tanenbaum, he was slightly
infactually wrong.

I think the best thing to keep in mind is, although most of us who frequent here
feel great zeal for open source software and know the issues quite well, a
reporter only reports events/issues and possibly does a little quick research to
offer both sides, but 80% of the time they are unfamiliar with the subject
matter, and they may get a different picture of what we read from statements
made by people like Linus.

Still, no excuse for such a lame article. I think one interesting point made,
however, was the statement that linux can handle remote applications better. Web
Services and applications delivered over a network are the next big thing, and
stating that linux does it better is, in fact, a very good thing.

Unfortunately, the rest of the article was quite poor.

[ Reply to This | # ]

AdTI's Minix FUD Rises From the Swamp at a MS Conference - Where Else?
Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, July 02 2004 @ 11:46 PM EDT
It seems that the guy is really big in the Open Source community, he said that
the Linux kernel was not re-entrant, then in a month, the kernel was made
re-entrant.

He also said that the kernel needed to be pre-emptible, then kernel 2.6 was
made pre-emptible.

Wow.

Now he is trying to say that the Linux kernel should have windowing ...

OS functionality-wise are very similar, that is, you can do the same functions
with them ..., but it does not mean that they are the same, internals, design
philosophy and other factors make the result product different.

Linux is a kernel OS, it does not aim to be more than that, ..., Windows in the

other hand, aims to be everything ...

What about file locking, ..., Windows has file locking, Linux file systems do
not have that. On Windows, if I try to delete a directory that is open on a
separate Explorer window an error occurs, ..., that does not happen on Linux.

Can I use any file system on Windows? Perhaps, I want to use raiserfs or ext3
instead of ntfs, can I do that?

On Linux, I can use a disk with 180Gb, on Windows 2000 (they may have fix
that on XP) you run into a ~128GB limit.

How can that guy (even though he has a nice web site
www.sysinternals.com), say that the two OS are similar, and ... that Linux is
playing catch up!

What is it that on Windows XP, some UNIX paths are supported, ...?

It is clear that Windows has been trying to become more and more UNIX like...
hey they even say that Windows 2003 is almost as secure as UNIX when the
Internet Explorer and Media Player are not installed. :-)

Cheers.

[ Reply to This | # ]

MSFT ZDnet connections?
Authored by: Anonymous on Saturday, July 03 2004 @ 12:42 AM EDT
I've wonderd about that for some time.

I'm sure msft spends a lot to advertise with ziff-davis, but I assume other
companies also advertise with zd - like ibm.

[ Reply to This | # ]

Among thiefs - "A Rich Neighbor Named Xerox"
Authored by: Anonymous on Saturday, July 03 2004 @ 03:48 AM EDT
Some might find these well-choosen words of Bill on windows' origins interesting in the light of the current FUD campaign.

Bill: "Well, Steve, I think there's more than one way of looking at it. I think it's more like we both had this rich neighbor named Xerox and I broke into his house to steal the TV set and found out that you had already stolen it."

So Steve Robber later sued Bill Swiper for have stolen the look and feel of the Mac GUI.

Perhaps XEROX should contemplate to sell licenses to windos users and C++ programmers just for a little more fun.

[ Reply to This | # ]

Depends on interpretation of 'Based upon'
Authored by: Anonymous on Saturday, July 03 2004 @ 05:30 AM EDT
Hi

Actually, that's more like a half-truth than a lie. You can say that Linux is
based on Minix in the sense they share many design pieces, including the
infamous errorno.h. It's certainly inspired by Minix in many respects, except
the choice of a monolitic kernel.

It is *not* a derived work in any sense, though, and that is what matters
legally. Being inspired by Minix is just fine, it's the express purpose of
Minix.

-Henrik

[ Reply to This | # ]

Meanwhile, in a parallel universe where the 80xx hegemony never happened ...
Authored by: futureweaver on Saturday, July 03 2004 @ 07:23 AM EDT

This is a piece I wrote elsewhere a little while ago, speculating on how things might have been different. Given the CS discussion going on here, I thought I'd throw it in, though you'll need to read Ed Felten's article to get the context.

I have no idea if Linux would have got off the ground in this parallel universe, though certainly the 432 was a lot less hacker[benign sense]-friendly. What is interesting in the current context is that it looks like Linux will have NX support (which is but one small element of what the 432 offered) a lot sooner than will Windows. La Grande is, of course, the "code vault" necessary to support hardware-enforced rights management, which should be of interest to some here.

Ed Felten has an interesting piece on Intel's La Grande technology, and its "predecessor" the iAPX432. I was involved in ITT's efforts to use the 432, and I'm not sure I buy either the object orientated slant, or the "building software into hardware is a bad idea" line.

On the first point, sure the 432 had things called objects, but they were not much like the objects of the later enthusiasm for OOP. The objects of the 432 were low-level primitives like processes, messages, semaphores, and so on. On the second, indeed the 432 did incorporate high-level hardware support for specific implementation of some functions, but again these were at the system level, for example garbage collection. Even here the basic idea was to offer hardware primitives to support some variety of strategy at the OS level.

Ed also refers to Dave Reed's article, which retails a number of misconceptions about the 432. Perhaps the strangest is the guilt-by-association with "military security models". It is indeed an error to embed these deep in hardware, but not one committed by the designers of the 432. Their capability-based security architecture was general purpose and could have implemented many different security models. No, the processor that gave us an inflexible and inadequate (also broken - it wasn't really fixed till the 486) security architecture was its hasty replacement the 286!

Intel's idea was that the 432 would be the successor to the 8086, and would leave the competition in the dust by leapfrogging a generation of computer architecture. At that point Intel's processors were a generation behind, with negligible memory management. But they had excellent development support (a trick Intel spotted well before Microsoft) and were fairly cheap. Motorola was coming up fast with the 68000, which was essentially on an architectural par with then-current minicomputers such as the VAX.

Intel planned to skip that whole generation of architecture and move to a capability architecture like that of the PP250 and Cambridge CAP, then thought by many to be the next big thing. Interestingly, the IBM S/38 was also a capability machine, but it mostly ran RPG so hardly anyone noticed. Until the 432 Intel had been careful about backward compatibility, but the 808x architecture was clearly limited and a clean break was still possible. The capability machine concept was attractive, because it offered efficient hardware support for multiprocessing, fault handling, and memory management - all of which embedded processor users (the biggest market at that time) like ITT wanted.

What killed the 432 was that it was very slow, and the yields were terrible because the chips were so big. When it failed, they rushed out the 80286, essentially the 8086 with some primitive memory management and protection, because of the urgent need to counter the 68000.

Capability machines turned out not to be a big thing after all. It's speculation of course, but if the 432 had succeeded, the history of the PC industry could have been rather different. Instead of a kluge architecture based on the 8088, we might have had a 432-based PC - with no MS-DOS as we know it, because the initial development of the 432 was cross-hosted on a VAX. Or IBM might have chosen the 68000. Either way, the most likely candidate for a PC OS would have been Unix - its protection model was cruder than that of the 432 hardware, but it could easily have been supported. And buffer-overflow vulnerabilities, along with a lot of other security issues, would be just a bad dream

[ Reply to This | # ]

A Microsoftist under every bed...
Authored by: Anonymous on Saturday, July 03 2004 @ 09:14 AM EDT
I think folks need to take some time off. There is nothing I can see
inaccurate and misleading about the ZDnet article. It's not particularly
interesting or enlightening, but it certainly doesn't qualify as an attack on
Linux.

As far as I can tell from reading everything, the hot button phrase is:

"Although Linux creator Linux Torvalds readily admits that he based his
work on Minix, both he and Tanenbaum refute claims that Torvalds borrowed more
than he admitted."

This is specious quibbling about word choice. Linux used the Minix filesystem
for a time. That's "based on" in the same sense that Minix is
"based on" version 7, and both authors have readily admitted this from
the beginning.

Since it's become clear that someone will claim I'm an agent of Microsoft or
similar claptrap, I'd like to state for the record I was using Unix long before
Linux appeared. The first Intel computer I bought had to boot and run Minix as
part of the acceptance test before I took delivery. When Linus first announced
the kernel on the Minix list I was offline because of a RIF. Just before the
RIF I bought a Sun 3/60 so Minix & Coherent fell by the way side. Linux was
a complete non-starter in 1991 unless you just wanted to hack an antique OS
design. As for BSD, there was this lawsuit...

Lots of commentators here like to make much of Linux being more reliable than
Windows. From the perspective of someone accustomed to high quality production
Unix systems, Linux looks pretty flaky. I'm using a RH EWS 3 system to write
this, but am desparately looking for something that will run some current
browser w/o major misbehavior and so will load Suse 9.1 to a disk this weekend.
A couple of days ago this box wedged so hard running KDE & Konquerer that
only a hard reset would clear it. That's the sort of thing that restricts my
use of Windows to accessing Outlook at work. In itself something I only
condescended to when I was bombarded w/ Word .doc files.

If God had intended people to use Linux, He wouldn't have created Unix. So
folks, it's time to get right w/ God! He says a reliable web browser for FreeBSD
would be an adequate pennance for having strayed from the fold and cleaved to
the Finnish heresy.

:-)

rhb

I'm not God, but I talk to Him a lot, so I'm pretty sure He agrees w/ me. He's
been trying to get me to use a Mac which is a little hard for a CLI guy like me
to accept

[ Reply to This | # ]

AdTI's Minix FUD Rises From the Swamp at a MS Conference - Where Else?
Authored by: Anonymous on Saturday, July 03 2004 @ 01:58 PM EDT
I'm not a troll and I disagree with all of AdTI's conclusions; but I think PJ is
forgetting that Linus "borrowed" the minix filesystem design for his
first kernel.

I'm not claiming that he took any code; just that he used the same design.
AFAIK this was the first time an OS other than minix supported this filesystem.

Andy Tannenbaum did not patent the design (like others recently have done with
FAT) so it was up for grabs and Linus grabbed it.

This is a bit different than working from POSIX standards since minix was not a
standard; it was just a different OS.

[ Reply to This | # ]

AdTI's Minix FUD Rises From the Swamp at a MS Conference - Where Else?
Authored by: afunke on Saturday, July 03 2004 @ 02:00 PM EDT
The "Talkback" feature at the ZDNET article is a joke. According to their "rules", they have the right to delete any post for "any reason", including posts that try to tell the truth about that poor article, even if the deleted posts weren't using rude words or required removal for other legitimate reasons. They seem to carefully delete some posts, while sparing others, so that the picture doesn't look so bad for the visitors...

[ Reply to This | # ]

    Linux is a grass roots movement.
    Authored by: Franki on Saturday, July 03 2004 @ 02:34 PM EDT
    What companies like Microsoft don't understand, is that bad FUD press for Linux
    won't really hurt it, and the reason for that, is that Linux spreads by word of
    mouth more then anything else.

    I tell everyone around me that Linux is brilliant and might be the answer to
    their problems, depending on what their problems are, and I do it (mostly)
    without appearing to be a anti-microsoft zealot.

    Uni students experiment with Linux, and programming for it, and these are the
    future tech guys that will be working at all manner of IT related companies the
    word over, and they are familiar with Linux and usually have a pretty good
    opinion of it as well. They are doing their bit to inform their boss's of the
    potential cost savings of changing to OSS. and since they are already familiar
    with it, the "higher support and training costs" are nowhere near as
    high as those touted by M$ when FUDing Linux.

    3rd world country peoples have two choices, pirate windows, or use a OSS
    alternative, and 3rd world and developing nations are increasingly using linux
    as supported and recommended by their governments.

    None of those above are particularly adversly effected by M$ FUD, and quite
    often the FUD helps us, because people that didn't know before, discover that
    there is an OS and apps that they didn't know about, and that has M$ worried. So
    in a way, they are helping us by making sure everyone knows about Linux and
    OSS.

    Had SCO not come out of the toilet and started their money grabbing, and M$ not
    releasing all their paid FUD reports, allot of people that know about Linux
    today, wouldn't have a clue, and now they do. and their view might not be the
    correct one, but it's a start, and reality will eventually clear up their M$
    inspired misconceptions.

    So in a way, we should thank M$, and ADTi and SCO, because the three of them
    have given Linux and OSS more press and put it in more peoples mind we could
    have hoped for otherwise.

    Also, if no other purpose is served, keep in mind that all manner of government
    departments now know that they can mention an OSS trial run, and screw M$ down
    to 65-75% price cuts, and that means M$'s cash cows are going to start working
    with much much tighter margins.

    One other interesting thing, is that M$ is now paying off most of their
    lawsuits, that means all the ones that settling or losing doesn't hurt them
    anywhere but their pocketbook.

    I imagine this huge spurt M$ settlements is going to result in allot more
    frivilous lawsuits, so they will get alittle of what they have been serving onto
    OSS lately. (directly or otherwise.)

    Being viewed as a soft touch who will settle to avoid bad press is going to cost
    M$ some serious cash in the longrun.

    I wonder if M$ will also settle with Realplayer in order to completly clear the
    decks of suits in the US... if so, that would go even further to suggest M$ will
    settle to avoid more bad press, as they have copped a heap of late.

    anyway, enough blue skying from me..

    regards

    Franki



    [ Reply to This | # ]

    Overstating his influence
    Authored by: Bystander on Saturday, July 03 2004 @ 05:18 PM EDT

    The article talks about one point Russinovich made in his presentation where he cites this< /a> article, where he points out a lack of reentrancy in some parts of the Linux kernel. In his presentation he talks about u-turns made in the evolution of Linux and uses this as one example, giving the impression that reentrancy was lacking because Linux developers didn't recognize its importance until after his article pointed it out. He emphasizes this by saying "Molnar said it was a 'clear red herring'". A month later he turned around and made all paths (in the Linux kernel) r-eentrant."

    Looking at the facts behind his allegations reviews some interesting insights. One is that the article where Russinovich talks about Linux kernel reentrancy was written in 1999, and was discussing his views on whether Linux 2.2 was enterprise ready. Remember, the kernel he was talking about then is now 5 years older and two major revisions further along. As Russinovich pointed out in his article in 1999, Windows NT had also at that time just implemented reentrancy in certain kernel pathways, so Linux was roughly at the same stage in this regards even 5 years ago. In addition, the reentrancy feature was hardly a u-turn in Linux development, nor a result of prodding from Russinovich as he implies. This FAQ page from 1996 shows in the answer to question 5 that 100% kernel reentrancy in Linux was being actively worked on many years prior to Russinovich's article in 1999. These facts show no u-turn in the thinking behind adding kernel reentrancy to Linux, but rather a careful and continuous evolution towards achieving full 100% reentrancy.

    Russinovich's article from 1999 suffered in its sole focus on perceived Linux shortcomings that were present at the time, and then using those to predict its success in the future. Linux in 1999 may not have been fully "enterprise ready", but only because making it so back then was not the highest priority for its developers. Lack of specific features could always be incorporated over time as needed, and history has shown this is exactly what has happened. The 5-year old complaints about Linux 2.2 are no longer valid with the latest Linux 2.6 release. His 1999 article did get one thing right in its conclusion, where he writes that after Linux addresses the problems he stated (which in 2004 it has), "UNIX variants and NT will feel a compelling threat to their enterprise dominance from this open-source OS."

    [ Reply to This | # ]

      I was at the talk... and this article does not describe what I saw
      Authored by: Anonymous on Saturday, July 03 2004 @ 06:03 PM EDT
      I was at the talk, and this article defies belief. Did the author of the article
      arrive 15 minutes late?

      Russinovich started by showing a slide (not available on commnet) that stated
      "Linux Rocks". He then went on to state that the rest of the session
      would be a discussion of the kernels, and nothing else.

      I see no mention of the many times Russinovich stated that Linux was more
      flexible than the NT kernel, nor of the jokey aside as to why he singled out
      Ingo Molnar in the slides, and Molnar's take on the talk.

      I also haven't noticed any comment that Russinovich invited Tanembaum to come to
      the talk (after all, we were in Amsterdam). He couldn't attend since he was in
      the states last week.

      The minix comments were not dwelled upon, and no mention of the adti study
      either. In fact, his talk completely convinced me that SCO really don't have a
      case.

      And did I hallucinate the part in which Russinovich stated that he previously
      worked for IBM, and worked on BSD? (and, um, given the location of the
      conference, hallucination can never be ruled out).

      This article really shocked me. It did not reflect the talk that I went to. And,
      yes, Linux does rock.

      [ Reply to This | # ]

      Layered services - did PJ miss the point?
      Authored by: futureweaver on Sunday, July 04 2004 @ 04:04 AM EDT

      Developer migration to layered services is a huge threat to Microsoft, because developers writing to SOAP etc don't care what the server runs. The danger to MS is that the market will split into application servers (a hard sell, they ask tough questions about reliability, security, lifetime TCO, etc) and browser-type clients ("Office - who needs it, we run Java-based web applications"). MS know all this, of course. It's why they wanted their own Java VM, and why there's such a big push behind .NET. But in a world where layered services are based on standards which can be implemented by anyone, both server and client become commodities where the differentiation is in the applications . Which is why MS is buying applications too (the trouble with that is, SAP doesn't seem to be for sale). However, I suspect Russinovich may have been alluding to this threat when he talked about layered services.

      Incidentally, the analogy between using MINIX as the development system for early Linux and using Word to write an article is flawed, because the outcome of using Word is not a WP program - indeed, not a program of any kind. The same goes for some of the other analogies, such as baking a cake - a cake is not any kind of cooking device. Passion is good, but it's not a substitute for clear reasoning.

      [ Reply to This | # ]

      AdTI's Minix FUD Rises From the Swamp at a MS Conference - Where Else?
      Authored by: blacklight on Sunday, July 04 2004 @ 07:42 AM EDT
      "Although Linux creator Linus Torvalds readily admits that he based his
      work on Minix, both he and Tanenbaum refute claims that Torvalds borrowed more
      than he admitted."

      The ZD writer is definitely writing in an inflammatory fashion. Linux is
      "based on Minix" in somewhat the same way tthat Leibniz's calculus is
      based on the multiplication table. However, the reason that Leibniz is a genius
      and I am not is that I would have a hell of a time getting to calculus from the
      multiplication table on my own. And since Linus's kernel is monolithic, one
      could argue that different multiplication tables were used.

      Linus has repeatedly and graciously acknowledged that he took inspiration from
      Minix. It is a far cry from "Linux readily admits ..." which implies
      that Linus did something improper.

      [ Reply to This | # ]

      Revisionism revised?
      Authored by: Anonymous on Sunday, July 04 2004 @ 04:31 PM EDT
      You quote the original ZDNet article:
      "... Although Linux creator Linux Torvalds readily admits that he based his work on Minix, both he and Tanenbaum refute claims that Torvalds borrowed more than he admitted."
      The article now says:
      "... Although Linux creator Linux Torvalds has never denied that he drew inspiration from Minix, both he and Tanenbaum refute claims that Torvalds used Minix code in Linux."
      Ah, the immutability of modern media... :)

      [ Reply to This | # ]

      10,900 new links to "When Think Tanks Attack"
      Authored by: Anonymous on Sunday, July 04 2004 @ 06:38 PM EDT
      http://sciencecop.joeus er.com/index.asp?AID=20114

      "When Think Tanks Attack"

      http://w ww.stopesso.org/posting/1087485056/1087883376/1088979494

      05 July 2004: 10,900 new links to "When Think Tanks Attack"

      Extremely popular, this weblog entry posted June 23rd now has 10,900 links across the internet, briskly discussed on multiple forums by computer geeks eager to volunteer to do data searches to bust these criminal conspiracies.

      This website added 1,800 new links in the past 14 hours since I checked last, with momentum increasing!

      http://www. cse.unsw.edu.au/~lambert/blog/computers/tanks.html

      When Think Tanks Attack

      Also, updated, strengthened with new links, and new graphics, including http://STOPEXXON.org map-linking interactively:

      http://www.ecosyn.us/adti/ ADTI_Frauds_01.html
      http://www.ecosyn.us/adti/Ad TI_Villians.htm
      http://www.ecosyn.us/adti/Pelosi.h tml
      http://www.ecosyn.us/ad ti/Heidelberg-Appeal.html
      http://www.ecosyn.us/adt i/Singer-Nightline.html
      http://www.ecosyn.us/adt i/Singer-1993-1994.html
      http://www.ecosyn.us/adti/Si nger-Seitz.html
      http://www.ecosyn.us /adti/Seitz_Tobacco_Crimes.html
      http://www.ecosy n.us/adti/Becky_Norton_Dunlop_AdTI.html
      http://www.ecosyn.us/adti/ Stohrer-Singer.html
      http://www.ecosyn.us/adt i/Hazeltine-Singer.html
      http://www.ecosyn.us/adt i/Confronting_AdTI.html
      http://www.ecosyn.us/ad ti/Killer_David_Koch.html
      http://www.ecosyn .us/adti/Walter_Williams_AdTI.html








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      [ Reply to This | # ]

      • Excellent post - Authored by: Anonymous on Monday, July 05 2004 @ 11:30 AM EDT
      AdTI's Minix FUD Rises From the Swamp at a MS Conference - Where Else?
      Authored by: blacklight on Sunday, July 04 2004 @ 10:43 PM EDT
      I think I speak for most if not all of the groklaw community when I say that we
      are not adverse to a technical dialogue with genuine Windows experts - they
      would be a welcome change from the marketing droids and auxiliaries who are
      plastering us with their FUD. I am sure that as the hostess, PJ will moderate
      any such discussion fairly. For my part, I will make only one request about the
      format of any such discussion: no anonymity.

      [ Reply to This | # ]

      OT: Coincidence?
      Authored by: Anonymous on Monday, July 05 2004 @ 04:04 AM EDT
      Is it merely a coincidence that the emeritus fellow at Alexis de Torquemada (or
      whatever) is called Gregory FOSSedal?

      ;-)

      [ Reply to This | # ]

      The article has changed.
      Authored by: Anonymous on Monday, July 05 2004 @ 04:23 AM EDT

      One of PJ's main quotes has been changed. It now (9:20 BST 5th July) says

      Meanwhile Linux, noted Russinovich, owes a great deal to the work of Andrew Tanenbaum, who created the Unix-like Minix operating system for educational purposes. Although Linux creator Linux Torvalds has never denied that he drew inspiration from Minix, both he and Tanenbaum refute claims that Torvalds used Minix code in Linux.

      - Roger

      [ Reply to This | # ]

      A problem with FUD sensitivity
      Authored by: bruce_s on Monday, July 05 2004 @ 09:00 AM EDT
      I think with the volume of FUD that has been flowing from
      SCOX, SUNW, MSFT and AdTI and associated (Don't) Think
      Tanks, I think some of us are beginning to suffer from
      something called "FUD Sensitivity".
      This a condition which results from exposure from severe
      levels of FUD. It is a condition where even slight levels
      of FUD or even FUD like materials, results in elevated
      levels of anger and a compulsion to write in talkbacks and
      Internet Usenet groups.
      Unfortunately there is no creams, lotions or pills for the
      condition. Convertion to a more fatalistic religion or
      world-view may help to deal with it.
      Humour is also known to help.
      The only known treatment is to ignore some of the obvious
      sources of the FUD and a rest from Internet News Sources.
      Self Help Groups called LUGs may help, but sometimes this
      can can result in a flare up in the condition or an
      increased sensitivity to another source of FUD.

      Bruce S.

      [ Reply to This | # ]

      • Hear, hear! - Authored by: Anonymous on Monday, July 05 2004 @ 11:31 AM EDT
      A reason why AdTI never made it to the bookshelves
      Authored by: Anonymous on Tuesday, July 06 2004 @ 06:38 PM EDT
      I justs read this on the Yahoo! Finance SCOX message board:

      http://finance.messages.yahoo.com/bbs?.mm=FN&action=m&board=1600684464&a
      mp;tid=cald&sid=1600684464&mid=151490

      Quote:

      "We (the SoftwareCEO moderators and I) were partly ticked about the
      misappropriation, but mainly annoyed about the misrepresentation: In its book,
      AdTI referred to "interviews" with two of our mods, and there was no
      such thing -- just a forums post from an anonymous person (Justin) posing as a
      student.

      Our moderators aren't shy about being in the public eye -- heck, most of them
      relish it -- and all of them are qualified. But in this case, no one told us
      there was a book in the works, no one told us there was a broader context, and
      no one asked if we'd mind being quoted.

      Besides the copyright infringement, that's just bad form. However, to be fair,
      AdTI was reasonable and cooperative when we called them on it..."

      One may specutlate if that "cooperation" threw a spanner in AdTIs
      scheme to spread their FUD even further. And pretending to be a student... Tsk,
      Tsk, Tsk...

      Linux_Inside

      [ Reply to This | # ]

      More stuff from ZDNet
      Authored by: Anonymous on Tuesday, July 06 2004 @ 11:09 PM EDT
      Please check out more interesting commentaries from the australian ZDNet!

      Who wrote Linux?

      [http://www.zdnet.com.au/news/software/0,2000061733,39152623 ,00.htm]

      yk

      [ Reply to This | # ]

      AdTI's staff?
      Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, July 08 2004 @ 07:38 AM EDT
      Just paid a return visit to www.adti.net

      Their "staff" page gives a bunch of addresses and emails, but no
      mention of their president, Mr. Brown.

      Also, the top "article" on their home page is a link to UPI's web
      site.

      Is ADTI really just a giant troll? Their public image, as displayed on their
      website seems, well....disjointed?

      [ Reply to This | # ]

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