Key bugs in core Linux code squashed

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Let me explain a few things here:

``Remember Linux is just paraphrasing of Unix, which is 35 years old, you think they would have gotten it right. If the laws of copyright were correct it would be illegal or otherwise known as plagarism.''

No, Linux provides similar and increasingly ideantial APIs to UNIX. That is the sane UNIX source can compile easily to Linux as the APIs are almost identical.

NOW: Linux is NOT UNIX. It is a complete from scratch implementation of a Unix-like system. It is NOT Unix neither it uses ANY of the licensed (SVr4) UNIX source code. They have written the OS kernel, the system libraries and the utilities from scratch. As a matter of fact, many of the linux utilities are somewhat more flexible than corrsponding UNIX ones.

The API closeness allowed the cross-porting of code from UNIX to Linux and vice-versa. As a matter of fact, numerous Linux/GNU apps are backported to UNIX currently.

Linux has joined the UNIX communities in the OpenGroup forums to align itself with the UNIX specification SUS3. This is a good thing: Linux is becoming a FREE UNIX unecambered by licensing fees. Anc cross porting becomes more smooth.

So, although Linux has borrowed many of the sound principles in UNIX, it is a complete rewrite. That means that the number and type of defects do not relate to the same of UNIX's. Also the relatively LOW number and severity demonstrates that this ragtug group of loosely cooperating people are doing pretty darn good job.


``That was also a beta version of win2000 the bug with the mouse we called it. Since then MS has tightened up their code. ''

Why would a company with 20,000 of professional 'engineers' create such a messy code (65K bugs) in the first place? By the year 2000 MS had been around for 22+ years.

To sum up: the linux developers are working surprizingly WELL even though they cooperate very loosely over the Internet, and with 1/100th of the resources that MS has. By any standard they are doing very successful job and correspondingly MS engineers are doing extremely POOR one. Case in point: the incorrigible FLAW found in the W2K kernel.

-m

Posted by: michael_t   Posted on: 08/04/05 You are currently: a Guest | Members login | Terms of Use

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