Re: tlug: The Myth of Open Source Security

[Shimpei Yamashita <shimpei@example.com>]

On Fri, Jun 02, 2000 at 05:29:51PM +0900, Stephen J. Turnbull wrote:
> >>>>> "wile y" == Chris Sekiya <sekiya@example.com> writes:
> 
>     wile y> Hell, support for non-intel platforms has seriously
>     wile y> suffered in the 2.3.x tree (but this will the the subject
>     wile y> of a separate rant, essentially indicting RedHat for
>     wile y> determining the sparc hardware support priorities).

It isn't as if it were ever all that great. The history of non-x86 Linux
development, as far as I know, has always been that of chasing unilateral
changes made by the main developers on the x86 platform. For the longest
time, you couldn't really use Linus's release on the PowerPC platform; you had
to use the PowerPC developers' tree, which never managed to keep up with
Linus's changes. 2.2.16 is probably OK, modulo bugfixes that appeared after
its release, but I've basically given up PowerPC Linux months ago for a
variety of reasons including:

* the kernel game (see above)
* the apparent lack of QC at LinuxPPC, which is the sloppiest distribution
    I've ever seen since, oh, Slackware96; I suppose I could try Debian or
    SuSE, though...
* I also have an x86 laptop, and x86 distributions are much more polished;
  I really don't *need* two Linux boxes
* subpar hardware support

And so on. Non-x86 Linux has never been more than second-class citizens in the
Linux world; don't expect the (perceived) egalitarianism of NetBSD here.

Maybe I'll try Darwin, although I'm not sure what it would be good for.

-- 
Shimpei Yamashita                   <http://www2.gol.com/users/shimpei/>
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