thirty years ago

[Eli the Bearded]

First Linux announcement, 25 August 1991.

From: torv...@klaava.Helsinki.FI (Linus Benedict Torvalds)
Newsgroups: comp.os.minix
Subject: What would you like to see most in minix?
Summary: small poll for my new operating system
Message-ID: <1991Aug25....@klaava.Helsinki.FI>
Date: 25 Aug 91 20:57:08 GMT
Organization: University of Helsinki


Hello everybody out there using minix -

I'm doing a (free) operating system (just a hobby, won't be big and
professional like gnu) for 386(486) AT clones. This has been brewing
since april, and is starting to get ready. I'd like any feedback on
things people like/dislike in minix, as my OS resembles it somewhat
(same physical layout of the file-system (due to practical reasons)
among other things).

I've currently ported bash(1.08) and gcc(1.40), and things seem to work.
This implies that I'll get something practical within a few months, and
I'd like to know what features most people would want. Any suggestions
are welcome, but I won't promise I'll implement them :-)

Linus (torv...@kruuna.helsinki.fi)

PS. Yes - it's free of any minix code, and it has a multi-threaded fs.
It is NOT protable (uses 386 task switching etc), and it probably never
will support anything other than AT-harddisks, as that's all I have :-(.

Just a couple of months before I bought an A/UX system. I didn't switch
to Linux until the late 1990s.

Elijah
------
probably still has install disks for A/UX

[John McCue]

Eli the Bearded <*@eli.users.panix.com> wrote:
> First Linux announcement, 25 August 1991.

<snip>

> Hello everybody out there using minix -
>
> I'm doing a (free) operating system (just a hobby, won't be big and
> professional like gnu) for 386(486) AT clones. This has been brewing

<snip>

> It is NOT protable (uses 386 task switching etc), and it probably never
> will support anything other than AT-harddisks, as that's all I have :-(.

Funny, remember the old days when one of the common
questions was "What machine is Linus using ?".

Then some people would try and get the same hardware :)

<snip>

30 years, who would have thought!

[The Doctor]

In article <eli$21082...@qaz.wtf>,

Eli the Bearded <*@eli.users.panix.com> wrote:

Yes BSD could have been bigger!

>Elijah
>------
>probably still has install disks for A/UX

--
Member - Liberal International This is doctor@@nl2k.ab.ca Ici doctor@@nl2k.ab.ca
Yahweh, Queen & country!Never Satan President Republic!Beware AntiChrist rising!
Look at Psalms 14 and 53 on Atheism https://www.empire.kred/ROOTNK?t=94a1f39b
Canada on 20 Sept 2021 vote ! Beware https://mindspring.com

[Bobbie Sellers]

Oh I was 54 when Linus announced and I assure you it has been
30 years. It took me 15 years and the collapse of CBM to get into
using GNU/Linux.

Oh and thanks to Eli the Bearded for the reminder.

bliss

--
bliss dash SF 4 ever at dslextreme dot com

[SixOverFive]

The biggest things often start very small, hype-free.

Strong rumors that Win-11 replaces a lot of the
behind-the-scenes code with de-facto Linux, Win-12
will be almost entirely Linux tweaked into a
look-alike/work-alike that fools people into thinking
it is still the old Winders line. MS just can't keep
up with 30+ years of "legacy" and and HAS to switch
to a more organized paradigm.

Oh, they CAN sell it because it's "value added" ...

The PROBLEM is that code snippets from their huge
well-financed development team will trickle into
mainline Linux - and soon MS lawyer will claim
to OWN Linux, sue Linus for stealing "their stuff".

Time to start a new -ix maybe ? Something completely
different ? There ARE some other worthy paradigms
in existence. Ever see OS-9 ... mostly relegated
these days to embedded microcontroller type systems.
It has a vaguely Unix look/feel/structure - but is
more logical, more efficient. Old-tymers who owned
RS CoCo's might remember. So ... ?

[The Natural Philosopher]

I think it took a decade and a bit before Linux outperformed (in terms
of what you could do on it, obviously it was always fater and nicer
code) a windows desktop, as a desktop. As a server it was all pretty
decent from the mid to late 90s.

--
The biggest threat to humanity comes from socialism, which has utterly
diverted our attention away from what really matters to our existential
survival, to indulging in navel gazing and faux moral investigations
into what the world ought to be, whilst we fail utterly to deal with
what it actually is.

[The Natural Philosopher]

On 26/08/2021 05:12, SixOverFive wrote:
> Strong rumors that Win-11 replaces a lot of the
>   behind-the-scenes code with de-facto Linux, Win-12
>   will be almost entirely Linux tweaked into a
>   look-alike/work-alike that fools people into thinking
>   it is still the old Winders line. MS just can't keep
>   up with 30+ years of "legacy" and and HAS to switch
>   to a more organized paradigm.
>

MS will have worked out where its income lies, as IBM did when it
realised the money wasn't necessarily in hardware or operating systems.

Google has showed more enterprise than MS in terms of cloud level
applications but Microsoft is in a good position to pick up more than
just skype.

It might make sense to do WINE properly for legacy apps, and sell an
entirely linux based 'windows' distro.

>   Oh, they CAN sell it because it's "value added" ...
>
>   The PROBLEM is that code snippets from their huge
>   well-financed development team will trickle into
>   mainline Linux - and soon MS lawyer will claim
>   to OWN Linux, sue Linus for stealing "their stuff".

Well I am not so sure that will wash these days. Redhat and IBM dont
claim ownership just because they work on Linux

And a lot of people with plenty of money for plenty of liars - sorry
lawyers - would be most unhappy to pay license fees to MS for something
they used to get for free.

No, the desktop operating system is no longer a money spinner really.
Cloud apps and office apps are where MS is probably cranking in the dollars

Anything that brings the mainline nonfree apps onto a linux platform is
worth it I think.


--
Of what good are dead warriors? … Warriors are those who desire battle
more than peace. Those who seek battle despite peace. Those who thump
their spears on the ground and talk of honor. Those who leap high the
battle dance and dream of glory … The good of dead warriors, Mother, is
that they are dead.
Sheri S Tepper: The Awakeners.

[Andreas Kohlbach]

On Thu, 26 Aug 2021 10:02:14 +0100, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
>
> On 26/08/2021 05:12, SixOverFive wrote:
>> Strong rumors that Win-11 replaces a lot of the
>>   behind-the-scenes code with de-facto Linux, Win-12
>>   will be almost entirely Linux tweaked into a
>>   look-alike/work-alike that fools people into thinking
>>   it is still the old Winders line. MS just can't keep
>>   up with 30+ years of "legacy" and and HAS to switch
>>   to a more organized paradigm.
>>
> MS will have worked out where its income lies, as IBM did when it
> realised the money wasn't necessarily in hardware or operating
> systems.

Everybody seems doing cloud today. Thus I didn't expect there would be a
Windows 11. I assumed they would create some dumb client after Windows 10
to connect to their cloud instead. Similar to what Google did with Chrome
OS, depending much or less on their cloud (pretty much useless without
internet connection).

Btw. I might need a new laptop after 9 years hacking on this one in front
of me and thought about a Chromebook, because they are cheap (no Windows
OEM license?). But don't want to give up on Linux. There are a lot of
Howtos in the internet, and some reporting of messing all up. Anyone
successfully installed Linux - preferably next to Chrome OS - on a
Chromebook here?
--
Andreas

https://news-commentaries.blogspot.com/

[Joerg Lorenz]

Am 26.08.21 um 18:21 schrieb Andreas Kohlbach:

> Btw. I might need a new laptop after 9 years hacking on this one in front
> of me and thought about a Chromebook, because they are cheap (no Windows
> OEM license?). But don't want to give up on Linux. There are a lot of
> Howtos in the internet, and some reporting of messing all up. Anyone
> successfully installed Linux - preferably next to Chrome OS - on a
> Chromebook here?

Wouldn't it be more appropriate and helpful to open a new thread for
this topic?


--
De gustibus non est disputandum

[The Natural Philosopher]

On 26/08/2021 17:21, Andreas Kohlbach wrote:
> On Thu, 26 Aug 2021 10:02:14 +0100, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
>>
>> On 26/08/2021 05:12, SixOverFive wrote:
>>> Strong rumors that Win-11 replaces a lot of the
>>>   behind-the-scenes code with de-facto Linux, Win-12
>>>   will be almost entirely Linux tweaked into a
>>>   look-alike/work-alike that fools people into thinking
>>>   it is still the old Winders line. MS just can't keep
>>>   up with 30+ years of "legacy" and and HAS to switch
>>>   to a more organized paradigm.
>>>
>> MS will have worked out where its income lies, as IBM did when it
>> realised the money wasn't necessarily in hardware or operating
>> systems.
>
> Everybody seems doing cloud today. Thus I didn't expect there would be a
> Windows 11. I assumed they would create some dumb client after Windows 10
> to connect to their cloud instead. Similar to what Google did with Chrome
> OS, depending much or less on their cloud (pretty much useless without
> internet connection).
>

I wondered about that - rather like a tablet or smart phone but here is
my best wet finger guess

MS knows it lost te smart ]phoine and tablet war, so its buying up the
cloud apps they use.
Linux won the server wars and the minicomputer space.

The only place for windows is the desktop. Where commercial people and
professionals need a platform for custom applications, and a supported
platform for office apps

Why bother supporting an OS that is stuck with legacy Intel hardware,
when Linux is already broader in scope?

The problem becomes on of building a legacy API to run older windows
apps, while porting MS apps to raw linux

If that is less effort and safer than continuing to develop the rats
nest that is Windows, why not do it?

> Btw. I might need a new laptop after 9 years hacking on this one in front
> of me and thought about a Chromebook, because they are cheap (no Windows
> OEM license?). But don't want to give up on Linux. There are a lot of
> Howtos in the internet, and some reporting of messing all up. Anyone
> successfully installed Linux - preferably next to Chrome OS - on a
> Chromebook here?
>

I bought a *refurbished* little HP Pavilion - the vendor knocked £30 off
it for removing the RAM and hard disk . I already had a busted Toshiba
Craptop to raid for RAM and disk. Booted up linux with no fiddles at
all. Bog standard hardware built well.

Rock solid little beast. There are loads of refurbed laptops 'not to
latest spec' or ex liquidation stock out there.

--
Truth welcomes investigation because truth knows investigation will lead
to converts. It is deception that uses all the other techniques.

[The Natural Philosopher]

Well the title has changed. so it *sort of* is a new thread...

--
Labour - a bunch of rich people convincing poor people to vote for rich
people by telling poor people that "other" rich people are the reason
they are poor.

Peter Thompson

[Eli the Bearded]

In comp.os.linux.misc, Andreas Kohlbach <a...@spamfence.net> wrote:
> Btw. I might need a new laptop after 9 years hacking on this one in front
> of me and thought about a Chromebook, because they are cheap (no Windows
> OEM license?). But don't want to give up on Linux. There are a lot of
> Howtos in the internet, and some reporting of messing all up. Anyone
> successfully installed Linux - preferably next to Chrome OS - on a
> Chromebook here?

Probably yes. Chromebooks seem to have pushed out all of the netbooks
that I so loved, but seem slightly more difficult to re-OS and never
seem to have great hard drive or RAM offerings. So I personally have
avoided them.

My method for picking a new laptop is generally:

1. Come up with some rough specs for what I want, to narrow the field
2. From the offerings in that narrowed field, search for "How to install
Linux on XYZ"
3. Discard any offerings with no promising results
4. If nothing left, readjust specs in restart, otherwise buy one of
the offerings

My most recent purchase was a Microsoft Surface Go 2, which met my
criteria of ~11" screen, 8GB RAM, slot for sd or microsd card, USB-C,
and Linux works. I was in a rush, so limited my search to Surface
offerings because I had heard they mostly work well with Linux already.

It was more costly than my usual budget, and the keyboard is a bit
soft. Linux was difficult to install, but doable, and has been pretty
solid since. I _have_ noticed that the trackpad seems to have a config
race condition during boot, so sometimes it works great and sometimes
it works terribly. One of the fast to reproduce "works terribly" signs
is "middle button emulation not present". Rebooting can help by rolling
the dice again on that race condition. Then when it works, avoid
rebooting for a while.

Elijah
------
not enamored enough to enthusiastically recommend the Surface Go

[Joerg Lorenz]

Am 26.08.21 um 18:50 schrieb Andreas Kohlbach:

> Nicht wirklich. ;-)
>
> I changed the subject. Thus creating a new topic would just be a technical
> issue in my opinion.

Nein.
Viele haben sicher diesen Thread und damit den von Dir eröffneten
Subthread abgehakt. Dein "Thread" ist thematisch extrem weit vom
Originalthread weg.

Neuer Thread = neue Leser
Alter Thread mit Subject-Change /= neue Leser

[Joerg Lorenz]

Am 26.08.21 um 19:19 schrieb Eli the Bearded:

> In comp.os.linux.misc, Andreas Kohlbach <a...@spamfence.net> wrote:
>> Btw. I might need a new laptop after 9 years hacking on this one in front
>> of me and thought about a Chromebook, because they are cheap (no Windows
>> OEM license?). But don't want to give up on Linux. There are a lot of
>> Howtos in the internet, and some reporting of messing all up. Anyone
>> successfully installed Linux - preferably next to Chrome OS - on a
>> Chromebook here?
>
> Probably yes. Chromebooks seem to have pushed out all of the netbooks
> that I so loved, but seem slightly more difficult to re-OS and never
> seem to have great hard drive or RAM offerings. So I personally have
> avoided them.
>
> My method for picking a new laptop is generally:
>
> 1. Come up with some rough specs for what I want, to narrow the field
> 2. From the offerings in that narrowed field, search for "How to install
> Linux on XYZ"
> 3. Discard any offerings with no promising results
> 4. If nothing left, readjust specs in restart, otherwise buy one of
> the offerings

Very much the same here. This time I ordered a new Dell machine with a
preinstalled Ubuntu. I'll get it in the second half of September.

Just a couple of weeks ago I "misused" my 2016 MacBook Air to install
Mint. Works wonderful. A live system showed me already a year ago that
it works.

After the recent debacle with the backdoor on iPhones in the US I
decided to free myself from the ringfenced Apple-ecosystem and work on a
diversified infrastructure.

A boot-stick with a Linux on it to test hardware should be acceptable
for most vendors if asked.

Chromebooks are a No-Go for me anyway.

Jörg

[Eli the Bearded]

In comp.os.linux.misc, Andreas Kohlbach <a...@spamfence.net> wrote:

> What's the difference?
>
> I assume everybody who read here reads here, no matter if a subject
> change occurred or not.

Sometimes people killfile based on "all articles with message-ID X in
references", which is a way to get all replies even as the debaters
vary the subject. I don't do that in _this_ group, but I have done it.

I'm also more likely to read an article that is starts a new thread
than one that is a deep reply. In trn, I use the "," junk-this-and-all-
replies action (which is a per-session junk, not a saved forever junk)
fairly regularly.

Were I to topic shift to "Linux on a Chromebook", I'd probably change
the subject and remove the references header, even if I included th
message-ID I was replying to in the body.

Elijah
------
might have used the "," and missed replies but for the subject change

[The Natural Philosopher]

On 26/08/2021 18:19, Eli the Bearded wrote:
> My method for picking a new laptop is generally:
>
> 1. Come up with some rough specs for what I want, to narrow the field
> 2. From the offerings in that narrowed field, search for "How to install
> Linux on XYZ"
> 3. Discard any offerings with no promising results
> 4. If nothing left, readjust specs in restart, otherwise buy one of
> the offerings
>

Pretty much how I did it
But with a stingy budget, reconditioned ex company HP Pavilion was the
best deal

> My most recent purchase was a Microsoft Surface Go 2, which met my
> criteria of ~11" screen, 8GB RAM, slot for sd or microsd card, USB-C,
> and Linux works. I was in a rush, so limited my search to Surface
> offerings because I had heard they mostly work well with Linux already.

I needed a mic and camera as well. Didnt need SD, but installed normal SSD


It's my travel laptop, so needs full comms.

Screen is good, sound is adequate, no cooling slots underneath to get
blocked by bedclothes - i was in hospital with it - mic and camera. Ran
Linux (Mint) straight out of the install DVD

Good workmanlike well made bog standard hardware.


--
“when things get difficult you just have to lie”

― Jean Claud Jüncker

[Joerg Lorenz]

Am 26.08.21 um 20:07 schrieb Andreas Kohlbach:

> On Thu, 26 Aug 2021 19:35:03 +0200, Joerg Lorenz wrote:
>>
>> Am 26.08.21 um 18:50 schrieb Andreas Kohlbach:
>>> On Thu, 26 Aug 2021 18:27:59 +0200, Joerg Lorenz wrote:
>>>>
>>>> Wouldn't it be more appropriate and helpful to open a new thread for
>>>> this topic?
>>>
>>> Nicht wirklich. ;-)
>>>
>>> I changed the subject. Thus creating a new topic would just be a technical
>>> issue in my opinion.
>>
>> Nein.
>> Viele haben sicher diesen Thread und damit den von Dir eröffneten
>> Subthread abgehakt. Dein "Thread" ist thematisch extrem weit vom
>> Originalthread weg.
>

> That is your assumption (going back to English). The Natural Philosop did
> reply to it.

TNP is killfiled here because of antisocial behaviour in other groups.

>> Neuer Thread = neue Leser
>> Alter Thread mit Subject-Change /= neue Leser
>

> What's the difference?
>
> I assume everybody who read here reads here, no matter if a subject
> change occurred or not.

This assumption is wrong because I do not do it = not everybody.

[The Natural Philosopher]

On 26/08/2021 21:36, Joerg Lorenz wrote:
> TNP is killfiled here because of antisocial behaviour in other groups.

Translate: He challenges orthodoxies and group think, so must be
'cancelled'.

--
Ideas are more powerful than guns. We would not let our enemies have
guns, why should we let them have ideas?

Josef Stalin

[SixOverFive]

On 08/26/2021 05:02 AM, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
> On 26/08/2021 05:12, SixOverFive wrote:
>> Strong rumors that Win-11 replaces a lot of the
>> behind-the-scenes code with de-facto Linux, Win-12
>> will be almost entirely Linux tweaked into a
>> look-alike/work-alike that fools people into thinking
>> it is still the old Winders line. MS just can't keep
>> up with 30+ years of "legacy" and and HAS to switch
>> to a more organized paradigm.
>>
> MS will have worked out where its income lies, as IBM did when it
> realised the money wasn't necessarily in hardware or operating systems.
>
> Google has showed more enterprise than MS in terms of cloud level
> applications but Microsoft is in a good position to pick up more than
> just skype.
>
> It might make sense to do WINE properly for legacy apps, and sell an
> entirely linux based 'windows' distro.
>
>
>> Oh, they CAN sell it because it's "value added" ...
>>
>> The PROBLEM is that code snippets from their huge
>> well-financed development team will trickle into
>> mainline Linux - and soon MS lawyer will claim
>> to OWN Linux, sue Linus for stealing "their stuff".
>
> Well I am not so sure that will wash these days. Redhat and IBM dont
> claim ownership just because they work on Linux

Well, RH and some others mostly sell "support", but they DO
write their own stuff for smoothly interconnecting lots of
other processors/boxes/storage even if those boxes are out
in "the cloud" somewhere. "Big data" customizations. MS can
do that too and BET their code will become intermixed in
most every Linux distro after a few years. MS is also
"Linux-izing" some of the Winders internals (just making
them "work-alike" except (hopefully) all the zillions of
security issues.

> And a lot of people with plenty of money for plenty of liars - sorry
> lawyers - would be most unhappy to pay license fees to MS for something
> they used to get for free.

MS lawyers will ENSURE they do ... $$$ talks. Bill PAYS,
Linus DOESN'T.

> No, the desktop operating system is no longer a money spinner really.
> Cloud apps and office apps are where MS is probably cranking in the
dollars
>
> Anything that brings the mainline nonfree apps onto a linux platform is
> worth it I think.

For security/stability reasons if nothing else. Better for all.
However that "who owns what ?" issue IS also out there. MS has
tried to kill Linux before, and if it puts a penny in their
pocket they'll scheme-up a way to try it again, and again.

Now if we can just induce Intel to quit putting little MINIX
machines inside the guts of their chips. That's where some
of the latest blights came from. MINIX was/is an *educational*
excercise, simple enough for students to grasp, it was NEVER
meant for real-world applications and has basically ZERO
security. Yea, yea ... the Intel engineers knew they could
save a lot of work by putting intelligent higher-level
management systems in there instead of hand-writing all
the rules in microcode and solder, but ....

[SixOverFive]

On 08/26/2021 12:21 PM, Andreas Kohlbach wrote:
> On Thu, 26 Aug 2021 10:02:14 +0100, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
>>
>> On 26/08/2021 05:12, SixOverFive wrote:
>>> Strong rumors that Win-11 replaces a lot of the
>>>   behind-the-scenes code with de-facto Linux, Win-12
>>>   will be almost entirely Linux tweaked into a
>>>   look-alike/work-alike that fools people into thinking
>>>   it is still the old Winders line. MS just can't keep
>>>   up with 30+ years of "legacy" and and HAS to switch
>>>   to a more organized paradigm.
>>>
>> MS will have worked out where its income lies, as IBM did when it
>> realised the money wasn't necessarily in hardware or operating
>> systems.
>
> Everybody seems doing cloud today. Thus I didn't expect there would be a
> Windows 11. I assumed they would create some dumb client after Windows 10
> to connect to their cloud instead. Similar to what Google did with Chrome
> OS, depending much or less on their cloud (pretty much useless without
> internet connection).

Have no doubts, MS badly *wants* a return to the
client/server + license fees paradigm. Every release
edges further and further in that direction.

Oh yea, since your "machine" and data really reside
on MS servers it makes it a hell of a lot easier to
monitor/mine/sell your stuff ....

With MS (and G), assume evil intent until proven otherwise.

> Btw. I might need a new laptop after 9 years hacking on this one in front
> of me and thought about a Chromebook, because they are cheap (no Windows
> OEM license?). But don't want to give up on Linux. There are a lot of
> Howtos in the internet, and some reporting of messing all up. Anyone
> successfully installed Linux - preferably next to Chrome OS - on a
> Chromebook here?

Some you CAN flush and install Linux, some you can't. I think
manufacturers have some deal with G and/or MS to intentionally
try and stick people with proprietary OSs. There are a few
outfits that sell notebooks pre-installed with Linux, but they
are expensive (good high-powered units though).

This missive is being writ on a N300-based Dell P24-something,
compact, cheap, absolutely not for modern games or video
work. Flushed Winders and managed to get MX in there. Winders
actually used up about 70% of the 32gb SSD ... MX only about
15 percent :-)

[The Natural Philosopher]

Redhat have IIRC over a hundred coders working on kernel and driver
stuff which goes back into the FOSS pool.

The may get income from support, but they spend it on code development
Linux wouldn't be where it is without injectoions of paid man hours from
IIBM red hat and others

"Big data" customizations. MS can
>   do that too and BET their code will become intermixed in
>   most every Linux distro after a few years. MS is also
>   "Linux-izing" some of the Winders internals (just making
>   them "work-alike" except (hopefully) all the zillions of
>   security issues.
>

The thing is that there are powerful and deep pockets that want Linux to
stay open source - hardware people for example. MS wont gop up against them

>
> > And a lot of people with plenty of money for plenty of liars - sorry
> > lawyers - would be most unhappy to pay license fees to MS for something
> > they used to get for free.
>
>   MS lawyers will ENSURE they do ... $$$ talks. Bill PAYS,
>   Linus DOESN'T.

Please, stop with your prejudice and read what is being written.
Many many people rely on Linux. Commercial people. Do you really think
the cost of paying some lawyers to take on MS (Gates isn't really part
of it anymore) is more than paying MS a licence fee on every CPU chip
sold, forever?

>
> > No, the desktop operating system is no longer a money spinner really.
> > Cloud apps and office apps are where MS is probably cranking in the
> dollars
> >
> > Anything that brings the mainline nonfree apps onto a linux platform is
> > worth it I think.
>   For security/stability reasons if nothing else. Better for all.
>   However that "who owns what ?" issue IS also out there. MS has
>   tried to kill Linux before, and if it puts a penny in their
>   pocket they'll scheme-up a way to try it again, and again.
>

Steve Bullmer has been gone for 7 years now. MS isn't what it was.
Neither is the market.

They failed with mobile phone, they pretty much failed with tablets. In
sense MS is the odd man out in a world of BSD/LINUX based Operating
systems.
I am sure they will in some way introduce the 'windows distro' and port
their stuff to linux eventually. Simply because even MS cant spend time
fixing the same bugs in windows that everyone else is fixing in linux.

The challenge is providing a legacy windows API, to linux, but who
better to do it than MS?

>   Now if we can just induce Intel to quit putting little MINIX
>   machines inside the guts of their chips. That's where some
>   of the latest blights came from. MINIX was/is an *educational*
>   excercise, simple enough for students to grasp, it was NEVER
>   meant for real-world applications and has basically ZERO
>   security. Yea, yea ... the Intel engineers knew they could
>   save a lot of work by putting intelligent higher-level
>   management systems in there instead of hand-writing all
>   the rules in microcode and solder, but ....

LOL!

Intel has had its day, too. ARM is taking over instead. CISC is just too
power hungry, and compilers can do a better job of optimising that CPUs
can...


I dunno about your experience, but my experience is that x86 CPU
development is really at an end almost. Its still clocking at the same
speed, and all the extra goodies - caching and multiple cores - are
introducing security issues that many find unacceptable...

No, MS is a fading star. The one that scares me is Google, and Amazon -
AWS runs too much stuff that ought to be on a server farm.


--
Those who want slavery should have the grace to name it by its proper
name. They must face the full meaning of that which they are advocating
or condoning; the full, exact, specific meaning of collectivism, of its
logical implications, of the principles upon which it is based, and of
the ultimate consequences to which these principles will lead. They must
face it, then decide whether this is what they want or not.

Ayn Rand.

[The Natural Philosopher]

My take on this was that a second hand two year old quality ex business
laptop would not only run linux 'out of the box', but was better specced
for the same price as a new chromebook

Uk prices for a new chromebook with 4GB ram and nasty essd start around
£200

I can get a refurbed Lenovo for that and for a little more an HP laptop.
Core i3 technology and 8GB RAM. Scrub out windows and overwrite the drive.

>    This missive is being writ on a N300-based Dell P24-something,
>    compact, cheap, absolutely not for modern games or video
>    work. Flushed Winders and managed to get MX in there. Winders
>    actually used up about 70% of the 32gb SSD ... MX only about
>    15 percent  :-)

Yup. Its hard to get an SSD smaller than 120GB these days! I think a raw
linux Mint install is only about 8GB - its hard to go over 20GB even
loaded up with apps. Data is another matter of course

I looked very hard at chromebooks, but they were all either built down
to a price, or more expensive than a laptop anyway.

You can get the same hardware as a chromebook running windows for very
little extra anyway, but why would you?

Want ability to program SD cards? buy a USB addition



--
“There are two ways to be fooled. One is to believe what isn’t true; the
other is to refuse to believe what is true.”

—Soren Kierkegaard

[Bobbie Sellers]

You can buy very nice used and refurbished Dell, i5 or i7 laptops for a
pittance (compared to new prices), I have an E6520,
E6520, and my letest bought April 2020. E7450. These can keep up it
seems though they burn a bit more energy, The Pine Book will be out of
stock until next month and it should run about $220-$250 if you want
to escape the Intel tyranny. Search on "Pine 64" to find the store. I
think it uses Manjaro with KDE.

Enjoy your shopping...

bliss - boots & runs a Pretty Cool Linux Operating System aka pclinuxos.

[Charlie Gibbs]

On 2021-08-27, The Natural Philosopher <t...@invalid.invalid> wrote:

> On 27/08/2021 02:38, SixOverFive wrote:
>
>>   Have no doubts, MS badly *wants* a return to the
>>   client/server + license fees paradigm. Every release
>>   edges further and further in that direction.

a.k.a "Software as a Service" (SaaS)

I find it ironic that the goal of the modern right-wing
business establishment is the elimination of private
ownership - the dream of Karl Marx.

>>   Oh yea, since your "machine" and data really reside
>>   on MS servers it makes it a hell of a lot easier to
>>   monitor/mine/sell your stuff ....
>>
>>   With MS (and G), assume evil intent until proven otherwise.

+1

>>    Some you CAN flush and install Linux, some you can't. I think
>>    manufacturers have some deal with G and/or MS to intentionally
>>    try and stick people with proprietary OSs. There are a few
>>    outfits that sell notebooks pre-installed with Linux, but they
>>    are expensive (good high-powered units though).
>
> My take on this was that a second hand two year old quality ex business
> laptop would not only run linux 'out of the box', but was better specced
> for the same price as a new chromebook

The laptop I'm writing this on is a refurbished Lenovo T410,
an i5 box that has no trouble with Linux. Plus - and this
is important for me - it has a professional-grade keyboard,
which is increasingly difficult to find in a laptop.

--
/~\ Charlie Gibbs | They don't understand Microsoft
\ / <cgi...@kltpzyxm.invalid> | has stolen their car and parked
X I'm really at ac.dekanfrus | a taxi in their driveway.
/ \ if you read it the right way. | -- Mayayana

[The Natural Philosopher]

On 27/08/2021 18:30, Andreas Kohlbach wrote:

> On Fri, 27 Aug 2021 03:34:21 +0100, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
>>
>> Uk prices for a new chromebook with 4GB ram and nasty essd start
>> around £200
>

> 4 GB would be enough for me. More important is the screen size. Should at
> least have a 15" display.
>
> Why is the ESSD nasty? I tested some in a shop and it felt fluid. No idea
> though how it would behave if Linux was installed.
>

its cheap and doesn't last?

My real point was that refurbished computers are great value.Better
value than new mass market chromebooks

I can pick up a used computer for less than the cost of buying the
processor in it. Bang for the buck is far better than new.

My cheap but new laptop didn't last as long as the refurbed model that
replaced it had *already* lasted before I bought it!

You might think what can go wrong in a cheap chromebook or laptop?
Backlight flickers. LCD screen has viciously narrow viewing angle and no
contrast. Interface board sockets fail with repeated use - Ethernet,
USB, power sockets all badly made and lose contact. Poor wifi
performance that drops out..camera fails. Keyboard is 'muddy'.
.
My £200 'new' laptop developed or had *all* of the above, and then it
wouldn't boot and gave memory errors no matter what RAM I put in, I just
gave up.

Same disk, same RAM in an used HP - faultless performance and twice the
wifi speed as well, Built to last.

The simple fact is that a second hand lightly used £500 laptop is way
better than a new £200 laptop.

And can be got for £200 more or less

My server here is a 15 year old MB that came with DDR2 RAM, and a
windows XP license for FREE!!

The disks in it did not, I agree. But its been the house server for
getting on for ten years now and is still capable of saturating the
100Mbps network that connects it to the world.



--
Outside of a dog, a book is a man's best friend. Inside of a dog it's
too dark to read.

Groucho Marx

[The Natural Philosopher]

On 28/08/2021 17:42, Andreas Kohlbach wrote:
> You just confirm that HP have a better quality (am not working for HP to
> say this).

That was not really my intention. My intention is to make the point that
second hand quality is often better than new crap.


--
Climate is what you expect but weather is what you get.
Mark Twain

[Andrei Z.]

Eli the Bearded wrote:
> First Linux announcement, 25 August 1991.
>

> From: torv...@klaava.Helsinki.FI (Linus Benedict Torvalds)
> Newsgroups: comp.os.minix
> Subject: What would you like to see most in minix?
> Summary: small poll for my new operating system
> Message-ID: <1991Aug25....@klaava.Helsinki.FI>
> Date: 25 Aug 91 20:57:08 GMT
> Organization: University of Helsinki
>
>

> Hello everybody out there using minix -
>
> I'm doing a (free) operating system (just a hobby, won't be big and
> professional like gnu) for 386(486) AT clones. This has been brewing

> since april, and is starting to get ready. I'd like any feedback on
> things people like/dislike in minix, as my OS resembles it somewhat
> (same physical layout of the file-system (due to practical reasons)
> among other things).
>
> I've currently ported bash(1.08) and gcc(1.40), and things seem to work.
> This implies that I'll get something practical within a few months, and
> I'd like to know what features most people would want. Any suggestions
> are welcome, but I won't promise I'll implement them :-)
>
> Linus (torv...@kruuna.helsinki.fi)
>
> PS. Yes - it's free of any minix code, and it has a multi-threaded fs.

> It is NOT protable (uses 386 task switching etc), and it probably never
> will support anything other than AT-harddisks, as that's all I have :-(.
>

<snip>

30 things you didn't know about the Linux kernel

https://opensource.com/article/21/8/linux-kernel

Sounds of the Compiling Linux Kernel

https://youtu.be/4yMVkQRhiiQ

https://github.com/Shizcow/SOTCLK

[Solbu]

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Hash: SHA1

Eli the Bearded wrote:

> I'm doing a (free) operating system (just a hobby, won't be big and
> professional like gnu) for 386(486) AT clones.

If I ever get a chance to attend one of Torvalds talks, the one question
I dream of asking is: When will it be big and professional like Gnu. :-)


- --
Solbu - https://www.solbu.net
PGP key ID: 0x4F5AD64DFA687324
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[Andrei Z.]

Eli the Bearded wrote:
> First Linux announcement, 25 August 1991.
>
> From: torv...@klaava.Helsinki.FI (Linus Benedict Torvalds)
> Newsgroups: comp.os.minix
> Subject: What would you like to see most in minix?
> Summary: small poll for my new operating system
> Message-ID: <1991Aug25....@klaava.Helsinki.FI>
> Date: 25 Aug 91 20:57:08 GMT
> Organization: University of Helsinki
>
>
> Hello everybody out there using minix -
>

> I'm doing a (free) operating system (just a hobby, won't be big and

> professional like gnu) for 386(486) AT clones. This has been brewing
> since april, and is starting to get ready. I'd like any feedback on
> things people like/dislike in minix, as my OS resembles it somewhat
> (same physical layout of the file-system (due to practical reasons)
> among other things).
>
> I've currently ported bash(1.08) and gcc(1.40), and things seem to work.
> This implies that I'll get something practical within a few months, and
> I'd like to know what features most people would want. Any suggestions
> are welcome, but I won't promise I'll implement them :-)
>
> Linus (torv...@kruuna.helsinki.fi)
>
> PS. Yes - it's free of any minix code, and it has a multi-threaded fs.
> It is NOT protable (uses 386 task switching etc), and it probably never
> will support anything other than AT-harddisks, as that's all I have :-(.
>
>

From Linus Torvalds <>
Date Fri, 17 Sep 2021 13:02:58 -0700
Subject 30 years since the Linux 0.01 release

https://lkml.org/lkml/2021/9/17/1018

"This is just a random note to let people know that today is actually
one of the core 30-year anniversary dates: 0.01 was uploaded Sept 17, 1991."

[Andrei Z.]

Dirk Hohndel Reflects On What Made Linux So Successful

https://www.tfir.io/dirk-hohndel-reflects-on-what-made-linux-so-successful/