Message-ID: <199807101914.UAA22683@linux.lisse.na> Date: Fri, 10 Jul 1998 20:14:50 +0100 From: Dr Eberhard W Lisse <mailto:el@LINUX.LISSE.NA> Subject: Re: Come on! (was Re: Bad experiences etc..) To: mailto:DEVEL-L@AMERICAN.EDU
Mike,In message <mailto:3.0.5.32.19980710102222.009e0450@webfirst.com>, Mike Weaver writes:
> Linux! Finally a sensible voice in a sea of confusion ;-)
Been saying this for years!
> What is the Linux approach? As far as I understand it, it is a shared
> development approach, where a group of users/developers works toward
> creating and developing an operating system and applications that are of
> use to all. Who is in charge? No one (well, Linus Torvalds, sort of). In
> this respect, it is not unlike the Internet, upon which it depends.
One can look up Eric Raymond's Bazaar vs Cathedral paper anywhere. It tells a lot about how software development can be done.
I understand Torvalds has the final say in what is going into the kernel, which for the non linuxers is the core of the operating system. There are some Young Turks, who tell him off once in a while but still, many develop, more test, very few finalize.
The rest of the operating system has not much to do with linux. Virtually everything is available as source code and runs on tons of systems. For most small groups of "maintainers" coordinate and finalize similar to the kernel.
> Does it work? In a word, yes. I've recently used it for:
> 1. My desktop. Total cost, less that $100.00 for software.
My workstation. It is a DNS server, WWW server, Email server, Graphics work station (X Windows and KDE desktop).
$1.95 for Redhat 4.2 on a CD from CheapBytes. All the rest off the Net free of charge.
> 2. Servers at work. A dns server, a dhcp server, a www server, an
> Email server. I've built a network that's faster than Windows NT,
> provides the same services and is far more stable. Total cost?
> $49.00 for all the above.
I built a router, ppp dialup server, UUCP server, DHCP server, SaMBa server (Microsoft networking), data base server. The whole country came onto the Internet through linux.
Price? as above.
> What does this have to do with development? A lot. The Internet is
> one of the most important developments in terms of education, trade,
> knowledge transfer and communication.
It's not just the Internet. It is much much more powerful:
With one CD and 386/486/586/686 you can conduct a whole B.Sc. course in computer science: languages, networking, databases, word processing, it's all there. You don't even need ethernet cards, if one really wants one can wire them together with modified printer cables or even serial cables.
Postscript emulation is standard. I found a Point of Sale application the other day (beta). mySQL ist blazingly fast and there is even a clever (but poorly documented) 4GL. GMT and GRASS for GIS tasks. PSPP, the SPSS clone (though still less then alpha).
And, of course, the GIMP. Beats the pants off Photoshop. (Ever thought about the labour cost advantages for Web Design done in a developing country?) Even has a fiendishly clever interface which can be hooked into other applications.
Finally, for the poor suckers who want Word or Eccel compatibility, StarOffice is free.
> I believe the world economy of the the next century will be defined
> by information and access to that information. It is critical that
> developing countries have access to this, and Linux is the easily
> the best platform to do this.
Don't forget these BSD variants. They run basically the same tools but linux is much better packaged by what is called "distributions".
> It's free, it runs on almost anything - in fact an "obsolete" 486/66
> computer makes a perfect Linux machine. It's fast, cheap, and, with
> an Internet connection, allows the operator to talk to anyone
> anywhere about anything.
I ran a 386 for years.
I ran the whole country's email through it for years (batched, gzipped UUCP).
but of course now I have much more fun with my stepwise upgraded 133 Mhz Pentium, 64MB, big drive, tape streamer and leased line.
What is very interesting is that Australia's computer science took off decades ago on a tape from AT&T with Unix source code for the PDP.
Why not repeat this? We do have the human resources.
el
-- Dr. Eberhard W. Lisse\ / Swakopmund State Hospital mailto:<el@lisse.NA> * | Resident Medical Officer Private Bag 5004 \ / +264 81 1246733 (c) 64 461005(h) 461004(f) Swakopmund, Namibia ;____/ Domain Coordinator for NA-DOM (el108)