OS News Archive

"Linux distributions such as Ubuntu, SUSE, and Linspire are making headway in the desktop market, but if you want to try something really different, you can find other, less-well-known alternative operating systems. While these OSes may not be the most stable, or have the greatest hardware support, they offer some unique ideas." SkyOS, Haiku, Syllable and Visopsys are reviewed.

"Parallels today announced that its Desktop for Mac virtualization software is available for purchase for $79.99, following the conclusion of a Beta program that generated more than 100000 testers from 71 countries and has resulted in the current stable, high-performance version. As a special incentive to new customers, the company will make the product available for $49.99 for 30 days following today’s announcement."

"Currently there are 2 solutions for Mac owners with an Intel chip for running Windows XP on their machine. First up is the solution from Apple called Boot Camp and secondly is the Virtual Machine (with Virtualization) from Parallels. So what's the difference? With Boot Camp Windows will be running 'natively', this means it will be running on the machine as if it was running on any regular PC from any manufacturer. This means full access to the CPU, Graphics and all other aspects. With Parallels Windows XP will be running on a 'Virtual Machine', this means that OS X will be running like normal with WinXP running inside a separate application, in effect two operating systems running at once."

HelenOS 0.2.0 has been released. "This release fixes many bugs and adds new functionality both to the kernel and userspace. The kernel now supports graceful task cleanup and the userspace layer was extended with framebuffer and console services. We also ported BSD tetris to demonstrate userspace capabilities of HelenOS. This is the first release with official documentation.".

And no, the microkernel debate is not over yet. In a reply to various comments made over the past few weeks, Andy Tanenbaum has written an article to address these. He first clearly states he respects and likes Torvalds, and that "we may disagree on some technical issues, but that doesn't make us enemies. Please don't confuse disagreements about ideas with personal feuds." The article states: "Over the years there have been endless postings on forums such as Slashdot about how microkernels are slow, how microkernels are hard to program, how they aren't in use commercially, and a lot of other nonsense. Virtually all of these postings have come from people who don't have a clue what a microkernel is or what one can do. I think it would raise the level of discussion if people making such postings would first try a microkernel-based operating system . Has a lot more credibility."

Hypervisor virtualization has broken out of the software development community and is rapidly becoming part of the mainstream for Windows installations. Rick Cook talks about who's hot and who's not quite there yet.

Torvalds has indeed chimed in on the micro vs. monolithic kernel debate. Going all 1992, he says: "The whole 'microkernels are simpler' argument is just bull, and it is clearly shown to be bull by the fact that whenever you compare the speed of development of a microkernel and a traditional kernel, the traditional kernel wins. The whole argument that microkernels are somehow 'more secure' or 'more stable' is also total crap. The fact that each individual piece is simple and secure does not make the aggregate either simple or secure. And the argument that you can 'just reload' a failed service and not take the whole system down is equally flawed." My take: While I am not qualified to reply to Linus, there is one thing I want to say: just because it is difficult to program, does not make it the worse design.

GNU/DOS 2006 SR1 was released today. It features various minor updates and bug fixes. Also, due to popular demand, the installation CD is now bootable. Download it here. GNU/DOS is a distribution of FreeDOS with various packages included, such as the OpenGEM GUI, a webbrowser and email client, the VIM editor, and much more.

VMware has unveiled a technology consortium of hardware, software and service providers, with the aim to jointly-develop virtual desktop products. Called the Virtual Desktop Infrastructure Alliance, the new consortium counts several technology vendors as members including Altiris, Atos Origin, Check Point Software Technologies, Citrix, ClearCube Technology, Fujitsu-Siemens, Hitachi, Hewlett-Packard, IBM, Sun Microsystems and Wyse Technology.

Version 0.62 of Visopsys was released today, including Qemu support, initial USB support, and some little games and bits of flair, in addition to the usual tweaks and bug fixes. Meanwhile, the offshoot project, "Partition Logic" continues to gain converts in the market for free partitioning tools. Detailed change log and downloads.

Authors David Marshall and Wade Reynolds offer IT professionals a bird's eye view of VMware's management tools and hardware requirements, as well as how it compares to Microsoft Virtual Server.

After the Why I like microkernels article, I thought it'd be useful to have a view from the "other side" of this endless war. While some of the reasons given by microkernel fans are true, the big picture is somewhat different and it's what I think it keeps traditional-style kernels in the top. Note: please take note that the author is not a native English speaker, so forgive any grammar or spelling mistakes.

Andrey Savochkin leads the development of the kernel portion of OpenVZ, an operating system-level server virtualization solution. In an interview on KernelTrap, Andrey offers a thorough explanation of what virtualization is and how it works. He also discusses the differences between hardware-level and operating system-level virtualization, going on to compare OpenVZ to VServer, Xen and UserMode Linux.

Right in between a car crash and Easter, I knew I had to write a Sunday Eve Column. So here I am, digesting vast quantities of chocolate eggs (and I don't even like chocolate), craving for coffee (for me about as special as breathing), with the goal of explaining to you my, well, obsession with microkernels. Why do I like them? Why do I think the microkernel paradigm is superior to the monolithic one? Read on.