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Apple Businesses

Yellow Dog Linux 2.1 Shipping 226

Posted by timothy from the oh-ess-what dept.
Durindana indicates this announcement of the newest version of Yellow Dog Linux, writing: "PowerPC fans, this is a big deal. YDL's certainly improved over its former state lately; hopefully 2.1 continues that trend. Does this make it the "best of class" (Mandrake's favorite term) for PPC?" There are at least four strong Linux-on-Mac contenders now, which is nice to see.
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Yellow Dog Linux 2.1 Shipping More

Yellow Dog Linux 2.1 Shipping

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  • I just really hope they improved the installation routine, because I really hated it... Maybe I'm just too big of a fan of YaST2
    (insert flame on memory usage here)

  • Why? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by LoudMusic ( 199347 ) on Thursday October 18, 2001 @03:59PM (#2448486)
    ... surely I'm not the first post ... am I?

    Why would anyone run Linux on a new Apple though? OSX will have so much more support and software availability than Linux on PPC ever could imagine. I see how YDL could be awsome on some older G3s (the beige ones that I have laying around at work), but there really can't be much demand for Linux on the new boxen. Can there?

    ~LoudMusic

    • Re:Why? (Score:4, Flamebait)

      by Auckerman ( 223266 ) on Thursday October 18, 2001 @04:02PM (#2448510)
      "Why would anyone run Linux on a new Apple though?"


      People who want a cheap, lightweight notebook (iBook), without having to use a "proprietary" OS, which has the cavet of "locking in" people to an OS. Not that I'm one of them, as I'm posting from Mozilla in OS X.

      • Are iBooks really that cheap? I haven't shopped around that much so I may well be wrong, but aren't equivalent Wintel notebooks cheaper.

        Just curious. A friend of mine needs a new notebook, and she would probably prefer another Mac.

        • Re:Why? (Score:2, Insightful)

          by LoudMusic ( 199347 )
          Yup. Apple scored big by making the latest iBook. It's very affordable, competes with the small Dells, and has some really cool features.

          You won't find Apple hardware cheaper in one place than another. Everyone sells at Apple's price, unless you're getting a discount, like educational or governmental.

          Heh, *she* wants a new notebook, eh? Well it depends on how much support you want to do. If you'd like to be over at her place more often, get her the one she'll be asking more questions about (:

          ~LoudMusic
        • ibooks base price ranges from about $1,300 to $1,700 depending on model / features. Check out apples store for exact details.

          Apple Store [apple.com]

        • Re:Why? (Score:1, Informative)

          by Anonymous Coward
          Are iBooks really that cheap?

          Now that the new iBooks are out, the "old" ones (ie, pre-monday) are being cleared out. 1,200$US for the low end or 1,500$US for the one with the DVD/CD-RW drive.

          check Small Dog Electronics [smalldog.com] or MacWarehouse.

      • Hey there you go, I forget that Apple is still selling some 'somewhat' lower end Macs. I could see running YDL on a new G3 based Mac. But the G4s just beg for OS X and a gig of ram (:

        By the way, I'm not a Mac guy, but I work with about 30 of them.

        ~LoudMusic

      • Well, I've always found

        • x86 hardware is dirt cheap
        • gettin apps, particularly binaries, easier for x86
        but that's just me - cheap and lazy.

        A friend that runs both UNIX and Macs has his Mac laptop setup to run Linux on PPC.

        He likes it because he spends all day in XEmacs on a Sun and the Linux box is a good facsimile of the same environment but in a portable. But, he also gets the Mac and GUI that he's liked for many years.

        Also, I noticed recently that the as-yet-still-vaporous G5 [theregister.co.uk] looks to really cook, blowing the doors off the 2 GHz P4 from the quoted SPECint2K and SPECfloat2K figures. That kind of performance is always interesting, and having a Linux platform that runs on it is a plus.

    • YDL is so fine. The installer is good if you read the instructions.
      • Ok great, it has a nice installer. That still doesn't make me want to use the OS. QNX has a bad ass installer (insert CD, select partition size, watch progress, remove CD and reboot), but I have no desire to use it either.

        ~LoudMusic

        • Re:Why? (Score:2, Insightful)

          by NDPTAL85 ( 260093 )
          The simplest answer is often the best one. People run Linux because they want to. Not because its convienent or "not Windows". If one has gotten used and likes Linux, what could Mac OS X give them? There are some similarities of course, the Unix parts of Mac OS X are quite good but they aren't exactly the same as Linux.

          Its just a matter of personal taste really. They would run Linux on anything they had probably, Sparcs, Power4's, PA-RISC, MIPS, Athlons and Pentiums....so why not G3's and G4's?

    • The ting about Linux is that it's.. well, Linux. Why would you run Linux on a wrist watch when you can run Casio's wrist-OS (or whatever it is named, the thing that shows the time)? Because it's great fun (-8

      I dunno about the perfomance of OSX (I haven't got a chance to get my hands dirty on it yet, unfortunatly), but the way I see it is that Linux might rock compared to OSX. I've seen it before on older Macs..

      And there's a lot of things you can do with Linux that you can't do with OSX. I won't get technical, you all know. (-8

      -B
    • Developers working on software that runs
      both on Linux and Mac OS X can test their
      application on both machines with a simple
      reboot.
    • Comment removed based on user account deletion
      • Software availability!?!?! Download GPLed source, type "make".
        Same goes for Mac OS X. But Linux can't run Mac or Windoze [connectix.com] programs (at least not nearly so cleanly as OS X, and certainly not with official support).

        Xfree running rootless with both Mac OS X native and Classic programs is a beautiful thing that no other OS (not Windows, not Linux) can do.

        (By the way, Microsoft now produces software that runs on a Unix system. Who'd have thunk it?)

        All that said, (back on topic) more Linux distros for the Mac can only be a good thing, particularly for older machines (as has been said umpteen times).

    • Re:Why? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Queer Boy ( 451309 ) <<dragon.76> <at> <mac.com>> on Thursday October 18, 2001 @04:09PM (#2448569)
      One of the most obvious is that maybe some people want an ultra-modern operating system that runs just as well on hardware a few years old.

      Another reason may be to do some serious programming (serious meaning developing other tools, things like Apache and Gimp), where there are tons of free already ported and tested dev tools.

      There's a lot of support behind Linux, and not all that much behind Darwin right now. It all boils down to the right tool for the job.

      Some people just want to get behind something that is free (as in beer and speech) while having a stylish computer to do it.
      • All those open source apps will run on OSX without any problem. If your kit's too old, use NetBSD. Either way, it will be easier and more reliable than Linux.

        The only obvious reason for Linux on a PPC is the recursive one - you are developing Linux for the PPC!

        Real nerds use *BSD - and flame everyone who doesn't :-)
      • To quote myself, "I see how YDL could be awsome on some older G3s (the beige ones that I have laying around at work), but there really can't be much demand for Linux on the new boxen. Can there?". So yea, I agree with you on your first point.

        I don't see why programmers would want to do serious programming on Apple hardware. Personally I can't stand their keyboard and mouse, and there are so many better options for hardware configuration going to x86. And it's sooo much cheaper.

        There is support for Linux, but not necassarily Linux on PPC. And just how good do you think the support is? I ask because I honestly don't know. I would imagine it could be hard finding quality Linux support without hitting a few biggots first.

        Ah, supporting free software and open source. AMEN BROTHA!

        ~LoudMusic

    • Re:Why? (Score:2, Flamebait)

      by anlprb ( 130123 )
      I picked up a Pismo (Powerbook G3 firewire) strictly with the intent of putting GNU/Linux on it. Why, you may ask. Because it is the operating system that I want and need, on hardware that I never have to worry about a hardware problem, something not supported on the hardware level, it has Ethernet onboard, the display is great, and it is an elegant chipset, with tons of power to boot. My 400 gives any 550-600 depending on systems specs a run for its money. Plus, how many of you have a glowing apple staring out at everyone when you are working on your laptop. OSX is not an OS that I can get behind. It is proprietary, does not run the software I need to run, and is slow as a dog going uphill in the middle of winter with molasses booties on, at least on a 400 with 128 megs of ram. Plus OSX's interface is not something that I care for. For those who like it, great, but E is for me. :) In the end, it is all about choice, right? Great RISC hardware, OF implementation, all good things.
      • Whoops, I meant to put int Troll tags but I guess the post filtered them out. No offense to OSX users out there. :)

    • Re:Why? (Score:2, Insightful)

      by maloi ( 175772 )
      To have a choice.

    • Re:Why? (Score:2, Interesting)

      by The Infamous Grimace ( 525297 )
      Because not all of us can use OS X. And don't get me wrong, I'm talking about an iMac DV 400 and a PB G3, both with OS X 10.0.4 and 192MB of RAM. I'm one o' those lucky ones who 'supported' OS X early on, and now can't get an upgrade to a USEABLE version without either 1) sending Apple $20 and waitin' for the mail, or 2) driving 100 miles, over a mountain pass, to the nearest CompUSA. Can't just wander down to the authorized dealer (Connecting Point) from whom I purchased my copy. Why exactly did Apple put those coupons in the box? What are they for, if not this? So Apple has lost at least two software purchases (another 10.1 OEM for the PB, and AppleWorks 6), and possibly a hardware sale (my mom is thinking about a notebook, and she already has a Dell desktop...) because I cannot upgrade from 10.0.4 easily. So I shall stay with 9.1 for the time being, and take a look at Linux for PPC. I already have SuSE on my PC.

      (tig)

      • Re:Why? (Score:2)

        by gig ( 78408 )
        The whining about the $19 handling fee for 10.1 upgrade packages (3 CD's and a manual) is really embarrassing to me as a Mac user.

        Users of other platforms, please understand that this attitude is not representative of most of Apple's users. Most people were very pleased to get a free license and a choice of either a $19 upgrade kit by courier or a free one at Apple Stores and CompUSA's. You can use one of these kits to upgrade any number of 10.0 machines.

        As for whether this is worse than what Linux offers, it's easy to pay $19 for a distro with 3 CD's and a manual and telephone and other support. Mac OS X 10.1 is a much bigger and better upgrade than Windows 98 to Windows 98SE, which was $69 in most parts of the world, but free in the UK because the small number of new features were deemed to be too little a change to charge for by the courts!

    • Re:Why? (Score:2, Flamebait)

      by kerrbear ( 163235 )
      Why would anyone run Linux on a new Apple though?

      I for one need to test my software on Linux Systems. Yellowdog makes this possible on my TiBook. Its also fast and not as irritating to use as OSX when installing software- especially software designed for Gnome or KDE.

      Your question perhaps is why somebody would choose one or the other. However Yaboot [penguinppc.org] allows multi-OS booting on Mac hardware. At boot time I can choose OSX, Linux, OS9, or a CD as my OS of choice. Its pretty awesome and impresses the hell out of people :-)

      • Re:Why? (Score:3, Informative)

        by GMontag451 ( 230904 )
        You don't need YaBoot to do that anymore. On any New World Mac (i.e. any Mac made after the first iMac), all you have to do is hold down the Option key during boot. This will bring up an OF based OS menu that will include all bootable volumes available.
    • Why would anyone run Linux on a new Apple though?

      True but it won't be *new* for long though - will it?
      I may not be running Apple hardware these days (unless - are IIe 's supported?) but I love the idea of it being available immediately. The sooner an alternative comes around the more likely it is to be perceived as "competition". That's probably the key point since we've seen just how unlikely companies are to innovate when there's a competitive void. And the MORE competition then the more consumers as a whole will benefit.

      So I say to the YDL folks - Keep it up!!
    • Not all PPC based computer are made by Apple. The PPC is a good chip and runs quite happily in the RS/6000, the GameCube ( not really a Linux candidate though ) and other unnamed machines.

    • Re:Why? (Score:4, Interesting)

      by Jeffrey Baker ( 6191 ) on Thursday October 18, 2001 @04:49PM (#2448848)
      Linux can run all MacOS 9 software using Mac-on-Linux, which is the functional equivalent of "Classic" which MacOS X uses to run the same applications. Linux PPC supports an aweful lot of PCMCIA cards on the powerbook that OS X doesn't. Linux PPC has better power management than OS X (yes I'm serious). Linux can play DVD movies on the external monitor of a powerbook, but OS X cannot. Linux has a journalling filesystem and OS X doesn't. OS X is loaded with local root vulnerabilities, and probably a lot of undiscovered remote vulnerabilities as well.

      Honsetly OS X hasn't got that much going for it.

      • Unfortunately, OS X has one thing going for it that Linux doesn't - and that is an easy installation, maintenance, and installation of software programs. I like linux, but if you think that Linux is the equal of OS X for a nontechnical person, you are deluding yourself.

      • Re:Why? (Score:2)

        by inio ( 26835 )
        Honsetly OS X hasn't got that much going for it.

        Aqua.

        Ever tried to lick X11? Blegh...
  • First: Terra, more power to you. Second: Why? Seriously, are there that many PPC's out there? I really don't know. While any development for linux is great, is there a market for this? And don't tell me that Linux isn't about markets. I know Linux isn't, but a business that distributes it is and that's what Terra is, a business. Why not aim for newer hardware?

    psxndc

    • Addendum: before I wrote this, I _did_ actually send the link to a friend that wants Linux on PPC hardware. The thing is, he's the only person I've ever met that wants to do so (or even still has a PPC).

      psxndc

    • Re:Not a troll, a serious question (Score:4, Informative)

      by dankow ( 462225 ) <dankowNO@SPAMmac.com> on Thursday October 18, 2001 @04:11PM (#2448587) Homepage
      The term 'PPC' includes G3 and G4 machines, not just the original PPC architecture. So yes, there are a lot of PPC machines out there.
    • Because Mac hardware is great hardware. I use a G4 at work (with OS 9.2.1) a G3 at home (with OS X) .

      The problem isn't with the market (Apple ship millions of Mac every year) but with support. But all of that is changing. Just look at the amount of Linux distributions that are coming out. Look at the number of Slashdot readers that have discussed there own Macs or about purchasing one.

      Don't be so ignorant about Mac hardware and popularity.

      My next computer purchase will be a used 9600 Power Mac and I am planning on installing YellowDog on it. I know of at least 3 other people that already own a Mac with Linux on it.

      I am also trying to convince my employer to let me install Linux on the 8600 at work.
      • Don't be so ignorant about Mac hardware and popularity

        It just isn't a world I live in. I just didn't realize that PPC includes G3's and G4's. I thought it was only original PPC equipment. My mistake. To be fair, I think Mac hardware is fine, the little that I know. I even plan on getting an iBook when I scrap up enough dough. It's small, it's cheap, and I can use all the apps that other people demand (MS Word, etc) while giving me the Mac GUI and the UNIX stability. That's a pretty sweet combo.

        psxndc

    • From what I can tell, they sell their own Linux distribution as a sideline of their real business, which is clusterable servers running YDL [terrasoftsolutions.com]. While a 500MHz G4 isn't the absolute newest, it's not bad.
    • You wouldn't *believe* all the Powerbooks at the Ottawa Linux Symposium [linuxsymposium.org], a gathering of hardcore Linux developers. I'm sure I saw Tridge carrying one around too...


      Apple's always made nice hardware, and geeks appreciate that. The only reason why I bought x86 is because of MacOS. But, Linux on PPC means I can now run my favorite OS on kickass hardware. It's win-win.

  • Why YLD is great for the Linux community. (Score:5, Interesting)

    by heldlikesound ( 132717 ) on Thursday October 18, 2001 @04:05PM (#2448537) Homepage
    Even as a hardcore Mac user (start up the flamethrowers), I have always been sympathetic to the open source cause and been interested in the dev. of Linux. However, without and old PC to muck around with, I'd never had the chance to try it out for myself. Along comes YLD, and now I'm able to install Linux on my old Power Computing (apple clone) machine. There were a few hiccups, but due to all the great Linux resources on the web, I figured them out and now I have my very own Linux box! Anyway, YDL gives mac users that WANT to get more techincal a chance to and provides the Linux community with good exposure, and that's always a good thing!!!
  • anyone used debian for the ppc? what is it like compared to yellow dog?

    H

    • Re:debian ppc (Score:2, Informative)

      by Tom Rini ( 680 )
      In general terms, it like comparing Debian/x86 to RedHat. YellowDog is still somewhat RedHat'ish last I knew.

      But more importantly, Debian/PPC is doing great. I can't think of any glaring PPC-specific bugs in either Woody or Sid right now.

  • Linux on Open Firmware Machines (Score:3, Informative)

    by johnalex ( 147270 ) on Thursday October 18, 2001 @04:11PM (#2448591) Homepage
    I really don't recommend Linux on the new Power Macs (B&W G3's and newer). The times I've tried to install LinuxPPC and YDL on these Macs, I nearly hosed the machine when I had to mess with the firmware.

    I'm running OS X 10.1 on my beige G3, and I haven't had any trouble with it. Sure, I had to buy more RAM, but hey, I paid only $25 for a 256MB DIMM.

    There's only one drawback to using OS X on the beige G3's: no serial support. Fortunately, I needed another printer anyway.
    • I run debian on a new ibook. Coming from the x86 world, partitioning properly took me hours to figure out and three tries to get it perfect. Here is a hint RTFM. Installing any OS can potentially hose your system if you don't know what you are doing.

      It runs fantastic, is identical to my desktop at work, and is not slowed down by all the chrome in OS X. I would reccomend running Linux on any of the Open Firmware machines. I tried several distributions and I favor debian for x86 or PPC. It may not have all the bells and whistles and it may not be for your average OS X user, but for a serious developer there is no substitute.
    • I run a fairly active server at a university for file sharing... FTP, HTTP, netatalk, etc. It's even doing software RAID and has a tape drive. It's a B/W G3 running LinuxPPC. No problems setting up, and today I hit 300 days uptime.

      I think the G3 machines are top-notch Linux boxen.

  • ext3 (Score:2, Interesting)

    by mz001b ( 122709 )
    I am not a PPC user, but I am a Linux user. I find it intersting that they are going with ext3 (as is RH). It will be interesting to see which journaling file systems the different distrobutions go with. Perhaps by years end, one or two of them will be dominant. Does OS X have journaling?

    • Re:ext3 (Score:3, Interesting)

      by toupsie ( 88295 )
      Does OS X have journaling?

      Not yet. Currently the only choices for filesystems are HFS+ and UFS. I would love to have a journaling file system. Great thing about Mac OS X is the open source project, Darwin [apple.com]. So even if Apple doesn't add a journaling FS some open source hacker can!

      Now if I can only get X Windows w/ GNOME running smoothly on my G4/Dual 500, I would be in OS paradise!!!

      • Based on this [macslash.com] article on MacSlash [macslash.com], XFree86 4.0 has already been ported to OS X. That's how MacGIMP runs on OS X.

        I don't know if you could run Gnome in it or not. That would be a sight to see: Gnome on top of Aqua. :-)

        Read the article for some interesting info on X and OS X.
        • When that happens, could Apple be nice and give us our Aqua themes back?
        • Thanks for the note. I already have Mac OS X running X Windows and GNOME, just not well. I get a ton of errors and program crashes. Sure Mac OS X can handle the crashing apps well, but I can't when one of my GNOME games does and my high score is in sight! :)
        • Yes, Gnome runs on OS X. I used Fink to install Gnome on my Powerbook G3/500, it runs fine, although a few applets are a little flaky (this will improve with time). XWindows even runs rootless with XDarwin, you can have the Gnome control strip across the bottom and I put the OS X dock across the right side of the screen, so both are accessible at the same time. You ought to see a screenshot I made, I fired up Virtual PC with two windows of Win98SE, Win2k, then I fired up rootless XDarwin with Gnu Midnight Commander, then MacOS X and then Classic, and MacMame for good measure. By my count, that's 6 OSes running at the same time! Try that on your pathetic x86 machines!

      • Re:ext3 (Score:5, Informative)

        by TotallyUseless ( 157895 ) <totNO@SPAMmac.com> on Thursday October 18, 2001 @04:58PM (#2448906) Homepage Journal
        check here [bgsu.edu] for an easy to follow tutorial to get xfree86, gtk+, gimp, etc set up and running on OSX. It gives a link to download a binary for xfree86, install instructions, and tells you how to use fink to install just about anything else you could want. enjoy
  • Has anyone attempted to port the XFS filesystem from SiliconGraphics to a PowerPC Linux variant?
    • Not personally, but it does work. There's even unofficial kernel debs floating around with support for it, and yaboot [penguinppc.org] just added support for booting off of XFS partitions.

  • SuSE for PPC vs YD ? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by green pizza ( 159161 ) on Thursday October 18, 2001 @04:18PM (#2448650) Homepage
    How does YD compare to SuSE's PPC offerings? Looks like SuSE has put together a pretty nice PPC distro too:

    http://www.suse.com/us/products/suse_linux/ppc/ind ex.html [suse.com]

  • Linux 4 PPC is a great Mac Saver... (Score:5, Interesting)

    by toupsie ( 88295 ) on Thursday October 18, 2001 @04:19PM (#2448661) Homepage
    I have been using Linux on Macs going back to Apple's Mklinux DR2 distro to maximize my old Macs. Unlike my x86 boxes, when my Macs get long in the tooth, I can't bear to throw them away or sell them. I can't tell you why but I just can't part with them. That's the beauty of Linux and Darwin. Once they are no longer useful for my desktop work, they are backed up, reformatted, LinuxPPC installed (sometimes Darwin) and stuffed into my server closet until they blow their motherboards (which hasn't happened). The 604e chipped PowerMacs make great e-mail and web servers for a small to medium sized business. I can't wait to try out Yellow Dog's latest distro. I have had such great results with the LinuxPPC folks [linuxppc.com]. These guys are supposed to be top notch PPC folks.

    On a side note, I finally tried out Mandrake 8.1 x86. That is an AWESOME graphical install!!! Almost as nice as installing Mac OS X.

  • It seems to me that most Linux users on normal PC's like to have a dual boot system so that when the dreaded instance comes up that you HAVE to run Windows, you can reboot and do what you have to do. Does anybody know if it's possible to setup a dual boot on a PPC? (Linux and MAC OS) If so, any reccomendations?

    • The distros I've used (Yellow Dog and linuxppc) have included hacky booters that will allow you to dual boot. You can screw with Open Firmware too which is a more elegant but frustratingly undocumented way to dual boot; I once had my G4 set up to boot into linux if you didn't hit the space bar within 10 seconds of it booting. I ganked somebody's Forth script to pull that off. Can't remember where I got it though, that was 2 years ago.

      Of course, you can run Mac-On-Linux which runs a lot of mac programs nearly perfectly and without noticable performance loss, without need to boot into MacOS.

    • using ybin/yaboot you can easily multi MacOS 8.x, MacOS 9.x, MacOS X and Linux. Even multiple installs of each OS. Check out http://www.alaska.net/~erbenson/ybin/ [alaska.net] for more info.
    • Dual boot between Mac OS and YDL2 is a breeze (pre OS X, at least-- I've seen some list traffic that indicates care is required with OS X). The yaboot loader pops up a little menu and you can press M for Mac, L for Linux, or C for CD (at least on my system), press nothing and it goes into whatever you set as the default. Of course, if you haven't already partitioned your Mac HD, you will have to reload Mac OS after partitioning.
      • Dual boot between Mac OS and YDL2 is a breeze (pre OS X, at least-- I've seen some list traffic that indicates care is required with OS X).

        I have an iBook2 with YDL2.0.

        Whenever I switch the Mac startup preference between OS9 and OSX, it overwrites the boot setting so that the machine will bypass the yaboot loader and go directly to Mac every time. To correct it I have to go into the Open Firmware screen and change the boot-device variable to point back at the yaboot partition. It's not a huge bother because I don't use the Mac side very often, and when I do I normally stay in OSX.
    • Setting up a dual (or triple, quad, etc) boot is very possible, and is usually set up for you during the initial install of your distro of choice.
      Generally speaking, most of the distros use a utility called yaboot, which in turn uses a utility called ybin to set up a bootstrap partition containing a Forth script which is 'blessed' to make the Mac firmware think its a System Folder. The Forth script is loaded initially, and presents you with a dialog asking which OS you with to boot; if Linux is chosen, yaboot is called and allows you to choose which kernel to boot from and what partition to use as / . If MacOS is chosen, the Forth script passes the location of the relevant System Folder to the firmware, and off you go with the little happy Mac icon. Of course, there are various caveats/pitfalls which I don't have time to go into, but this link provides lots of further info on the subject:
      http://penguinppc.org/projects/yaboot/ [penguinppc.org]

      I've currently got Mandrake 8, MacOS 9.2.1, and OS X running using this method on a rev.b iMac, and it works beautifully.
    • It seems to me that most Linux users on normal PC's like to have a dual boot system so that when the dreaded instance comes up that you HAVE to run Windows, you can reboot and do what you have to do. Does anybody know if it's possible to setup a dual boot on a PPC? (Linux and MAC OS) If so, any reccomendations?

      This is where linux on a mac really shines.

      Assuming you like being in linux all the time, it is possible to run MacOS 9.x in a window in linux... see http://maconlinux.org for details. You get to still have ethernet, sound, the whole bit.

      That won't run MacOS X.x, but it is kinda there.

      The other option is just to reboot, yaboot is a great boot loader (simmilar feature set to grub in the x86 world). It will let you boot MacOS 9.x and 10.x, to cd, and also to the openfirmware.

      I have an x86 desktop, and one of the new TiBooks. The desktop and the laptop preform just about the same (I can't tell the differance), but I like working on the laptop so much more, even if I am at my desk. The PPC arch is much nicer to work with. (please note before flaming: the above paragraph is my opinion, and opinions can't be wrong)

      Happy computing!

  • Mandrake (Score:3, Informative)

    by Dr. Sp0ng ( 24354 ) <mspong.gmail@com> on Thursday October 18, 2001 @04:33PM (#2448755) Homepage
    I run Mandrake 8 on my Powerbook (G3 Wallstreet second edition), and I'm quite impressed with it. There are *very* few differences between it and the x86 edition. I used to run LinuxPPC on it, but it seemed to be a very halfassed recompiled version of RedHat. How does Yellowdog compare? Also, does anybody know the state of the FreeBSD port? I'd really like to run it on there, since it's my favorite x86 OS...
  • Well, in keeping with YDL tradition, the iso is not available on their FTP and probably won't be for a couple months.

    I'm a little ambivilent about this - I can understand that they want to make money from their open source endeavors, and by withholding the ISO, they ensure that if you really, got to have it, you'll buy it from them.
    On the other hand, it would be nice to actually play with it before putting the cash out. I was once called an OS slut by another sysadmin, and he was right - I like to play with every distribution - not just of Linux, but OSes in general. So to me, freely available ISOs are a godsend. When I find a distribution I like, I've often purchased the retail version, to support the company/group in question. But I *do* enjoy trying before buying.
    • i have to agree. it's a little annoying they don't offer the iso along with the release. it was months before 2.0 was available to download after it was released.

      new people going to the site after reading the press release are going to be either confused, frustrated, download the old buggy 2.0 release or just walk away unsatisfied. can't say that will help sales would it?

      • Re:Not on their FTP... (Score:2, Informative)

        by Anonymous Coward
        It will be available in two weeks. You have to understand. PPC is a reallly tiny market. The only way we stay in business is by selling CDs. So, while we don't really want to delay the ISOs.. it is necessary for our continued survival (especially given the economy right now).

        Regards,
        Dan
        co-founder
        Terra Soft Solutions

        • Re:Not on their FTP... (Score:2, Informative)

          by dburcaw ( 41154 )
          Whoops.. that is infact me posting above.
          Sorry about the AC :-)

          -Dan
        • Excellent news Dan. Was it my imagination or was the delay between 2.0's commercial release and ISO release much longer than two weeks? Seemed that way at the time.

          This is good news though. Now that I've got a shiny G4 Ti, if YDL 2.1 is as good as I hope it will be, a week or two after I play with the ISO you'll have an order from me for a package.

          I don't mind paying, I just like to know what I'm getting first. (I too work for an open source Linux company, and understand the survival issues... ;)
        • I know it's really important to make money, and I know that you guys must've done a lot of work on YDL before releasing it, but I really do take issue with holding back on releasing the iso for free.


          Because no matter how much work was done at TerraSoft, when it gets right down to it, most of the code was written by somebody else. And it wasn't written so that you guys could make money off of it, it was written for everybody, on the condition that if changes were made to it that they would be available for everybody too.


          Is it even legal under the GPL to delay the free release like that? It certainly is a grey area.

  • Is Linux PPC a profitable business? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by chrysalis ( 50680 ) on Thursday October 18, 2001 @04:37PM (#2448775) Homepage
    Times are bad for OSS companies. Progeny is dead, Eazel is also dead, Corel had so pass the Linux baton, SuSE did massive layoffs, Mandrake did an IPO in a hurry to avoid bankrupt, Redhat focuses on services, training and databases because they lose money by working on the distro, Dell has no more interest in Linux, Loki filled chapter 11...

    And all these companies did something real. They worked on quality products, they weren't stupid start-ups selling vaporware. But the market wasn't large enough, and they failed.

    Now, what about Linux PPC? Macs users are about 4 % of computer users. That's huge.

    But now, if companies selling distros and Linux-related products on PC (+ some other architectures) went (or are going) bankrupt, how can a company survive with only 4 % of other's market?

    Yellow Dog is a very good distro. I installed it once, and it was very easy, and it ran flawlessly. Plus the name is funny, I love it.

    Having Linux vendors for non-Intel architectures is also very important, because portability is a strength of OSS.

    But I can't understand how a company can survive by working on a PPC-only distro. This is a niche market.

    I really hope the best for Yellog Dog Linux, but after the death of Progeny (an excellent, non-niche distro), I'm really doubtful.

    • The company LinuxPPC.com [linuxppc.com] converted from to a nonprofit corp a while ago (January 2001-ish), see slashdot story [slashdot.org], around the time not only that lots of open-source companies were struggling, but also in the wake of Jason Hass' dreadful injuries after being hit by a drunk driver and his decision to go to college.
    • A better question is whether any Linux distro is a profitable business. Reading the first sentence of your post, the answer is probably no. Service/support yes, but distros?

      But does that matter? Not to me ... I support the open source community by testing out alpha software, finding bugs, whacking on a program till it croaks, that kind of thing. Still thinking of getting my development feet wet sometime and contributing that way.

      Profits are great for a company. Linux is a hobby for me, not a way to make $$$. If you want to make big $$$, serve up some pr0n.
  • How old does a Mac have to be before it can't run YDL or LinuxPPC? I have a PowerBook 5300 (yucko) that I would like to use for something other than a doorstop, and wonder if installing YDL on it is possible, or sheer folly.

    • Re:Newbie question (Score:2, Informative)

      by treellama ( 526694 )
      Has to have open firmware; so no ydl or linuxppc for your 5300. mklinux [mklinux.org] works for some older macs but I don't think the 5300 is one of them.
      • I looked at the faq [sourceforge.net] and found that it won't be very useful:

        Under MkLinux, the PowerBook 1400, 2300, and 5300 are partially supported. External SCSI support is not working yet, nor is support for the internal modem or card-based ethernet (internal). PCMCIA cards are not supported on any PowerBook. Thus, the systems are a bit isolated, but they're useful for development, etc.

        Oh well!

    • Re:Newbie question (Score:2, Informative)

      by mapinguari ( 110030 )
      Another alternative to consider is the NuBus branch [sourceforge.net] of LinuxPPC. The most recent kernel listed is 2.4.5.

      How old does a Mac have to be before it can't run YDL or LinuxPPC?

      Since NuBus-LinuxPPC boots 6/7/8100's, theoretically, a Mac would have to be so old as to have a 68K instead of a PowerPC processor before it can't run some version of LinuxPPC.

      The PowerBook 5300 is listed among the "known to work [sourceforge.net]."
  • Ever since I left graduate school almost three years ago, I have been running some distribution of Linux on some Power PC. My first experience was LinuxPPC on pre-G3 beige computer (I can't even remember the model). LinuxPPC was a pain in the ass, X only had 16 bit color depth, and many applications didn't work correctly. That said, it worked fantastically as an X client for the SGI servers that I worked on.

    From there I used Yellow Dog Linux 1.2, which was a huge improvement. I installed this on a G3 iBook. Once again the graphics sucked, but the interface was clean and very easy to switch to. This distribution was essentially based on Red Hat 6.2. X still sucked, though.

    When I traded my iBook for a blue G3 minitower, I upgraded my Linux distribution to SuSE 7.1. After some false starts on the installation (mostly due to USB hardware problems), I had the system up and running. I was stunned. 24 bit color, upgraded kernel, and tons of applications. SuSE rocked.

    I'm tempted to try YDL 2.1, mainly because I like Terra Soft Solutions. That said, I think that the SuSE 7.3 PPC distribution will be absolutely amazing (they skipped the 7.2 release so they could concentrate on 7.3). I'll leave my system in place, and patiently wait.

  • Nice GNU tools site for OS X (Score:3, Informative)

    by call -151 ( 230520 ) on Thursday October 18, 2001 @04:52PM (#2448870) Homepage
    One thing that OS X has going for it is that lots of the gnu tools are available and very easy to install via the fink [sourceforge.net] mechanism and the other nice installers available. There is a good central clearing place of various tools, including XFree86, various window managers, and lots of good things at osxgnu.org [osxgnu.org] which is worth checking out. For a while, XFree was broken in 10.1 but there is a patch there that works great. It seems like with so much available for OS X, it is harder to justify using LinuxPPC or the other linux distros for Apple machines.
  • I put YDL on my Titanium powerbook as soon as I got it. It is easily the fastest linux machine I've ever used in a solely desktop capacity. It is only 400mhz, but it runs nice and fast, the graphics are snappy, and with my favorite DVD player, ogle, it even plays my DVDs. Sound support is a little questionable, but that may be the kernel in general on apple hardware. It is nice to have a nice looking machine (despite all the hardware design flaws -- one of them being the DVD drive doesn't read redbook audio natively, so no CDparanoia/cdda2wav) that runs an OS that I can actually use -- OSX isn't usable for me (perhaps it will be in the future).

  • needs better ease of use (Score:3, Interesting)

    by jchristopher ( 198929 ) on Thursday October 18, 2001 @05:14PM (#2449002)
    Yellog Dog is trying to market to existing Macintosh users. Those users are accustomed to Apple's ease of use. I tried Yellow Dog, and it was not nearly the equal of the latest x86 (RedHat or Mandrake) installers. I can't imagine that they will persuade many mac users to switch.

  • Not quite... (Score:2, Insightful)

    by wholesomegrits ( 155981 )
    There are at least four strong Linux-on-Mac contenders now, which is nice to see.

    No, there are not. LinuxPPC is all but stagnated, MkLinux development has slowed to a snail's pace after Apple tossed them of the USS Jobs into rough seas, in an old Zodiac with just one oar, SuSE is, well, SuSE, and Mandrake PPC is a bitch to install on Pre-Grey G3 boxen.

    Hardly a steller showing for a fantastic platform. I all but abandoned my efforts at converting a StarMax 4000 (aka PowerPC 4400) into a Samba box. Installation is anything but straightforward unless you have a NewWorld machine, and the packages and updates are not particularly well kept up.

    I'm not faulting any particular distro or person here, but fact of the matter is, to call it a strong showing is just Linux bunko.
    • LinuxPPC used to be a good platform. I had it running on my B&W G3 for quite a while as a student. But since I finished off my degree I hadn't had a burning need to boot linux.

      Armed with a few spare hours last weekend, I decided to give it a boot and see how it compared with my new installation of 10.1... And I couldn't boot. I figured that this was a sign to go get the latest distro and install a 2.4 kernel. But lo and behold, I seemed to already have the latest version of LinuxPPC (2000). And half the links on their pages were broken.

      Has LinuxPPC really stalled out completely? Is anybody out there still working on the distro?

    • I assumed the writer was referring to Yellow Dog [yellowdoglinux.com], SuSE [suse.com], Mandrake [linux-mandrake.com], and Debian [debian.org]. Adding LinuxPPC [linuxppc.org] and MkLinux [mklinux.org] brings the tally up to six, and Linux-m68k [linux-m68k.org] makes seven. Linux on the Mac is flourishing.

  • I'm sorry, but yellow dog never was worth it.
    Its just a repackaged linuxPPC that has become VERY source un-friendly. Any release on any platform that isn't compleetly source friendly is just a waste. Now what I'm really waiting for is a Slackware PPC distro...

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