A Power Users Look at Linux on the Mac 598
An anonymous reader writes "Even though most Linux users have treated Linux as an operating system for their x86 white boxes, Linux runs equally well on PowerPC machines. This article looks at Linux on the PowerPC and the appealing range of PPC machines produced by Apple, where the option of using Linux is of great value to many users."
OK, I agree to some extend, BUT... (Score:3, Insightful)
Well, needless to say, I feel in love. Things like the recent introduction of iTunes and a better browser only make the deal sweeter.
Sure, the hardware's pricier and maybe a bit modern art-deco for my tastes, but as much as I love Linux, I can't imagine running it instead of OS X on my laptop.
Even Robin Malda uses OS X!
Why use Linux at all when there's Mac OS X? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Why use Linux at all when there's Mac OS X? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Why use Linux at all when there's Mac OS X? (Score:3, Insightful)
Yeah, but if you've already shelled out the cash for a Mac, the version of OS X that came on it was essentially free too. Your point's kinda moot.
Re:Why use Linux at all when there's Mac OS X? (Score:5, Insightful)
Powerbooks, on the other hand, could possibly be the best laptops in their price range. Why, if you need a Linux laptop, not buy a Powerbook?
Re:Why use Linux at all when there's Mac OS X? (Score:5, Informative)
Perhaps because it uses a video card [apple.com] which nVidia can't be bothered to support on PPC?
Cf.
- (lack of) linux support [yellowdoglinux.com]
- requests to nVidia [petitiononline.com]
- (lack of) response from nVidia [nvnews.net]
Now if only we had MOL running under Darwin/OS X, that would make for a great Linux-on-Mac [maconlinux.org] solution.Re:Why use Linux at all when there's Mac OS X? (Score:5, Insightful)
Photoshop photoshop photoshop
Quark Quark Quark
Dreamweaver dreamweaver?
acrobat! acrobat!
Re:Why use Linux at all when there's Mac OS X? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Why use Linux at all when there's Mac OS X? (Score:3, Informative)
There are some pretty cool buildtime scripts that make some software very portable, but definitely not all of it, nor even the majority of packages.
I can't r
Re:Why use Linux at all when there's Mac OS X? (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Why use Linux at all when there's Mac OS X? (Score:5, Interesting)
Now, Linux on newer Macs? I dunno. I've never used OS X, so I can't comment.
Re:Why use Linux at all when there's Mac OS X? (Score:3, Informative)
I was having problems with our two powerbooks (OSX) talking to a printer that was plugged into the airport. Fine, I thought, I'll call up Apple's CS people and they'll figure it out.
Hah! The fellow I talked to had me go through the machine's internet connections. Why he did this isn't obvious. The printer should work even if the machines aren't connected to the internet. But never mind; by the end of the session, my previously-working internet connect
Re:Why use Linux at all when there's Mac OS X? (Score:5, Insightful)
Right, right, it's his problem. (Score:5, Informative)
It's totally his fault that a piece of equipment was designed to be "smarter" by autoproviding certain services without checking to see if they already exist!
Comment removed (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Why use Linux at all when there's Mac OS X? (Score:5, Insightful)
Basically, his tech support experience was pretty much the same as with every other company. Apple is pretty much on par with other companies in most respects, it's just that they've got such a rabid fanbase that you can't point this out objectively without getting shouted down/blamed.
I've found that often times Mac stuff 'just works', and that's fine. When it doesn't 'just work' you're often worse off than with other platforms where there's more/better support for strange problems.
Re:Why use Linux at all when there's Mac OS X? (Score:5, Interesting)
RAM is cheap now though. I'd say you need about 384MB to keep OS X running smoothly and the terminal application is fairly nice.
Re:Why use Linux at all when there's Mac OS X? (Score:5, Informative)
bottom line, linux and powerppc are a great match.
right on (Score:4, Interesting)
Exactly. It's like putting a VW Bug engine into a mid-60's porsche. Not only is it not going to work right(and LinuxPPC doesn't work nearly as well, just on a features basis, as OS X), but it'll be slow and everyone who sees it will just stare at you- and if they're not polite enough, demand to know why you did it. Even Robin Malda uses OS X!
Who cares? Slashdot is hardly an example of technical prowess; in fact, it's rotting(HTML 3?!?). The FAQ hasn't been touched since '99, and they have yet to rise to the challenge of solving any of the problems they themselves created(slashdotting for example). From what I've heard(several OSDN sales people worked where I used to work), Malda got wined and dined by one company after another hoping he'd either post about them or endorse their products. Absolutely no integrity.
Obviously you haven't used OS X on older hardware. (Score:5, Interesting)
Linux doesn't care about my video chipset. X11 DEs don't require 32 megs of VRAM. Linux runs inside of 128 megs of physical memory without difficulty. Fluxbox is just as responsive as OS 9 on the same hardware- something OS X still can't claim.
All that and here's the bag of chips: The Debian "Software Update" (apt) updates EVERY APPLICATION ON THE SYSTEM. Compare to OS X, where I get my Apple updates through SWU and have to download and install Adobe updates, new builds of BZFlag, new versions of Quicksilver, etceteras myself.
Not to say I don't have issues with various packages, but dear GODS Linux is far more useable on older hardware than OS X. On a general level- quality of applications and userland are a slightly different matter.
Re:Obviously you haven't used OS X on older hardwa (Score:5, Informative)
I have Puma on my 8600 and Jaguar on my Beige G3, atm. Have a look at X Post Facto [opendarwin.org].
If you want to run X11, then yes it does. Have a look at /etc/X11/XFree86Config-4 on your Linux box. Now go and install X11 on Darwin, and look at the same file. Oops! It isn't there. That's right; it doesn't need you to tell it what blinking graphics card you have, it can just ask the kernel.
Only if you only install Debian packages. As soon as you install something from another source, you have to maintain it yourself. Just as you would on OS X.
OS X also has the benefits of being a BSD: no ugly klunky SysV init, a classy signal handling mechanism, and Ceren. But it's a ++BSD; have a look at the System Starter. Marvel at the way you can compile a single binary that will run on multiple architectures. Drool over the dynamic loader. Whimper in awe at the Mach threading system.
Re:Obviously you haven't used OS X on older hardwa (Score:5, Interesting)
That would be because that is incorrect. Rhapsody and the earliest release of OS X, OS X Server 1, did indeed use the Display PostScript system from NeXTSTEP, modified to present a slightly more Mac-esque user interface. But when Adobe bumped up the licensing costs for DPS, Apple were forced to go back and effectively write a new graphics system from scratch. They based it on Portable Document Format, it's called Quartz and the user interface is known as Aqua.
I find your assertion that OS X does not use X laughable. The latest version of OS X comes bundled with an X server that will run rootless right on top of the Aqua screen. The XFree86 distribution will build from unmodified source and work on earlier OS Xs too: have a look at X11 running in Aqua [ox.ac.uk] on a Beige G3 with Jaguar. I develop software for a network of Linux PCs, OPENSTEP PCs, NeXTs, Macs, Suns and assorted other systems. If it wasn't for OS X's support for X11 there would be much less portability between the systems (although GNUstep helps a great deal in that regard). So OS X does use X11, even if you and some other users choose not to.
Actually I'm talking from the perspective of a Debian user here. Debian's package hierarchy is good, but it's still far from exhaustive. There will come times when the program you would like has not been Debianised. And when it does, you have to install that program yourself and maintain it yourself, just as you would on any other operating system.
Darwin is not the kernel. Is that so freaking hard to understand? XNU is the kernel, which is a part of the Darwin Operating System. Darwin is a BSD operating system which includes the Mach microkernel running in monolith mode, with features from the BSD kernel added in. The BSD subsystem does not as some people think run as a personality on top of Mach; the two have been combined by Apple.
Yes indeed I am. This post comes to you from a turbo colour slab running OmniWeb 2.0 on top of NeXTSTEP 3.3. Acquisitioned is not a real word, acquired is. Yes, I know that fat binaries came from NeXT. They're still in use today, in OS X. OS X is the only modern operating system to use this technology, in which it is far superior to other offerings. It's jsut a pity that Apple don't make more of it.
No you don't, and frankly I don't give a monkey's because ELF is getting old. The Mach_O binary format provides portability as well as small executables when compiled thin. It provides superior threading by realising processes, LWPs and threads as kernel-scheduled Mach threads. It's better than ELF.
It appears that more homework is required on your part regarding the various parts that go to make up OS X. Find out about Xnu, Mach, Darwin and FreeBSD, then report back on your progress. The second assignment will focus on Cocoa, Quartz, Aqua, CoreFoundation, IOKit and possibly WebObjects if we have time.
Re:OK, I agree to some extend, BUT... (Score:5, Informative)
One would normally not see this as the canonical form is:
This is faster as it does not need to send information between two processes using an IPC mechanism (the pipe) and it avoids unecessary computation ("grep filename" may be slower (depending on the grep implementation) than simple filename comparison a la fgrep).If you're actually going to use a regular expression to search for a file, the more common method is:
This avoids printing directories. Add '[^/]*$' to the end of the regex to avoid matches in directory names. Many versions of "find" (including Mac OS X "find") support a "-regex" option, but this is nonstandard.If your search allows it, even better is:
I'm not suggesting that you didn't know these things, but you can be certain that (due to the nature of the article) some *nix newbies will read your post and they may start doing those commands on a regular basis, not knowing of better alternatives, so one should be careful when posting these things to such a forum.Re:ls -R | grep filename (Score:3, Informative)
`locate foo` will turn up much different results than `grep -R foo`.
Re:OK, I agree to some extend, BUT... (Score:5, Informative)
"No need to mention that the quality of open source support in OS X is worse than on MS-Windows: Xfree, OpenOffice, Mozilla - they are almost unusable, comparing to them on MS-Windows boxen."
Unfortunately, it seems as though you have never even tried Xcode and/or Fink ( http://fink.sourceforge.net/ ). the current open source apps I run on my Mac are: Mplayer (direct port), Xchat (direct port), Gaim (direct port), Camino (Mozilla derivative direct port), Gimp (via XFree86), XMMS (Via XFree86), and GNUPG that I personally compiled with GCC. I also have absolutely no problems at all with an ssh -X session to run my X apps off my Linux server.
If you are going to bash something you could at least provide some examples; everything I have tried to run that is open source has compiled and run just perfectly.
Re:OK, I agree to some extend, BUT... (Score:5, Funny)
A bit OT (Score:4, Interesting)
I'd like to see instant on Linux desktops, and S3 suspend-to-ram states that are 99.99% reliable.
BTW, can any mac user tell me: how well does the ACPI equivalent on MAC work?
Re:A bit OT (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:A bit OT (Score:5, Informative)
1) Turning it off in BIOS, 2) During the start of the Win2k installer, where it says press F6 (or F8? I forget) to install third party drivers, you hit that button and then install "Standard PC."
I think you can do the same by changing the "ACPI-compliant computer" driver in Device Manager under "computer" to "Standard PC." Of course, this isn't recommended, as I believe it requires the reinstallation of a lot of drivers (maybe all?), and I don't even know if that works correctly, but one should always be open to experimentation I guess. :P
Macintosh IRQ system (Score:5, Informative)
My IDE is on IRQ 26 on my Mac, and USB is 28, I don't know what else is in there, but I'm pretty sure the Mac has 255 IRQs and there's no sharing.
This is why hardware for the Mac is so much easier to plug-and-play.
Do you realize that even on modern PCs there's only 8 IRQs? There's another 'cascade' interrupt device that provides IRQ 9-15.
Interesting concept (Score:5, Interesting)
IBM wants to sell chips. Apple wants to sell hardware. If IBM came out with a "desktop" or even "workstation" PowerPC machine that ran, say, Yellow Dog Linux (or PPC Suse or the like), how would Apple respond?
Especially since most of the programs made for PPC Linux can easily be ported to Apple - whether running under X11 or adding in Cocoa portions - and I'm sure Apple would be more than happy to supply a compiler that could turn PPC-X-Windows code to Aqua code - cludgy, but it could work.
If such a system took off, Apple would be pretty happy - more programs could be converted easily. And odds are, if you're already running PPC desktop, you might be looking at OS X for ease of use issues.
On the other hand - who would use such a system? Most people would probably go for x86 Linux - x86 parts are cheaper, more software is available (even on just the Linux side alone). So a person wanting a PPC desktop would have to have a very good reason, like wanting to do high-end calculations or graphics rendering.
In which case, they'd probably just go for a Mac first anyway.
Personally, I think that Apple's best move is this:
1. Keep the high-end Powermacs/powerbooks.
2. Keep the lower-cost iBooks.
3. Make the iMacs truly cost compatible. Yes, there are the eMacs - what I think would blow away the market is a $600 headless iMac. Small base, maybe like the Cube (only upgradeable - that's what killed the little guy). Most people already have monitors, and if they could by a $600 G4 Mac they'd be estatic. Apple would make money, and could eventually move them over into the more expensive stuff - and even if they didn't, they'd gain market share, which would still mean more money.
Either way, we'll have to see what happens with IBM and Apple. The 970 chips are becoming more popular (Xbox Next, anyone? - this could be a side issue about how many Xbox games could be ported to OS X if the Xbox Next is truly G5 based....), so the future could hold anything.
Re:Interesting concept (Score:4, Interesting)
"Whatever."
I'm sure Apple would be more than happy to supply a compiler that could turn PPC-X-Windows code to Aqua code - cludgy, but it could work.
Apple doesn't want lots of kludgey X11 ports; they want native Cocoa/Carbon apps. That's why X11 isn't installed by default.
On the other hand - who would use such a (Linux PPC) system?
Nobody; that's why it isn't on the market.
Re:Interesting concept (Score:4, Insightful)
My problem is pretty much what you describe: I already have monitors, and damn better ones than what's in iMacs, so that rules those out. And I simply don't need a laptop at all, so that rules out iBooks and PowerBooks. And the G5, well, let's just say I'm not going to pay twice the price of an Athlon 64 (not counting the yearly Apple tax on MacOS upgrades) just to get Apple's logo and a funny blue desktop theme.
But just to be nasty, I don't think Apple has that much of a reason to lower prices. Their hardware _is_ underperforming, and you can know that when benchmarks start pitting a dual CPU G5 against a single CPU P4. (And start putting ridiculously expensive and unneeded gizmos in the P4, like the most expensive professional Open GL card, to hike the price up the Mac's. The Mac compared, of course, having a much cheaper ATI 9800 in it. Well, guess if it ends up just as fast, might as well try to hide that a PC equivalent is half the price.) As a replacement for the previous benchmarks which needed to cripple the PC's compiler to look competitive.
Getting in the price race for commodity hardware still isn't going to sell much more boxes than they already do. Once you catter to that market, we're talking bang per buck. Apple desktops don't have the bang, and can't match Dell's buck, so I really can't see them selling gazillions of boxes in that market.
Plus, to be even nastier, without the "I'm an elitist snob and look how much I can afford to pay for a modern art computer case" factor, they might actually sell _less_ boxes. Noone got fanboys for selling commodities yet.
The same goes for the UI and apps. Apple doesn't want to be yet another X11 box. First because that just begs comparing it to a PC running the exact same X11 and the exact same software on X11. Second, it just begs comparing the cost of just downloading the latest XFree86, versus paying the yearly Apple tax on MacOS. And third, see above. Being another X11 box doesn't have that nice "I'm a snob with an expensive kitsch for a GUI" touch.
So I really can't see them getting in a pissing contest with Dell, price-wise. It's just not economically feasible.
Re:A bit OT (Score:5, Interesting)
OS X (and OS 9, as well, if that's your cup of tea) wakes from sleep in less than a second (to displaying the desktop), and is usable (as in actually responsive and opening a program) in maybe 3 seconds. It's one of the reasons why Apple notebooks are so highly prized. Shut the lid, and it's asleep in less than two seconds. Open the lid, and it's awake in less than three.
On desktop machines, it's equally as functional. Plus, it's always cool to see the pulsating (snoring) "sleep" light, since a lot of Macs are basically dead silent when "asleep"; it saves you from the idiot who wants to press the power button on your machine.
Re:A bit OT (Score:3, Interesting)
You know, that's one of the wierd things. Does OS X have different sleep modes or something? If I shut the lid on my powerbook, the powerbook will wake up instantly when I open the lid. But if I just let the powerbook sit there, eventually it'll go to sleep as well, only now when I hit shift, it takes
Re:You must be using a G4. (Score:3, Informative)
I get much more annoyed when I see Photoshop eating up 10% cpu when it's just sitting there doing nothing.
Already done - it's called CHRP (Score:5, Informative)
Here's some more technical info. [firmworks.com]
p.s. mac sleeping is perfect - sleep and wake are quick, and network connectivity (even when roaming) is very fast.
Re:A bit OT (Score:3, Interesting)
It is comical to walk past it when nobody's touched it in a while, as there will invariably be a dialog on the screen:
"Module VXI to PXI bridge has prevented the system from going into sleep mode [OK] [cancel]"
Yes, technically it is Tek's fault for not making their module not support sleep mode correctly, but anybody who has had the misfortune to see what it takes
What is wrong (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:What is wrong (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:What is wrong (Score:5, Informative)
Re:What is wrong (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:What is wrong (Score:5, Informative)
Re:What is wrong (Score:5, Informative)
I assume you mean AFP, not AFS. That's Apple Filing Protocol v Andrew File System. I'm pretty sure Apple's not very focused on AFS, today. Nor does anyone describe AFS as "insanely fast."
Re:What is wrong (Score:4, Interesting)
My reasons to do this would be to access the wealth of software out there. Does OS-X have the ability to support gnome and/or Kde apps? I figure it can be done, but how much hassle would it be?
I know I'll get flamed for this but I dump a full KDE and Gnome development load on my machines, just to simplify the times when I want to add something cool I find out there. I never claim that Linux is lean and mean, my installs are huge! I just don't turn everything on.
Re:What is wrong (Score:5, Informative)
I have mod points right now, but I'll respond to this instead.
KDE and Gnome have been ported to run on MacOS X. Apple provides a version of XFree86, which is bundled with Panther, or a free download for Jaguar. X11 runs rootless, which means all of your X11 windows are mixed in with your normal OS X windows. KDE and Gnome have both been ported. KDE is a little farther along than Gnome, but both are available through Fink. [sf.net] Check to see which packages [sourceforge.net] are available.
Also, with KDE, the Qt library has been made available under the GPL for MacOS X, just like on Linux. So KDE software can be ported to MacOS X native [slashdot.org] with much less hassle than before.
Apple also supports Linux on their computers. TerraSoft [yellowdoglinux.com] makes the Yellow Dog Linux distro. They are also an Apple Value Added Reseller, and they sell Macs with YDL preloaded without voiding the Apple warranty.
Re:What is wrong (Score:5, Informative)
If you call anything in the last 2 years a mac, then sure, you probably have a good case for OS X being a better choice.
But what about my sweet Power Tower Pro with a 250 Mhz 604e chip? Am I supposed to be content with OS 8.1 (the last *officially* supported OS by Apple), or the dead end 9.x? Or try to run XpostFacto to get OS X to run? Nope.
My answer was YellowDog Linux. It discovered all the hardware and runs sweet. I can use apt-get to install/upgrade software (who cares if it's an RPM and not a DEB, aside from the politics?). Heck, mplayer even plays MPEG4 encoded avi's smoothly.
The choice is yours, but for my machine Linux has definitely resuscitated it!
Re:What is wrong (Score:5, Insightful)
Oh, and as someone responsible for patching all of those OS X boxes let me say that the machines are only as secure as the patches you apply to them. If you don't patch the OS X machines, or the linux machines, or the windows machines, they're going to be vulnerable. I'd say at the moment I've applied as many patches to the Linux machine as security updates to the OS X machines. The windows machines (two of them) are currently unpluged in a corner so I feel they're pretty safe at the moment.
Re:What is wrong (Score:4, Informative)
I think you'll also find that most everything you need to run in Linux will compile on OS X or is already available in Fink.
Re:What is wrong (Score:5, Informative)
X11 ships with OS X 10.3 on the developer CD. An earlier version of the same was available as a download for 10.2.
Whether to use virtual desktops has always been a matter of user preference ... but there appear to be options for OS X [google.com].
Re:What is wrong (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:What is wrong (Score:4, Interesting)
The Airport Extreme card (among other things) works in OS X and not in Linux. Portability is why I bought a laptop. Not a hard call why I would keep it in OS X.
Re:Simple answer (Score:3, Insightful)
OSX is a completely refined UNIX based OS. It has commercial application support by major vendors and is breeze to upgrade/update/patch/etc.
I have used Linux as a desktop for a good part of a year. I also now own 3 macs running OSX. I would NEVER go back to Linux as my desktop. Linux was a pain to maintain. I felt like I was spending more time updating my box than actually using it.
You may ask, why bother updating your linux desktop all
What is the best distribution for MAC? (Score:3, Interesting)
Anyway, I am planning to buy an old mac (mostly because I like its colour), and, of course, I want a Linux-only system.
Therefore, which distributions do you suggest. Are there sws that are not available for the mac-linux (openoffice?)?
Thanks,
M.
--
http://incuso.altervista.org [altervista.org]
Re:What is the best distribution for MAC? (Score:5, Informative)
YellowDog is a port of RedHat, pretty much. The advantage is that they only produce a PPC distro and are very good at it. They have navy contracts with PPC products and actually sell PPC hardware. One of the very few companies who do aside from Apple. YellowDog is good if you want the ease of use that a modern distro should provide.
OpenOffice should run fine. It will also run with OSX using apple's X11, but not natively under Aqua.
KOffice and the Gnome office will also work out-of-the-box.
Re:What is the best distribution for MAC? (Score:4, Interesting)
Hardware Availability (Score:4, Insightful)
The question is... (Score:4, Insightful)
Yes (Score:4, Informative)
And I can buy a sesame seed for much cheaper than (Score:5, Funny)
Another source for the hardware? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Another source for the hardware? (Score:3, Interesting)
Not to mention they'd be a lot faster than the PPC chip of a comparable price. I use Linux because I'm cheap or else I'd be running MacOS X on all the machines in my house. Alas I can't afford to replace my $500 desktop with a $3000 equivalent Mac.
Of course you can have... (Score:5, Informative)
http://www.maconlinux.org
-Ghostis
Its clear ... unified hardware (Score:5, Insightful)
But this is Apple (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:But this is Apple (Score:4, Interesting)
Knoppix for PPC (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Knoppix for PPC (Score:5, Interesting)
PowerBook Users Choose Linux (Score:5, Informative)
Apple is enormously overpriced (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Apple is enormously overpriced (Score:5, Insightful)
I do on-site PC service and support for a living, and sometimes it really amazes me how cheap a replacement part or upgrade costs. But then, I also look at how often these parts fail and the shoddy workmanship in most "name brand" PCs - and I realize, you still "get what you pay for".
For example, we just recently ordered some cheap 40 gigabyte EIDE hard drives. The labels on them said "BSE Data Systems". Who is that, I wondered? Well, they appear to be OEM'd Maxtor drives - but the quality was awful. Out of 5 we ordered, 3 were DOA and 1 got "S.M.A.R.T failure" messages from the computer's BIOS after only one use. A failure rate of 80%!?!
As prices drop, this only gets worse and worse. Apple is one of the only vendors that still builds a "premium" product, in all respects (yes, including price). I paid more for my Apple Powerbook because I've owned the other stuff already - and I'm tired of cheap plastic doors that snap off, a laptop that weighs about 5lbs. too much and looks like a brick, etc.
Clarification (Score:5, Informative)
Apple's G5 towers are comparable in speed to the fastest x86-derived CPUs and systems; in other words, the Intel Itanium and AMD Athlon64.
Itanium is not x86 derived. It has its own novel instruction set [virginia.edu].
Is G5 Linux native 64 bit? (Score:5, Insightful)
If so, then that would be a real good reason to replace OS/X with it.
Re:Is G5 Linux native 64 bit? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Is G5 Linux native 64 bit? (Score:4, Insightful)
OS X.3 can address 64 bits [theregister.co.uk]
The most compelling reason to do Linux on Mac... (Score:5, Informative)
http://www.maconlinux.org/sshots/pic12.jpg
Running multiple versions of MacOS in parallel. Think about the possibilities for software developers. Having multiple environments immediately available for testing.
Then of course there's the ability to run all those Mac apps when needed and still have the Linux desktop to go to when they aren't needed.
Mac on Linux is what the open source world should try and create for the Windows world. Think of the possibilities if you could run Windows at work in a Window - be able to do all the windows specific stuff at need, but have Linux goodness in which to work as well. If a phb strolls in, just flip your desktop over to full screen windows. Then for the rest of the time go stealth with Xpde, good enough to fool a casual glance. Maybe some rootless window hack could even be figured out.
Of course, if your boss says you Must Use Windows, there's not a whole lot you can do. But perhaps this would be an acceptible compromise.
Wrong info in the article about OF (Score:5, Informative)
Also OF can read both partion maps, Apple format and x86 format.
Of course you can still use yaboot if you want.
PowerPC isn't just Mac stuff. (Score:5, Informative)
a pegasos I or II [pegasosppc.com] is a PPC based machine, there's also Amiga One [eyetech.co.uk] boards - a new Mini-ITX AmigaOne [amiga.org] looks REALLY appealing, as long as it's not slugged with the "Amiga Tax" (double the price for the privilege of being able to run AmigaOS4 if it's released). a Mini ITX board with a GHz or more G4 - not a scaled down VIA type setup, but a full honest-to-goodness G4. That's appealing.
There's also several VMEbus boards based on PPC chips from PPC440 to G4s, and a newer one out soon from Momentum computer, Dual G5s on an ATX board [970eval.com]. Pricey, but it's just a reference board at the moment.
If prices dropped on these, especially on the Momentum board, I could see these being real alternatives to x86, especially for people a bit worried about MS's palladium plans. A mac is a wonderful thing, but if you ask 'Why bother" about putting Linux over the top of a machine that'll run OSX, one of the above solutions might be an option.
Re:PowerPC isn't just Mac stuff. (Score:5, Informative)
You don't have to worry about "if" it's released, it's right around the corner now. Current Amiga 1 owners should get their copy's of the OS4 Beta in the next few weeks.
Re:PowerPC isn't just Mac stuff. (Score:5, Informative)
I will tell you why I do not run Linux on my Mac and shoose to use OS X. I can go to Compusa and the Apple store and buy software that is simply not going to appear in open source. Route 66 mapping software with GPS support is available. iMovie and iDVD also are great apps along with iTunes and GarageBand. I can run REAL MS Office apps and have no fear of iffy office document support. As good as Abiword and Gnumeric are, I need REAL office.
One other feature thats hardly mentioned much anymore is the fact that ANY application that prints can print to a pdf file thanks to Quartz Extreme. I don't need acrobat for anything except more advanced PDFs.
Why Linux, why PPC? (Score:5, Informative)
A question a bunch of people have raised in comments is "why bother with Linux if you buy a Mac with OSX on it"... well, read the article. I don't say that switching to or adding Linux is always desirable; but I think I do a good job of describing some scenarios where it is. That said, I certainly -do- like OSX quite a bit (where my favorite installed application is still bash
Also, contrary to some down-modded poster, IBM can INDEED easily handle the load of slashdotting. In fact, a zillion hits to my article is indirectly good for me (I'm not on commission or anything, but it puts an extra sparkle in my editors' eyes). Also, FWIW, all my articles soon make it to [http://gnosis.cx/publish/] (which reminds me that I need some updating, it's been a couple months)... which is also quite strong enough to survive
Yours, David...
Yup. (Score:4, Interesting)
Then I tried OSX for the heck of it, you know, it was already installed.
And now you can pry OSX off my mac from my cold, dead hands.
Confused Author (Score:5, Insightful)
That second hierarchy actually comes from NeXTSTEP, where it was called /NextApplications, /NextLibrary, /NextDeveloper, etc. Mac OS 9 did not have a particular imposition of hierarchy in the same way that UNIX might; applications can live just about anywhere.
Secondly there's a very conscious and IMHO good reason to farm off the NeXTish stuff into a different hierarchy - that is that it's a different system. All of the files in /etc, /usr, /var etc. are in the same places that you would expect to find them on any UNIX. Looking for the run control scripts? They're in /etc/rc*.
The OPENSTEP-derived APIs, the Aqua GUI, Cocoa applications etc. are orthogonal to UNIX. They just happen to be running on a UNIX system (unless you're using Yellow Box for Windows NT). Keeping them in their own hierarchies so that they don't intrude on or get confused with UNIX stuff is a good idea.
There is an anti-case-study: GNUstep [gnustep.org] does indeed put all of its files into the UNIX hierarchy, but it still partitions them into separate subdirectories, namely /usr/GNUstep and ~/GNUstep. Again, because it's orthogonal to the underlying UNIX system, it tries to keep out of its way.
Package Management (Score:5, Informative)
The author isn't aware that Mandrake can do the same thing by running urpmi PACKAGENAME. And the graphical front end, rpmdrake, is a competant method of installing softare. Also, it is possible to install yum or apt-rpm via urpmi if you prefer them.
just bought a g5 (Score:5, Informative)
I still run linux exclusively on my laptop and in the office, and on just about any server I have a say over. Some people ask why install Linux on a ppc but a lot of oss apps don't run smoothly on osx even with fink. I've had a lot of problems, where running a full fledged distro seems to run pretty smoothly on the ppc.
OSX is nice but if I was not running photoshop, garageband, or final cut, I would not have purchased a mac. I have a dual 2.8 xeon at work running gentoo that I prefer hands down over the G5 for coding, mainly for software reasons.
I like the gentoo packaging system, everything is available through portage. With OSX, I feel like I'm running windows again because most of the software is shareware. Like I just paid $130 for isight, but I can pretty much only video chat with it by default. If I want to use it for a webcam, I need to pay $30. If I want to record video with imovie, I need to pay $50 for ilife.
Another thing that bugged me about isight was the apple has hard coded the min requirements for the software. So if you plug the isight in to a 500mhz g3 ibook, it will not even attempt to work even though it could. I've never ran in to windows or linux software that will not even attempt to run if you don't meet the min requirements.
so it turns out I can use the isight with the g3 500 ibook, but I have to spend another $30 for some shareware that removes the limit and lets usb cameras work for isight. So in total, it cost me $110 in software in order to get basic functionality out of my $130 fire wire camera.
My debacle with the isight is classic case of why free software and keeping a separation between the software developers ands the company that makes the hardware, has a lot of value.
Re:just bought a g5 (Score:5, Informative)
And remember that 'iSight' and 'iChatAV' are different products. iSight == hardware, so getting USB cameras to work for the iSight would require soldering new ports into the back of your $130 video camera.
It's perfect (Score:5, Interesting)
After a week I was fed up with it. I've been running gentoo linux on a lot of x86 servers, so I decided to make it a gentooppc computer - with a GUI for the first time.
It took some effort at that time, since gentooppc was just starting, but eventually I managed it.
I felt proud that it worked and it made many mac addicts give me strange but cool looks.
Nowadays I run the 2.6 kernel and kde 3.2 and I must say it's perfect (only vga out is a bit of a b!tch with my graphical chipset): reliable and fast and all of the hardware is supported. I use it mainly for webbrowsing (konqueror), movies (mplayer), email (sylpheed-claws) and SSH'ing to other machines.
Only one but, if you run linux on a non x86 computer, you don't have the nice Wine things, but on the other hand you can run DOS apps with Bochs (though terribly slow on my system).
I won't swap if someone offered me a faster powerbook with OSX and I weren't allowed to reinstall my beloved linuxppc.
Two big problems (Score:3, Informative)
I have a powerbook... (Score:4, Insightful)
And there isn't an nvidia driver for linux/ppc.
So really, why use Linux here? I even have fink if i need some gnu/linux stuff.
I wouldn't even know how to install linux here, because i would need to repartition and don't want to lose data.
Speed Speed Speed (Score:5, Interesting)
I know I know OS X is a more modern os blah blah blah. People used to say (maybe they still do and I just ignore them) the same thing about java, it is a more modern language and all of it's advanced capabilities are too much for todays computers. The end result? Very few modern GUI apps are written in java. I say the same thing for OS X, just because it uses a somewhat new concept for GUI (pdf-based) doesn't justify it's cripplingly slow speeds. I for one would rather have a fully functional GUI that doesn't make a decent processor suck wind every time I try to resize a browser window, than have the prettiest antialised interface. For the record I personally find gnome 2.4 with the ximian industrial theme quite pleasing to the eye. Just my $0.02.
Older macs love it (Score:5, Insightful)
OS X runs OK on it but Yellow Dog, in addition to providing a modern browser for the platform, etc., just flat flies on the machine.
Resize a window on an old machine running OS X and you will know the pain of having a kick ass OS that is unusable in normal circumstances.
Linux provides older macs with a modern OS without the bloat.
As for hardware support, at least using YDL, the volume control on the old AIO is functional while on OS X it is broken.
YDL also fits nicely on my 1Ghz G4 flat panel imac although it does not provide any additional functionality that is not already available through OS X.
Eat your dog food: server mode (power) (Score:3, Interesting)
Nobody has a way to do this on anything newer, which means something like FOUR YEARS worth of machines (or more!) can't reboot when the power goes out and then comes back on.
Linux on the Mac is nothing more than a toy until someone can figure out how to set the server mode flag. I don't care if I have to run it in my boot scripts. As long as it works I will be happy.
Until it exists, I know that nobody is really using Linux on Macs for anything important, since all their machines would stay off the first time they lost power (including draining a UPS)!
Yes, I'm bitching, and no, I'm not trolling. I've done a lot of work with Linux and a G4, and this has been pissing me off the whole time.
Why upgraded Macs run slow. (Score:3, Informative)
Linux on Sparc (Score:5, Interesting)
Just two weeks ago, I got my first Apple machine.. (Score:5, Informative)
The first thing I did when I got my hands on it was to re-partition it's hard drive and install Panther. Then I followed the instructions on setting up the mother of all Linux distributions [debian.org] on it from here [debian.org].
I did the initial install of the Debian GNU/Linux base system (not without having to use a different kernel image for the ATA support, among other things to fiddle with), but then I started to take a serious look at OS X. It's an impressive operating system, with such a lovely and responsive GUI but the real power of UNIX I'm all used to underneath. I installed lots [sf.net] of [mozilla.org] open [mozilla.org] source [sf.net] software [sf.net] that I've get used to and couldn't live without. It all works so smoothly and nicely along other native applications, such as iTunes, Mail.app, Safari, Keynote, etc. - you get the best of both worlds. You have fink [sf.net], you have darwinports [opendarwin.org], there's even OpenOffice.org [openoffice.org]. And if you're a developer, you also got Xcode [apple.com] from Apple. As I said, the both of worlds. And for some extra bucks you can get back some of your most beloved features from the Linux world: WindowShade X [unsanity.com] is a fine example of it.
Panther is also packed with some neat features not present anywhere else. Finder, for example, if one of the best file manager I've ever used. And Expose - I really miss it when working on Linux. One of the most useful enhancements a desktop environment could have get, it's not only eyecandy.
But then the necessity came and striked me hard. I have a small Linux consulting company. I was in a meeting with a customer the other day, and he wasn't so convinced that Linux could be a _viable_ alternative on the desktop. He thought it was just a black screen with UNIX-y commands and such. And there I was, with my iBook with Debian loaded on it but with no desktop environment to show off. Just a black screen with UNIX-y commands and such.
So I spent the whole night that day googling around and finally got my iBook to work nicely with Linux 2.6.2, supporting almost every single feature that's present on it except for Airport Extreme and the sleep functionality, which are not supported: sound, networking, USB 2.0, firewire, the combo drive, the ATI Radeon 9200 with DRI, the special function keys, the CPU frequency scaling. I even configured it to use an hfsplus partition for the
There are still some things that Linux can do better than OS X. Like OpenOffice.org or GIMP. Certainly both programs do exist for OS X but their performance and overall integration with the rest of the system is not so good.
The conclusion of it is that, even if MacOS X is one hell of an operating system, Linux is fun. I love to use the same plataform on my x86 desktop I've grown used to for more than 6 years than on my PPC based laptop. And I still have the chance to reboot and use Panther for the amusement of it.
Regards,
Too bad Linux & Mac can't cooperate. (Score:4, Interesting)
This was Apple's choice when they did the big jump to PPC and OSX: they could have gone with the PC platform, they could have built OSX on the Linux kernel, etc. I think the OSS community would have embraced the slick, polished GUI and software that Apple has if Apple had given them a reason to - it's exactly what Linux needs. But what the OSS community did not need (and still doesn't need) was to reopen the BSD vs. Linux divide (like GTK vs. Qt).
I'm sure they had solid financial and strategic reasons for staying away from any Linux compatibility, but for both Apple and Linux users (and for us developers) it was a bad choice. Perhaps they were concerned that if they did something that really benefited the OSS community then MS would get mad (ie. no more Office).
It's a shame - since Linux is focussed on the low cost, business market, and Apple is focussed on premium, brand conscious, consumers, they could have co-existed and cooperated very nicely.
In the end my company delayed, but has recently decided to port to Linux.
Support for powerbooks and PM G5s sorely lacking (Score:5, Interesting)
YDL hardware support page [yellowdoglinux.com]
Linux on ppc is just not worth it on a new machine. But on a positive note, by the time support is available, the computer will be too old to upgrade to the newest MacOS and will need the linux build.
Not ready for prime time (Score:5, Informative)
As a Mac (primarily) and Linux user, I would say Linux on the Mac or Mac clone is not ready for prime time. Just look at Yellow Dog Linux. Terrasoft sells Macs with YDL preinstalled, but, if you browse their site, there are major areas in their own Mac machines which are not supported.
I run Gentoo on a Mac clone (Power Computing PowerCenter Pro accelerated with a G3 add-on card). Getting this up was quite a chore and the video (an on-board version of an ATI Rage card) still only works in fb mode despite literally months screwing around with it. On a G4 dual processor Mac, Gentoo works better, but the DRI acceleration is still not up to snuff.
I mostly find Linux useful in bringing slow older x86 boxes to a useful speed. My main laptop is an old 400 MHz P2 Dell which runs wonderfully with Knoppix/Debian (although the Dell Rage Mobility is still a problem).
Re:IBM should... (Score:3, Informative)
PARENT TEXT IS FROM A TROLL SITE (Score:5, Informative)
Oh look, you're just regurgitating a pre-written troll from a troll site [trollaxor.com]. Go away, troll.