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Why Microsoft Should Build Its Next Version of Windows on Top of Linux | |
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| Time: 10:13 EST/15:13 GMT | News Source: E-Mail | Posted By: Robert Stein | ||
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I was exchanging e-mail recently with my friend Mike Class, SJ, who is associate dean of the Graduate School at Marquette University in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Mike, who is a Jesuit priest and therefore naturally drawn to the whole idea of conversion, wants Microsoft to build its next version of Windows on top of Linux. And you know, it actually makes some sense! The idea of Windows as an operating system is purely a product of the Microsoft marketing department, and not some law of nature. When Windows 1.0 appeared, it was a separate program you loaded on top of MS-DOS. Same for Windows 2.0 and 3.0 up through MS-DOS 6.22, the last standalone version of DOS sold by Microsoft. That way, they thought at the time, if Windows ever proved to be a commercial failure (this was far from certain and it is easy to claim Windows WAS a failure before 3.0), it would have been easy for Microsoft to punt back to MS-DOS. | ||
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| #26 By 135 (208.50.206.187) at 1/17/2003 7:29:05 PM |
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I like int0x6h, he's everything that your typical Linux zealot should be...
Illmannered Illinformed Illbehaved Illegible |
| #27 By 13997 (68.101.187.31) at 1/18/2003 1:33:33 AM |
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At least the people commenting here have a brain.
The NT kernel is already a solid foundation for the XP OS. When the 'unix' gurus designed NT, they chose at that time to abandon the things that still plague unix variants like Linux and BSD. Why would Microsoft take a giant step back to a unix when the 'unix' people of the time pushed Microsoft to build its own NT kernel because unix could not be massaged enough to offer the features that the NT kernel has had since 1992. Even today, many of the inherent features in the cores of the NT OS are still being unlocked and brought to fruition, and they have been in the OS all the time. NT has so many basic and well designed pieces, it will grow to support anything Microsoft wants to put on top of it, whether it is Win32 or something else. If Microsoft wanted to run Linux, the NT kernel already has a multi subsystem design, something Linux does not. Microsoft could simply add a true Linux subsystem that runs on the NT kernel with the advantages of NT and also run seamlessly along side all the Win32 applications that run in the Win32 subsystem. Just like the other subsystems that have existed in NT like Posix, OS2, Win16, and DOS. Microsoft in fact has a unix product that they don't talk about much that already does this, it just isn't the Linux variant of unix. I suggest these people pick up a book on the design of NT and stop feeding the uneducated masses with articles like this. Silly, yes indeed… |
| #28 By 61 (65.32.170.1) at 1/18/2003 10:44:03 AM |
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ArkiMage:
Indeed it is true that his use of words made it sound like the Windows team is just discovering these wonderful things that were built into the kernel. However what he meant to say was there are many features built into the original kernel that have gone unused sicne day 1 for reasons like performance issues, getting the bugs worked out in the implmentation, whatever... that are just now being brought into actual use. In which case it is a very true statement. |
| #29 By 2459 (24.233.39.98) at 1/18/2003 11:30:56 PM |
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Hey, thenetavenger. Welcome to ActiveWin. I remember you from betanews. I was just looking at your old "NT is a real OS" post.
As avenger, and others have said, NT is basically the product of MS' experiences with UNIX, DOS, Windows, and OS/2. Knowing what had been done, and what could be done, they decided to start from scratch. Using any *n*x as a base for the next version would only be taking a big step backwards (I'd much rather have Longhorn's managed code/media/UI enhancements). It also opens MS up to more security issues, a problem Apple now has with its reliance on existing BSD/*n*x tools. Here's an old article from 1998 that covers NT's featureset in comparison with VMS. http://www.win2000mag.com/Articles/Index.cfm?ArticleID=4494 Kernel Enhancements in XP: http://msdn.microsoft.com/msdnmag/issues/01/12/XPKernel/default.aspx http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/appendix/hh/appendix/enhancements5_2e0j.asp |
| #30 By 2960 (68.100.157.191) at 1/19/2003 5:33:02 PM |
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"It also opens MS up to more security issues, a problem Apple now has with its reliance on existing BSD/*n*x tools. "
That's interesting. Apple has had very _few_ security related issues to patch... TL |
| #31 By 2459 (24.233.39.98) at 1/19/2003 10:33:53 PM |
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http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=61798
Also go here http://online.securityfocus.com/cgi-bin/sfonline/vulns.pl Select Vendor: Apple Title: MacOS X You'll find that many of the security issues are related to code from OSS components that have been included with OS X. Plus, there is automatically an increased risk when dealing with unfamiliar code. This is part of the reason (other than the obvious bad prescedent) why MS doesn't want Sun's Java included by default with the OS. The code can't undergo the same processes that the MS code can, and it can't be reviewed by MS, so MS can make no assurances about the code. Yet Sun doesn't want to pay the cost of any end-user support issues that may crop up because of their product. I know that the Sun scenario is slightly different because Apple can see the OSS code, but the sheer amount of code makes it easier for them to just include the components as-is and devote more time to their native code. If you switch the title selection to MacOS instead of MacOS X, you can see the difference in the number of vulnerabilities. By drawing from the same codebase, Apple is becoming vulnerable to many of the exploits that also affect *n*x. This post was edited by n4cer on Sunday, January 19, 2003 at 22:37. |
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