Part of it. It was a stumbling block out of the gate. I tried the Jolix BSD (before all the others) and it didn't work on my 486. Linux did. FreeBSD and BSDi didn't exist quite yet. I didn't look at the BSDs again for 10 years. By that time I had introduced Linux into my work (I was a sysadmin). I was lucky to work at a place that used OpenBSD for firewalls and FreeBSD for web servers. Linux was everywhere else.

Sure. Some wouldn't touch FreeBSD because of the Daemon mascot

Linux was easier to contribute to. It seems like you have to be part of the "inner circle" to add to BSD. Plus there are 3 of them. When you contribute to the Linux kernel, it goes to all Linux distributions.

I remember an Oracle developer at a Linux user group saying he compiled Oracle on Linux & it didn't need any changes. This was before it was offered for sale. When Oracle started selling for Linux, it drove sales.

The dotcom collapse also meant there was no VC capital to buy "proper" Unix systems. They had to max out their credit cards so they bought x86 and put Linux on them. In most cases they found the AMP stack was faster on Linux than on Solaris that they were paying $$$ for during the dotcom.

Having multiple systems can help w/ security. But having 1 OS means you need one set of skills. I don't want to go back to the admin differences between Solaris, SunOS, OSF/Digital Unix/Tru64, HP-UX, Irix, Xenix, Ultrix. Linux is basically rpm/yum and deb/apt flavors.

The BSDs might be better for some things but you always adapt Linux. OpenZFS is a good example. It's often a source code download that gets built locally and installed because of the CDDL license where in BSD, it's in the kernel and distributed as a binary.

Maybe containers can be added to BSD, I think they're on MacOSX. They're on Windows (they have a Linux layer to do it!).

Look at what Apple did with Arm. They moved so much stuff on the chip, eliminating bottlenecks. From a high level, they changed the architecture of the motherboard.

Could anyone but Intel or AMD do such a reimagining?
Does the ARM licensing put a limit on what you can do?

RISC-V means you can do even more customization than ARM. You don't need have licensing to pay.

These CPU designs always trickle up from the bottom. The ones at the top performance (Ahmdahl, Cray, other mainframes, VAX) eventually got caught by something that started cheap and grew up. 6502, 8080/Z80, 68000, 8088 got put into embedded systems and home computers.

Eventually with workstations they trying to build the next platform at the top. Sparc, MIPS, PA-RISC, PowerPC, Alpha. x86 had the volume & could invest in speeding up other pieces of the motherboard, like memory managment. Intel got the fever to redo x86 with Itanium but AMD was able to modify x86 to do more.

Then you had ARM in embedded systems/phones after the PC market followed the x86 volume/performance. Licensees could customize ARM like some of the other RISC, but there was volume to make it cheaper.

If RISC-V can get used at volume, it could become cheaper than ARM and surpass it. With custom CPUs heating up (nvidia GPUs for AI) for AI and other custom workloads, maybe ARM/x86 could be displaced?

I was at a place trying to hire a maintenance guy. There was a drug test that used a piece lock of hair & it would detect a month back. He failed the 1st one, so they gave him another test after 2 weeks. He failed that, so another 2 weeks. He passed the 3rd test. Then they found out he couldn't drive the maintenance truck because he didn't have a driver's licence.

I had an '85 Nissan Pickup. I would love one today. It was 15 feet by 5.5ft wide by 5ft tall and under 2500 libs. A Ford Ranger is 17.5x6x6 ft and over 4000 lbs.

I don't need power windows, locks. I'd like to be able to hose out the floor too.

Or the low bidder won because they forgot something.
In the construction business, they will go out of business if they repeat. Contracts are mostly fixed costs and the bidder will have to eat the overage if they make a mistake.
If you get a cost-plus contract, it's because you have proven yourself to the bid owner. If you've really proven yourself, there won't be a bid and you can do time & materials job contract.

FreeBSD wasn't around when Linux came out. Dr, Dobb's had a series on 386BSD around that time which IIRC led to FreeBSD.

Unix on PCs was $$$, often as much as the PC. The compiler was often another chunk of $. They also required a 386, Minix and later, Coherent, ran on the '86 and '286 systems we had and were under $200. We all wanted the Unix environment, so we tried to get as close as we could.

Absolutely. Many of us were using Minix. It had limitations that prevented it from being real Unix.

1st, the memory model is 64k I&D. Many Unix tools did not fit. Especially the GNU tools everyone wanted. There were patches for 386s that did allow different memory models, but most of us didn't have them.

2nd, You could not distribute the code. Instead, cdiffs were distributed and you had to patch the code which was messy. There was no packaging beyond tar and compress.

3rd Patches were not really accepted into Minix & those 386 patches never went in back then. Minix was created to teach students who didn't have 386s, not hobbyists trying to have Unix.

I don't remember if DJGPP was there at the start of Linux. Most of us running Dos didn't have 386s and most of the GNU tools were not there. There were the GNUish utils that ported some tools (not emacs!). I can't remember if they needed a 286.

I found Dos and all the public domain ports of Unix tools to be as good as Minix mostly. In the end, both were toy Unixen, not the real thing.

Definitely. 386s came out and started to get affordable too. When I got my 486 in '91 ($5k!), I downloaded 386BSD and it didn't boot. Linux (0.95) did and I never looked back. I suspect most were like me.

My system didn't have a soundcard or CD-ROM. Those would have added > $300. Dial up internet was also not available. I was able to go to a local college computer lab and later worked for a company that was on the internet before everyone was able to get internet.

Linux also allowed others to contribute. Minix didn't back then and neither did 386BSD.

BSD had the AT&T lawsuit over it so there was reluctance to distribute. Some of the core developers formed a commercial product, BSD386 and I think they were sued as well.

They didn't care to learn about the US employment system.

When I worked for a UK based company they took too long to let people go.

It took a year to see "the guy who goes out for a walk" get fired. When 4 of the 7 main developers gave notice, on the same day, they should have shut down the US office for the project. Within 2 months another lead dev and the lead devops left.

The devops left because he was supposed to be able to hire 1-2 more devops. When he asked for budget to set up CI in the cloud, he was denied and spent the next few months figuring out how to use AWS for the runners on the free tier and looking for another job. When he left, no one could fix it, they gave us the budget right away for the runners in the CI system

It took over 6 months to start closing things. Management was too busy doing boarding school pranks like carrying a real life poo emoji to upper management when there was bad news. Wankers.

It was easily the worst place for management I ever worked.

The US coworkers were good. They fired one guy when he had cancer probably because they didn't understand the US Heath system (which is fair, but they should figure it out. I brought him in to my current company within a year when he was able to work again and he's still here 5 years later

As a coder, I hated having management that was fulls of salesman types. Instead of a group email (or chat) to everyone possibly involved in the issue, they would phone one person. This triggered a chain of 1-1 conversations to find the ones with the knowledge needed and with less & less detail of what happened. Usually someone in the middle came up with the answer, but not the one needed. If there was a message to a group, the needed people would take part in a subsequent thread, leaving out all that search.

Or worse, I'd ask a question in email and they'd set up a meeting instead of just replying. A few times, I was able to avoid the meeting with 10 minutes of back & forth email. We also had a 5 hour time zone gap which made interactive collaboration harder.

The other thing is that the chat, email and calls need to not just be about work. That can make them work like the water cooler meetup. If you don't have the non-work, you will miss work related things that come up at lunch, coffee, etc. I've seen that happen. I've also seen a group that was across timezones stop collaborating when people didn't have the annecdotes in the electronic connections.

If I go to the office, I'll have to drive in traffic ~ 60 minutes total. The drive home will be slow, bumper to bumper w/ risks of hitting people. More when its snowing.

Now, I might not drive for a week or more. My depression has improved. I'm less angry at things. I am not getting burned out as I was before.

But I have a WFH job. I could leave & get more for something in an office, but it just isn't worth 30-40% more pay and 10% less time for myself because of the commute.

Linux can absolutely use TPM.

Having TPM on all new systems is a good thing for security if you can put your own keys in.
Maybe the FSF should focus on *that*.

All those systems that can't upgrade to Win 11 will be great candidates to convert to free or open systems too.

The Microsoft Windows lock in for consumers has been considerably loosened since they killed netbooks. Many consumers do everything on a phone, tablet, chromebook or Macintosh. More software is developed for web or android/iphone than windows too.

Boston, MA has roads that go underground and underwater through tunnels.

Where I work, they noticed that only 10% of the office is now used since the lockdown ended. The lease was due for renewal.
They already moved the datacenter to a colo (because they outgrew it)

So, they are moving to a new office that is 9% smaller.
They save $$ on office costs and continue to save on WFH office costs.
Employees who need an office still have one.

Our culture allows this. We work across locations and timezones. We always have and will always need to.
Most employees are like the xkcd comic https://ancillary-proxy.atarimworker.io?url=https%3A%2F%2Fimgs.xkcd.com%2Fcomics%2Fd...

I'd guess there isn't much collaboration in the RTO mandating companies

I have the latest Fedora with the latest web browsers installed on my laptop model that debuted in 2011.

There are few things I can't do. Post to instagram and view comcast.

I traded my car in and bought 2 new cars in the last year. I really liked my old car, loved the brand. The 2024 cars are all touch screen. I think there was a volume button. *everything* else is screen. On all their models. I switched brands, it cost $10k more. The 1st had buttons for the fan. The 2nd has a knob and its way better.

There is something about keeping your eyes on the road while reaching over for a knob or button and feeling it. You *cannot* do that with a touch screen.

There is a reason race cars and fighter jets don't have touch screens.