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Linux is a family of open source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991 by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically packaged in a Linux distribution (or distro for short).
Distributions include the Linux kernel and supporting system software and libraries, many of which are provided by the GNU Project. Many Linux distributions use the word "Linux" in their name, but the Free Software Foundation uses the name GNU/Linux to emphasize the importance of GNU software, causing some controversy.
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The anti Rust bullshit is gonna kill Linux's growth.
Meh, it's just internal politics. Whether or not it's rust makes no difference to the layperson whatsoever. I'm in favour of rust but don't blow it out of proportion.
it seemed like the innocent(ish) holy wars of the past like emacs vs vi; but it's taken on a whole new destructive trajectory of its own and the old guard would rather see Linux ossify into irrelevancy rather than letting the next generation take over.
it reminds me of an old quote from a general to the effect of: if 5 americans survive a nuclear war and 4 russian survive; then we've won and it was worth it.
either that or it's like the technological equivalent of the the democratic leadership w disaffected democratic voters leading to defeat in this last election or an elderly driver whose grown children are trying to take away their keys before things get worse; all are refusing to acknowledge the writing on the wall because they think they still got it, but they don't.
Ossify is up there with moist in my list of favourite words.
It's really a bummer seeing how much childish drama is in the Linux dev community.
I am not nearly a good enough dev to contribute to the Linux kernel, but I am working my way towards that point currently at night after my kids are in bed. Be the change and what not.
There is a reason the type of devs who have the talent, passion and time for projects like this are not spending 60hrs/wk at Google.
That's a good way to take a bad situation and make it better. Good luck! Maybe I'll join you one day.
Rust seems to be imperative for security. I hope people in the Linux kernel community put aside their differences and find common ground for the benefit of everyone.
From my perspective as an outsider, there is a lot of apparent hostility and seemingly bad faith engagements going on in this space. Hopefully the reasons are innocuous like them just not wanting to learn a new language, to avoid increasing their workload, or to simply avoid working with the Rust team for whatever reasons they might have.
I would argue that anybody standing in the way of progress and increased security should be moved out of the way. No need for shaming or deep dives, just move the ship forward.
Hector posting it to social media, and by his own admission, to shame the C devs, is pretty hostile and bad faith too. Imo it's the most overt occurrence of hostility here, but no one seems to mind? Are people just completely numb to social media hostilities or smth?
Social media is virtual town hall and a place for many to vent and deal with their emotions - not everybody is perfect and uses the internet the way you approve of. It's truly no different in essence than the LKML or other public-facing communication platforms - it just has more voices and more free engagement. We can be big people who express ourselves any way we'd like as long as we respect others the way we'd like to be respected.
I don't advocate for shaming because I wouldn't want it done to me, but I don't see Hector acting in bad faith, and their actions are questionably hostile because Hector clearly wavered in their approach. They are under a lot of stress and are obviously motivated by the feelings of the other R4L maintainers and their issues - Hector's good faith and empathy is plain to see. They are very upset that others are being disrespected, that their work is being unnecessarily questioned, and that their efforts overall are likened to a "cancer" while people openly stand in their way.
Did Hector disrespect the maintainer in question? Did Hector call people to action in order to shame the maintainer in question? Their initial intention did matter, of course, and I was not able to read the drama in question on social media because it appears to be removed. Hector certainly wanted the maintainer removed, which I don't personally agree is ideal or fair, but it's not their decision and it's not social media's decision.
On the flip-side in this instance, I similarly see somebody who brings up valid issues with splitting the codebase accompanied by a lot of emotions spilling out (like seeing Rust as a cancer, and vowing to stop it from spreading in the codebase further), but I personally fail to see how that is their problem if the code isn't going to involve them. It's up to the Linus and the larger LKML community to discuss the form in which Rust will take in the Linux kernel.
Clearly a discussion that could be had with Hector included, but there is a lot of hostility towards larger public focus coming from Linus, and he effectively shut the discussion down and accused Hector of being the problem. There certainly are problems all around, from my perspective, but all of that could've been resolved, and still can.
Does the kernel not need a lot of memory unsafe Rust code? There is a way to bypass the safety nets and I heard that for stuff like kernel development that is necessity.
Yes, from my understanding as an outsider and layman, of course. From my perspective, the observation and insights developed from the R4L project will make Linux much stronger project overall moving forwards.
Agreed, especially as the proprietary alternatives are starting to incorporate more and more Rust, even Windows is starting to rewrite their core libraries in Rust.
On top of security though, its going to be important for continuing to bring new maintainers onboard. Less and less people are learning C, especially to a level proficient enough to be a kernel maintainer. As Rust matures even more, C is effectively a legacy language at this point, a C++ won't be too far behind either, and Linux is going to be hard pressed to find maintainers as the graybeards retire.
Damn, Linus really went out of his way to say:
How about you accept the fact that maybe the problem is you. You think you know better. But the current process works. It has problems, but problems are a fact of life. There is no perfect. However, I will say that the social media brigading just makes me not want to have anything at all to do with your approach. Because if we have issues in the kernel development model, then social media sure as hell isn't the solution. The same way it sure as hell wasn't the solution to politics. Technical patches and discussions matter. Social media brigading - no than\k you.
...but still fails to answer the question of "should we continue implementing kernel things in rust".
Yes I read the whole thread and the lack of replies on his part were kind of infuriating
This news along with the news of WiFi driver maintainer stepping down, feels like there won't be any new blood in Linux kernel development except for corporate funded developers.
That’s a shame irrespective of the drama. Asahi is surprisingly good. Installation is (relatively) straightforward.
I’ve got it on my primary laptop. I don’t use it frequently because battery life is poor compared to MacOS and I can’t use an external display but it’s an impressive achievement and I’m sure it will only get better. I haven’t used fedora in 20 years but it’s slick and easy and most of it just works. It looks just like my Linux workstation desktop.
It seems a lot of new developers want to do some things differently; old guard devs can either make some compromises, or accept that fewer new devs will want to be part of upstream.
Unsurprising. You don't have to follow Hector Martin on social media for very long to learn that he's a petulant, indignant, self-righteous drama queen.
I'm not going to deny that he can act aggressively, but his point is still valid. The anti-Rust sentiments of some maintainers has slowed down the upstreaming of Rust into the kernel. It doesn't make sense to waste people's time by letting R4L limp along in its current state.
R4L either needs to be given the go-ahead to get things upstreamed, to the dismay of some Linux maintainers who don't like Rust, or R4L should be killed and removed from the kernel so we can stop wasting people's time.
Personally, I think killing R4L would be a major mistake. Android's Linux fork with Rust support has been a major success for Google and significantly cut down on vulnerabilities. And the drivers for Apple's M chips has been surprisingly robust given how new they are and for being reverse engineered.
There's a lot of issues with Rust taking more and more of the kernel. I'd like to see the whole kernel transitioned to Rust, but the project can't stand still for that amount of time. Unless someone is willing to take that on, I think it's better that Rust "stay in it's lane", as gross as that sounds.
Sounds a lot like Linus Torvalds back in the day, just saying...
Some similarities but the main difference in my eyes is that Linus doesn't have a permanent victim complex.
I'm not too new to linux, but also not too veteran, has it always has this shit drama? There is always some sort of fucking child throwing a tantrum about some shit. Has it always been the case? It's really getting annoying.
This kind of stuff happens in big companies too, but you don't see it because it's not in a public mailing list. One of my teams had a developer who stood on tables to yell until his opinion was accepted, and one time when another developer wouldn't back down, he threw a chair at them. That angry developer worked there for another 7 years until retirement, while many smart team members around him quit rather than continue dealing with him.
😂. I'd beat the shit out of the mother fucker. I get that he's a smart developer, but you don't fucking throw a chair at me, bitch.
It has always been like this.
Man, this is so unfortunate :/
FOSS land is always going to be populated by freaks and geeks. The well socialized devs get jobs at Google. It's impressive the "system" works as well as it does, IMO. Passion is a big motivator.
There is always some sort of fucking child throwing a tantrum about some shit. Has it always been the case?
Petty much. The big difference this time is that there's a common enemy (Rust) instead of relatively isolated petty crap.
What is it that rust is less preferable to?
Typeidentifier variable;, in Rust you have let mut variable : Typeidentifier;, and it's just the tip of the iceberg.Well shit
The kernel developers should Come up with a memory safe version of C for developing on the kernel. Kind of like how Git was created.
They kind of already do. The C used by the kernel team isn't the exact same as what everyone else uses. Mainly because of the tooling they've built around it. I can't remember specifics, but the tooling in place really helps out in that department.
Also, "memory safe C" is already a proposal for the C lang project.
So... Rust?
Rust is already as fast as C and memory safe. The reasons people don't want it in the kernel basically amount to being a boomer that doesn't like new things for immaterial reasons. Rust has already proven itself capable in mission-critical applications like drivers.