Text 11034, 106 rader
Skriven 2006-05-23 11:57:46 av RobertB. (1:379/45)
  Kommentar till text 11022 av Mike '/m' (1:379/45)
Ärende: Re: Apple closes down Intel OS X kernel
===============================================
From: "RobertB." <rb28@nyu.edu>

I don't know what they mean exactly, but AFAIK, Apple only made certain aspects
of OS X "open" (the kernel) to the development community, and those were
minimal. Is this new "proprietary" kernel actually a big deal?



In article <uusu6219fdj0vou9c6bh106sca4p40v74v@4ax.com>,
 Mike '/m' <mike@barkto.com> wrote:

> Do they mean closed-source instead of proprietary?
>
>  /m
>
> On Sat, 20 May 2006 15:21:54 -0400, "RobertB." <rb28@nyu.edu> wrote:
>
> >Since when was OS X's kernel ever not proprietary?
> >r.
> >
> >
> >In article <446b717d$1@w3.nls.net>,
> > "Rich Gauszka" <gauszka@hotmail.com> wrote:
> >
> >> they'd be better off selling os x with approved motherboards as I doubt
> >> they
> >> can stop the pirates
> >>
> >> http://www.infoworld.com/article/06/05/17/78300_21OPcurve_1.html
> >>
> >> Thanks to pirates, or rather the fear of them, the Intel edition of
> >> Apple's
> >> OS X is now a proprietary operating system.
> >>
> >> Mac developers and power users no longer have the freedom to alter,
> >> rebuild,
> >> and replace the OS X kernel from source code. Stripped of openness, it no
> >> longer possesses the quality that elevated Linux to its status as the
> >> second
> >> most popular commercial OS.
> >>
> >> The Darwin open source Mach/Unix core shared by OS X Tiger client and OS X
> >> Tiger Server remains completely open for PowerPC Macs. If you have a G3,
> >> G4,
> >> or G5 Mac, you can hack your own Darwin kernel and use it to boot OS X.
> >> But
> >> if you have an Intel-based Mac desktop or notebook, your kernel and device
> >> drivers are inviolable. Apple still publishes the source code for OS X's
> >> commands and utilities and laudably goes several extra miles by open
> >> sourcing internally developed technologies such as QuickTime Streaming
> >> Server and Bonjour zero-config networking. The source code required to
> >> build
> >> a customized OS X kernel, however, is gone. Apple says that the state of
> >> an
> >> OS X-compatible open source x86 Darwin kernel is "in flux."
> >>
> >> Apple has only shipped client systems, the users of which care least about
> >> openness. Soon, though, Apple will break out Intel variants of the kinds
> >> of
> >> machines that InfoWorld readers buy and on which I depend; namely, servers
> >> and workstations. I hope that Apple's flux settles into a strategy that
> >> favors demanding users and developers.
> >>
> >> Apple's retreat to a proprietary kernel means that all users must accept a
> >> fixed level of performance. The default OS X kernels are built for broad
> >> compatibility rather than breakneck speed and throughput. That doesn't
> >> matter at present, because all Intel Macs are built on the same Core
> >> Duo/Core Solo 32-bit architecture. But Apple's workstation and server will
> >> be built using next-generation 64-bit x86 CPUs. The chipset, the bus, the
> >> memory, almost everything about the high-end machines will be much
> >> advanced
> >> over iMac and MacBook Pro. Intel's road map plots a rapid course to ever
> >> higher performance. Macs will inherit the benefits of Core
> >> Microarchitecture's
> >> evolution, but OS X is limited in the degree to which it can exploit
> >> specific new features without creating branch after branch of OS code to
> >> handle each tweak to the architecture.
> >>
> >> Users in demanding fields such as biosciences or meteorology do hack OS
> >> kernels to slim them down, alter the balance between throughput and
> >> computing, and to open them to the resources of a massive grid. The
> >> availability of Intel's top-shelf compilers, debuggers, libraries, and
> >> profilers create unprecedented opportunities to optimize OS X for specific
> >> applications.
> >>
> >> Even if I don't need to hack the kernel, knowing that I can affords me a
> >> level of self-sufficiency and insulation from vendors' whims that fixed
> >> system software, such as Windows', does not.
> >>
> >> Apple is in the unique position of losing hardware sales to software
> >> pirates. It faces the risk of cloned Macs being distributed in foreign
> >> markets where intellectual property protection is weak. I empathize. But
> >> there are ways to address the piracy issue without stripping the critical
> >> and defining quality of openness from OS X. That's a subject addressed in
> >> my
> >> Enterprise Mac blog.
> >>
> >> I hope it's discussed at Apple so that OS X's openness can be pulled from
> >> its state of flux and restored to the state that OS X's most demanding
> >> users
> >> expect and deserve.
> >>
> >>

--- BBBS/NT v4.01 Flag-5
 * Origin: Barktopia BBS Site http://HarborWebs.com:8081 (1:379/45)