On 12 Mar 2002, Ben Barrett wrote: > Well, I knew the folks to code on the kernel are an elitist bunch, but I > thought it was because they were god-like. Turns out that lanl Advanced > Computing Lab folk have been finding a lot of outstanding bugs in > various bits (bsd kernels too! but they often use linux b/c it offers > the best SMP support while providing source to work with), and as they > report to the kernel folk what is broken and suggest how it might be > fixed, the kernel list is often quiet. The coders are seemingly ashamed > of their code, and often try to explain that "it's not a bug"...
Gee, I'm shocked, i tell you, shocked, to find out that the kernel hackers are human beings with human failings... Of course there is an open and public process for correcting errors, so eventually things will get better. > This is ALL 2nd-hand to me, so chew yer salt. Anyway, I started by > asking all about how linux is used and why they like it, assuming that > "it's so great"... proceeding to get the pragmatist view of those who > struggle to make broken bits work. They've got LOTS of great hacks > going on, from shadow-processes of all cluster node processes on the > head node, to patches to gcc for the G4's altivec. These are the guys simulating nuclear explosions, ant colonies and global weather systems right, so they have an actual need for this stuff. > One thing that kinda > bummed me out when visiting was that there's SO MUCH hardware inside the > facility that's not being used. I kept asking "Why can't I just take > the old outdated stuff? It'll make room for more taxdollars..." but > they really have a problem with tax dollars leaving the lab : ) Hmmm, I know this friendly 501c3 organization that would be quite happy to put several-years-behind-the-state-of-the-art stuff to good use. > I just thought linux was somehow perfect for that [cluster] environment, > but it is not SO different from any other OS. There is some Plan 9 > momentum there, and the visualization cluster (I think the one recently > slashdotted was not ACL's) runs windows... b/c linux never has the > latest graphics hardware support. It made me sad to see the windows > cluster; I was ROTFL at it for a bit, but it was a good lesson to see > 'all the children playing nice together...' Just like in the Real World > (no not mtv's) when systems are designed with Requirements, instead of > just 'seeing if we can get it to run', as opposed to making an ad-hoc > "cluster" out of virtual machines. It just blew my mind, everything > that goes on the lab. The linuxbios folks are burning eeproms and > breaking mobo's, and in the same room, inter-process communication and > memory mgt is being worked out for some *massively* parallelized > routines... so back to linux, really it is great, it's just not perfect > (until the next version, anyway). ;^ ) Now I'm looking forward to your friends Demo. > > Sorry, I almost *never* answer the question. You should just ask Matt > what headaches linux has caused him, he's got some great stories to > tell. > I remember a lot of being incredibly frustrated before I figured out what was going on. And I have run into a few bugs here and there (mostly in userland code tho'). but then again I'm not putting as much stress on the system as it sounds like they are doing.
