Logan Shaw wrote:
Also, to make it perhaps a little clearer, it is quite possible to build something called "a Linux system" and vary all the components except the Linux kernel. The command-line utilities can be the GNU ones, or you can use, for example, BusyBox instead. You can use the GNU libc library, but you can also use uClibc libc instead if you prefer that. The only thing in common to all things that are rightly called "Linux systems" is the Linux kernel. The kernel is the one thing that distinguishes an operating system as "Linux". Speaking of which, and getting back on topic a little bit, I wonder if the Linux-based Palm OS will even have a libc. It's not absolutely necessary that it would. After all, Palm OS doesn't have one right now. (There is no malloc(), printf(), chmod(), fork(), etc.) In other words, I wonder if the PalmSource is porting Palm OS to run on top of the Linux system calls or on top of the libc library calls. It could be done either way. Anyway, the point is if they skip the libc and go straight down to the kernel, then from a programmer's and user's point of view, the device will not feel very much like Linux at all.
If they are going to run Palm OS on top of libc, we will have some very interesting advantages. For example, it would be fairly easy to port a (text-only) Linux application to Palm devices. Ok, it's not probably that useful to run vi on Palm, but think on how many useful libraries are available for Linux. That's a nice advantage.
Luciano -- For information on using the PalmSource Developer Forums, or to unsubscribe, please see http://www.palmos.com/dev/support/forums/
