Messages in this thread | | | From | alex.buell@tahallah ... | Date | Tue, 4 May 1999 10:36:16 +0100 (BST) | Subject | Re: Ken Thompson interview in IEEE Computer magazine (fwd) |
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On Tue, 4 May 1999, Alexander Viro wrote:
> Hrrrmp... You know, this guy is the author of UNIX. No kidding. I > disagree with him (as if he cared), but at least some respect is in > order here. Basic design of the system + many years of development are > worth something. Linux is written from scratch, but we owe *lot* to > Ken and Dennis. Not to mention anything else, without their work most > likely history would look, well, ugly - Vomit Making System > everywhere. And you can look at the state of FreeVMS project to > evaluate the odds of getting any free system in that case (inherent > ugliness of VMS misdesign aside).
I have to disagree with you on this. Respect is earned not automatically given. He might be the father of UNIX but the first incarnations of UNIX were ugly. and also, I would have thought that he would have at least TRIED Linux himself, installing it, configurating it, and using it. There is no substitute, especially with all his background & experience. I think he has made a big mistake by basing decisions upon some crippled/broken/badly configured Linux systems that he only used/saw. How can I give him respect if he did that?
I also take issue about VMS. It's NOT that bad!! It's beautiful! If you want to see a really broken operating system, I refer you to Windows NT, but then you knew that didn't you?
> It's mostly unwarranted, pretty bitter and sad, but if there is > somebody who deserves our respect at all then Ken *is* such man. No > matter how strongly we disagree his opinion. We definitely owe him > that much.
I'll concede on that point. But still...
Cheers, Alex -- "A mind opened by new ideas cannot return to its original limits"
http://www.tahallah.demon.co.uk
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