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J E F F4
Whatta Ya Think About Dat?
Premium Member
join:2004-04-01
Kitchener, ON

J E F F4

Premium Member

ISS now using Linux...

I know it's been mentioned here, but worth talking about again:

»venturebeat.com/2013/05/ ··· s-linux/

If I was Microsoft, I'd be worried about this:
quote:
The United Space Alliance manages the NASA/ISS computers. A United Space Alliance spokesperson told press the switch was made because ISS astronauts and cosmonauts needed an operating system “that was stable and reliable.”

Man...that cuts deep. It's a statement, they didn't say "more stable and reliable" but simply "stable and reliable" which obviously Windows isn't.

Doesn't help that Vista was a disaster and many are slow to upgrade to 7 and basically Windows 8 is a failure.

Begs the question though, is Unix or "unix-like" the only decent OS?

Who uses Unix?

1) Apple (OS X)
2) BlackBerry (QNX -- BB10)
3) Linux
4) Android

That's an impressive list. Of course, there are others as well.
Kearnstd
Space Elf
Premium Member
join:2002-01-22
Mullica Hill, NJ

Kearnstd

Premium Member

No it is not, Windows is still good for the consumer end.

However the ISS has special needs I am sure and only Linux can fill the gap of being tweaked to suit needs. NASA can compile their own kernel if needed, They cannot do that in windows.

Also computing resources are more limited on the ISS, From what I understand NASA spaceborne computing is a few generations behind because they need computer parts that are long proven and easier to harden against the rigors of being in orbit(and beyond.) Guessing windows is too resource demanding.

markofmayhem
Why not now?
Premium Member
join:2004-04-08
Pittsburgh, PA

markofmayhem to J E F F4

Premium Member

to J E F F4
said by J E F F4:

I know it's been mentioned here, but worth talking about again:

»venturebeat.com/2013/05/ ··· s-linux/

If I was Microsoft, I'd be worried about this:

quote:
The United Space Alliance manages the NASA/ISS computers. A United Space Alliance spokesperson told press the switch was made because ISS astronauts and cosmonauts needed an operating system “that was stable and reliable.”

Man...that cuts deep. It's a statement, they didn't say "more stable and reliable" but simply "stable and reliable" which obviously Windows isn't.

Doesn't help that Vista was a disaster and many are slow to upgrade to 7 and basically Windows 8 is a failure.

A couple dozen laptops switched from Windows XP to Debian 6 in 2013 seems less impressive than your post.

Also, this is developing:
said by Keith Chuvala :

Unfortunately, sources like ZDNet have misquoted or misconstrued my interview with the Linux Foundation, and several "news" blogs and such have picked up the inaccuracies they reported. Yes, we do use Linux on ISS and are expanding its use across our systems. However, we have not, nor will we in the foreseeable future, "dump" Windows.

said by ZDNet Article, the "source" :

Keith Chuvala, a United Space Alliance contractor, manager of the Space Operations Computing (SpOC) for NASA, and leader of the ISS's Laptops and Network Integration Teams, recently explained that NASA had decided to move to Linux for the ISS's PCs. "We migrated key functions from Windows to Linux because we needed an operating system that was stable and reliable รข€” one that would give us in-house control. So if we needed to patch, adjust, or adapt, we could."

Specifically, the ISS astronauts will be using computers running Debian 6. Earlier, some of the on-board computers had been using Scientific Linux, a Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) clone. While not the newest version of Debian, Debian 7 has just been released, Debian is nothing if not well-tested and reliable.

While Linux has been used on the ISS ever since its launch (PDF link) and for NASA ground operations almost since the day Linus Torvalds created it, it hasn't seen that much use on PCs in space. "Things really clicked," said Chuvala in an interview, "after we came to understand how Linux views the world, the interconnectedness of how one thing affects another. You need that worldview. I have quite a bit of Linux experience, but to see others who were really getting it, that was exciting."

Good for Linux. This broadens both CS and IT and as long as upstream Debian is fed, the FOSS model just received a powerful addition to community. This isn't a "Windows sucks" story, it is a "Debian is the most stable OS in the world" statement. I don't quite understand the need some of you have to shit in your hands and rub it in Redmond's face... in the end, you will have shit on your hands, you know?