linux 'is a piece of crap' 11 april, 2001 by johnmichael patrick monty monteith

There has been considerable talk in the news this week about a little comment by Linus Torvald, father of the popular Linux operating system. When asked his opinion of the new Macintosh OS (operating system) X (ten) that is based on a flavor of Unix (like Linux), he said he thought 'it is a piece of crap'. In a world of political correctness, and watching what one spurts in public, his comment was a bolt of lightning in the center of a gaggle of geese. It caused quite a bit of chatter.

Partly because Linus is so well respected, and partly because everyone expected him to love a product that in so many ways mirrors his own child, his comments took the information technology world a bit by surprise. So why did he say it?

Linus has a number of 'issues' with OS X, and firmly believes the Mach Kernel (the core of the new operating system) and some of the ways it was incorporated into the rest of the software were big mistakes. While many Macintosh fans might quickly dismiss his criticisms with their new pet love, I suspect that designers at Apple are listening closely. His comments actually have considerable validity, and many of them are shortcomings that Apple is busy working on. In fact, the CEO of Apple, Steve Jobs, was once courting Linus to join his team in Cupertino. Little did anyone know then what a success Linux would turn out to be.

It is due to the success of Linux that we must carefully evaluate the brilliant commentary on all operating system software by Linus. Crap. Yes. I see where he is coming from.

Where he is coming from, of course, is that Linux now has a larger installed base than any Mac operating system. Linux servers dominate the web and most Internet functions throughout the world. Microsoft operating systems are a distant second place. Apple Computer barely shows up on the radar screen. In fact, this article you are reading now came to you courtesy Apache web server running on Linux. From the Linus perspective, if Apple were marketing OS X primarily for server use, he would be absolutely correct. Web servers are important, but that was not Apple's goal.

While the web might get front page coverage at every turn, if we move to page twelve of the morning edition we will find that Linux has not done quite as well as we were lead to believe. Yes, Linux can be installed for free on nearly any computer, and happens to be one of the most stable operating systems anywhere. None the less, it is (forgive me) crap when it comes to novice home users. Yes. Crap. And, here is a surprise.. That is exactly where Apple's OS X is going to be installed. Where Linux has never been.

One might think that with thousands of WinTel machines sitting out there collecting dust, and a new exciting Linux OS that could be installed for free, that everyone would be doing it. But, this is a hobby left for those with either a lot of free time, or a computer science degree. Red Hat may be relatively easy to install, but scratch beyond the install, and things start to get complicated. Spend a few minutes searching newsgroups and web tech databases and you will begin to get a sense of it. While the latest version of Gnome might look like a Windows XP or OS X on those opening icons, when you start to use it, you find it functioning more like Windows 3. (Yes, Windows 3, not 3.1.) Countless examples .. RH PPP is an awful program for trying to create Internet connections that fails ten times as often as it works. LinuxConf (the default configuration tool) is configured and worded in such a way that even network administrators have a tough time knowing what they mean. And, while Gnome might show signs of modern OS design, when used on daily tasks it runs clunkier than GEOS on a Commodore 64. And, if you thought for even a single second that you could run Linux without touching a CLI window (old Unix text command system), you have been taking a few too many crack pipe breaks at the office. Linux is still best used in the native form.. Text.

Still, it is the best operating system in the world for most server functions. For home users it is light years behind any Mac or Windows product. There simply is nothing intuitive or easy to use about any version of Linux on the market.

Now, do not get me wrong. Linux makes sense. It is one of the reasons I love it. Whenever a problem happens in Linux, given the time and the desire, I can hunt down exactly what it is doing. After all, I can even search the program source code. Never do you have to ask 'why did that crash again?' when running Linux programs. First off, it virtually never crashes. If it does, you can search out exactly why. You simply can not say that about any Mac or Windows OS.

But, I am a geek. I know that. I work on Linux and Unix systems daily. I do not believe for one second that anyone who has never used Vi before will find anything compelling about the current Linux releases. They are the perfect product for geeks, and the biggest nightmare in the world to computer novices.

What I am describing to you is what can only be considered the polar opposite of OS X. Apple spent considerable energy making an operating system that is first and foremost a product for the masses. In doing so, they might have made a couple mistakes on the geek-view side, but they were not building this to please Linus. They simply built the most modern, beautiful, and cleanly designed home user operating system ever made. While I have many problems with it myself (like how could the self-proclaimed leader in DVD recording release their OS without DVD or CDRW drivers - but I digress), there is still far too much to love about this product. In so many ways, it is beautiful. It may not be geek-heaven, but it may be home-user-heaven.

On the other hand, if Linux were to be marketed to the same audience OS X is, I would be forced to proclaim Linux as a piece of crap. Not because it is, but because it is not an operating system that could be used by a home user. OS X can. And for that, Apple is to be congratulated. They managed to do something that Linus has yet to achieve - a product that home users can take home, install, and happily call their own.

In many ways Linux is superior to OS X. It is a far more simple, stable, and cleanly designed OS for servers. It is something that can transform any 286 into an Apache web server for free in a matter of a couple of hours, and perhaps never crash (until a hacker breaks into it). Impressive stuff. Does it give Linus the right to call OS X crap? Perhaps.

Of course I write all of this secretly hoping that Linux developers will see the road Apple is building and venture down it. There is much Linus can learn from OS X. I hope he will use a few less four letter adjectives of Apple's products and instead help develop a product that will compete. He is a brilliant man, and I would not bet against Linux. Perhaps in a couple years it will dominate home computers as it does servers. But, today, Windows XP and that 'piece of crap' from Cupertino will win that battle easily.