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When will MS replace the NT-kernel in windows?
nctnico:
--- Quote from: SiliconWizard on January 22, 2024, 08:57:37 pm ---How can you ever imagine Linux (or any other project) staying independent while becoming a core part of their business?
--- End quote ---
Linux is already a core part of every Android mobile phone out there. So basically, Linux is a core part of Google's business worth around 65 billion dollars per year. Then add the like of Samsung, Xiaomi, Huawei, etc
Karel:
--- Quote ---- MS maintains and offers their own Linux distro called "Mariner".
- MS has implented Linux into windows called "WSL2".
- MS has joined the Linux Foundation.
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15 years back, nobody would have believed that but now it's a fact.
Today, nobody believes that, in the future, MS will replace the NT kernel with the Linux kernel.
To me, I can't look into the future but technically, I don't see any obstacles. Imho it's a matter of money.
I believe that, if it's cheaper for them, they'll do it.
p.s.: Two years ago MS hired Lennart Poettering (systemd inventor) who was working for Red Hat...
PlainName:
--- Quote ---p.s.: Two years ago MS hired Lennart Poettering (systemd inventor) who was working for Red Hat...
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Windows is going to be even more fucked than it is now.
Nominal Animal:
--- Quote from: nctnico on January 22, 2024, 06:25:01 pm ---It is the dozens upon dozens of layers of software (userspace libraries) that sit between the application and the kernel. That is where the problem is for Wine; it is such a mess that it is next to impossible to emulate correctly. And I doubt Microsoft can re-create these libraries to a satisfactory level.
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I agree; it is one of the technical reasons why a kernel swap would be extremely difficult.
--- Quote from: tooki on January 22, 2024, 06:37:20 pm ---Well [Apple] really just swapped out the entire OS.
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I see your point.. perhaps it is better an example of how to switch OSes completely, and a simple kernel replacement unrealistic unless the kernels are already similar enough.
--- Quote from: tooki on January 22, 2024, 06:37:20 pm ---I’m not saying one could; that was the OP’s idea. With that said, Microsoft likely could make it work; they’ve moved the Win32 APIs to multiple disparate kernels over the years.
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I don't think Microsoft could; the Linux kernel is just too different. Perhaps, just maybe, to a microkernel; so they could add their own API and services on top of that. I believe the internal changes needed to the Linux kernel to implement all Win32 APIs would just make it a different kernel altogether.
That said, I do not know the innards of the windows kernels; I have only inferred some of them, based on the APIs Microsoft has published.
Nominal Animal:
--- Quote from: SiliconWizard on January 22, 2024, 08:57:37 pm ---Having options is good, even, and especially when some of the options look worse/better than others to *you*.
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Exactly.
To me, this includes the wide variety of Linux distributions, which some feel is a downside and makes proprietary software distribution too difficult. (I've argued about this earlier in different threads here, and while I can describe the techniques to overcome the differences, I still haven't created a practical example.)
(WSL and WSL2 I consider very similar to Wine: not everything will work correctly, and for some things you need to go to the real thing, for example via virtualization.)
--- Quote from: SiliconWizard on January 22, 2024, 08:57:37 pm ---I think some people also have an idealized view of Linux (and saying this while I have quit using Windows almost entirely)
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True. It seems to weird people out when I mention that very few Linux (kernel or other software) developers actually put any weight on the number of users they have, because it is irrelevant to them. Being 'enticed' with "but you'd get loads of more users that way" reads like "but you get to shovel much more snow on your own that way". It is an ecosystem, with rules to how it works (when it works; it does not always!), and it is nothing like one might expect or assume.
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