Linux On Steroids: DIY supercomputer software from Sandia
Tim May
tcmay at got.net
Thu Aug 9 17:37:36 PDT 2001
On Thursday, August 9, 2001, at 04:53 PM, Declan McCullagh wrote:
> On Thu, Aug 09, 2001 at 12:17:45PM -0700, Tim May wrote:
>> A better approach is to take the already-functional machines already
>> on
>> desktops and harness them for parallel computation. Hardly a new idea,
>> as it has been used for distributed key cracks, molecular modelling,
>> and
>> SETI signal processing.
>>
>> We on the Cypherpunks list, including Jim Gillogly, Lucky Green,
>> myself,
>> and others, proposed this in the mid-90s. Cf. articles on DES-busting
>> screen savers, circa mid-1995. The "Chinese Lottery" idea of using
>
> Even by then, it was a relatively old idea. In 1988 or 1989, Richard
> Crandall wrote an application called "Godzilla" (later renamed Zilla
> after trademark threats) for NeXT computers that did parallel
> computation and was configurable. It was remarkably ahead of its
> time. I think it even was a screensaver too. NeXT used it at their
> corporate HQ in Redwood City (where I worked in 1990) and it was also
> available via the usual wustl/etc. FTP sites.
Thanks for the info. Sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander. I get
tired of people reinventing the wheel, but I am happy to be corrected
that someone invented a wheel before I/we did.
As for NeXT, they pioneered in many areas. I wanted one in 1990, but
couldn't justify spending $8-10K for a Cube, so I "settled" for a Mac
IIci, which served me well for four years. (I spent a year writing the
Cyphernomicon on it, for example, plus all of the early Cypherpunks
traffic.)
Since then, I've had a succession of Macs, including: Powerbook 100,
170, and G3. A 7100AV, a G4 Tower, and an iBook SE.
But now I also have the NeXT OS, even improved over NeXTStep, according
to what I hear from NeXT fans. OS X ("OS Ten, not "OS Ex") is truly an
enjoyable experience. Unix (BSD) for those who want to use it, the Mach
kernel NeXT was earliest to adopt in a major product, and a stunning
Aqua interface. I can't do it justice in this short article.
I have it on my G4 Tower, which I'm using now, and on my iBook. It' s
caused me to abandon a few vendors who have been dragging their feet in
favor of those who decided to embrace OS X in a major way. For those who
are interested, here's what I'm mostly using right now:
-- OS X Mail for e-mail, replacing Eudora Pro that I have used in one
form or another since 1992. Eudora runs under OS X, but they seem to
have little effort to make it _consistent_ with OS X conventions. Mail
is bundled-in with OS X; I understand that is based on the NeXTMail
appication. Besides, after 9 years of using the same mailer, I'm
enjoying the fresh outlook (pun intended).
-- Thoth for newsreading. Done by Brian Clarke, who did VA-Newswatcher
and YA-Newswatcher. Lots of features. I send in my "shareware" fee for
this, being so happy with this.
-- OmniWeb, a great browser from the Omni Group, a Seattle-based bunch
of NeXT programmers who are turning out some nice apps. (This is a
wonderful example of what happens to bigness: the Omni Group is about 10
or fewer people. Compare their output to the "Netscape Division of
AOL/Time Warner," or whatever it is called. When was the last time
anyone seriously claimed the Netscape Navigator is better than
Microsoft's Explorer?)
-- Explorer. Yes, I also use Explorer. Been using it more or less
happily for several years. It does some things very well.
-- Squeak (Smalltalk). A fully Cocoaized (Objective C, the native lingo
of OS X) virtual machine, with the source code running on the VM.
-- Apple Works, instead of Microsoft Office. This is the descendant of
ClarisWorks, an "all-in-one" package. It's fully OS X-optimized, which
means a capable word processor, spreadsheet, outliner, etc.
(Yeah, I know about Microsoft Word. Being an old-timer, I can count on
winning a lot of "Who used it first?" contests. I bought Microsoft Word
1.0 for the IBM PC in late '83, back when it came bundled with the
Microsoft Mouse. I did a paper in early '84 on my IBM PC, bought with my
own money ($3000 in 1983 dollars. And I bought Microsoft Word 1.05 as
soon as it appeared for the Mac, circa 1986. I've used it for many years
since. However, for my 1995 paper on "Crypto Anarchy and Virtual
Communities," widely distributed on the Net, I decided to use
FrameMaker, which our own Hugh Daniel had earlier helped design. The
world has moved away from elaborate printed pages, at least for laymen
like us, so FrameMaker is unused by me. I may upgrade to the OS X
version, or maybe not.)
In daily use of OS X, I am stunned by its power and robustness. Perhaps
comparable to Linux (though even Gnome is not as "visually pleasing,"
which is why Easel was trying to do what it did, but ran out of money).
Better than Windows, that's for sure. (I bought Windows 1.0 for my IBM
PC in '85, and use Windows 98 in emulation mode on my Macs.)
Bottom line: I L-O-V-E OS X!
--Tim May
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