Abolition requires imagination. Is Linux becoming the privacy friendly status quo that we’re all forced to accept? What comes next? I just created /c/beyondlinux.
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Linux is a family of open source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991 by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically packaged in a Linux distribution (or distro for short).
Distributions include the Linux kernel and supporting system software and libraries, many of which are provided by the GNU Project. Many Linux distributions use the word “Linux” in their name, but the Free Software Foundation uses the name GNU/Linux to emphasize the importance of GNU software, causing some controversy.
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I imagine a world beyond proprietary software, and GNU/Linux is the most promising implementation of that.
I don’t agree with reducing software-freedom to an issue of mere privacy-friendliness. I’m willing to be realistic about the security shortcomings of Libre software but not if the alternative is locked down silos and walled gardens.
As a copyright abolitionist, I wholeheartedly agree with you and support the freedom of GNU/Linux entirely, and that is why I hold it to such high standards of security. GNU/Linux is private, sure, but not secure by default. Please read Madaidan’s article on Linux’s security model and his guide to Linux hardening. I’m personally holding out for such promising alternatives such as (a potentially ungoogled) Fuchsia. Did you know that the FLOSS kernel SeL4 is proven to be correct with mathematical precision? POSIX compliant innovations will someday leave Linux in the dust.
This may be a nitpick of your comment, but I think very little of claims that a large program is “proven to be correct with mathematical precision”. We all know there are bugs in every large program, and if we aren’t smart enough to write the code without mistakes, then we aren’t smart enough to evaluate a proof of its correctness without mistakes.
Their Github page even has a section on reporting security vulnerabilities, suggesting that they themselves are not so certain of its correctness as you make it sound.
Formal verification is a thorough process.
Downvote because this is ad for the /c/beyondlinux guild, which was already advertised on multiple places today.
There is only closed and open source, so there is nothing beyond that.
This title and post text don’t seem to have anything to do with the article content?
I’m really sorry I couldn’t make clearer the imagination that comes with creating a usable and FLOSS operating system! The article is a little pessimistic, sure, but check out some resources on up-and-coming kernels like Zircon and SeL4 in particular and tell me what you think.
I have seen a couple of other FLOSS operating systems including 9front and Redox, though I haven’t heard of Zircon. In fact I do believe that eventually one of these projects will or should succeed Linux. I believe Linux is too burdened with historical baggage to innovate properly. I’m most familiar with 9front, and some of the ideas in its design seem so brilliant to me that I really hope it becomes the future. (As far as the article content itself, I’m not knowledgeable enough about that area to comment on it.)
Zircon is the kernel for Fuchsia.
Just my two cents:
I will never, ever trust anything made by Google. seL4, sure since it’s both formally verified and the kernel itself is a very small codebase (you still need to be careful of who’s making your userspace programs with any seL4 OS though), but there are way too many places to hide backdoors even in open source projects for CIA/NSA backed Google to ever be a viable option for security. It’s something that the UnGoogled Chromium and UnGoogled Android projects have proven time and time again because even as projects with the express intent to remove Google dependence, they’re still finding existing Google stuff in weird places and are adamant that they’re never sure that they’ve removed everything.