Terra Soft Releases 64-bit Yellow Dog Linux

Kai Staats writes ""With Tiger 'unleashed' in 48 hours and even Microsoft caught-up in the 64-bit wave, we give into peer pressure and release this interim set of ISOs. A compilation of our work to date as we move toward the early summer release of v4.1, Yellow Dog Linux v4.0.90 is built upon eighteen months in-house and customer experience with 64-bit," states Kai Staats, CEO Terra Soft Solutions."

Re:Apple?

[RangerRick98]

Yellow Dog Linux runs on the PowerPC architecture, which would be Apple hardware.

Re:Apple?

[KillerDeathRobot]

Well IBM makes those processors, why not file under IBM? Or better yet under Linux or something?

I guess it shows how interesting this article is to me when I'm willing to quibble over its filing!

Re:Apple?

[Durindana]

if you're really interested, disregard the trollage.

If you check the sidebar for the story, you'll notice it's filed under Operative Systems and Linux as well as under Apple, just as you suggest.

Re:Apple?

[Chucker23N]

"
Well IBM makes those processors, why not file under IBM? Or better yet under Linux or something?"

Have you even been to TerraSoft's site? Because if you had, you'd notice that they're an exclusive Apple reseller for Macs that come pre-loaded with Linux.

Nothing to do with IBM, btw, except for the G5s.

hhhmmm...

[Mad_Rain]

I see the announcement of iso's, I just can't find them on any of the webpages. :) I'm sure there'd be a lot of people who'd be willing to help with a bittorrent seed, if one is officially available.

On a slightly different note, I know Debian, Mandrake, and some other linux distrobutions have PPC offerings and 64-bit offerings as well. How come it took so long for there to be a 64-bit PPC offering? Just not enough of an installed userbase?

Re:hhhmmm...

[Wabbit Wabbit]

from TFPR:

"Exclusively available to YDL.net Enhanced members v4.0.90 may be downloaded immediately from www.ydl.net"

So...I think you have to be a member to get to the ISOs.

Gentoo?

[brokencomputer]

Gentoo has had 64bit support for PPC for what, a couple of months now? Isn't yellow dog only focused on PPC? Why does it take them this long? Do they just not have the manpower? This isn't a troll, just an honest question.

Re:Gentoo?

[aventius]

Most of linux is optimized for x86 it seems. I'm under the impression that gentoo and numerous other distros just simply recompile & repackage their x86 isos for PPC... and the Terra Soft goes through and optimizes all the code for PPC and makes sure all the Apple hardware works perfectly. They bundle a good product. I had it running on my Powerbook at one time.

Re:Gentoo?

[colinleroy]

Terra Soft goes through and optimizes all the code for PPC and makes sure all the Apple hardware works perfectly

To be honest, they say so, but it's rather Benjamin Herrenschmidt who makes sure Apple hardware works on Linux.

Re:Gentoo?

[Anonymous Coward]

If you RTFA, you'll notice this:
"Yellow Dog Linux v4.0.90 is built upon eighteen months in-house and customer experience with 64-bit"

It's been in Y-HPC since Y-HPC was released back in November at SC2004, and was in the _old_ (YDL 3.0.1 based) G5 beta ISOs available to YDL.net Enhanced customers since last year.

Yes sound, wireless, and sleep features(!)

[Anonymous Coward]

Read more details here [yellowdoglinux.com].

Wireless works through Mac-On-Linux which is included. Onboard sound for Non-G5 machines at the moment (mini onboard sound doesn't work at the moment either). Sleep function works now for laptops.

Screenshot

[missing_myself]

Features http://www.yellowdoglinux.com/products/ydl.shtml [yellowdoglinux.com]
Purchase http://www.terrasoftsolutions.com/store/purchase.p hp?submit=ydl#ydl [terrasoftsolutions.com]

Business?

[MrMiyagi]

Does anybody know how these guys stay in business? They seem to have free downloads, and I can't see any support packages that they charge for. (à la Red Hat)

Is this a business or just a bunch of volunteers? I'm not trolling here, it's just a question.

Re:Business?

[psychopracter]

IIRC you can buy a premiere type membership and get downloads of software before the average schmeddly.

But Terrasoft's huge business is in reselling Apple hardware. For example they've sold hardware and software to Lockeed-Martin and they also sold 260 XServes to the US Navy http://www.macobserver.com/article/2003/08/07.8.sh tml [macobserver.com]

Re:Business?

[ztirffritz]

YDL.net is a fee based support network. It also gives users webspace, webmail, and early access to files, updates, etc. You also get preferential service with YUM updates. If you use their main servers for YUM, it does not work very often because the servers are smoking. If you have a YDL account you can get a back-door ftp account to another server that seems more robust and stable...or perhaps I'm the only fool paying for this service. I like to reward their efforts and I'm not a starving college student anymore, so I pony up the funds for what I take.

64bit architectures?

[slipper-e]

I've heard some people refer to Darwin as a pseudo 64bit system, in reference to the fact that it uses a 32bit kernel. Both YDL and Darwin support 64bit memory addressing. Are there any other aspects of an os that need to be addressed in order to fully utilize the architecture? Also what benefit does the 64bit kernel actually provide over 32bits? Apple seems to have covered its bases with respect to HPC functionality like the math libraries and the memory addressing.

64bit architectures: Confusing

[screwthemoderators]

There's also an issue about Darwin not really utilizing its microkernel, but running processes on a subsystem as though on a monolithic kernel. What does it all mean? I assume an optimized microkernel would make little difference.