Linux -- Without Unix

Hubert Tonneau writes: "Once upon a time, Linus took GNU system, wrote a brand new kernel for it, and it was Linux. I did it just the other way round: I took Linux kernel, wrote a brand new system for it, and it is FullPliant. In very few words, Linux without Unix. This is the first system completely complying with free software's philosophy, because you can read it from the first line to the last one since all the code, including the dynamic compiler, the HTTP, FTP, SMTP, POP3, patches repository and database servers, plus the remote Web configuration tool and the strong crypto proxy, fits in a single megabyte and is compiled on the fly. The first server running FullPliant can be accessed at: [this site]." Interesting.

Re:what does this accomplish?

> I have to admit, this just doesn't make sense.
> All this hard work I just can't see it going anywhere, its like dumping all the work (good or bad) and essentially starting over.

Just like Linus did by writing the Linux kernel instead of trying to improve the Minix kernel, you mean?

> I just cannot see how this can be done without huge backing from someone like Sun, Microsoft, or Apple.

I have difficulty seeing how this *could* be done with backing from a huge corporation.

A bunch of good programmers working together on something they think is cool can produce much better work than a bunch of programmers being continually ordered around by a marketting department.

GNU + Linux isn't the be all and end all of operating system design. None of the systems we have today are. We need people to continually try new ideas and come up with unfamiliar things.

- Muggins

First system complying with WHAT?

What philosophy, is it, exactly, that requires everything to be compiled on the fly?

Was it Kant that talked about interpreted code. Now, I believe Descartes hypothesized a proof for God based on the idea that self-modifying programs could not be construed as a perfect model of any single thing. And the Chinese talk about the severing of the mind-body relationship through the long-term contemplation of object orientation. And Adm. Grace Hopper lectured on the idea that through debugging it could be determined that the nature of man can always be proven flawed.
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No better

Looks like it's susceptible to the Slashdot Effect... but this time I wouldn't expect any mirrors.

Another location

Here is another offical homepage (it's just not up updated to the last second): http://pliant.cx/ [pliant.cx]

Oh no, not another one!

They claim they are trying to make you a programmer. This page [pliant.cx] describes their .page-format, as an alternative to html.

Pity they haven't understood what (proper) html is about. They've gone and created this visual, contextless (or meaningless, if you will) markup-language, which is converted to equally rotten html. They also claim for "dynamic" pages, which, as I see it is a rather poor excuse for limited, and limiting server-side scripting.

From my point of view, they've tried reinvent the wheel as a square. For instance, from theirwebsite [pliant.cx]

Pliant programs always run in the compiler itself, which compiles on the fly. Thus, a program can ask to compile another piece of code at any time (equivalent to the 'eval' instruction in many interpreters), or free some compiled code (a compile function is a data). All of this gives great flexibility.

Ain't this just a poor way of saying "A Just-in-Time-compiler is about the only thing we'll let you work with"? Just my NKr. 02

Don't Point, it's not polite

I'm sure Linus Torvalds probably heard some comments like this when he was originally working on building the first Linux kernel.

What's your point? That LT explained himself, and now nobody ever has to explain themselves ever again?

Anyway, there's a big fallacy in this whole discussion. Everybody seems to think that LT woke up one day and said "Eureka! (My kernel work) + (GNU Project) = A NEW OS !" That's not what happened. For one thing, GNU always had their own kernel [gnu.org] (althougth they've taken their sweet time finishing it!). For another thing, LT was never a big fan of most of the GNU software (in this article [linuxworld.com] he expresses admiration for GCC, but attitudes ranging from indifference to absolute disgust with everything else).

The simple fact is that LT wrote a simple POSIX-compliant kernel for his own private purposes -- mainly self-education. It was the viral marketing that he unintentionally started by giving the source to his friends that established Linux+GNU as a new OS. I once heard him say he was more shocked by the 100th copy of Linux than the 1 millionth!

That being said, it might well be interesting and useful to create a new "OS" based on the Linux kernel. "Completely complying with free software's philosophy" strikes me as a rather silly motivation, but Tonneau does seem to have done some interesting work that bears further discussion. Is anyone going to comment on FullPliant's unique features, or is everybody stuck on Religious Flamewar mode?

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Re:what does this accomplish?

GNU + Linux isn't the be all and end all of operating system design. None of the systems we have today are. We need people to continually try new ideas and come up with unfamiliar things.

Heresy! Burn him at the stake!

Interesting, here are similar technologies

Without trying to detract from Pliant, this reminds me a lot of the Self project.

Interesting links on Self can be found here [dmoz.org].

Where Pliant syntax is discussed [pliant.cx], it is said that it is original because "The Pliant parser is original in that it doesn't rely on an automaton derived from a grammar. It is simpler, but more customizable and therefore much more powerful. "

I'd like to point out that the parsing extensibility of Pliant can be found in the Forth language and I believe that Rebol [rebol.com] may also have some of these advantages. The language Lua [puc-rio.br] also comes to mind as a language with syntactic extensibility.

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Thanks a lot

Thanks a lot, Hubert. I was all ready to sit down and actually clean my desk of about two years' worth of crap, and then you come along with this hare-brained idea that dares to be different.

Needless to say, the desk will remain uncleaned tonight, while I figure out how to get the HTTP server running :)

Who died and made ICANN boss? Support OpenNIC [unrated.net].

Re:How is that INTERESTING?

"The greatest danger to good computer science
research today may be excessive relevance . . .
[C]ommercial pressure . . . will divert the
attention of the best thinkers from real
innovation to exploitation of the current fad,
from prospecting to mining a known lode"
-- Dennis Ritchie
Communications of the ACM, August, 1984

"What's the point?"

I'm seeing some posts here from people saying "What's the point of this? Who would use it? Why don't you just use your talents to make Linux better instead?"

I'm sure Linus Torvalds probably heard some comments like this when he was originally working on building the first Linux kernel. Why not just use DOS, or Minix, or save up some money and buy a real computer, or whatever?

If nobody ever did anything revolutionary, where would we be?

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Programmers and the Rest of the World (TM)

According to the Pliant Documentation, the creator wants to use his project to turn everyone into programmers so that they'll support FSF ideals.

This logic is a little twisted for me, but okay...

The simple fact of the matter is that programmers aren't the only technically comptent people who use computers. The idea that *everyone* should *have* to program all the time to fit into this guy's rather skewed world view is ridiculous! Take myself for example: I'm a graphical artist. Like many /. readers, I make webpages for a libing. While I *occasionally* crank out some PHP or some Javascript, the vast majority of my 'technical expertise' lies in the areas of understanding the intricacies of dozens of art, paint and drawing programs. I know what minor differences HTML code will display in certain browsers. I can administer Apache, IIS, and a slew of other web servers. I'm competent to install and administer any number of server OS's. I'm even competent enough to make choices between certain operating systems for certain tasks and requirements.

I understand the basics of how machine languages work on different processors and why programming languages behave as they do, *but* If I had to *once* sit down and crank out an application in Java or C, I would be lost. I don't have *time* to hack. I'm busy with the rest of my highly technical job.

The idea that you have to be a programmer to be technically competent is ludicrous, but one all too many hackers view as sacrosanct. Give it up, geeks.

Lisp a logical language?

I took a quick look at the Pliant documentation and I can tell two thngs so far:

1. This project took a lot of work (15 years is the claim).

2. And it was probably all in vain.

If the author took at least one of those 15 years to take a look at existing programming languages he could have used a simple and stable language as a base. How can he call LISP a logical language!? LISP is a functional language. But terminology is the least problem here. Check this quotation:

A language is a bridge between the human way of coding a program and the computer way. I assert that Pliant is the best way now available, because it addresses the bridging goal with the highest level of flexibility.

Come on, if somebody asserted to have created the best OS ever I could even believe it. But the best programming language? Such a thing simply can't exist, and event if it could Pliant has no chance from what I've seen. The only interesting part of it is the full meta-programming ability integrated with JIT-compiler, but there are languages with far cleaner meta-programming facilities. Only in the research community, though. If Pliant manages to bring more attention to great applicability of meta-programming it may be worth those 15 years of work, though.

Embedded systems

Y'know, this might be just the thing for embedded systems. Depending on how robust it turns out to be, the combination of the Pliant userland and the Linux kernel seems like a great way to build simple, network-aware, embeddable systems without a great deal of unnecessary complexity.
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Why not GNU Pliant?

As the code written by the project lead is all GPLed (not necessarily some contributed portions) wouldn't it make sense for the Pliant project to join GNU? The project would get some free publicity, mirrors everywhere, and an extra boost from the GNU brand. There might have to be reassignment of copyright, but on the other hand, in the long run it might be cleaner to have contributors reassigning to the trusty FSF.

Holding up okay so far...

It's also the first server running FullPliant to be Slashdotted. :^)

Politically Incorrect just started on ABC. There are 100+ responses. God knows how long this article has been up, but it's still the top of the page.

I'm impressed. No one has crashed it yet, and it doesn't seem to have melted down yet.

Re:Programmers and the Rest of the World (TM)

You apparently have no idea what a Camel Testicle Scraper gets paid (a CTSC is a very prestigous cert indeed.)

For someone who claims to know what they're talking about, you sure know how to mess up your acronyms. Being a CCTS (that's Certified Camel Testicle Scraper) myself, I cringed when I read your mangling of that prestigious certification's name.

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You beat me to it...

I have wanted to do something like this for a long long time. Unix, GNU and Linux have accumulated such a huge amount of inconsistencies, variations and obscurities that I can see why it is so frustrating for newbies. If I could re-architect all the programs to get rid of all of the inconsistencies without having to have any backwould compatibility it would be great. Imagine having all programs on your system store all their configuration information in one consistent place - or just one place for systemwide stuff and one place for each user's local configs. Imagine if all the configuration files had the same format. Imagine if command line switches for all commands had some sort of pattern or predictability. It would be a big programming job to make things work like this, but it would make a system that was easier to learn, use, administer and develop for. It would also be just plain more fun. The Linux kernel lends itself to exactly this kind of development, and I have been wanting to start a project like this but have not had either the time nor the energy for it. It would also be fun to participate in all the design discussions to hash out how it all would work - tha twould really be the most fun!

It makes perfect sense

I couldn' access the site -- as it's been hit hard already, but some of the early comments suggest that this guy is waisting his time; that he should be using his talents to further linux or an existing projecct.

I think that is a very silly point of view. Should Linus T. have been criticized for waisting his talents on linux, and not helping further Minix or 386BSD? People are free to do what interests them. That's the wellspring of innovation. Sure, some time is waisted, but that's the fun and elegance af creation.

One minor point, though; UNIX is more than the utilities that are layered into a shell. The kernel API and system calls are as much a part of UNIX philosopy as bash, ls, etc. Saying that this is "without UNIX" is probably overstating the uniquenes of the project.