VERY basic linux system 242

In a message on 26 Jan 2006 08:35:59 -0800, wrote :

You might want to look at XINU -- this is an *educational* toy UNIX kernel.

This is because a typical Linux distro is meant to be a production time share system and these dependencies are the result of making efficient use of system resources. Yes, we can go back to static libraries and duplication common code all over the place, but that is a waste and has other problems. If you do in fact 're-invent the wheel' you will eventually end up with the same 'dependency hell' as you are describing.

Most of the more complex dependency hell' situations are often for the more complex packages, like X11 desktops or things like web browsers. Most of the basic commands don't have all that much in the way of 'dependency hell'. All of the base level commands (like cp, mv, etc.) are all in one or two packages and only depend on the C RTL, which itself has no outside dependencies.

There are two *different* things going on here, which many people confuse. There is 'multi-tasking', 'multi-user', *and* 'multiple-user'. There is actually a difference between 'multi-user' and 'multiple-user', strange as that sounds. My laptop is a case in point. It has pretty much a stock White Box Linux 3.0 install (much the same as RHEL 3.0). This is a 'multi-tasking' (more than one process at a time), 'multi-user' (the multiple processes run with *different* UIDs) and NOT 'multiple-user' (there is only *one* user account).

As to 'logging into KDE multiple times on the same machine'. Yes this is silly, generally (but does have uses sometimes). But 'logging' into multiple xterms (or virtual consoles), is *very* common. Note that there really is no difference between running several applications under one X11 session or running multiple X11 sessions, as far as 'multi-tasking' 'multi-user'. From a (modern) OS point of view there is no difference. The kernel sees several user processes, each of which is the head of its own job tree. How they came to be and how they might relate to each over is not really as important.