Darwin

[aduffbrew]

OK,

 

I have to admit, I really haven't done my homework on this one. I starting wading through all the online information available and it kind of gave me a headache. I thought I would cut through the muck and just ask you guys directly what's up with Darwin these days?

 

It's no longer available directly from Apple as an OS distribution but what does that mean really? Is any meaningful work continuing on it apart from OS X?

 

Is it a viable OS option or is it really just a novelty for tinkerers and Apple geeks?

 

How does it compare to GNU/Linux distributions?

[Hagar]

Basically, it's just for tinkerers and to fulfil apple's commitment to opensource. you can still download an installable iso of darwin 801, but there are no binary updates (although there was an 801 -> 8.1 around at one point, which I would like to get hold of again if possible) so unless you are very clever with compiling source etc, Darwin stops there. I think David Elliot put it best when he said something to the effect of "if you want to run darwin, get os x" as far as comparing to other 'nix'es, it doesn't really. there is nothing stropping you *in theory* from updating & compiling Darwin 9.4.0, and building X11 & whatever other opensource *nix goodies you might want to run, but it's a huge task, and not really worth it.

[Synaesthesia]

The Opendarwin project has been abandoned! They say Apple are not really committed and don't care about it. They're probably right. Apple also withheld crucial technology from them, by keeping it proprietary in OS X.

 

Unfortunately OS X is Apple's main interest, of course.

 

As for the OS, I suggest you rather go with a good open source Linux or Unix variant, or OS X.

[InorganicMatter]

The Opendarwin project has been abandoned! They say Apple are not really committed and don't care about it. They're probably right. Apple also withheld crucial technology from them, by keeping it proprietary in OS X.

 

Well, of course. Darwin is not the heart and soul of Mac OS X. The API foundation is what makes Mac OS X special. These technologies (Core Graphics, Core Audio) are 100% closed-source technologies developed by Apple, for Apple. As stated above, Darwin has some open-source components from the BSD kernel, and so remains open-source to fulfill those requirements. Sure, you could download the Darwin source, and compile it, but you can't do anything with it after that.

 

It's like getting ahold of the engineering drawings for one tiny component of Intel's Core CPU architecture. You feel special because you have it in your hands, but it still doesn't do you any good.

 

Could you compile the Darwin kernel, bundle it up with Xorg/KDE and make (yet another) a Unix-like operating system? Yeah, but you'd be better off just using FreeBSD.