linux-kernel - Re: What computer do Linus and other prominent kernel developers have?

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Date:	Tue, 01 Jun 2010 14:30:53 -0400
From:	Valdis.Kletnieks@...edu
To:	"Fred ." <eldmannen@...il.com>
Cc:	linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org
Subject: Re: What computer do Linus and other prominent kernel developers have?

On Tue, 01 Jun 2010 19:28:01 +0200, "Fred ." said:
> What exact computer hardware components do Linus Torvalds have in his
> computer system?
> Also other prominent kernel developers like Alan Cox, etc.
> 
> If want to buy same motherboard, CPU, GPU, HDD, etc.
> 
> That way, I know there wont be any problems running Linux, because if
> I have that problem,
> then he will also have that problem.
> If he have that problem, he will surely fix it.

I'm not a prominent developer, I'm just a semi-famous crash test dummy, but.. ;)

"Hey, we just found something which doesn't crash my Vaio!" -- Andrew Morton

Note carefully the following problems with your plan:

1) People like Linus, Alan, and Andrew are all perfectly capable of running
a kernel that has a cherry-picked fix or two on it.  So it's quite possible
they have a system that 2.6.34 doesn't run on, but 2.6.34 plus 3 fixes does.
This can add substantially to your support costs.

2) It may not even be possible to *get* the exact same configuration anymore,
because the vendor has changed things around.  I have a Dell Latitude E6500
laptop. It has a " MATSHITA DVD+/-RW UJ892" in it.  If you buy an E6500, there
is a good chance it will come with some *other* DVD  burner (one of my
co-workers kept count, and was up to over a dozen different CD drives/models
that Dell shipped during the long production run of one of their Optiplex
models).

3) If they have some odd hardware config, and you have troubles installing/
maintaining it on that odd config, you're unlikely to be able to get personal
support from them.  However, if you get the same config as 3 zillion Linux
fanboys, any one of them will be able to bail you out. (I tell newcomers to
Linux not to install the distro that's "cool" - install the distro you can get
tech support by buying a pizza for the teenager next door. ;)

4) It's quite possible they have hardware that has known issues that don't
bother them in their daily usage, but render it useless for your usage. (For
instance, I have *no idea* if suspend works on this E6500, because I never
use suspend - it's not even built into my kernel.  If it's broken on this
model and you *need* suspend support, you'll be a very unhappy camper.

4a) A related issue - not only do you need the same hardware, but also the
same .config and distro, in case there's mis-match out there.  And some
developers do odd things either because they just haven't bothered upgrading
their userspace, or they intentionally want to test kernels for backward
compatibility.  I think Andrew still has a Fedora 7 or 8 out there.  Will
suck if you get that same hardware and discover you need Fedora 13 to support
some software you need and Andrew doesn't use...

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