POWER: The Road to Open Source
summary
A 27-year POWER user recounts how POWER hardware moved from running closed AIX with a few open-source apps to a predominantly open-source ecosystem (OpenPOWER) where Linux in little-endian mode enables easier porting and optimization. The talk traces platforms from RS6000, PowerMac, Genesi to modern POWER and highlights how availability of native desktop build-and-test (e.g., Raptor workstations) revived developer activity and enabled commercial software like SAP HANA to run on open-source stacks.
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chapters (14)
- 0:00POWER: The Road to Open Source Peter Czanik, One Identity
- 0:25Overview - A subjective history of POWER and open source - Trends and conclusions
- 0:521992-1993 Dartmouth College RS6000 systems remotely Fastest systems No idea if I used open or closed source
- 1:51Open source 1994- FreeBSD user 1995- Linux admin 1996- SUSE Linux tester / contributor, Linux on the desktop
- 2:291999 intern at systems integrator Installed RS6000 systems AIX + open source apps on top - Compiled from source (no packaged binaries) -Installed the most powerful server of Hungary at that time
- 4:36Linux on POWER Power Mac IBM POWER servers - More hobby than commercially viable
- 8:14More POWER: Power Mac as Linux developer workstation - POWER servers with Linux instead of AIX - Many Altivec optimizations benefiting both HPC and multimedia
- 9:14Disturbance in the force Apple switches to Intel - Freescale stops generic PowerPC development - PA Semi is the new hope - Apple buys it Genesi also quits POWER
- 10:43Many developers leave as Power Mac gets old . Most POWER servers run Linux • Commercial applications on top of Linux on POWER (like SAP Hana)
- 12:16A new hope Raptor Computing - POWER workstation – "fully open", not just the software, but also the firmware and the CPU - Developers returning
- 14:03Some fun facts POWER dominance in space (Mars rovers) - Prominent places in Top500 & Green 500 - Syslog-ng performed 1.5x better on POWER9 than on any other platforms tested
- 15:51Trend 1: AIX - Linux - Originally closed source OS Some open source apps on top Open source OS and apps Open source OS with commercial applications Linux running in little-endian mode, which makes porting and optimizing software easier
- 17:41Trend 2: developers need affordable workstations - Used IBM and Power Mac Genesi + new Power Mac With servers only many developers disappeared With Raptor workstations many active developers again
- 19:13Conclusions POWER embraced open source - Developers prefer to have native desktop/workstation class hardware
