
ISS switches from Windows to Linux, for improved reliability - Libertatea
http://www.extremetech.com/extreme/155392-international-space-station-switches-from-windows-to-linux-for-improved-reliability
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samfisher83
Windows xp would run for months without any issues. Its all the 8 million
background apps and crappy drivers that caused the problems, but windows
itself on a good hardware runs fine. So does linux.

~~~
mpyne
On the other hand Linux is a lot easier to troubleshoot should something
break, and it is much easier to disable or completely remove unnecessary
subsystems.

I had a Linux-powered laptop on the boat that was critical to a particular
training task the CO liked, and it was somehow wedged by a bad shutdown.

Knowing what little I did of Linux, bash, etc. at the time I (a random LTJG)
was able to figure out how to get the system to boot again, which allowed us
to continue training without having to choose between breaking comms or going
without that training software for the majority of the remainder of the
patrol.

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hardwaresofton
“We migrated key functions from Windows to Linux because we needed an
operating system that was stable and reliable.”

As a person who installed windows 8 three days ago (on a second hdd, thank
God) to give it a try (mostly because I wanted to play some games I
discovered), and yesterday watched it BSOD itself to oblivion for no good
reason, I agree with this statement.

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mjolk
The most surprising part of this for me was that the machines weren't running
linux in the first place.

