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Rebel Code: Linux and the Open Source Revolution (Hardcover)

by Glyn Moody (Author) "Outside, a louring Seattle sky broods over the clumps of squat white buildings scattered around an extensive campus in constant expansion ..." (more)
4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (10 customer reviews)

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Product details

  • Hardcover: 334 pages
  • Publisher: Allen Lane (25 Jan 2001)
  • Language English
  • ISBN-10: 0713995203
  • ISBN-13: 978-0713995206
  • Product Dimensions: 23 x 15 x 2.8 cm
  • Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (10 customer reviews)
  • Amazon.co.uk Sales Rank: 724,435 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Product Description

Amazon.co.uk Review

Everyone in computing has heard of Linux and hundreds of millions use it every day. Every Net user accesses Linux systems dozens of times during any Net session. Yet because people associate products with companies, Linux--with its thousands of largely anonymous volunteer developers and free availability--is a difficult fit with our world view.

The Rebel Code puts Linux into an historical and social context. Based largely on interviews with the main players and precise historical data (Linux kernel releases are dated to the second) it traces Free Software from its early eighties origin with Robert Stallman's founding of the Gnu Project and takes it as far as the end of 2000 with Gnu/Linux becoming a worldwide phenomenon running handheld PDAs, PCs and Macs, IBM mainframes and powering the world's biggest supercomputers.

Glyn Moody charts every milestone in the development of the Linux kernel from Linus Torvalds' first installation of Minix. As important, he follows the progress of major Free Software projects--essential to the success of Gnu/Linux--from Emacs and GCC to Sendmail and XFree86 finishing with KDE and Gnome.

The end result is a curiously exciting and compulsively readable tale which stands comparison with Tracy Kidder's book, The Soul of a New Machine. Endlessly fascinating, you'll be up reading it well past bedtime. --Steve Patient



Product Description

In 1991, Linus Torvalds, a Finnish student, sent an e-mail to an internet newsgroup, asking for advice on how to make a better operating system. His project, he said, was a hobby and would never be "big and professional". Yet in less than ten years he and a loose alliance of hackers have created an operating system - LINUX - that challenges Windows for the server software market and is now poised to dominate the next generation of handheld and desktop computers. In this age of new technology start-ups, LINUX is impressive, but it might seem like just another business success story. What makes this story strange - and deeply troubling for the business world - is that LINUX is free. Not only is it free, but anyone can adapt it in any way they wish, as long as they pass it on to new users on the same terms. And far from being an isolated case, it is one of dozens of software projects round the world that have ignored or postponed commercial concerns to concentrate on writing the perfect code and have dedicated themselves to the principles of free and open development. For years they have been dismissed as irrelevant idealists. Yet already, more than any government or corporation, these fluidly organized and highly efficient teams of "amateurs" have defended and entrenched the open standards on which the Internet depends. In this definitive account, Glyn Moody traces the history of open software from its origins in the UNIX community 30 years ago, through its embrace of internet technology, to its present status as Microsoft's only serious rival. Moody shows how pioneers like Richard Stallman struggled to define and defend the principle of free software development, and how companies like IBM, Netscape and Hewlett Packard first ignored and then raced to understand and attempt to control - its potential. He reveals for the first time the full story of the creation of LINUX, Apache, Sendmail and many of the other open source programmes. As he describes the personalities and principles of those involved, he shows how subtle and apparently trivial differences in method have spelt success or failure for individual projects. This is a book about the human urge to share and exchange, about the limits - and resilience - of the profit motive. Above all it is about what we can achieve together when we suspend, even for a moment, the pursuit of personal advantage.
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Customer Reviews

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Average Customer Review
4.6 out of 5 stars (10 customer reviews)
 
 
 
 
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

 
11 of 13 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars Interesting but skewed view of the free software movment, 30 April 2002
I found this book as interesting for it's sense of being written at the hight of the dot-com boom, when it seemed Linux would truly change everything as I did it's intended content. There is a lot in here about the history and philosophy the Free Software foundation (FSF) which really put the whole 'Linux' thing into perspective i.e. 'Linux' is just the kernel, the thing that really makes 'Linux' exciting is the GNU philosophy (read the book to find out more).

Although I enjoyed the book, the journalism is pretty one-sided and almost totally un-critical of the open-source philosophy. For instance, it does not touch on the fact that, for all the clever-clever hackers out in GNU land - most of the critical software is simply a re-hash of software devised by 'traditional monolithic corporations'
UNIX, NFS, TCP/IP anyone? Still it's a good read, but take what it says with a pinch of salt.

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6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Enchanting, 9 Mar 2001
I picked this book up after I couldn't find an o'reilly python book at the bookshop. I'd heard it mentioned on /. (slashdot) and thought I'd give it a go. From the very first page I couldn't put it down. A well written history book of the underground movement and it's key people. I'm sure that sociologists would have just as much fun reading it as hackers. A fantastic read!
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2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars a good journalistic account, 26 Jun 2003
By achates (Cambridge) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Rebel Code: Linux and the Open Source Revolution (Paperback)
I enjoyed this book and learnt quite a few things from it, despite being fairly familiar with most of the story already. In the large part it's well written and easy to read. However I second the reviewer above who complains about the lack of references. Even though Moody does say in the preface that much of his material comes from interviews, there is plenty that clearly does not and should have been referenced. This omission stops it from being truly useful as a history.

Also, another minor criticism, which applies to most books of this genre (journalistic accounts of computer history), is the book's relentless focus on the individuals involved, with little or no assessment of technical or other factors. Thus each episode involves yet another student hacker performing heroic coding feats, one blends into the next and the thing gets a little tedious. Perhaps Moody felt himself or his readers unequipped to deal with the technical issues, but the inclusion of just a little more technical depth would have added texture, and made some chapters a lot more engaging.

Nevertheless I think this is a good book, one of the best of its type, and deserves four stars.

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Most Recent Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5 stars Very informative and thought provoking
I really enjoyed this book, and recommend it to anyone interested in what got us here today.
Published on 1 Jul 2004 by ghenry

5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent!!!
Rebel Code is an excellent introduction to the world and history of open source software developent. Read more
Published on 7 Jun 2001 by anthony7509

5.0 out of 5 stars Highly recommended
An excellent and fascinating book that describes the Linux (and open source) revolution from the beginning. Read more
Published on 20 May 2001

5.0 out of 5 stars Very enjoyable and informative
As somebody who didn't know much about the evolution of Linux or the Open Source movement before reading this book, I found it to be very interesting and informative. Read more
Published on 27 Feb 2001 by rm.thompson@ulst.ac.uk

4.0 out of 5 stars The greatest history of Linux that (n)ever was
As someone who has been tracking the progress of Linux since 1992, and has been using it continuously since 1994, I have been looking for some years now - at least since 1998,... Read more
Published on 23 Feb 2001 by Primoz Peterlin

5.0 out of 5 stars Very interesting read
I found this to be a very good read. It is nice to see the people behind the technologies. I would recommend this to anyone interested in GPL, open source or even proprietary... Read more
Published on 9 Feb 2001 by jkehoe@raven.ie

4.0 out of 5 stars Enlightening Open Source history
Glyn Moody's book is an admirably complete history of Linux and the open source movement. It also manages to keep the pace going well, despite having to deal with a comparitively... Read more
Published on 7 Feb 2001

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