International Space Station dumps Windows for Linux

[Atman]

Ground control to Major Tux: Space station dumps Windows, now uses Linux

For reasons involving reliability — which is semi-kinda important in low-Earth orbit, apparently — our fellow nerds living aboard the International Space Station have made the switch from Windows to Linux for astronauts’ laptops.

The space nerds will get training from the Linux Foundation for the upgrade to Debian 6. The foundation has actually customized two courses specifically for NASA astronauts’ needs, including a basic Linux user course and more advanced coursework on how to develop applications for Linux.

Previously, the laptops aboard the ISS had been running Windows XP.

The United Space Alliance manages the NASA/ISS computers. A United Space Alliance spokesperson told press the switch was made because ISS astronauts and cosmonauts needed an operating system “that was stable and reliable.”

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Read more at http://venturebeat.com/2013/05/10/iss-linux/#BuCKY0pz8h4U9dPm.99

[dixiegrrrrl]

1. heh heh heh....great move!!!!

[nadinbrzezinski]

2. Careful, nerds

Will cme and say...what about Win 7-8 or whatever favor?

He, he

[htuttle]

3. I wonder if they just took a stack of Live CD's up with them?

I'm sitting here imagining the crew of a space station trying to decide whether to install Emacs or not...

[Recursion]

10. Don't be silly. Nobody smart enough to be an astronaut would use vi

[L0oniX]

12. ...or pico.

[Recursion]

13. emacs is a great operating system; it just needs a good text editor (nt)

[LisaL]

4. Support for Windows XP is ending.

So I am guessing they didn't want to upgrade to Windows 8.

[L0oniX]

11. Don't count on that. MS is concerned that if they end XP people will move...

to Ubuntu or other ready to use linux/unix based os with KDE or Gnome.

[FogerRox]

25. XP on my 2006 laptop to this day.

I can understand the sentiment.

[awoke_in_2003]

17. Windows 8 is an upgrade? nt

[cliffordu]

6. Why do I think the astronauts already know about Linux??

[L0oniX]

8. NASA has been using Linux/Unix for a long time. n/t

[L0oniX]

7. MUHAHAHAHAHAHA

[Recursion]

9. Debian 6 was deprecated last week

Sigh...

[L0oniX]

15. http://distrowatch.com/

Rank Distribution H.P.D*
1 Mint 3851<
2 Mageia 2113<
3 Ubuntu 2008>
4 Debian 1611>
5 Fedora 1584<

[Recursion]

16. Debian 6 is now "oldstable"; "stable" is 7

6 ("Squeeze&quot was also always meant to be a short-term fix between Lenny and Wheeze; it's just that it ended up lasting 2 years.

I'm a Debian user, personally, so I don't think it's dead at all...

[lpbk2713]

14. Who needs all that bloat anyhow?

Good move ISS

[phantom power]

18. ....

[FailureToCommunicate]

19. Geez...Linux, Windows, if they're NETWORKED, it won't matter if THESE guys show up...

[Rex]

20. Oh God they were using Windows XP!?!?

I just assumed the were all unix based formats or some derivative of the unix source code.

[IDemo]

21. Don't they realize that all other advanced space beings use Apple® ?

There, got that one out of the way...

[Atman]

22. There is an ISS app for that.

[HarveyDarkey]

23. I guess they finally realized they needed some reliability

I'm still using XP occasionally on a dual boot system with Ubuntu. I only boot to windoze to use some software that won't work on Linux. That's maybe 5% of my usage at best. I never go online with windoze.

[unc70]

24. JSC runs Linux on the consoles

Migrated from DEC Alpha UNIX to AMD64 Linux.

[Turbineguy]

26. They were probably kept on "hold" for too long.

I told the Microsoft technical help that they should never keep somebody on hold for longer than it takes to install Linux. They were not amused.