Is the military using some custom linux distro?
Like, what runs their systems? Drone controls and servers and all that shit?
BSD?

I'm having a hard time imagining some wounded field soldier using a windows laptop to call for tactical airstrike in his position because he's "never gonna make it anyway, tell Marie I love her"

Idk about nowadays, but within the last decade Microsoft was still providing support for XP specially for the DOD. Maybe its Linux now, but somehow I doubt it.

Windows 7, service pack 1

>>63926890 (OP)
Windows 7 for Business

Windows XP NSA edition.

>>63926890 (OP)
some 64-bit version of Windows XP, probably.

workstations are windows

blufor trackers in the humvees etc are linux (used to be windows)

>>63926890 (OP)
from an European NATO military IT

>Is the military using some custom linux distro?
depends on what you describe as "custom"

where I work
it's a standard enterprise linux distros which is partly developed / supported from my country
but there's extensive hardening
and we have our own package repository

>servers
run exclusively on this distro
with a few exceptions where very old software runs on some old Windows server version
but these servers are not easy to access (lots of security issues)

>windows laptop
up until a few years that was the standard option
now we have linux laptops
again same server distro but with KDE (so technically there is an official KDE rice kek) and a bunch of other stuff

we try to phase out windows out of all critical positions though
no clue what's the final plan with windows
but it's (rightfully) deemed as vulnerability

lots of planning around RISC-V though
in like ~10y there should be a secure standard laptop with it
and there's some fuzz about getting a formal verification for any kernel we'll use on it

>having a hard time imagining some wounded field soldier using a windows laptop to call for tactical airstrike
most new / modern software runs in the web
you're not bound to any specific OS
and communication will all switch to matrix in the next few years

>>63926924
>risc-v
wots dat?

>>63927043
>risc-v
It's a new-ish open and license free ISA, or instruction set architecture, like ARM (Macs and smart phones) or the Intel/AMD x86-64 (PCs and many servers).
The ISA of a computer basically means what kind of machine code it runs and what exactly the abstract logic of the CPU is (in relation to accessing memory/peripherals, supporting multiple processes, handling interrupts/hardware events, etc.).
RISC-V seems to be slowly taking over at least various embedded systems thanks to being fairly clean, open and free of patent/licensing issues, and actually having support in programming tools, which has often been a problem with less-used CPU architectures.

There are plenty of open-source CPU designs that implement the RISC-V ISA, and some manufacturers are working on their own proprietary designs, but I'm not aware of any implementations that are quite there for desktop / server use. There are some Raspberry Pi -tier dev boards out there right now, though. Some embedded things like hard disk controllers, routers and so on may also be running on a RISC-V chip as of 2025.
The architecture should be able to scale to larger machines, though, and at least the EU's been funding some projects to develop their own RISC-V implementation so they could have their own CPU cores.

>>63927043
that's >>63927109 well explained
think of it as an more accessible alternative to Intel/AMD/ARM

additionally
>why is this interesting from a (EU) military standpoint
there's still a lot of concern about Intel ME and AMD PSP (and many other design quirks / shortcuts)
which "can" be abused as backdoor
and just the general problematic of buying chips designed & manufactured by US (or even worse Chinese) companies for defense critical applications (ITAR...)

RISC-V would be an ideal alternative where you can actually control and secure every level of your hard / software
there's also motivation to have fully formally proven systems up to the kernel
which in essence just mean the system works exactly how you designed it (super important for some cryptographic applications)

>as of 2025
current timeline is having viable CPUs in 2030/31
and infrastructure / software ready for ~2034

but as of now there are workable implementations already
Xuantie C930 just recently as the most powerful one (Chinese)
SiFive, Andes, Codasip or Imagination and more all make various rsic-v CPUs

>EU's been funding some projects to develop their own RISC-V implementation so they could have their own CPU cores
actually spoke in front of the committee who wrote that part of the budget in Brussels a few years ago
interesting part is that man EU universities / research institutes are "funding" companies in stealth
so the whole allocated budget is probably much higher than officially communicate

>>63927217
>RISC-V would be an ideal alternative where you can actually control and secure every level of your hard / software
Yup. If you make your own RISC-V core, you can build code for it with off-the-shelf tools (you may want to validate those tools for extra security, but anyways) and enjoy having a standard architecture where the implementation is still under your control, instead of relying on foreign licensed or reverse-engineered CPU blocks. China seems to be interested in doing just this. Maybe Russia too, not that they have a lot of money to spare for anything right now.

>interesting part is that man EU universities / research institutes are "funding" companies in stealth
Yeah, the architecture looks a lot more straightforward to implement than x86-64's 40 years of kludges, and I think some functioning cores have been designed in student projects.
An actually fast desktop performance core would still require quite a bit of engineering, but it's kind of neat that a trivial single-core implementation by a student can potentially run the same code as a giant 128-core superscalar pipelined server monster.

>>63927109
>>63927217
Thanks. Sounds pretty good then desu.

>>63926890 (OP)
Don’t worry about it chang.

>Patriot runs on JavaScript
>Pantsir or Tor (the video just said "air defense unit") is either Windows Server 2008 or Windows XP based on the GUI I saw

It's a wild world out there.

>>63927424
>Don’t worry about it chang.
Sure thing Pvt. Alonzo-Washington

>>63927109
>The ISA of a computer basically means what kind of machine code it runs and what exactly the abstract logic of the CPU is

Its a lower-level programming language that abstracts away the headache of dealing with silicon and copper since CompSci majors no longer are taught any of that stuff.

>>63927864
>since CompSci majors no longer are taught any of that stuff
"CompSci major" could mean anything these days. Some comp sci departments are just Java diploma mills, maybe with a bit more math included.
Some others still at least teach the theory of computation, the mathematical basis of programming languages and how they're designed, etc.

One challenge for these semi-secret military projects is the difficulty of finding devs since you can't even trust CS majors to understand anything about computers these days, and a completely different ISA + OS might be an impossible hurdle for some of them.
Probably part of why they want to use as much commodity hardware and tooling as possible.

>>63927272
>and I think some functioning cores have been designed in student projects.
>An actually fast desktop performance core would still require quite a bit of engineering
it's not necessarily the overall speed
you can compensate with a bigger die (more transistors)
RISC-V server CPUs seem to be almost on par

it's energy efficiency for (non ASIC) mobile application that's tricky

also getting into the right fabs
afaik nothing below 5nm (Veyron V1) and even that's the exceptions
and the experimental / university stuff is typical 40nm+

>>63927640
that's very much to be expected the way military contracts are structured
you need looong availability of hardware
sometimes the hardware is outdated after a few years but you have 30y more of support
or the manufacturer just has no incentive certifying newer software

that's the reason most stuff runs on web tech today
you can verify browser engine backwards compatibility once and then know that all old applications run while having newer base software

Its a very mixed bag and depends on the use case of the system. Enterprise networks will likely run windows, large distributed mission systems might run either, more bespoke or otherwise compartmentd systems will probably run Linux, and even some more antiquated legacy stuff might be running some old ass UNIX distros.
Also almost all of these systems sre procured and designed in a vacuum as it's own thing so it's up to the program office and whoever is designing the architecture to choose a la carte what is best for the system.
T. 10 years doing DOD cyberspace stuff

>>63926890 (OP)
Install Gentoo

>>63928202
Old meme is old.

What's up with Gentoo, anyway? Never sucked around with it even though I can claim I got a printer working with Arch.

Millitary computer hardware is generally a few generations back because it needs to survive very harsh conditions. Can the laptop operate at +45C to -40C? Is it waterproof down to 3 or 4 meters? Can it survive a dropped, thrown, stepped on, and shaken around? This is why everything in the military is in a heavy metal case and connectors are huge. Look up Mil spec 810 for the details.

>>63928245
it's like arch but you compile everything yourself
it's a nice niche type of autism within the linux world. takes a lot of time to compile but there's a performance benefit to it also no bloat.
would i recommend it? no

>>63928325
>Millitary computer hardware is generally a few generations back
>because it needs to survive very harsh conditions
that's not really the reason though...

it's because the long time frames for procurement
and long lasting contracts
which essentially lock in a certain hardware for potentially multiple decades

>>63926890 (OP)
The servers are typically running Windows Server 2016 or newer, or RHEL both bare metal and using ESXI, although there are still some holdouts on solaris, and hpux along with some other misc linux distos. Last time i remember seeing xp was for programming a nortel phone switch back in 2018.

t. ANG cyber and lead sysadmin DoD contractor.

>>63926890 (OP)
Not sure about other aircraft but the CONECT system used on B52s (basically the onboard comms network) runs Windows (XP or 7).

>>63928782
>The servers are typically running Windows Server 2016 or newer,

I refuse to believe this. We just upgraded to server 2020 for a major east cost independent hospital last summer. There is no way the military is so cutting edge as to only be 2 windows versions behind.

>>63926890 (OP)
Apparently, the Norks are using a KDE variant.

>>63928876
>US military
>cutting edge
If you only knew how bad things really are

>>63928982
>the Norks are using a KDE variant
the newer one, Red Star OS 4, is based on Kubuntu
they use that throughout their military

the actual funny thing is that their military issue PCs have the watermarking of USB drives
means, they worry about soldiers watching "illegal" k-dramas kek

though the whole distro is a mess
they botched everything network related
and their browser, Naenara, has sooo many unpatched known security issues, it's laughable
all they'd have to do is merge in the firefox updates, but for whatever reason they don't
and their default "security" measure to prevent tinkering is rebooting

>>63929304
>they botched everything network related
they need Jesus and TempleOS.

>>63929304
>they botched everything network related
to be fair that is very easy to fuck up on a grand scale.

>>63929304
the funniest part, it's not like the norks are not trying
they have somewhere around 30-100 (actual reports on that number are all a few years old though, so take with grain of salt) full time staff working on, what is essentially just a customized distro like every retard on /g/ runs
just less up to date and with more security issues...

>>63926890 (OP)
because the military is run by geriatric fucktard boomers
its literally whatever the fuck paid for the most hookers to show up at the 3 star generals hotel
they wouldnt fucking see the ITAR violations if you had the bangledeshi/singaporan outsourced code writer physically walk up to them and Tase them with the chinese made transformer thats in the bullshit $500k a piece gadget they wasted taxpayer money on
there is absolutely no standardization or architecture/machine standard or documentation/legacy requirements for tech in government or military, not if you compared it to other controlled items like a Radio or a weapon system, virtually any startup can shove the most pedantic bullshit to the pentagon for adoption, everything is held together with string or compartmentalized and separated as much as possible so they dont fuck up everything

>>63928876
no one tell him what the nukes ran on for 60 years

>>63929421
>no standardization or architecture/machine standard
Microsegmentation!

>>63929429
Read that post again. I know about the yuge floppies.

I refuse to believe that server2016 is anywhere in the military. That stuff is too new. i.e. 10 year old software is too up-to-date for what is standard.

>>63928143
>you can compensate with a bigger die (more transistors)
Yeah sure, but unless you want to put 2000 trivial microcontroller tier cores on that die, someone has to design and validate a more complex core.
RISC-V is far less of a mess than x86, but a high performance core's still going to want pipelining, superscalar + speculative execution, branch prediction, etc. and getting all that to work reliably is probably a lot of work.

Picrel is one of the better Chinese x86-64 cores out there. Perf somewhere on the level of an AMD Bulldozer from 2011 (so not that fast).
There's a lot of tiny implementation detail inside each box that gets refined over CPU generations; I think most RISC-V cores are just at the start of that process.

>>63926890 (OP)
Windows 666 Bill Gates Satanic Edition.

>ctrl+f INTEGRITY
>ctrl+f seL4
>0 hits
???

>>63929432
>cant figure out why your Satlink targeting system doesnt work because the shitty startup that made it went defunct 5 years ago when the QE^∞ money faucet was turned off and they left no documentation, troubleshooting or instruction sets for doing something as simple as changing satellite lists because it wasnt required

I saw some linux distro on a UK secure terminal but i cant fucking remember what it was called.

>>63928143
>>63929451
Performance is a function of the microarchitecture, not the ISA. Remember that the current generation of high end server processors from Intel and AMD still use the x86-64 ISA from 2005, and are many orders of magnitude faster than twenty year old processors, even when not using any new instruction set extensions that were added since then. There aren't yet any high performance RISC-V microarchitectures, but they'll come in time.

>>63929504
>Performance is a function of the microarchitecture, not the ISA.
Did I imply otherwise? I was saying exactly that high-performance RISC-V cores are very much in the early stages of their development.
The ISA is simple enough that a student can design a trivial implementation, which is nice, but yes, getting high perf is going to take a bit more microarchitecture work than that.

>>63929496
>changing satellite lists
kek


Just dick around the comnand line, I'm sure it will be something common sense.

>>63929577
Instructions unclear, spent $30k on contractors.

>>63926890 (OP)
Linux is only free if your time is worthless.

>>63929472
ain't that just selinux

>>63926890 (OP)
Probably either linux or windows xp/7/10

>>63926890 (OP)
DOS and Windows 3.0
t. knower

>>63927943
They also don't want to spend a year working on something that takes less than a week.

>>63929342
>>63929304
Don't forget the sketchy AF .kcmsf files.

>>63929328
>they need Jesus and TempleOS.
TempleOS would probably be a decent basis for a military-specific OS.

>>63930174
>No networking
What's the point?

>>63929873
Yeah, that's the other part.
I'm sure they'll find a way to make the project take at least a year anyway.

>>63929696
SELinux is a set of permissions-control extensions for the Linux kernel. seL4 is a formally verified implementation of the L4 Microkernel for real-time operating systems. They share nothing in common, although I suppose you could run Genode OS on top of seL4 for POSIX compatibility that would allow you to run some "Linux software" the same way that the BSDs, Mac OS, Solaris, z/OS, and other POSIX-compatible operating systems can.

>>63926890 (OP)
microshit fucking windows my brother
t. had to ship avionics debug computers to the US marines and the australian army and follow US DOD security certification for windows.


they do ahve certificates for SUSE and UBUNTU so someone must be using them maybe servers

>>63929472
>INTEGRITY

i was gonna bring it up but forgot what it was called. I stumbled across it for the first time when i was reading about rtos.

>>63926924
very nice

here in my country is an insane hodgepodge of modern windows, old windows, azure, linux on azure, linux on real hw, random projects on debian, rhel, missile launchers running off raspberry pis, etc. pretty sure there's still some old unix machines around too from the 80's or 90s. it's insane.

>South American military IT

>>63929600
only 30k? add a couple zeros to that. the ECP is written for 2 additional full time system administrators and 2 SREs, salaries alone are going to cost 1 million, and Boeing needs to take its 200% profit margins too.

Israeli 30 mm turrets on our Pandurs run Windows XP.
t. Czech

>>63926890 (OP)
it's all Red Hat.
https://www.redhat.com/en/solutions/public-sector?pfe-lrwoz2muo=defense
>With 100% U.S. executive departments relying on Red Hat, we provide trusted cloud, virtualization, storage, and platform solutions that empower federal, state, local, and academic programs with flexibility and collaboration.
More details:
https://www.redhat.com/en/solutions/public-sector/dod

>>63930600
>missile launchers running off raspberry pis
holy kek
i'd pay to see that
probably didn't even bother to make a fitting PCB and just used off-the-self / dev boards

but the rest is kinda understandable for any country with small(ish) budget and no domestic OS development
you'll just take whatever is available

>>63928325
Asus Tufbooks claim to be able to do these things, windows 11, standard hardening and security. It's about the same as Linux and MacOS but with a far better AV

>>63926890 (OP)
The computers are running Windows, the Bradley Fighting Vehicle runs Red Hat Enterprise Linux with systemd
>t. runs Debian and recognized the boot screen

>>63928982
>KDE variant
KDE isn't an OS, fag. KDE is a Desktop Environment, it runs on multiple distros (Ubuntu, Debian, Arch, Gentoo, etc.)

>>63930180
There's modifications available for TempleOS that enable networking, some Anon was posting from TempleOS once

>>63932717
>Bradley boot screen

How long is the boot time on a Bradley?