Ian Murdock founder of the Debian project dead at 42

- Ian Murdock, the founder of the Debian project is dead. The cause of death has not yet been announced but before his death he had a confrontation with police. He was just 42 years old.

Murdock created the Debian project while he was still a student of computer science at Purdue University. Murdock earned a bachelor degree in computer science there back in 1996. Debian was one of the earliest Linux distributions. Debian is still regarded as one of the most successful open-source projects. At present more than 1,000 people still are involved in the Debian project.

The Debian project name came from the first name of Murdock's girlfriend Debra and his own first name, Ian. Debian was first announced back in 1993 but the first stable release did not happen until 1996. and was called the Debian Linux release. Debian has access to a huge repository of software packages over 43,000 in all. Murdock contributed to the the tech community as CTO of the Linux Foundation, as a senior leader at Sun Microsystems, and as Vice-President of Platforms at Exact Target, now part of Salesforce.

A tribute to Murdock was posted by Docker.

We consider ourselves lucky to have known Ian and worked with him. He amazed everyone whom he worked with for the depth of his thinking, passion and experience. He was truly brilliant and an inspiration to many of us; his death is a loss to all whom he has known and touched.There is also a remembrance posting on Debian.

The circumstances of his death are quite mysterious. If Murdock had more visibility as a celebrity, the press would be all over the story. According to Zdnet, the San Francisco Police Department had nothing to say of Murdock's death for now. A copy of what was supposedly his arrest record was all but blank. However, sources said to be close to the department said the police responded to reports that Murdock was trying to break into a home at about 11:30 p.m. on Saturday, December 26. Murdock was said to be drunk and resisted arrest. He was ticketed for two counts of assault and another for obstruction of an officer. He received an abrasion on his forehead during the arrest and was taken to a hospital. Apparently he was again arrested for knocking on the door of a neighbor at 2:40 a.m. It was not clear that this was the same door. He was arrested and taken to San Francisco county jail. On Sunday afternoon he was released after paying $25,000 for a bail bond.

The next day all sorts of erratic tweets appeared on Murdock's Twitter account. One read: "i'm committing suicide tonight.. do not intervene as i have many stories to tell and do not want them to die with me." Some people thought his Twitter account had been hacked. His Twitter account is now deleted but among thetweets were accusations:"the police here beat me up for knowing [probably an auto-correct for "knocking"] on my neighbor's door.. they sent me to the hospital." The tweets claimed the police beat him twice:"they beat the shit out of me twice, then charged me $25,000 to get out of jail for battery against THEM.(1/2) The rest of my life will be devoted to fighting against police abuse.. I'm white, I made $1.4 million last year, (2/2) They are uneducated, bitter, and and only interested in power for its own sake. Contact meimurdock@imurdock.com if you can help. -ian"Murdock also claimed the police followed him home when he left the courthouse and assaulted him again. He went on: "I'm not committing suicide today. I'll write this all up first, so the police brutality ENDEMIC in this so call free country will be known. Maybe my suicide at this, you now, a successful business man, not a N****R, will finally bring some attention to this very serious issue." His final tweet was: "I am a white male, make a lot money, pay a lot of money in taxes, and yet their abuse is equally doned out. DO NOT CROSS THEM!?" It would seem that Murdock died the same night on Monday December 28th.

The Wikipedia entry on Murdock says:Details surrounding his death have not been released; As of 1 January 2016 there is no public record of the cause of death,[13] but some have pointed to the last tweets from Murdock's account[14], where he announced he'd commit suicide and reported to having an altercation with police, shortly after which he was found dead.[15]The police confirmed the earlier altercation in which they claim Murdock was "belligerent, possibly drunk and argumentative with officers." They claim that when he was put in a squad car he banged his head on the metal separator and had to be taken to a hospital for treatment and then was released. Three hours later the police claim Murdock was back knocking on the same door and so they arrested him. Whatever happened, it is surprising that there is little media coverage so far.

Microsoft making it more and more difficult to boot Linux

There are numerous computer operating systems (OS) other than the various versions of Windows and this includes well over 100 distributions of Linux-based systems.

Wikipedia gives a short history of Linux. A list of some of the more popular versions for 2015 together with their relative virtues can be found here.

Until the development of Windows 8, it was relatively simple to install Linux distributions from a DVD or from a USB stick on computers that allow booting from a USB stick. I use Lili USB creator to create mine but there are several other free creators. The instructions are easy to follow. Once you have your USB stick or DVD with the Linux installer and distribution on it, you simply use it to boot up your computer into the Linux OS.

To do this it used to be easy before Windows 8. You simply went into your BIOS settings by pressing a designated key when booting. Often what key to press is shown during the bootup process. You can then change the boot order so that the computer will boot from the USB stick or DVD. There will be a list of choices. Some computers will not have the USB alternative. You then restart your computer and it will boot into Linux. You have the choice of just running Linux from the DVD or USB-stick, installing Linux alongside Windows (dual boot) or wiping out your Windows and installing just Linux. Newer distributions often also allow you to run Linux from within Windows.The installer has a program that will help you partition your hard drive but this can also be done within Windows 10 and perhaps earlier versions. A good account of how to install Linux in a dual boot system can be found here.

With the advent of Windows 8.0 and 8.1 and Windows 10, the traditional BIOS sytem was changed to a UEFI system. However, you could still access the UEFI settings so that you could set them to boot from your DVD or USB stick. Accessing the UEFI settings is a bit more difficult than with the earlier or legacy BIOS setttings but there are at least different ways of doing it Three ways are described here. However, since Windows 8 there is another problem, UEFI Secure Boot.

UEFI Secure Boot is described a follows: When you boot a new Windows 8 PC, the Secure Boot feature in the UEFI firmware checks the operating system loader and its drivers to ensure they’re signed by an approved digital signature. On Windows PCs, the UEFI Secure Boot feature generally checks to see if the low level software is signed by Microsoft or the computer’s manufacturer. This prevents low-level malware like rootkits from interfering with the boot process.But the same feature that blocks rootkits will also block other software, like Linux boot loaders.This created a huge problem for those who wanted to install a dual boot system or just try out Linux from a DVD or USBstick. The system refused to boot because there was no Microsoft or other approved signature.

However, there was a work-around to this problem. There was a switch within the boot settings to turn Secure Boot off or on. Turning it off allowed Linux users to boot the system into Linux. Microsoft required that Windows 8 have this switch. However, in Windows 10, Microsoft had a surprise. Having the switch became optional: Manufacturers will be able to enable UEFI Secure Boot without giving you a manual kill switch, as they have to do with Windows 8 systems. If that happens, you’ll only be able to boot Microsoft-approved operating systems on these locked-down PCs. Microsoft is turning the Secure Boot screws tighter, and Linux users are right to be concerned—but the issue is more complicated (and probably less disastrous) than it seems at first blush.

There are still some Linux systems that are able to boot even though UEFI Secure Boot is turned on, including popular versions such as Ubuntu, since they have an approved signature. However, many versions will not.

I tried booting Linux Mint from a bootable USBstick with my HP Pavilion P6 series computer running Windows 10. It failed to boot. I checked to see if there is a toggle switch to turn off Security Boot. There was not. I then went to my Gateway SX2185, also running Windows 10, and found it had the toggle switch and I turned off Secure Boot. I was able to run Linux Mint with no problems. I then created a bootable USBstick for Ubuntu 14.04.3. I tried to boot from it on the Pavilion. It works fine. Microsoft has not stopped users from trying Linux or creating dual boots. It has just made it more difficult so that less people will be bothered. Readers could carry out a little experiment. Go to your local computer store and ask them which of their computers have switches to enable or disable UEFI Security Boot. It would be interesting to see how many sales people know what you are talking about.