Status of the Linux Standard Base

Having closed the formal public review process for the
latest Linux
Standard Base — a working group effort of the Free
Standards Group aimed at driving and promoting standards
to increase Linux compatibility for ISVs — LSB 2.0 is set to be
released soon, according to Jim Zemlin, named FSG director last
May.

Zemlin said LSB 2.0 features a revision of the core
specification to support modules that are built on the foundation of
the core LSB.

“This will accommodate future growth as Linux
standards for different vertical markets, for example, are developed
as extensions to the core LSB,” he said.

Other changes in the upcoming LSB release include the
introduction of an Application Binary Interface (ABI) for C++,
something long-awaited by the industry, said Zemlin, former vice
president of marketing for Covalent and co-founder of enterprise
application service provider Corio.

LSB 2.0 also incorporates updates to many of the
specifications and implementations underlying the LSB, such as the
Single Unix Specification (SUS), according to Zemlin.

He also highlighted support for new architectures in LSB
2.0, including PPC64 and AMD64. Other CPU architectures supported by
LSB 2.0 include IA32 and IA64 architectures, as well as PPC32, S390
and S390X.

“In addition to providing a written specification, LSB
2.0 includes a wide range of tools for Linux, such as test suites, a
development environment, a sample implementation, and developer
documentation,” Zemlin said.

Zemlin, who is working with ISVs to encourage and inquire
about LSB compliance, said FSG members such as IBM, HP, and Red Hat
have all supported the LSB efforts to date.

“Right now, ISVs spend considerable time and resources
rewriting and retesting applications to make sure their products run
on each version of Linux that their customers might be using,”
Zemlin said. “The LSB allows customers to build applications to
the LSB specification and be confident that their products will run
with all LSB-compliant systems.”