Interview with TAdviser: Alexey Novodvorsky, "Basalt ACT" - about Linux in the "post-Intelian" era

Alexey Novodvorsky: Of course she did! There was a real demand for domestic products. I just want to clarify: the term "import substitution" is not entirely correct. The essence of the state program is not to replace imported software and equipment with Russian ones, but to ensure the country's technological independence in the field of IT. The Sisif repository, software development infrastructure and Alt operating systems developed by Bazalt ACT are a serious contribution to the construction of a technologically independent digital platform.

Alexey Novodvorsky: You can talk about the differences in the Alt family from the operating systems of other companies developing OS based on Linux for a long time. I note two key ones: these are the only operating systems in the world that support the maximum number of Russian and foreign hardware platforms and are developing on the basis of the domestic Sisyphus repository, a repository of free software in Russian jurisdiction.

Alexey Novodvorsky: At the end of 2020, the Sisyphus project^[1] celebrated its twentieth anniversary. It is developed by the ALT Linux Team, a voluntary non-profit association of developers. These people work in different organizations, in different countries, but communicate mainly in Russian. ALT Linux Team also includes many developers of Basalt ACT.

The repository combines the repository of source software packages of free software (today there are more than 23 thousand) and the original development infrastructure. I want to emphasize that the repository is completely open: it contains mainly components with free code. Any programmer can use software packages and a set of convenient modern tools of the repository assembly environment. This is a principle that we have been following for all 20 years.

Alexey Novodvorsky: The bank of software packages is formed by all members of the ALT Linux Team. They include in the repository the development of Russian and international projects of the ACT. Each member of the ALT Linux Team team is the maintainer of one or more software packages. Maintainers monitor the regular updating of packages, are responsible for their operability, interact with their development projects - international or Russian. With these projects, we have a bidirectional technology transfer: we transfer our achievements to them and receive open code of recent versions of the software. On the principle of free code exchange, the entire sphere of free software is built. Complex software products - for example, operating systems - are multi-component platforms. Their creation and development require enormous resources - human, temporary, financial. The international community of ACT developers distributes this load, and thus we all significantly save resources and quickly release new versions of products. Free software components are used today by almost all developers - from small firms to global giants such as Google and Microsoft.

Many members of the ALT Linux Team participate in international ACT projects as development managers. This allows you to influence the development of "primary" software products, to include patches prepared by domestic specialists.

ALT Linux Team members are also developing a development infrastructure. The main tools were created by the specialists of Basalt ACT. For example, a hasher for securely and reproducibly assembling packages in a "clean" sandbox environment, a gear for assembling packages from the versioning tree, and others. All of these tools are stored in the repository and are available to all users.

Alexey Novodvorsky: Initially, we created the repository as a working environment for operating system developers. Today, it creates not only operating systems, but also other diverse software.

About once every two years, Basalt ACT releases a new version of the Alt operating systems. To develop them, we are forming a platform - a stable branch of the Sisyphus repository, which changes quite conservatively. All components of the platform are tested for compatibility, which guarantees reliable operation of end-products. The current version of our OS is based on the Ninth Platform.

And the repository continues to develop further: updated software packages and experimental developments appear in it daily.

Alexey Novodvorsky: Of course, we could, like all other colleagues in the Linux kernel operating system market, develop our products based on foreign repositories. But we wanted to create a repository, the development of which we manage ourselves. This provides an opportunity to address what we consider a priority. For example, to implement directly in the repository support for a wide range of processor architectures: Russian, the most popular foreign, open international platforms. Accordingly, we operate Alt operating systems on a wide range of hardware platforms.

Alexey Novodvorsky: Indeed, supporting different hardware platforms is a matter of our professional pride. We like to experiment with different platforms. I like it when computers with processors of different architectures come to life when installing an operating system from the Alt family on them and work steadily. But, of course, this work is not an experiment for the sake of an experiment. The benefits for consumers are obvious: they have the freedom to choose servers and workstations. Organizations can build the hardware part of a digital infrastructure on one or more hardware platforms with the required technical characteristics, price and cost of operation. In addition, Russian developments in supporting domestic processors transferred to international projects provide the prospect of Russian computers entering the world market.

Alexey Novodvorsky: The main argument in favor of including a particular platform in the development is consumer interest in it. We try to ensure that our operating systems run on computers with processors of all the most popular or promising architectures. Now Sisyphus has implemented support for twelve processor architectures. Among them are e2k and e2kv4 ("Elbrus"), MIPS32 ("Baikal-T1"), POWER (YADRO Power 8 and 9), ARM64 ("Baikal-M," Huawei Intel Kunpeng, ThunderX and others), ARM64 (Elv02) and other processors. RISC_V64 architecture repository is developing.

Alexey Novodvorsky: Now - yes. It's a historical legacy. With the x86 platform, which is built on 32 and 64-bit Intel processors, we work from time immemorial. And we even maintain support for 32-bit Intel processors: for us, this is a very small overhead, and there are still those who want to work for them. Therefore, there is no reason to sharply throw this platform, as Red Hat, for example, did.

Until recently, x86 dominated, but now the situation has changed: the world has entered the "post-Intelian" era. Quite a lot of computing and everyone smartphones today works on architecture processors. ARM It's pretty specific. On ARMv8 (it is also called ARM64 or AArch64), different chips are built that run under the OS on different kernels Linux. Our experts bring them into a single core. This is a big and difficult work, thanks to which the Alt OS is compatible with technology on different chips. For example, these are computers with Russian processors Baikal-M, powerful 1 the Chinese servers Huawei Taishan and TaiShan 2 with Kunpeng, the American ThunderX processors. A desktop based on Kunpeng has already been announced, but for well-known reasons it has not yet entered the series. However, we managed to get a prototype of this desktop. Our ARM specialist tested it in his work and said: "All right, this is my computer. I will not give it to anyone! "

Other developers also ordered such computers. They differ, first of all, in a high degree of standardization, which many ARMs do not yet have, and meet the requirements of ARM SystemReady - one of the standards that electronics manufacturers on ARM processors must adhere to. You can, for example, install any video card on such a computer. Like Nvidia - put Nvidia, like AMD - put AMD. This is a valuable innovation. If you used to deal with ARM, then you know that if there was a Mali video card - everything, there was nothing to get away from it.

We connected the ARMv8 platform to the number of main ones relatively recently, in the early summer of 2020. I want to say a big thank you to Huawei: the Taishan-1 server is the only quite powerful server I know that is built on honest ARMv8. In the sense that he understands both the 32-bit command system and the 64-bit, which other servers do not have.

On existing Baikal-M boards from Baikal Electronics, our product works. Baikal-M and its modifications, Baikal-S is our target platform, work with it has been going on since 2003. I do not think that in Russia there are other companies that are engaged in ARM's for the same time. I note that we provided support for Russian Baikal-T processors built on the MIPSEL platform

Of course, let's not forget that the world uses many devices on 32-bit ARMv7 processors. This platform is used mainly by developers of embedded devices, less often - tablets or thin customers. For manufacturers of embedded devices, it is important that their iron works. Therefore, everyone creates their own firmware and basic cores for their devices. But we managed to navigate this diversity. At first, they ensured the compatibility of Alta with the Mcom02 board of the Russian company ELVIS, then they learned to work as a board of the Saratov company SKiT. And ready to work with other ARMv7 processors.

And finally, Alt runs on Raspberry Pi3 single-board computers with ARM64 processors.

Alexey Novodvorsky: Elbrus "confidently gaining popularity. The e2k architecture on which these processors are built was developed by engineers of the Russian company MCST. Alt OS version 9 runs on Elbrus servers and workstations with e2k3 and e2kv4 processors. The OS interacts with these processors in native code to optimize processor performance.

Elbrus computers on e2k3 processors use many organizations. Models 401 (single-processor workstation) and 404 (four-processor server) are available, but are practically not produced - this is the previous generation of Elbrus.

Models 801, 802, 804 as well as 101 are built on the current e2kv4 platform. They run on processors with an extended instruction system.

I note that Elbrus computers under the control of Alt OS provide real technological independence of the digital infrastructure, since both the processor architecture and system software are developed in Russia. And our developers continue to work: they have already prepared images of the Alt OS for the latest e2kv5 processors.

Alexey Novodvorsky: Many people love and hope that the POWER platform will develop in Russia. Today, for example, domestic Yadro servers are built on it. We have installed POWER8 and POWER9 on our certified Alt 8 SP Server OS. This is an excellent solution for critical information infrastructure - it requires very powerful servers.

Alexey Novodvorsky: Yes, lagging behind certified versions is a common problem for all software companies. It, as you correctly noticed, is associated with a lot of organizational work on the preparation and completion of the certification process, on interaction with the test laboratory and FSTEC. But we have already managed to align our certified OS line with the general purpose product line. Bazalt ACT and IVC, the rights holders of the Russian protected operating system Alt 8 SP, have just announced that this OS of the ninth version has successfully passed the inspection control of the FSTEC of Russia. This is the only line of protected operating systems in the country that runs on seven hardware platforms. Three of them were added for the first time.

The emergence of such an OS is especially important for organizations that own a critical information infrastructure (CII). They need a software product that provides the ability to create a trusted digital environment for working with confidential information and personal data. With the advent of the ninth version of Alt 8 JV, KII owners will be able to install operating systems of the same family on any computers that work in a digital environment - from "light" workstations to powerful servers. If an organization uses specialized operating systems from different developers for each device class, it inevitably receives problems "at the joints." Can you imagine what benefits come from operating systems of the same family, which are guaranteed to work smoothly in one hundred percent of cases?

Alt 8 SP "of the ninth version was created on the basis of the Ninth Platform - a stable branch of the Sisif repository. Now all the operating systems of the Alt family are developing on the basis of the Ninth Platform. This enables us to maximize the benefits of the new repository platform, synchronize development, and reduce development costs. Package assemblies for each of the hardware platforms will be synchronously updated, which allows you to create software solutions with common properties for different hardware architectures. And, as always, all sources are available.

Alexey Novodvorsky: Yes. We do not basically close our code. Once we realized that we have a lot of our ideas, and therefore our software products are independent, they will never be clones of foreign software. Or, as they say now, derivatives. And our Alt OS could not become a derivative. Because of this, we are faced with some difficult tasks, including in terms of labor intensity, but we are quite successful in solving them.

Alexey Novodvorsky: Here, preliminary training is very important. We, together with colleagues from IVC and ISP RAS, have developed and are developing methods, tools and organizational approaches for safe development. They identify the potential vulnerabilities of the products we create. In 2020, we moved the methods of analyzing and testing software code to a qualitatively new level, which developers around the world begin to practice. For each product, our experts compile an individual map of the surface of attacks, noting potentially dangerous areas on it. Then, developers comprehensively investigate each of the areas with the help of a whole set of different tools for static and dynamic analysis of program code. We are grateful to colleagues from the Phobos-NT STC, who clearly set the task of inspecting the new version of the Alt 8 joint venture and helped implement it in a short time.

Alexey Novodvorsky: I express my gratitude to the FSTEC of Russia: the current leadership of the department decided that vendors of certified products are obliged to correct current vulnerabilities and immediately post fixes, and users are obliged to install them. The product certificate action is retained. Previously, the vendor did not have the right to include a service pack in the certified OS without re-inspection, and the user was not obliged to install it.

Alexey Novodvorsky: Naturally, we report this, and FSTEC can check the changes made at any time. There are, of course, elements of trust - after all, not many companies have appropriate licenses and certificates. But the final check is under inspection.

Alexey Novodvorsky: We asked this question almost immediately when we decided to develop Sisif for different hardware platforms. And they gradually managed to organize work so that by default they could perform simultaneous, synchronous assembly of software products for most hardware platforms. And if the OS is not intended for assembly on some platform, then the task says: "For all platforms, except for such and such." That is, we a priori excluded the approach in which we release the product for Intel today, tomorrow - for ARMv8, and the day after tomorrow - for Power.

We can produce products synchronously. Yes, organizationally and technologically this is difficult. But economical. Alta developers build packages for all architectures at the same time. Moreover, directly - on processors of this architecture, without cross-compilation. Thus, we significantly reduce the risk of abnormal situations during the operation of the software by consumers.

Alexey Novodvorsky: Elbrus processors run servers, workstations, and storage systems. Workstation performance is high and servers are powerful enough to be used in data centers. Elbrus has a great advantage: a very fast and good emulator of Intelian architecture. You can install both domestic applications, both Intel and Windows applications on a Russian computer. The unfortunate lack of servers - the lack of hardware virtualization - developers promise to eliminate in the next year and a half.

Today, Elbrus computers are acquired mainly by organizations that own critical information infrastructure. They need to switch to domestic equipment and software in a short time, so the demand for Elbrus will grow noticeably in the coming years. But its dynamics are restrained by one feature: the source codes of the processor are not open, they can be obtained, like the processor itself, only under a non-disclosure agreement (NDA). This reduces sales, and therefore, the circulation of equipment. Today, computers on these Russian processors are sold only to Russian legal entities concluding an NDA agreement, they cannot be supplied abroad.

Alexey Novodvorsky: Yeah, it's a serious problem. Until the deliveries of Elbrus became massive, the price of them remains high. To reduce the costs of the IT infrastructure built on Elbrus, Bazalt ACT developed the Gorynych technology. This is the world's first technology for creating a multiseat workstation using a domestic hardware architecture. Up to six users can work on one computer with the Russian Elbrus-8C processor running the Alt OS. At the same time, all workplaces are autonomous. To organize each workplace, it is enough to simply connect a monitor, keyboard and mouse to the computer, individual peripherals are provided: audio system, USB ports, etc. If necessary, you can expand multi-monitor workplaces on Gorynych. For example, two employees will use three monitors. Gorynych technology is useful for equipping jobs for employees who do similar work. For example, in the design department, in accounting, in the personnel management service, in computer classes and laboratories in universities, schools and training centers.

Alexey Novodvorsky: The ARM platform has become universal: these processors have servers, smartphones, tablets, embedded devices, thin clients, desktops.

It is unnecessary to talk about the prevalence of smartphones. The popularity of single-board computers on the ARMv7 platform is rapidly growing. Raspberry Pi leads here, Rockchip, Orange Pi and Allwinner devices are somewhat less common. These computers have good performance, low heat dissipation and low price, their design allows you to study the structure of the computer, assemble it from miniature parts. Therefore, they are readily purchased for home use and equipment of educational institutions. For example, there are virtually no other computers in African schools. In the countries of Europe and America, they also occupy a noticeable market share. In Russia, single-payers have not yet received widespread recognition, but this is a matter of time.

As for desktop computers, there are practically no full desktops on ARM in Russia now. The main share of the workstation fleet belongs to computers on Intel processors. But in the foreseeable future, the situation may change: after all, domestic processors on the x86 platform do not exist, and on the ARM platform they are.

Processor developers can purchase a license for ARM, which allows, among other things, the ability to modify the architecture. Baikal Electronics has such a license. She plans to produce ARM desktops on Baikal-M processors, which can be a real alternative to workstations on the Intel platform.

And finally, the servers. ARMv8 servers are highly competitive with x86 servers in terms of performance. Therefore, the ARMv8 platform developers software based on the Linux kernel consider the same target as the x86 platform. Almost all software that is created for Intel, with a few exceptions, is also assembled for ARMv8. We have acquired powerful ARMv8 servers for native assembly of our software products. This approach provides an additional guarantee of our software operability, since any cross-assembly (assembly of software intended for one hardware platform, on computers of another platform) is slower and fraught with a large number of errors.

Alexey Novodvorsky: It depends on a lot of factors. The global market will certainly respond to Apple's transition to the ARM64. In our country, the change in market share largely depends on preferences for domestic iron and stimulation of software development for domestic platforms. Many questions arise: where the equipment will be produced, how quickly it is possible to establish the production of components, etc. Therefore, it is difficult to give an accurate forecast. But! The Alt OS line already provides the user with a real choice of computing equipment on different hardware platforms. It does not matter what platform your server, thin client, workstations will be on - for all this equipment there is a single line of operating systems that are synchronously updated. All of our products, including certified products, include a set of group policy management programs. These programs allow the IT infrastructure running the Alt OS to interact with the legacy IT infrastructure running MS Active Directory. Organizations get the opportunity to transfer the already created digital infrastructure to domestic solutions in stages, without a large one-time financial burden.

Alexey Novodvorsky: This is an unfortunate misconception! Free software is not synonymous with free software. The ACT is distributed under the control of various free licenses, which regulate, among other things, the possibility of its use in commercial products. For example, the BSD license (Berkeley University Software License) allows you to purchase source code software, modify it and release your derivative product under any free or proprietary license. Including - to distribute it on a commercial basis. For example, BSD software is used in Microsoft products . Similar components are included in our software products. Since 2005, Alt operating systems have been issued under an open license, it is sometimes called "wrapping." It records that the OS distribution is not a program, but a collection that contains a large number of components under different licenses, and describes exactly what rights to use and modify each specific component are granted to the user. It should be noted that for individuals, Alt operating systems are free. They can be freely, without registration, downloaded from the company's website GetALT.org^[2] and used for personal purposes. Representatives of legal entities can also download the OS and test for free, and then purchase the required number of licenses.

Alexey Novodvorsky: Through a partner network, very extensive. Since 2005, we have been working on the Vendros model. They came to her by trial and error. Russian manufacturers of the ACT, and the largest foreign companies - Canonical (Ubuntu), SUSE and others - went through similar mistakes. Initially, everyone had an idea: manufacturers of free software should earn mainly support for their products. But this idea was not working. As soon as the developer began to support the first, second, third level, this was inevitably followed by implementation projects and... business turns into an integrator. Such an organization of work very blurs resources. Therefore, we switched to the vendor model, which allowed us to focus all our efforts on development. We delegated not only implementation work to partners, but also support for the first-second level, leaving only the third - when it is necessary to make significant changes to the code.

Alexey Novodvorsky: "Basalt ACT" is growing in all areas. We started with a small company with a small unit in Balabanovo. Now, in addition to the Moscow office, we have a serious division in Obninsk: it employs more than thirty employees who are engaged in testing and development. We transferred the office from Balabanovo to Obninsk, since it is easier to recruit personnel here - this is a "science city" with a branch of MEPhI. About a hundred employees work in the central Moscow office. In addition, there is a division of Basalt ACT in Saratov. Its employees are engaged in development for the ARM platform: for Baikal-M processors and for Raspberry Pi.

Our Saratov specialists are conducting another promising project - the implementation of group OS policies that are compatible with Active Directory policies. Its essence is to give consumers the opportunity to uniformly manage group policies in two segments of the digital infrastructure: running the Alt OS and Windows OS. Let me remind you that Group Policies are a set of rules that configure the operating system environment.

Imagine that you need to transfer tens of thousands of jobs and hundreds of server resources to Russian software. To do this at the same time is unrealistic. A period is inevitable when two domain zones will coexist in the digital infrastructure - Alt OS and Windows OS. The distribution of the Alt OS includes Samba Active Directory, a free analogue of Microsoft Active Directory, capable of working on hundreds and thousands of computers. This has been tested by practice. Only the ability to implement unified group policies in two domain zones was not enough. Therefore, two years ago they began a free project for their implementation. Created a workable solution that is in great demand. Everyone can use it, the code is posted on GitHub^[3]. The project is constantly developing. Our specialists are doing a lot of work to expand the number and variety of policies, to develop a graphical shell of the control program.

Another important and promising direction is virtualization. The line of our certified operating systems includes basic virtualization tools: KVM, libvirt, QEMU. These tools allow you to deploy virtual systems, increasing flexibility and scalability IT of -resources. The products also include lxc container management tools, and for 64-bit architectures "also docker-ce and. Kubernetes

There is also a separate multi-platform OS "Virtualization Server." She aroused great interest among colleagues from Huawei and IBM. By using this OS, you can deploy the virtual environment on the server of the architecture that you are closer and more interested in. Moreover, virtual resources can be easily transferred from one architecture server to another, making it easier to get away from Intel.

Alexey Novodvorsky: No, Huawei did not offer to "buy" Basalt ACT - for a Chinese company, we are much more interesting as a promising partner with a significant market share in the segment of operating systems. We and our Chinese colleagues have developed a very close fruitful cooperation to ensure the compatibility of the Alt OS with Huawei processors, now we are discussing several new joint projects.

Alexey Novodvorsky: We have seriously strengthened partnerships with developers of domestic products. Every year, more and more Russian firms appear that are interested in ensuring the compatibility of their application products with the Alt family OS. We work with them very intensively and complex, since Russian organizations need software stacks to support a wide range of business processes. But, since the Alt OS is not a derivative of foreign OS, we have to conduct all the work to ensure compatibility on our own. Therefore, we spend more on the compatibility program than other Linux vendors. ARPP "Domestic Software" provides us with great support in cooperation with developers of domestic software. Basalt ACT is one of the founders of the Association. Over the years of its existence, we managed to create very successful forms of communication between developers.

Alexey Novodvorsky: You are right, five years ago there was no such intensive collaboration with manufacturers of applied Russian software. And there was no such developed ecosystem of domestic products around OS based on Linux. The joint work of manufacturers of Russian software products intensified with the introduction of sanctions, with the advent of the Unified Register of Russian Software, with the provision of preferences to domestic software.

We do not experience difficulties in building interaction with partners. When technical specialists enter the dialogue, the work immediately goes into a constructive direction, in most cases good contact is established. Therefore, I do not tire of repeating: our main capital is the high, largely unique qualifications and human qualities of our specialists, their ascetic passion for their business.

Alexey Novodvorsky: Literally before the conversation with you, I specified the data - the year 2020 was a record year for our company in implementations. We have delivered more than 110 thousand licenses of operating systems of the Alt family. For the first time, the subjects of critical information infrastructure (CII) became the most active consumers - they acquired about 70 thousand licenses. These organizations need secure software products. Therefore, it is natural that the leader in sales is a line of OS certified by the FSTEC of Russia.

As for large projects, let us note the significant difference between the supply and the project. The project of transferring a large organization to Russian decisions is not a matter of one year. Such projects are carried out in stages, and deliveries at each stage vary in volume. Basalt ACT has many such long-term large-scale projects. They are also led by State authorities medical the institutions of many regions, regions and regions of the country,,,, Pension Fund of Russia,, RUSSIAN RAILWAY,, Gazprom NGOs, Surgutneftegas Goznak airline "Russia"",,, Mechanical engineering FTS Oncology NMIC administrations,,,," Central Research Institute Emercom of Russia FSIN of Russia Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation of Aerospace Forces, "regional structures and many MINISTRY OF INTERNAL AFFAIRS RUSSIAN FEDERATION others. The largest share of supplies is to the authorities in the organization. health care Interest in domestic FAs from the sector has grown significantly. industrial

Basalt ACT "has become one of the few companies that managed to maintain sales growth in 2020, even despite the difficulties associated with the pandemic. Total sales amounted to 491.5 million rubles. We still have not had such results, and they allow us to invest in development quite seriously and in a timely manner. To a large extent, such a high sales volume was achieved thanks to the restructuring of our commercial divisions and the emergence of a strong commercial director who helped optimize work with integrators. Our team was originally made up of strong developers who can create world-class products, but not promote them to the market. Now this "weak link" has been strengthened.

Alexey Novodvorsky: Today in the segment of Russian OS there are four leading vendors: Basalt ACT, Astra Linux, RED SOFT and ROSA. There is a logical market structure in which there is a completely Russian development - the Alt OS family, as well as Debian and RedHat derivatives (clones). ROSA creates an interesting original ROSA Fresh product . This is a fully open development with a strong focus on virtualization. RusBITeh-Astra works differently: almost all their own developments are closed.

Our market colleagues at one time decided that in order to successfully develop their business, they need to create clones of foreign software. We fundamentally went the way of developing independent development. Moreover: we would rather leave this business than start producing derivatives. We have quite constructive relations with colleagues. Of course, competition is sometimes tough, but, in the end, we all understand perfectly well that we are working to achieve one common goal - the creation of a Russian software platform. There are projects where we cooperate very fruitfully. For example, together with RED SOFT and RusBITech, our company is part of the OS DAY consortium. It includes 9 IT companies and organizations, we jointly hold the annual OS DAY conference dedicated to the development of Russian operating platforms. In 2021, it will be held for the eighth time!

Alexey Novodvorsky: The increase will undoubtedly be: both for external reasons, and for internal ones, and how the development of Russian products is progressing. The more success there will be, the more active developers who interact with international projects for the development of the ACT. Technology transfer is the principle of the ALT Linux Team. RusBITeh, for example, prefers to acquire small firms that develop individual components - including those that are not in Debian and other foreign repositories - to integrate these developments. Basalt ACT prefers to recruit talented developers and develop free projects - its own and international. But as we develop a free open source project, we need to "run fast" to keep our products competitive. I always said that free development is about "running fast." I hope we succeed.

Alexey Novodvorsky: Thank you.