So what is the state of the Hurd? Is it vaporware, like Duke Nukem Forever? Fortunately not: the code exists, there is still work going on (for instance as part of Google Summer of Code), and there are even some relatively functional Hurd distributions. Let's look first at the code and the current architecture, and then at the Hurd distributions.

Interested in coding on Tor and getting paid for it by Google? If you are a student, Tor project has good news for you: it has been accepted as a mentoring organization for Google Summer of Code 2010 together with The Electronic Frontier Foundation!

A month of the Hurd: Arch Hurd, updated Debian GNU/Hurd QEMU image, and GSoC students.

"A Dutch university has landed a European Research Council grant to continue work on a Unix-type operating system that aims to be more reliable and secure than GNU/Linux or Microsoft Windows..." -- see also The GNU Hurd project

«Hurd having been in development for so long, but still not production-ready; and with Linux as a mature free kernel being firmly established as the de-facto standard kernel for the GNU system -- people often wonder: why haven't developers abandoned the Hurd long ago?

"Hello,

it has been more than three years since the last "Bits from the Debian GNU/Hurd porters", high time for an update on the port:

* Snapshot releases
* Base and toolchain status
* Xen support
* Autobuilder availability and archive coverage improved
* Developer machine
* Summer of Code 2008
* Still no debian-installer
..."

"David Chisnall takes a look at the GNU Project's infamous HURD kernel, exploring some of the features that make it unique and some that have found their way into other systems. [...] Even in its current state, HURD exists to prove a point: It’s possible to have a complete and usable system running nothing other than GNU code." -- http://www.informit.com/articles/printerfriendly.aspx?p=1180992

It's time for another round of Google's Summer of Code (SoC). The SoC is an effort that first started in 2005 as an effort to get students involved in open source code development. Google provides a stipend to the student and to the mentoring organization that helps the student.

Kai Blin this week sent the application for this year's Summer of Code.

"GNU Hurd (usually referred to as the Hurd) is a free software computer operating system kernel, released under the GNU General Public License. It has been under development since 1990 by the GNU Project of the Free Software Foundation. It consists of a set of servers (or daemons, in Unix terminology) that work on top of a microkernel; together they form the kernel of GNU. The Hurd aims to surpass Unix kernels in functionality, security, and stability, while remaining largely compatible with them..."