From norman at oclsc.org  Sun Oct  1 01:17:28 2017
From: norman at oclsc.org (Norman Wilson)
Date: Sat, 30 Sep 2017 11:17:28 -0400
Subject: [TUHS] UNIX of choice these days?
Message-ID: <1506784652.28254.for-standards-violators@oclsc.org>

Warner Losh:

  It's an abundance of caution thing. This code had security problems in the
  past, we're not 100% sure that we've killed all the issues, though we
  believe we have.

====

And if there isn't anyone who's actively interested in the
code, willing to dig in to clean it up and make security
issues less likely, deal with multiprocessing matters, and
so on, that's a perfectly reasonable stance.

I think it's an unfortunate result, and I wonder how much
of it comes from a cultural view that sysctl >> /proc.
(Recall how Ken and Dennis originally resisted Doug's push
for pipelines and filters, because--as Dennis once put it
in a talk--it just wasn't the way programs worked?)

But as someone who is sometimes credited with removing
more code than he wrote while working on the latter-day
Research kernel, it's hard for me to argue with the principle.
A lot of the code I tossed out was complicated stuff that
was barely used if used at all, and that nobody was willing
to step up to volunteer to maintain.

Norman Wilson
Toronto ON


From mparson at bl.org  Sun Oct  1 01:40:10 2017
From: mparson at bl.org (Michael Parson)
Date: Sat, 30 Sep 2017 10:40:10 -0500 (CDT)
Subject: [TUHS] Favorite UNIX
In-Reply-To: <CAK7dMtBjgVeoEraveDDC1rhG+Aors_KAWeoy6HKpCV_vy9EdmQ@mail.gmail.com>
References: <CAK7dMtBjgVeoEraveDDC1rhG+Aors_KAWeoy6HKpCV_vy9EdmQ@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <alpine.NEB.2.20.1709301021060.28681@neener.bl.org>

On Thu, 28 Sep 2017, Kevin Bowling wrote:
> What is your favorite UNIX.  Three possible categories, choose one or more:
> 1) Free
> 2) Forced to use a commercial platform.  I guess that could include
> macOS and z/OS with some vivid imagination, maybe even NT.
> 3) Historical

Compared to many here, I'm barely a beginner, I'm in my 40s, got my
intorduction to Unix in the early 90s with SunOS 4.something while in
college.

1) Free:
I was then introduced to Linux by a friend of mine, back in the
pre-Slackware days even, some 0.9x kernel.  The first kernel I compiled
myself was 0.96.

Like Larry said, Linux is mostly what I use as my desktop Linux.  It
works well enough on my Thinkpad.  I run NetBSD on my VPS for bl.org,
and I do prefer working in NetBSD, just that trying to get 'Desktop'
like work done on it is harder, as these days, it's all developed on
Linux and ported to others.

2) Commercial platform
In the 90s, it was SunOS 4, though I actually started to like working
in Solaris around 2.5.1.  It started to stabilize and the jobs I was
working at started buying hardware that would run it well.  (Solaris
2.4 on SS1 and SS2 was not fun).  I've not had a lot of experience with
other commercial offerings.  While I was with IBM, I was exposed to AIX
(of course), other jobs had HP/UX, and I even logged into an IRIX box
once, though that was in a DC across the country from me and was used as
a fileserver.

Since Oracle bought Sun, I've given up on Solaris, which really doesn't
leave many options for Commercial Unixy platforms.  I do use an iMac at
home and a MacBook Pro for work, but even there, I spend most of my time
in xterms spawned form XQuartz logged into remote Linux systems.

3) Historical
I like playing with historical systems.  I've recently started playing
with Amiga UNIX (Commodore's port of SysVr4 to 68030) under FS-UAE.
Maybe someday I'll get it running on the Amiga 3000 that is currently
gathering dust.  I also have a Mac Quardra 950 out in the garage that
some day I want to get A/UX running on.  Then there is the HP 9000
715/80 and the RISC NextSTEP media waiting for some round tuits.  I've
recently found instructions for installing SunOS 4.1.3 under qemu-sparc
that I want to try as well.

-- 
Michael Parson
Pflugerville, TX
KF5LGQ


From itz at very.loosely.org  Sun Oct  1 03:53:14 2017
From: itz at very.loosely.org (Ian Zimmerman)
Date: Sat, 30 Sep 2017 10:53:14 -0700
Subject: Favorite UNIX
In-Reply-To: <alpine.NEB.2.20.1709301021060.28681@neener.bl.org>
References: <CAK7dMtBjgVeoEraveDDC1rhG+Aors_KAWeoy6HKpCV_vy9EdmQ@mail.gmail.com>
 <alpine.NEB.2.20.1709301021060.28681@neener.bl.org>
Message-ID: <20170930175314.gdz6gj4lhjrk6fpp@matica.foolinux.mooo.com>

On 2017-09-30 10:40, Michael Parson wrote:

> I've recently found instructions for installing SunOS 4.1.3 under
> qemu-sparc that I want to try as well.

Can you share a pointer to those with us?

-- 
Please don't Cc: me privately on mailing lists and Usenet,
if you also post the followup to the list or newsgroup.
Do obvious transformation on domain to reply privately _only_ on Usenet.


From mparson at bl.org  Sun Oct  1 04:34:14 2017
From: mparson at bl.org (Michael Parson)
Date: Sat, 30 Sep 2017 13:34:14 -0500
Subject: Favorite UNIX
In-Reply-To: <20170930175314.gdz6gj4lhjrk6fpp@matica.foolinux.mooo.com>
References: <CAK7dMtBjgVeoEraveDDC1rhG+Aors_KAWeoy6HKpCV_vy9EdmQ@mail.gmail.com>
 <alpine.NEB.2.20.1709301021060.28681@neener.bl.org>
 <20170930175314.gdz6gj4lhjrk6fpp@matica.foolinux.mooo.com>
Message-ID: <674dfbe51503c22a1dbc271c38142cd6@bl.org>


On 2017-09-30 12:53, Ian Zimmerman wrote:
> On 2017-09-30 10:40, Michael Parson wrote:
> 
>> I've recently found instructions for installing SunOS 4.1.3 under
>> qemu-sparc that I want to try as well.
> 
> Can you share a pointer to those with us?

Sure:

https://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/QEMU/SunOS_4.1.4

Oops, 4.1.4, not .3. :)

-- 
Michael Parson
Pflugerville, TX
KF5LGQ



From krewat at kilonet.net  Sun Oct  1 04:45:38 2017
From: krewat at kilonet.net (Arthur Krewat)
Date: Sat, 30 Sep 2017 14:45:38 -0400
Subject: Favorite UNIX
In-Reply-To: <674dfbe51503c22a1dbc271c38142cd6@bl.org>
References: <CAK7dMtBjgVeoEraveDDC1rhG+Aors_KAWeoy6HKpCV_vy9EdmQ@mail.gmail.com>
 <alpine.NEB.2.20.1709301021060.28681@neener.bl.org>
 <20170930175314.gdz6gj4lhjrk6fpp@matica.foolinux.mooo.com>
 <674dfbe51503c22a1dbc271c38142cd6@bl.org>
Message-ID: <875c5591-b738-c7fe-596b-75a2f346eec4@kilonet.net>

Good stuff, I gotta try this. That Wiki reminded me that for the longest 
time, I was running "xv" on Solaris only because of the compatibility 
package for SunOS. I don't think I ever compiled it natively for Solaris.



On 9/30/2017 2:34 PM, Michael Parson wrote:
>
> On 2017-09-30 12:53, Ian Zimmerman wrote:
>> On 2017-09-30 10:40, Michael Parson wrote:
>>
>>> I've recently found instructions for installing SunOS 4.1.3 under
>>> qemu-sparc that I want to try as well.
>>
>> Can you share a pointer to those with us?
>
> Sure:
>
> https://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/QEMU/SunOS_4.1.4
>
> Oops, 4.1.4, not .3. :)
>



From kevin.bowling at kev009.com  Sun Oct  1 06:29:55 2017
From: kevin.bowling at kev009.com (Kevin Bowling)
Date: Sat, 30 Sep 2017 13:29:55 -0700
Subject: [TUHS] UNIX of choice these days?
In-Reply-To: <1506784652.28254.for-standards-violators@oclsc.org>
References: <1506784652.28254.for-standards-violators@oclsc.org>
Message-ID: <CAK7dMtAwcZB0UTMTaiYghLnuHqtyDf9kXPL3=YoVoHsvXoxFVQ@mail.gmail.com>

I never really considered proc vs sysctl as deeply as this discussion.
Both seem like a little bit of a stretch and cause some impedance
mismatch in ways they are actually used.  For instance on FreeBSD you
can pass opaque structures around and that's how some of the utils
work -- these aren't displayed using sysctl(8).  So now you have ABI
over a text API anyway.

I seem to recall proc is loosely deprecated in Linux anyway in favor
of sysfs.  GregKH mentioned people misuse both, for instance making
them output pretty histograms instead of simple text values, that
defeat the fundamental design tenants of these interfaces -- which is
to try and maintain a stable API.

One thing I think Linux did pretty well is the whole object
orientation in C thing with kobject, and that nets you automatic sysfs
directories and nodes for pretty much everything.

Lots of gymnastics trying to solve a fundamentally more simple problem
of a text API vs ABI, hierarchy and maybe some object orientation.  At
risk of ridicule, I think the AIX ODM was the best planned and
executed take on all that :)

Regards,

On Sat, Sep 30, 2017 at 8:17 AM, Norman Wilson <norman at oclsc.org> wrote:
> Warner Losh:
>
>   It's an abundance of caution thing. This code had security problems in the
>   past, we're not 100% sure that we've killed all the issues, though we
>   believe we have.
>
> ====
>
> And if there isn't anyone who's actively interested in the
> code, willing to dig in to clean it up and make security
> issues less likely, deal with multiprocessing matters, and
> so on, that's a perfectly reasonable stance.
>
> I think it's an unfortunate result, and I wonder how much
> of it comes from a cultural view that sysctl >> /proc.
> (Recall how Ken and Dennis originally resisted Doug's push
> for pipelines and filters, because--as Dennis once put it
> in a talk--it just wasn't the way programs worked?)
>
> But as someone who is sometimes credited with removing
> more code than he wrote while working on the latter-day
> Research kernel, it's hard for me to argue with the principle.
> A lot of the code I tossed out was complicated stuff that
> was barely used if used at all, and that nobody was willing
> to step up to volunteer to maintain.
>
> Norman Wilson
> Toronto ON


From bakul at bitblocks.com  Sun Oct  1 07:56:29 2017
From: bakul at bitblocks.com (Bakul Shah)
Date: Sat, 30 Sep 2017 14:56:29 -0700
Subject: [TUHS] UNIX of choice these days?
In-Reply-To: <CAK7dMtAwcZB0UTMTaiYghLnuHqtyDf9kXPL3=YoVoHsvXoxFVQ@mail.gmail.com>
References: <1506784652.28254.for-standards-violators@oclsc.org>
 <CAK7dMtAwcZB0UTMTaiYghLnuHqtyDf9kXPL3=YoVoHsvXoxFVQ@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <7E337D3A-984E-444B-BE8F-7AFCBE7F50DF@bitblocks.com>


On Sep 30, 2017, at 1:29 PM, Kevin Bowling <kevin.bowling at kev009.com> wrote:

> I seem to recall proc is loosely deprecated in Linux anyway in favor
> of sysfs.  GregKH mentioned people misuse both, for instance making
> them output pretty histograms instead of simple text values, that
> defeat the fundamental design tenants of these interfaces -- which is
> to try and maintain a stable API.

> One thing I think Linux did pretty well is the whole object
> orientation in C thing with kobject, and that nets you automatic sysfs
> directories and nodes for pretty much everything.

The Linux /sys fs is truly bizarre. On a RaspberryPi running Linux 4.4.21+:

$ find /sys | wc		# total entries
11448
$ find /sys -type l | wc	# count of symlinks
1077
$ find /sys -type f | wc 	# count of "regular" files
8931

I am not sure exposing most everything via a namespace in this
manner is such a good idea (or at least in "good taste" :-)
Interfaces should be lean.

Similarly the /proc fs is quite strange. Why does it have any
non process subdirectory?

$ echo /proc/[0-9]* | wc -w 	# count of processes
142
$ echo /proc/[^0-9]* | wc -w 	# count of non-process directories
58

Compare:

Linux (raspberryPi + X windows):
$ echo /proc/[0-9]* |wc -w	# how many processes
142
$ find /proc/[0-9]* | wc -l	# how many proc related files+dirs
66153

FreeBSD (10.3 amd64+zfs+4 lightweight jails):
$ echo /proc/[0-9]* | wc -w	# how many processes
123
$ find /proc/[0-9]* | wc -l	# how many proc related files+dirs
1075

Plan9 (mostly quiescent):
$ echo /proc/[0-9]* | wc -w
64
$ du -a /proc/[0-9]* | wc -l
1235

Anyone feeling sad about /proc in FreeBSD should consider
the alternative!


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From kevin.bowling at kev009.com  Sun Oct  1 08:37:57 2017
From: kevin.bowling at kev009.com (Kevin Bowling)
Date: Sat, 30 Sep 2017 15:37:57 -0700
Subject: [TUHS] UNIX of choice these days?
In-Reply-To: <7E337D3A-984E-444B-BE8F-7AFCBE7F50DF@bitblocks.com>
References: <1506784652.28254.for-standards-violators@oclsc.org>
 <CAK7dMtAwcZB0UTMTaiYghLnuHqtyDf9kXPL3=YoVoHsvXoxFVQ@mail.gmail.com>
 <7E337D3A-984E-444B-BE8F-7AFCBE7F50DF@bitblocks.com>
Message-ID: <CAK7dMtD-89CZ-rtKqaroNMXVaELZvu3_MC0Rnej5+Gy-+3HaMg@mail.gmail.com>

To understand the Linux sysfs, you have to understand what problem
they are trying to solve.  It is self inflicted, but it solves a
problem in a way the community values.  Because the kernel is an
independent project versus libc (glibc, musl, Bionic, etc), and
because the base system is from others as well (coreutils, busybox,
systemd), Linus has become fanatical about ABI stability.  The simple
text interfaces allow the kernel to change haphazardly without much
planning, and still retain binary compatibility.  In terms of code
churn and needless KPI proliferation, Torvald's "masturbating monkeys"
insult toward OpenBSD holds up pretty well for his own crew :)

Operating systems (using subtle terminology that excludes "Linux"
without more specification) don't have that problem.

I haven't played with Plan9 at all.  Read some code, the TCP stack was
cute but unrealistically simplistic.  I need to take it for a spin.

Regards,

On Sat, Sep 30, 2017 at 2:56 PM, Bakul Shah <bakul at bitblocks.com> wrote:
>
> On Sep 30, 2017, at 1:29 PM, Kevin Bowling <kevin.bowling at kev009.com> wrote:
>
>> I seem to recall proc is loosely deprecated in Linux anyway in favor
>> of sysfs.  GregKH mentioned people misuse both, for instance making
>> them output pretty histograms instead of simple text values, that
>> defeat the fundamental design tenants of these interfaces -- which is
>> to try and maintain a stable API.
>
>> One thing I think Linux did pretty well is the whole object
>> orientation in C thing with kobject, and that nets you automatic sysfs
>> directories and nodes for pretty much everything.
>
> The Linux /sys fs is truly bizarre. On a RaspberryPi running Linux 4.4.21+:
>
> $ find /sys | wc # total entries
> 11448
> $ find /sys -type l | wc # count of symlinks
> 1077
> $ find /sys -type f | wc  # count of "regular" files
> 8931
>
> I am not sure exposing most everything via a namespace in this
> manner is such a good idea (or at least in "good taste" :-)
> Interfaces should be lean.
>
> Similarly the /proc fs is quite strange. Why does it have any
> non process subdirectory?
>
> $ echo /proc/[0-9]* | wc -w # count of processes
> 142
> $ echo /proc/[^0-9]* | wc -w  # count of non-process directories
> 58
>
> Compare:
>
> Linux (raspberryPi + X windows):
> $ echo /proc/[0-9]* |wc -w # how many processes
> 142
> $ find /proc/[0-9]* | wc -l # how many proc related files+dirs
> 66153
>
> FreeBSD (10.3 amd64+zfs+4 lightweight jails):
> $ echo /proc/[0-9]* | wc -w # how many processes
> 123
> $ find /proc/[0-9]* | wc -l # how many proc related files+dirs
> 1075
>
> Plan9 (mostly quiescent):
> $ echo /proc/[0-9]* | wc -w
> 64
> $ du -a /proc/[0-9]* | wc -l
> 1235
>
> Anyone feeling sad about /proc in FreeBSD should consider
> the alternative!
>
>


From lm at mcvoy.com  Sun Oct  1 10:36:46 2017
From: lm at mcvoy.com (Larry McVoy)
Date: Sat, 30 Sep 2017 17:36:46 -0700
Subject: Favorite UNIX
In-Reply-To: <674dfbe51503c22a1dbc271c38142cd6@bl.org>
References: <CAK7dMtBjgVeoEraveDDC1rhG+Aors_KAWeoy6HKpCV_vy9EdmQ@mail.gmail.com>
 <alpine.NEB.2.20.1709301021060.28681@neener.bl.org>
 <20170930175314.gdz6gj4lhjrk6fpp@matica.foolinux.mooo.com>
 <674dfbe51503c22a1dbc271c38142cd6@bl.org>
Message-ID: <20171001003646.GA28606@mcvoy.com>

On Sat, Sep 30, 2017 at 01:34:14PM -0500, Michael Parson wrote:
> 
> On 2017-09-30 12:53, Ian Zimmerman wrote:
> >On 2017-09-30 10:40, Michael Parson wrote:
> >
> >>I've recently found instructions for installing SunOS 4.1.3 under
> >>qemu-sparc that I want to try as well.
> >
> >Can you share a pointer to those with us?
> 
> Sure:
> 
> https://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/QEMU/SunOS_4.1.4
> 
> Oops, 4.1.4, not .3. :)

If it runs 4.1.4 it will run 4.1.3 (which was my favorite release, lot
of Larry love in there, a lot of other people's love in there, lots of
late night hacking by people who cared).


From dave at horsfall.org  Sun Oct  1 10:51:30 2017
From: dave at horsfall.org (Dave Horsfall)
Date: Sun, 1 Oct 2017 11:51:30 +1100 (EST)
Subject: Favorite UNIX
In-Reply-To: <20171001003646.GA28606@mcvoy.com>
References: <CAK7dMtBjgVeoEraveDDC1rhG+Aors_KAWeoy6HKpCV_vy9EdmQ@mail.gmail.com>
 <alpine.NEB.2.20.1709301021060.28681@neener.bl.org>
 <20170930175314.gdz6gj4lhjrk6fpp@matica.foolinux.mooo.com>
 <674dfbe51503c22a1dbc271c38142cd6@bl.org>
 <20171001003646.GA28606@mcvoy.com>
Message-ID: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710011149430.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>

On Sat, 30 Sep 2017, Larry McVoy wrote:

> If it runs 4.1.4 it will run 4.1.3 (which was my favorite release, lot 
> of Larry love in there, a lot of other people's love in there, lots of 
> late night hacking by people who cared).

Agreed; it was my favourite SunOS.  Never got to use 4.1.4, as $BOSS 
decided to switch to Slowaris instead (that's where the applications 
were).

-- 
Dave Horsfall DTM (VK2KFU)  "Those who don't understand security will suffer."


From lm at mcvoy.com  Sun Oct  1 11:10:17 2017
From: lm at mcvoy.com (Larry McVoy)
Date: Sat, 30 Sep 2017 18:10:17 -0700
Subject: Favorite UNIX
In-Reply-To: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710011149430.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
References: <CAK7dMtBjgVeoEraveDDC1rhG+Aors_KAWeoy6HKpCV_vy9EdmQ@mail.gmail.com>
 <alpine.NEB.2.20.1709301021060.28681@neener.bl.org>
 <20170930175314.gdz6gj4lhjrk6fpp@matica.foolinux.mooo.com>
 <674dfbe51503c22a1dbc271c38142cd6@bl.org>
 <20171001003646.GA28606@mcvoy.com>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710011149430.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
Message-ID: <20171001011017.GB28606@mcvoy.com>

On Sun, Oct 01, 2017 at 11:51:30AM +1100, Dave Horsfall wrote:
> On Sat, 30 Sep 2017, Larry McVoy wrote:
> 
> >If it runs 4.1.4 it will run 4.1.3 (which was my favorite release, lot of
> >Larry love in there, a lot of other people's love in there, lots of late
> >night hacking by people who cared).
> 
> Agreed; it was my favourite SunOS.  Never got to use 4.1.4, as $BOSS decided
> to switch to Slowaris instead (that's where the applications were).

I think 4.1.4 had Greg Limes herculean effort to make the VM system
scale on multiprocessors.  So it might be worth a look.

Yeah, at that time everyone was pushed to Solaris.  Here's another Larry
story for ya.

I created this weird ass NFS server that was a cluster.  I sort of
cheated but sort of did not.  It ran really fast, it used one of the
first ethernet switches (a modified Kalpana, the mods were VLANs, I
thought I invented that but apparently somebody beat me to it).  I did
the development on my beloved SunOS 4.x but Scooter insisted that it
ship with Solaris.

So I'm at the Moscone center, some tech/geek thing, I'm pitching this
product.  It was a technical pitch, I'm an engineer, so it was mostly
geeks in the room.

There is some dude in the room who keeps railing on Solaris.  I'm trying
to be a good soldier and say that Solaris is the future, yada yada.
This guy keeps going on and on about how much Solaris sucks and couldn't
he have this system with SunOS.

I finally lose it, like really lose it, and say "I know, I know, Solaris
sucks, you should see what this system does with SunOS, I fucking hate
Solaris".

It was all captured on tape.  My boss, Ken Okin, VP of all server hardware
at Sun, said "Find that tape and destroy it".  So I did.

Fun times?  I guess?  Welcome to the real world, it's not all about what
the geeks want.  When it is, wallow in that, it doesn't happen that often.

--lm


From b4 at gewt.net  Sun Oct  1 11:13:38 2017
From: b4 at gewt.net (Cory Smelosky)
Date: Sat, 30 Sep 2017 18:13:38 -0700
Subject: Favorite UNIX
In-Reply-To: <20171001011017.GB28606@mcvoy.com>
References: <CAK7dMtBjgVeoEraveDDC1rhG+Aors_KAWeoy6HKpCV_vy9EdmQ@mail.gmail.com>
 <alpine.NEB.2.20.1709301021060.28681@neener.bl.org>
 <20170930175314.gdz6gj4lhjrk6fpp@matica.foolinux.mooo.com>
 <674dfbe51503c22a1dbc271c38142cd6@bl.org>
 <20171001003646.GA28606@mcvoy.com>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710011149430.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <20171001011017.GB28606@mcvoy.com>
Message-ID: <1506820418.129128.1123757408.03946155@webmail.messagingengine.com>



On Sat, Sep 30, 2017, at 18:10, Larry McVoy wrote:
> On Sun, Oct 01, 2017 at 11:51:30AM +1100, Dave Horsfall wrote:
> > On Sat, 30 Sep 2017, Larry McVoy wrote:
> > 
> > >If it runs 4.1.4 it will run 4.1.3 (which was my favorite release, lot of
> > >Larry love in there, a lot of other people's love in there, lots of late
> > >night hacking by people who cared).
> > 
> > Agreed; it was my favourite SunOS.  Never got to use 4.1.4, as $BOSS decided
> > to switch to Slowaris instead (that's where the applications were).
> 
> I think 4.1.4 had Greg Limes herculean effort to make the VM system
> scale on multiprocessors.  So it might be worth a look.
> 

I have source for 4.1.4 scurried away...but I don't think I have 4.1.3.

> Yeah, at that time everyone was pushed to Solaris.  Here's another Larry
> story for ya.
> 
> I created this weird ass NFS server that was a cluster.  I sort of
> cheated but sort of did not.  It ran really fast, it used one of the
> first ethernet switches (a modified Kalpana, the mods were VLANs, I
> thought I invented that but apparently somebody beat me to it).  I did
> the development on my beloved SunOS 4.x but Scooter insisted that it
> ship with Solaris.

How'd you do VLANs on that?

> 
> So I'm at the Moscone center, some tech/geek thing, I'm pitching this
> product.  It was a technical pitch, I'm an engineer, so it was mostly
> geeks in the room.
> 
> There is some dude in the room who keeps railing on Solaris.  I'm trying
> to be a good soldier and say that Solaris is the future, yada yada.
> This guy keeps going on and on about how much Solaris sucks and couldn't
> he have this system with SunOS.

I'd love to run SunOS on modern hardware...;)

I need to fix my IPX/IPC...

> 
> I finally lose it, like really lose it, and say "I know, I know, Solaris
> sucks, you should see what this system does with SunOS, I fucking hate
> Solaris".
> 
> It was all captured on tape.  My boss, Ken Okin, VP of all server
> hardware
> at Sun, said "Find that tape and destroy it".  So I did.
> 
> Fun times?  I guess?  Welcome to the real world, it's not all about what
> the geeks want.  When it is, wallow in that, it doesn't happen that
> often.
> 
> --lm


-- 
  Cory Smelosky
  b4 at gewt.net


From mparson at bl.org  Sun Oct  1 13:05:52 2017
From: mparson at bl.org (Michael Parson)
Date: Sat, 30 Sep 2017 22:05:52 -0500 (CDT)
Subject: Favorite UNIX
In-Reply-To: <674dfbe51503c22a1dbc271c38142cd6@bl.org>
References: <CAK7dMtBjgVeoEraveDDC1rhG+Aors_KAWeoy6HKpCV_vy9EdmQ@mail.gmail.com>
 <alpine.NEB.2.20.1709301021060.28681@neener.bl.org>
 <20170930175314.gdz6gj4lhjrk6fpp@matica.foolinux.mooo.com>
 <674dfbe51503c22a1dbc271c38142cd6@bl.org>
Message-ID: <alpine.NEB.2.20.1709301729130.4274@neener.bl.org>

On Sat, 30 Sep 2017, Michael Parson wrote:
> On 2017-09-30 12:53, Ian Zimmerman wrote:
>> On 2017-09-30 10:40, Michael Parson wrote:
>> 
>>> I've recently found instructions for installing SunOS 4.1.3 under
>>> qemu-sparc that I want to try as well.
>> 
>> Can you share a pointer to those with us?
>
> Sure:
>
> https://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/QEMU/SunOS_4.1.4
>
> Oops, 4.1.4, not .3. :)

Found some more info about qemu-system-sparc, turns out, you don't even
need an 'ss5.bin' file, and CG3 graphics seem to work.  Aparently the
built-in stuff works well enough to boot and install the OS.

I'm using a real SS5 rom image and -vga cg3 to have a graphical head.

Now to see if I can find any pre-compiled software archives anywhere.

I tried NextStep too.  The media boots, but it eventually hangs and
never lets me install.

-- 
Michael Parson
Pflugerville, TX
KF5LGQ


From kevin.bowling at kev009.com  Sun Oct  1 13:15:41 2017
From: kevin.bowling at kev009.com (Kevin Bowling)
Date: Sat, 30 Sep 2017 20:15:41 -0700
Subject: Favorite UNIX
In-Reply-To: <alpine.NEB.2.20.1709301729130.4274@neener.bl.org>
References: <CAK7dMtBjgVeoEraveDDC1rhG+Aors_KAWeoy6HKpCV_vy9EdmQ@mail.gmail.com>
 <alpine.NEB.2.20.1709301021060.28681@neener.bl.org>
 <20170930175314.gdz6gj4lhjrk6fpp@matica.foolinux.mooo.com>
 <674dfbe51503c22a1dbc271c38142cd6@bl.org>
 <alpine.NEB.2.20.1709301729130.4274@neener.bl.org>
Message-ID: <CAK7dMtBoZ1-zZsCgHONLoma-aFvTewOi=x_14gw_7NdsA+B+5A@mail.gmail.com>

This one is kind of wild, it emulates a SparcStation 5 on an FPGA
http://temlib.org.  The screenshots show SunOS 4.1.4.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zYL42WQfgGI

On Sat, Sep 30, 2017 at 8:05 PM, Michael Parson <mparson at bl.org> wrote:
> On Sat, 30 Sep 2017, Michael Parson wrote:
>>
>> On 2017-09-30 12:53, Ian Zimmerman wrote:
>>>
>>> On 2017-09-30 10:40, Michael Parson wrote:
>>>
>>>> I've recently found instructions for installing SunOS 4.1.3 under
>>>> qemu-sparc that I want to try as well.
>>>
>>>
>>> Can you share a pointer to those with us?
>>
>>
>> Sure:
>>
>> https://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/QEMU/SunOS_4.1.4
>>
>> Oops, 4.1.4, not .3. :)
>
>
> Found some more info about qemu-system-sparc, turns out, you don't even
> need an 'ss5.bin' file, and CG3 graphics seem to work.  Aparently the
> built-in stuff works well enough to boot and install the OS.
>
> I'm using a real SS5 rom image and -vga cg3 to have a graphical head.
>
> Now to see if I can find any pre-compiled software archives anywhere.
>
> I tried NextStep too.  The media boots, but it eventually hangs and
> never lets me install.
>
>
> --
> Michael Parson
> Pflugerville, TX
> KF5LGQ


From wkt at tuhs.org  Sun Oct  1 13:25:36 2017
From: wkt at tuhs.org (Warren Toomey)
Date: Sun, 1 Oct 2017 13:25:36 +1000
Subject: Mangled and non-mangled TUHS mail lists
Message-ID: <20171001032536.GB31930@minnie.tuhs.org>

All, there are now two variants of the TUHS mailing list. E-mail sent
to tuhs at tuhs.org will propagate to both of them.

The main TUHS list now:
  - doesn't strip incoming DKIM headers
  - doesn't alter the From: line
  - doesn't alter the Subject: line
and hopefully will keep most mail systems happy.

The alternative, "mangled", TUHS list:
  - strips incoming DKIM headers
  - alters the From: line
  - alters the Subject: line to say [TUHS]
  - puts in DKIM headers once this is done
and hopefully will keep most mail systems happy but in a different way.

You can choose to belong to either list, just send me an e-mail if
you want to be switched to the other one. But be patient to start with
as there will probably be quite a few wanting to change.

Cheers, Warren


From krewat at kilonet.net  Sun Oct  1 13:43:28 2017
From: krewat at kilonet.net (Arthur Krewat)
Date: Sat, 30 Sep 2017 23:43:28 -0400
Subject: Favorite UNIX
In-Reply-To: <20171001011017.GB28606@mcvoy.com>
References: <CAK7dMtBjgVeoEraveDDC1rhG+Aors_KAWeoy6HKpCV_vy9EdmQ@mail.gmail.com>
 <alpine.NEB.2.20.1709301021060.28681@neener.bl.org>
 <20170930175314.gdz6gj4lhjrk6fpp@matica.foolinux.mooo.com>
 <674dfbe51503c22a1dbc271c38142cd6@bl.org> <20171001003646.GA28606@mcvoy.com>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710011149430.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <20171001011017.GB28606@mcvoy.com>
Message-ID: <0d6c2d73-dac3-887a-9f67-966303c2b7b7@kilonet.net>

On 9/30/2017 9:10 PM, Larry McVoy wrote:
>
> I think 4.1.4 had Greg Limes herculean effort to make the VM system
> scale on multiprocessors.  So it might be worth a look.
>
>
This? From 4.1.4:

/*      @(#)vm_mp.c     1.1     94/10/31        */

/*
  * Copyright (c) 1986 by Sun Microsystems, Inc.
  */

/*
  * VM - multiprocessor/ing support.
  *
  * Currently the kmon_enter() / kmon_exit() pair implements a
  * simple monitor for objects protected by the appropriate lock.
  * The kcv_wait() / kcv_broadcast pait implements a simple
  * condition variable which can be used for `sleeping'
  * and `waking' inside a monitor if some resource is
  * is needed which is not available.
  *
  * XXX - this code is written knowing about the semantics
  * of sleep/wakeup and UNIX scheduling on a uniprocessor machine.
  */




From clemc at ccc.com  Mon Oct  2 00:00:04 2017
From: clemc at ccc.com (Clem Cole)
Date: Sun, 1 Oct 2017 10:00:04 -0400
Subject: Mangled and non-mangled TUHS mail lists
In-Reply-To: <20171001032536.GB31930@minnie.tuhs.org>
References: <20171001032536.GB31930@minnie.tuhs.org>
Message-ID: <CAC20D2PTJVsMODnKs17E4ai5yH1QGPpzBLcJP6a9fU_6MRryzA@mail.gmail.com>

Warren,

Thank you for your time and efforts.   We all know this does not just
happen and because of your dedication we all reap many rewards.   Our
thanks is not enough I know, but it was I can offer here.

Clem
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From don at DonHopkins.com  Mon Oct  2 00:07:02 2017
From: don at DonHopkins.com (Don Hopkins)
Date: Sun, 1 Oct 2017 16:07:02 +0200
Subject: Favorite UNIX
In-Reply-To: <20171001011017.GB28606@mcvoy.com>
References: <CAK7dMtBjgVeoEraveDDC1rhG+Aors_KAWeoy6HKpCV_vy9EdmQ@mail.gmail.com>
 <alpine.NEB.2.20.1709301021060.28681@neener.bl.org>
 <20170930175314.gdz6gj4lhjrk6fpp@matica.foolinux.mooo.com>
 <674dfbe51503c22a1dbc271c38142cd6@bl.org> <20171001003646.GA28606@mcvoy.com>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710011149430.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <20171001011017.GB28606@mcvoy.com>
Message-ID: <78D9C815-6E0E-41AC-8B6A-510167DE9E85@gmail.com>


> I finally lose it, like really lose it, and say "I know, I know, Solaris
> sucks, you should see what this system does with SunOS, I fucking hate
> Solaris".
> 
> It was all captured on tape.  My boss, Ken Okin, VP of all server hardware
> at Sun, said "Find that tape and destroy it".  So I did.
> 
> Fun times?  I guess?  Welcome to the real world, it's not all about what
> the geeks want.  When it is, wallow in that, it doesn't happen that often.
> 
> --lm

Solaris: so bad I left the company.

Hey does anybody remember what ever happened to Steve MacKay? 

(I don’t mean what I did to him, because I remember that, just what happened to him afterwards! ;-) 

-Don

The Worst Job in the World

Subject: The Worst Job in the World 
From: Michael Tiemann <tiemann at cygnus.com>

I have a friend who has to have the worst job in the world: he is a Unix system administrator. But it's worse than that, as I will soon tell.
Being a Unix system administrator is like being a tech in a biological warfare laboratory, except that none of the substances are labeled consistently, any of the compounds are just as likely to kill you by themselves as they are when mixed with one another, and it is never clear what distinction is made between a catastrophic failure in the lab and a successful test in the field.

But I don't want to tell you about biological warfare, I want to tell you about what makes my friend's job so terrible. First, some context.

The training for Unix system administration is a frightening process. When machines start dying, users start screaming, and everything grinds to a halt, the novice feels the cold fingers of terror clutching about his heart.

 
    #!/bin/sh
    # this doesn't work, but no time to fix it -- hope nothing crashes
    progname=$0
 

But if one stays the course, one might some day achieve the dubious satisfaction of being able to mutter "at least I know why it broke!".
 
    #!/bin/sh
    # This works...I wonder if it will get me laid
    progname="`echo $0 | sed 's:^\./\./:\./:'`"
 

But there are many who must dwell in this miasma both day and night. What makes my friend's job so ugly is that he doesn't only work with just any strain of Unix -- he works with Solaris. And he doesn't just deal with just any braindead users -- his users are the executives at Sun Microsystems.
Let me tell you about Sun Microsystems. At Sun, there's a long history of executives playing pranks on one another. For April Fools, these rowdies would play tricks like putting a golf course (complete with putting green) in Scott McNealy's office, or floating Bill Joy's Ferrari in one of the landscaped ponds. Things have come a long way since then. Now every day is April Fools, and my friend doesn't like it one bit.

VP: "Admin!! What the fuck is this thing running on my machine?"

Admin: "It's Solaris, sir."

VP: "Get it off of my machine at once!"

Admin: "But sir, Ed Zander told me that you should be running Solaris now."

VP: "Zander, huh? I'll fix him. Is he running Solaris?"

Admin: "No sir."

VP: "Why not?"

Admin: "If he ran Solaris, he wouldn't be able to get any work done."

VP: "Very well, restore my machine to SunOS, and put this Solaris crap on Zander's machine."

Admin: "But sir..."

VP: "That's an order! And tell him Scott gave you the directive himself!"

Admin: "Yes, sir."

Zander: "Admin!! What the fuck is this thing running on my machine?"
Admin: "It's Solaris, sir."

Zander: "Get it off of my machine at once!"

Admin: "But sir, Scott McNealy told me that you should be running Solaris now."

Zander: "McNealy, huh? I'll fix him. Is he running Solaris?"

...

The only thing worse that being a Unix system administrator is doing the job for ungrateful users.



From don at DonHopkins.com  Mon Oct  2 00:08:06 2017
From: don at DonHopkins.com (Don Hopkins)
Date: Sun, 1 Oct 2017 16:08:06 +0200
Subject: Mangled and non-mangled TUHS mail lists
In-Reply-To: <CAC20D2PTJVsMODnKs17E4ai5yH1QGPpzBLcJP6a9fU_6MRryzA@mail.gmail.com>
References: <20171001032536.GB31930@minnie.tuhs.org>
 <CAC20D2PTJVsMODnKs17E4ai5yH1QGPpzBLcJP6a9fU_6MRryzA@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <89DEC1F8-88E6-41A6-AD91-B1F866C26F0B@gmail.com>

Here here! That DKIM stuff is a PITA. Thanks, Warren.

-Don

> On 1 Oct 2017, at 16:00, Clem Cole <clemc at ccc.com> wrote:
> 
> Warren,
> 
> Thank you for your time and efforts.   We all know this does not just happen and because of your dedication we all reap many rewards.   Our thanks is not enough I know, but it was I can offer here.
> 
> Clem

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From madcrow.maxwell at gmail.com  Mon Oct  2 01:27:14 2017
From: madcrow.maxwell at gmail.com (Michael Kerpan)
Date: Sun, 1 Oct 2017 11:27:14 -0400
Subject: [TUHS] Favorite UNIX
In-Reply-To: <CAK7dMtBjgVeoEraveDDC1rhG+Aors_KAWeoy6HKpCV_vy9EdmQ@mail.gmail.com>
References: <CAK7dMtBjgVeoEraveDDC1rhG+Aors_KAWeoy6HKpCV_vy9EdmQ@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <CAHfSdrXP6exADuUkPRzBSuqEubRM2wvsSx8tfX+MgCwrKjfUPw@mail.gmail.com>

On Sep 28, 2017 11:02 PM, "Kevin Bowling" <kevin.bowling at kev009.com> wrote:

What is your favorite UNIX.  Three possible categories, choose one or more:
1) Free
2) Forced to use a commercial platform.  I guess that could include
macOS and z/OS with some vivid imagination, maybe even NT.
3) Historical

1. FreeBSD is best of breed, these days. It's logical, stuff tends to just
work, and it just feels right.

2. I don't have much experience with modern commercial Unix. A few of my
friends really like macOS (formerly OS X, nee NeXTSTEP), but it's
artificially locked to Apple hardware so I've never really tried it.
Frankly, I do most of my daily computing on Windows, which works fine for
video games, word processing, web browsing, graphics work, and hosting VMs
to run FreeBSD in.

3. NeXTSTEP/OPENSTEP is still really cool. The kernel is a mess and the
whole PostScript as primary display was less than ideal for graphics
performance, but it was cool and nobody's done a graphical UI as well since.

Mike
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From dwalker at doomd.net  Mon Oct  2 02:37:07 2017
From: dwalker at doomd.net (Derrik Walker v2.0)
Date: Sun, 1 Oct 2017 12:37:07 -0400
Subject: [TUHS] Favorite UNIX
In-Reply-To: <CAK7dMtBjgVeoEraveDDC1rhG+Aors_KAWeoy6HKpCV_vy9EdmQ@mail.gmail.com>
References: <CAK7dMtBjgVeoEraveDDC1rhG+Aors_KAWeoy6HKpCV_vy9EdmQ@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <c67dd27b-3041-dc2b-f701-5828f423c47a@doomd.net>

On 09/28/2017 10:58 PM, Kevin Bowling wrote:
> What is your favorite UNIX.  Three possible categories, choose one or more:
> 1) Free
> 2) Forced to use a commercial platform.  I guess that could include
> macOS and z/OS with some vivid imagination, maybe even NT.
> 3) Historical
1) Linux - not the greatest, by far, but it gets the job done and pays 
the bills ( in my case, anyway ). And it still has good long term 
viability, as of 2017, anyway.

2) Solaris - Sun finally got it right starting with Solaris 7, and it 
just got better from there.  I ran it for many, many years on my Home 
Ultra 5.
Really sad to see what Oracle did to it! I use to have boss say that 
Solaris was the UNIX geek's UNIX, he might be right ( altho these days 
that's probably BSD ).

3) Irix - Not the best UNIX, but damn, those workstations it ran on WERE 
the best.  I miss my Indigo R4K/Elan almost as much as I do my Ultra 5 
with Solaris 9 on it!

-- 
-- Derrik

Derrik Walker v2.0, RHCE
dwalker at doomd.net

"Those UNIX guys, they think weird!" -- John C. Dvorak


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From ggm at algebras.org  Mon Oct  2 02:51:31 2017
From: ggm at algebras.org (George Michaelson)
Date: Sun, 1 Oct 2017 09:51:31 -0700
Subject: [TUHS] Favorite UNIX
In-Reply-To: <c67dd27b-3041-dc2b-f701-5828f423c47a@doomd.net>
References: <CAK7dMtBjgVeoEraveDDC1rhG+Aors_KAWeoy6HKpCV_vy9EdmQ@mail.gmail.com>
 <c67dd27b-3041-dc2b-f701-5828f423c47a@doomd.net>
Message-ID: <CAKr6gn16SF8th4coZxqgbMt07V++1WRFK-VkeeY3je_2NrDjRQ@mail.gmail.com>

My favourite remains V7 on a pdp11. Not because of any specious
reductionism, but because it was a dawning experience, and because of
the 'learn' package which I found very good, subsequently stripped
because of licence restrictions. I had the care of one in Leeds uni in
'82 and loved it. Far more than the Norsk Data mini, perhaps less
usefully than the 780s with 4.1 but still. It was a joy.

I freely admit I did next to nothing of substance (maintenance coding
an X.25 comms package for JANET was the high spot, on a compiler with
a very low #define expansion limit which hit us badly) but somehow, it
remains my favourite.

I also admired the ease with which people I knew could do things with
it. 32V was (AFAIK) a logical outcome.

On Sun, Oct 1, 2017 at 9:37 AM, Derrik Walker v2.0 <dwalker at doomd.net> wrote:
> On 09/28/2017 10:58 PM, Kevin Bowling wrote:
>>
>> What is your favorite UNIX.  Three possible categories, choose one or
>> more:
>> 1) Free
>> 2) Forced to use a commercial platform.  I guess that could include
>> macOS and z/OS with some vivid imagination, maybe even NT.
>> 3) Historical
>
> 1) Linux - not the greatest, by far, but it gets the job done and pays the
> bills ( in my case, anyway ). And it still has good long term viability, as
> of 2017, anyway.
>
> 2) Solaris - Sun finally got it right starting with Solaris 7, and it just
> got better from there.  I ran it for many, many years on my Home Ultra 5.
> Really sad to see what Oracle did to it! I use to have boss say that Solaris
> was the UNIX geek's UNIX, he might be right ( altho these days that's
> probably BSD ).
>
> 3) Irix - Not the best UNIX, but damn, those workstations it ran on WERE the
> best.  I miss my Indigo R4K/Elan almost as much as I do my Ultra 5 with
> Solaris 9 on it!
>
> --
> -- Derrik
>
> Derrik Walker v2.0, RHCE
> dwalker at doomd.net
>
> "Those UNIX guys, they think weird!" -- John C. Dvorak
>
>


From tih at hamartun.priv.no  Mon Oct  2 03:24:40 2017
From: tih at hamartun.priv.no (Tom Ivar Helbekkmo)
Date: Sun, 01 Oct 2017 19:24:40 +0200
Subject: Line Terminators in Text Files [
In-Reply-To: <CABH=_VS8TNJSStmgSyT9xifbqtbsWQqN_0XaPss2oVwJn3B=8Q@mail.gmail.com>
 (Paul Winalski's message of "Mon, 4 Sep 2017 13:29:59 -0400")
References: <CAC20D2MbSa3YxkkKdYUj01R0C-cnm0Bv6d+dAsBtEhHCegL4Qw@mail.gmail.com>
 <CABH=_VS8TNJSStmgSyT9xifbqtbsWQqN_0XaPss2oVwJn3B=8Q@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <m23772u6g7.fsf@thuvia.hamartun.priv.no>

Paul Winalski <paul.winalski at gmail.com> writes:

> RMS finally got a true stream mode interface circa VAX/VMS version 5,
> three releases after the DEC C compiler was first released.

I ported C-TeX to VAX/VMS 5, using the straight stream mode for I/O, and
was annoyed by how slow it was.  I ended up writing my own glue to have
it write binary RMS files in 512 byte blocks instead, and the speed
increase was very gratifying.  We're talking several times faster.

I remember how this made our VAX 780 able to process TeX files at just
about the same speed as my 12MhZ 286 PC, when I was alone on the system
at night.  Then I discovered it did it just as fast during the day, with
about a hundred other users on the machine.  :)

-tih
-- 
Most people who graduate with CS degrees don't understand the significance
of Lisp.  Lisp is the most important idea in computer science.  --Alan Kay


From jnc at mercury.lcs.mit.edu  Mon Oct  2 03:51:06 2017
From: jnc at mercury.lcs.mit.edu (Noel Chiappa)
Date: Sun,  1 Oct 2017 13:51:06 -0400 (EDT)
Subject: Favorite UNIX
Message-ID: <20171001175106.5FE3318C0A6@mercury.lcs.mit.edu>

    > From: Don Hopkins
    
    > Solaris: so bad I left the company.

Why was Solaris so much worse than SunOS?

I guess the Sun management didn't understand that was the case? Or were they
so hot for the AT+T linkup that they were willing to live with it?

	Noel


From lm at mcvoy.com  Mon Oct  2 04:05:00 2017
From: lm at mcvoy.com (Larry McVoy)
Date: Sun, 1 Oct 2017 11:05:00 -0700
Subject: Favorite UNIX
In-Reply-To: <20171001175106.5FE3318C0A6@mercury.lcs.mit.edu>
References: <20171001175106.5FE3318C0A6@mercury.lcs.mit.edu>
Message-ID: <20171001180500.GD16755@mcvoy.com>

On Sun, Oct 01, 2017 at 01:51:06PM -0400, Noel Chiappa wrote:
>     > From: Don Hopkins
>     
>     > Solaris: so bad I left the company.
> 
> Why was Solaris so much worse than SunOS?

Because SunOS had years of polish.  It was a nicer starting point (BSD
had all the fun stuff, AT&T was sort of a stuffed shirt's Unix, BSD was
Unix for hackers) and the engineers who polished it did so because they
loved it.  Lots of us stayed late into the night working on that OS and
it showed.  It was fun times, McNealy knew we were working on it and he'd
come over to the kernel team's building and egg us on.  He'd get up on
the conference table and preach to us how it was going to rule the world.

> I guess the Sun management didn't understand that was the case? Or were they
> so hot for the AT+T linkup that they were willing to live with it?

No, the deal was that Sun needed money and AT&T bought $200M of Sun stock
at 35% over market.  In exchange, Sun agreed to take SVR4 and make it
popular.   At&T wanted SVR4 to be the next SunOS.

But that was a kick in the nuts to us engineers.  The sytem v source base
was crap compared to sunos, a huge step backwards.

So my crowd pretty much all left in disgust.  There was a lot of heartache
over it.  None of us knew about the business deal at the time, in fact I
think a lot of management didn't know.

I pushed for a free version of SunOS 4.x.  I removed the STREAMS code and
the drivers because that wasn't free; put back the BSD tty drivers and
I had an unencumbered source base.  I demo-ed it.  My boss, Ken Okin,
VP of server hardware, paid me to argue for that for 6 months (which is
why I say I don't think management knew about the deal; Ken was a senior
dude, he wouldn't have sent me off if he knew for sure I was going to 
fail).

I wrote a paper arguing for this:

http://www.mcvoy.com/lm/bitmover/lm/papers/freeos.pdf

but it never happened.  We'd all be running SunOS today if they had done
that.

Instead, they repeated the SunOS journey.  Bryan and crew polished that
turd for years and got it sort of reasonable.  Some people grew to like
it, I never did.  Too system v-ish for my tastes.  You have to install
the GNU tools to have a reasonable tool chain, they never fixed the
default tools.  That's crazy, why ship them and maintain them if you
aren't using them?  Solaris has always felt weird to me, but they went
for it and got it better.  Only to have it tossed away again.  Yuck.


From don at DonHopkins.com  Mon Oct  2 04:13:56 2017
From: don at DonHopkins.com (Don Hopkins)
Date: Sun, 1 Oct 2017 20:13:56 +0200
Subject: Favorite UNIX
In-Reply-To: <20171001175106.5FE3318C0A6@mercury.lcs.mit.edu>
References: <20171001175106.5FE3318C0A6@mercury.lcs.mit.edu>
Message-ID: <77208462-CD53-4C32-9A57-D5A59A5E7FED@gmail.com>

> 
> On 1 Oct 2017, at 19:51, Noel Chiappa <jnc at mercury.lcs.mit.edu> wrote:
> 
>> From: Don Hopkins
> 
>> Solaris: so bad I left the company.
> 
> Why was Solaris so much worse than SunOS?
> 
> I guess the Sun management didn't understand that was the case? Or were they
> so hot for the AT+T linkup that they were willing to live with it?
> 
> 	Noel


[I recently posted this to the hacker news discussion about the death of solaris…]

Remember the poster they were giving out at Usenix with a picture of the BSD Tie Fighter blowing up the AT&T Death Star, and the mathematical formulation "4.x > V for all values of x from zero to infinity”?

It just didn't make sense that Sun kicked AT&T's ass with BSD Unix, and then capitulated to them by switching over to SVR4.

Yeah, yeah, I'm sure there was some business reason, but it was a bitter pill to swallow.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unix_wars

-Don



From don at DonHopkins.com  Mon Oct  2 04:39:51 2017
From: don at DonHopkins.com (Don Hopkins)
Date: Sun, 1 Oct 2017 20:39:51 +0200
Subject: Favorite UNIX
In-Reply-To: <20171001180500.GD16755@mcvoy.com>
References: <20171001175106.5FE3318C0A6@mercury.lcs.mit.edu>
 <20171001180500.GD16755@mcvoy.com>
Message-ID: <7D062B54-FEAA-442C-82BE-0B2B527EB463@gmail.com>


> On 1 Oct 2017, at 20:05, Larry McVoy <lm at mcvoy.com> wrote:
> 
> On Sun, Oct 01, 2017 at 01:51:06PM -0400, Noel Chiappa wrote:
>>> From: Don Hopkins
>> 
>>> Solaris: so bad I left the company.
>> 
>> Why was Solaris so much worse than SunOS?
> 
> Because SunOS had years of polish.  It was a nicer starting point (BSD
> had all the fun stuff, AT&T was sort of a stuffed shirt's Unix, BSD was
> Unix for hackers) and the engineers who polished it did so because they
> loved it.  Lots of us stayed late into the night working on that OS and
> it showed.  It was fun times, McNealy knew we were working on it and he'd
> come over to the kernel team's building and egg us on.  He'd get up on
> the conference table and preach to us how it was going to rule the world.

I’m with you there, and fought some similar futile battles about NeWS (but it was good practice for later more successfully convincing EA to free SimCity). 

I’d totally given up working on NeWS and for Sun before I graduated, but James Gosling promised me that Sun had turned over a new leaf, Scott McNealy was 100% behind it, and they would make NeWS free. 

What actually happened a slap in the face: Sun released the OpenWindows source code for “free” (as in beer, not speech), at only $995 media cost (and no you can’t put it on your ftp server). So it was “free” as in bullshit, actually. 

-Don



> 
> From: hopkins (Don Hopkins)
> Subject: Sun's inconsistent and misleading use of the word "FREE"
> Date: 29 November 1990 at 18:10:55 GMT+1
> To: rjg, smitad, rogern, tomj
> Cc: rxb, chan, dianam at corp, cathybg at corp, messino at corp, scott at corp, edz at corp, hopkins
> 
> I have been hoping for Sun to make Open Windows free since it was
> called SunDew, and during that time, I've made it perform many
> indescribable acts (both on and off stage), worked with quite a few
> companies trying to make it a success, and drained much much more of
> my energy into it than I ever knew I had to give.
> 
> With horror, I have been following the messages on the network in the
> aftermath of the OWPS "free for $1000" disaster...  The big problem
> was not the $1000.  It was the word "free".
> 
> In short: If you were a slave, what how would you feel if your master
> announced you could go "free", but he really meant he was selling you
> down the river for a media cost of only $1000?
> 
> The OWPS 2.0 press release used the word "Free" exactly three times,
> in two *COMPLETELY* different ways: Twice to describe the cost of the
> OWPS source code and license (but not the media, therefor it can't be
> freely distributed by MIT on the X11R4 tape, or the Free Software
> Foundation).  And once to describe the XView toolkit -- which really
> is *truely* free, in the same sense that we have been asking Sun to
> make NeWS free for years.
> 
> Free #1:
>  Sun Microsystems announced today that the source code for its
>  OpenWindows(TM) application development environment will now be
>  available free of charge (cost of media only -- $995).
> 
> This use of the word "free" is quite fair and well qualified (you
> could try to weasel out by saying "free of charge" meant no static
> electricity).  The problem is that there is no way to get OWPS 2.0
> without the media.  So why use the word free if there is no way you
> can get it without paying money? In the first paragraph of the press
> release, you get peoples hopes up, then dash them with a slimy
> marketing maneuver typical of a used car ad. But at least you did not
> string them along for long.
> 
> Free #2:
>  "Offering free source code for the industry's most advanced,
>  comprehensive window environment demonstrates our ongoing commitment to
>  open systems," said Ed Zander, vice president of marketing at Sun.
> 
> I agree that Open Windows is the best window system on Earth, and that
> making it possible for anyone to get it for free would demonstrate a
> *lot* of good things about Sun, and pay off enormously, in both the
> short and the long run.  But it's not available to everyone, and it's
> not free, so Sun hasn't demonstrated anything positive at all. You say
> it's free, but you actually have to pay to get it, if you even qualify
> at all.  That's the worst thing you could possibly say.  If you had
> come right out and said it was "only" $1000 to "some" people, and
> never used the word free, this might not have been a disaster.
> 
> Free #3:
>  The OLIT toolkit -- based on AT&T's OPEN LOOK toolkit (XT+) --
>  implements the OPEN LOOK look and feel and supports MIT Intrinsics.
>  The XView toolkit is also offered free on the X11 R4 tape available
>  from MIT. 
> 
> *THAT* was the big mistake. You used the *exact* same word, "free", to
> refer to XView. Not only that, but you said "also offered free on the
> X11R4 tape available from MIT." What does that word "also" in that
> sentence mean? It must be referring to something else that's free, and
> what could that be?  There is no doubt that the press release tries to
> compare the "freeness" of XView with the "freeness" of Open Windows,
> and then has the nerve to go on and say that XView is available on the
> X11R4 tape from MIT!  There is no other reasonable interpretation.
> The implication is that OLPS is "free" in the same sense that enables
> MIT to give XView away on the X11R4 tape.  And according to what I
> have been told, that is *NOT* the case.
> 
> It is *great* that XView is free, and Sun definitely means for it to
> be widely available, easy to get, and freely distributable, as
> evidenced by our quick and positive response to the problem raised by
> Richard Stallman of the Free Software Foundation with the wording of
> the XView legal notice.  (If we didn't clarify the notice, FSF could
> not have given away copies of XView, and MIT would have to *remove*
> XView from the X11R4 tape.)
> 
> For years, we (customers, software developers, and employees) have
> been asking Sun to make Open Windows available for free, in such a way
> that it could be distributed on the X11R4 tape or through other public
> channels, but that has not happened yet. Our concern is *not* that we
> just don't want to pay money for it!! The most important thing is that
> we can make changes to the source code, and give copies of it to
> anyone who wants it, using any media or distribution channel we want.
> But we can't, so it doesn't matter how cheap it is. Even if you didn't
> charge for media, it wouldn't really be the kind of "free" it needs to
> be. It must be unrestricted, like XView.
> 
> Were it not for the use of the word "also", it would have only been a
> "very deceptive" press release. But because of that "also", in
> combination with the inconsistent and misleading use of the word
> "free", and the gratuitous reference to the X11R4 tape, I have to say
> that it was an *EXTREMELY DECEPTIVE* press release.
> 
> The worst part is that the most horrible bit of misdirection takes
> place at the *end* of the press release, once the reader has waded
> through the obviously slimy marketing maneuvers at the top of the
> press release and figured out that Sun is trying to fool him. At this
> point, the reference to the fact that XView is distributed on the
> X11R4 tape is a slap in the face!
> 
> OWPS 2.0 is *not* free to go on X11R4 tape.  Or at least, that's what
> you've told me, and I am very sorry about it.  So why did you mention
> the fact that XView was on the X11R4 tape?  It is highly commendable
> that Sun has actually given XView away for free.  And it really paid
> off.  If we hadn't, Motif would have creamed us.  The same argument,
> that freedom catalyzes success, applies to Open Windows as well, but
> unbelievably, there are still people at Sun who just haven't figured
> it out yet.  But even though they won't give Open Windows away for
> free, they still want to *SAY* they give Open Windows away for free.
> 
> This is why the customers, software developers, and employees are
> pissed off.  Many of the most important ones will be at Sun Users
> Group, all next week!  There is an Open Windows "birds of a feather"
> meeting Tuesday night, 5:45-7:00.  I am almost afraid to show my face.
> I really really hope you have an explanation for what happened
> together by then.  It's going to go over like a lead brick if nobody
> from Sun can give any answers.  The worse thing in the world you could
> do would be to repeat the same old marketing hype. Do *not* try to
> explain to people that Open Windows is "free". Avoid that word like
> the plague, unless you *really* mean it.
> 
> 	-Don
> 
> PS: Enclosed is the press release:
> 
> SunFLASH Vol 23 #12					       November 1990 
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
> 
>           Package Includes Window System and Toolkits
> 
> MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif. -- November 13, 1990 -- Sun Microsystems
> announced today that the source code for its OpenWindows(TM)
> application development environment will now be available free of
> charge (cost of media only -- $995).  This means that hardware and
> software developers will now have a cost-effective way to incorporate
> OpenWindows -- including the easy-to-use OPEN LOOK(R) graphical user
> interface -- into applications developed or ported to many platforms
>> from different vendors.
> 
> The package includes code for the X11/NeWs(TM) Window System, OPEN LOOK
> toolkits, and OpenFonts(TM) with its TypeScaler(TM) technology.  Before
> today, only OpenWindows binaries were available from Sun.
> 
> "Offering free source code for the industry's most advanced,
> comprehensive window environment demonstrates our ongoing commitment to
> open systems," said Ed Zander, vice president of marketing at Sun.
> 
>                     Advanced Imaging Model
> 
> The X11/NeWS Window System that is part of the source package combines
> a fully compliant X implementation with Sun's NeWS(R) technology, which
> offers the most advanced PostScript(R) imaging model available today.
> NeWS lets developers work with interactive, on-screen PostScript
> graphics -- particularly useful for commercial applications such as
> desktop publishing and multimedia.
> 
> Also part of the source code package is OpenFonts -- Sun's
> nonproprietary font technology, which includes 57 scalable fonts.
> 
>             OPEN LOOK Toolkits Provide Portability
> 
> The keys to OpenWindows' portability are two OPEN LOOK toolkits,
> XView(TM) and the OPEN LOOK Intrinsics Toolkit (OLIT). XView is Sun's
> X-based toolkit that gives developers an easy way to design new
> applications with the OPEN LOOK graphical user interface, as well as to
> migrate the 2,800 existing kernel-based SunView(TM) applications to the
> networked window environment of OPEN LOOK and X.
> 
> The OLIT toolkit -- based on AT&T's OPEN LOOK toolkit (XT+) --
> implements the OPEN LOOK look and feel and supports MIT Intrinsics.
> The XView toolkit is also offered free on the X11 R4 tape available
>> from MIT. OpenWindows is a standard part of the industry's leading
> UNIX(R) operating system, UNIX System V Release 4 from AT&T.
> 
> Since OPEN LOOK toolkits will be available for a range of platforms,
> developers can standardize on a single graphical interface.  Toolkits
>> from Sun and other vendors are available now or will be offered within
> three months for UNIX workstations from Digital Equipment Corp.,
> Hewlett-Packard and IBM, for VAX/VMS systems from Digital.
> 
>                          Availability
> 
> OpenWindows source code will be available January 1, 1991 on magnetic
> tape for $995 (which includes the cost of media and documentation)
> through Sun distributors.  The source license is included at no cost.
> There are no royalties for distributing applications developed with
> OpenWindows.  Hardware vendors will pay nominal royalties for systems
> they resell that run the OpenWindows environment.
> 
> Sun Microsystems, Inc., headquartered in Mountain View, Calif., is a
> leading worldwide supplier of network-based distributed computing
> systems, including professional workstations, servers and UNIX
> operating system and productivity software.
> 
> ###
> 
> OpenWindows, XView, X11/NeWS, OpenFonts and TypeScaler are trademarks
> and NeWS is a registered trademark of Sun Microsystems, Inc. OPEN LOOK
> and UNIX are registered trademarks of UNIX System Laboratories, Inc.
> PostScript is a registered trademark of Adobe Systems, Inc. All other
> products or services mentioned in this document are identified by the
> trademarks or service marks of their respective companies or
> organizations.
> 
> 
> FOR MORE INFORMATION:
> Cathleen Beall Garfield  (415) 336-6536 
> Diana Murray OpenWindows Licensing Manager (415) 336-1567
> 
> +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
> 

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From will.senn at gmail.com  Mon Oct  2 05:09:59 2017
From: will.senn at gmail.com (Will Senn)
Date: Sun, 1 Oct 2017 14:09:59 -0500
Subject: Favorite UNIX
In-Reply-To: <mailman.1424.1506881102.3779.tuhs@minnie.tuhs.org>
References: <mailman.1424.1506881102.3779.tuhs@minnie.tuhs.org>
Message-ID: <BD481514-E269-47B4-8FE7-23E52524CE62@gmail.com>

On Sep 28, 2017 11:02 PM, "Kevin Bowling" <kevin.bowling at kev009.com> wrote:

What is your favorite UNIX.  Three possible categories, choose one or more:

1) Free
2) Forced to use a commercial platform.  I guess that could include
macOS and z/OS with some vivid imagination, maybe even NT.
3) Historical

1. FreeBSD. It's super stable and tends to be logical. The documentation is great once you get over the learning curve. Debian is a close second for the same reasons. Mint with KDE Plasma 5 is beautiful and user friendly.

2. I used Sun OS with a CDE-like interface back in the day and that was ok. Mac OS X 10.5-10.12 are great.

3. I enjoy the research versions of unix and other OSes that are available for the SimH PDP 11 emulator.

Will
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From mparson at bl.org  Mon Oct  2 05:35:49 2017
From: mparson at bl.org (Michael Parson)
Date: Sun, 1 Oct 2017 14:35:49 -0500 (CDT)
Subject: Favorite UNIX
In-Reply-To: <201710011513.v91FDSMB011831@freefriends.org>
References: <CAK7dMtBjgVeoEraveDDC1rhG+Aors_KAWeoy6HKpCV_vy9EdmQ@mail.gmail.com>
 <alpine.NEB.2.20.1709301021060.28681@neener.bl.org>
 <20170930175314.gdz6gj4lhjrk6fpp@matica.foolinux.mooo.com>
 <674dfbe51503c22a1dbc271c38142cd6@bl.org>
 <201710011513.v91FDSMB011831@freefriends.org>
Message-ID: <alpine.NEB.2.20.1710011424120.4274@neener.bl.org>

On Sun, 1 Oct 2017, arnold at skeeve.com wrote:
> Date: Sun, 01 Oct 2017 09:13:28 -0600
> Michael Parson <mparson at bl.org> wrote:
>
>> On 2017-09-30 12:53, Ian Zimmerman wrote:
>>> On 2017-09-30 10:40, Michael Parson wrote:
>>>
>>>> I've recently found instructions for installing SunOS 4.1.3 under
>>>> qemu-sparc that I want to try as well.
>>>
>>> Can you share a pointer to those with us?
>>
>> Sure:
>>
>> https://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/QEMU/SunOS_4.1.4
>>
>> Oops, 4.1.4, not .3. :)
>
> So then the next question is where can one find install media (or
> image thereof...)

I bought a boxed copy of 'Solaris 1.1.2' off e-bay many moon ago,
though I've been told it can be found with the google search term of
'winworldpc'.

-- 
Michael Parson
Pflugerville, TX
KF5LGQ


From steve.mynott at gmail.com  Mon Oct  2 06:15:31 2017
From: steve.mynott at gmail.com (Steve Mynott)
Date: Sun, 1 Oct 2017 21:15:31 +0100
Subject: Favorite UNIX
In-Reply-To: <20171001175106.5FE3318C0A6@mercury.lcs.mit.edu>
References: <20171001175106.5FE3318C0A6@mercury.lcs.mit.edu>
Message-ID: <CANuZA8TSrJUd7PFZp0Taq9NnfOTDXgZ-cgQtNBO99ZpgRiXYag@mail.gmail.com>

On 1 October 2017 at 18:51, Noel Chiappa <jnc at mercury.lcs.mit.edu> wrote:

> Why was Solaris so much worse than SunOS?

Probably because it was so much more buggy on release and people were
more used to BSD and didn't like change and the fact that greedy Sun
had removed the compiler. Solaris 2.3 had core dumps from base
binaries everywhere where SunOS 4.1.3 seemed quite stable.

I ended up admin'ing Solaris 2.5 which seemed mostly fixed but it had
taken 2 or 3 years to become usable. There was a lot of Sun wierdness
like not working with DNS by default and I tended to remove most of
the Sun packages and replace by the GNU ones and qmail.

By the time releases were renumbered to 7 and 8 etc. the writing was
on the wall for Solaris.  That PC under the desk running linux ran
several times faster, had all the extended GNU utilities installed by
default, was much cheaper hardware and open source software compiled
without patching.  I was always a linux advocate in a London based ISP
and many co-workers were still Sun bigots. I particularly remember
them laughing at a version of linux which returned negative ping
times! I also remember the awful flexlm(?) licence server for the
official Sun CC and having to shout out to co-workers in the office
"anyone compiling? I need to". I don't think that lasted long and
drove us quickly to GCC on Solaris.

After a while that PC under the desk became a rack mount server in the
data centre and displaced Solaris.  In many jobs over the last decade
I've seen the odd Solaris server which hadn't been replaced and noone
(apart from me!) wanted to touch. There were lots of gotchas for linux
users. I remember someone crashing Solaris at the BBC with the
"killall" command and everyone filling up /tmp and running out of
swap! But they became less and less in number. The decent techs zfs,
dtrace (mostly) appeared in FreeBSD anyway.  Oracle's licensing fees
were so expensive even banks dropped Solaris.

When I recently fired up one of the open source Solaris clones under a
VM it seemed even wierder than I remember with some bizarre XML based
startup rc system. I didn't have much desire to experiment further.
Firing up BSD 4.3 and SunOS 4.1.4 I was surprised how timeless they
seemed and how close to modern BSDs they were.   I still couldn't
remember how to get SunOS 4 DNS working of course!

Given modern linux developments such as systemd I hope I'll be using
BSD more in the future! Maybe BSD won in the long term ;-)

-- 
4096R/EA75174B Steve Mynott <steve.mynott at gmail.com>


From jon at fourwinds.com  Mon Oct  2 07:21:20 2017
From: jon at fourwinds.com (Jon Steinhart)
Date: Sun, 01 Oct 2017 14:21:20 -0700
Subject: Favorite UNIX
In-Reply-To: <CANuZA8TSrJUd7PFZp0Taq9NnfOTDXgZ-cgQtNBO99ZpgRiXYag@mail.gmail.com>
References: <20171001175106.5FE3318C0A6@mercury.lcs.mit.edu>
 <CANuZA8TSrJUd7PFZp0Taq9NnfOTDXgZ-cgQtNBO99ZpgRiXYag@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <201710012121.v91LLKHK004998@darkstar.fourwinds.com>

Steve Mynott writes:
> On 1 October 2017 at 18:51, Noel Chiappa <jnc at mercury.lcs.mit.edu> wrote:
> 
> > Why was Solaris so much worse than SunOS?
> 
> Probably because it was so much more buggy on release and people were
> more used to BSD and didn't like change and the fact that greedy Sun
> had removed the compiler. Solaris 2.3 had core dumps from base
> binaries everywhere where SunOS 4.1.3 seemed quite stable.

I think that the root cause is AT&T USL.  When UNIX went from research
to "product" different people worked on it.  And those people seemed to
lack the artistry, vision, and craftsmanship of the original developers.
AT&T pushed their SVR4 crud hard onto the rest of the world.  Meanwhile,
the folks at Berkeley produced code more in the original tradition
possibly because of Ken taking a sabbatical year to teach there.  SunOS
was the result of the pipeline between Berkeley and Sun.

Solaris was the result of Sun abandoning the Berkeley branch for the USL
branch.


From stewart at serissa.com  Mon Oct  2 08:12:36 2017
From: stewart at serissa.com (Lawrence Stewart)
Date: Sun, 1 Oct 2017 18:12:36 -0400
Subject: Favorite Unix?
Message-ID: <5FB830E1-690C-49B5-8D05-BC5C81D3BC4E@serissa.com>

I’m an HPC guy.   The only good OS is one that is not executing any instructions except mine.  No daemons, no interrupts, nothing. Load my code, give me all physical memory, give me direct access to the interconnect and then get out of the way.  If I want anything, I will let you know, but don’t wait up.

When I put on an educator’s hat I still have a soft spot for V6 and V7.  Those were my first exposure to Unix and the Unix Way.  One could actually learn style by reading code and writing device drivers.  These days kernels (Linux at least) are too complicated and too cluttered up with ifdefs to learn much.  The real recent innovations like RCU and queuing locks and NUMA affinity are buried pretty deep, and actual reliable file systems like ZFS and BTRFS are just too complicated for mortals.

As a user, what I really want are reliability, the commands and utilities, and stable APIs.  I don’t like a lot of things about Posix, but it is at least a little stable and a little portable.  For myself, I use MacOS and Debian Linux, and open, close, read, write.

-Larry



From don at DonHopkins.com  Mon Oct  2 09:28:09 2017
From: don at DonHopkins.com (Don Hopkins)
Date: Mon, 2 Oct 2017 01:28:09 +0200
Subject: Favorite UNIX
In-Reply-To: <201710012121.v91LLKHK004998@darkstar.fourwinds.com>
References: <20171001175106.5FE3318C0A6@mercury.lcs.mit.edu>
 <CANuZA8TSrJUd7PFZp0Taq9NnfOTDXgZ-cgQtNBO99ZpgRiXYag@mail.gmail.com>
 <201710012121.v91LLKHK004998@darkstar.fourwinds.com>
Message-ID: <F01BFED4-3E46-4FCB-B1FF-057A836E60AA@gmail.com>

The term I heard to describe Unix USL was “Turkey Farm”. And there was something about “Stewing in their own juices for too long”. Sounds delicious! 

-Don


> On 1 Oct 2017, at 23:21, Jon Steinhart <jon at fourwinds.com> wrote:
> 
> Steve Mynott writes:
>> On 1 October 2017 at 18:51, Noel Chiappa <jnc at mercury.lcs.mit.edu> wrote:
>> 
>>> Why was Solaris so much worse than SunOS?
>> 
>> Probably because it was so much more buggy on release and people were
>> more used to BSD and didn't like change and the fact that greedy Sun
>> had removed the compiler. Solaris 2.3 had core dumps from base
>> binaries everywhere where SunOS 4.1.3 seemed quite stable.
> 
> I think that the root cause is AT&T USL.  When UNIX went from research
> to "product" different people worked on it.  And those people seemed to
> lack the artistry, vision, and craftsmanship of the original developers.
> AT&T pushed their SVR4 crud hard onto the rest of the world.  Meanwhile,
> the folks at Berkeley produced code more in the original tradition
> possibly because of Ken taking a sabbatical year to teach there.  SunOS
> was the result of the pipeline between Berkeley and Sun.
> 
> Solaris was the result of Sun abandoning the Berkeley branch for the USL
> branch.



From lm at mcvoy.com  Mon Oct  2 10:36:28 2017
From: lm at mcvoy.com (Larry McVoy)
Date: Sun, 1 Oct 2017 17:36:28 -0700
Subject: Favorite UNIX
In-Reply-To: <201710012121.v91LLKHK004998@darkstar.fourwinds.com>
References: <20171001175106.5FE3318C0A6@mercury.lcs.mit.edu>
 <CANuZA8TSrJUd7PFZp0Taq9NnfOTDXgZ-cgQtNBO99ZpgRiXYag@mail.gmail.com>
 <201710012121.v91LLKHK004998@darkstar.fourwinds.com>
Message-ID: <20171002003628.GS16755@mcvoy.com>

On Sun, Oct 01, 2017 at 02:21:20PM -0700, Jon Steinhart wrote:
> Steve Mynott writes:
> > On 1 October 2017 at 18:51, Noel Chiappa <jnc at mercury.lcs.mit.edu> wrote:
> > 
> > > Why was Solaris so much worse than SunOS?
> > 
> > Probably because it was so much more buggy on release and people were
> > more used to BSD and didn't like change and the fact that greedy Sun
> > had removed the compiler. Solaris 2.3 had core dumps from base
> > binaries everywhere where SunOS 4.1.3 seemed quite stable.
> 
> I think that the root cause is AT&T USL.  When UNIX went from research
> to "product" different people worked on it.  And those people seemed to
> lack the artistry, vision, and craftsmanship of the original developers.
> AT&T pushed their SVR4 crud hard onto the rest of the world.  Meanwhile,
> the folks at Berkeley produced code more in the original tradition
> possibly because of Ken taking a sabbatical year to teach there.  SunOS
> was the result of the pipeline between Berkeley and Sun.
> 
> Solaris was the result of Sun abandoning the Berkeley branch for the USL
> branch.

+1 couldn't have put it better.
-- 
---
Larry McVoy            	     lm at mcvoy.com             http://www.mcvoy.com/lm 


From lm at mcvoy.com  Mon Oct  2 10:38:54 2017
From: lm at mcvoy.com (Larry McVoy)
Date: Sun, 1 Oct 2017 17:38:54 -0700
Subject: [TUHS] SunOS to Solaris - why?
In-Reply-To: <14fc91a9-922c-c73a-0fb1-78e8c3cd92ea@kilonet.net>
References: <14fc91a9-922c-c73a-0fb1-78e8c3cd92ea@kilonet.net>
Message-ID: <20171002003854.GU16755@mcvoy.com>

As I've said elsewhere, Sun was out of money.  AT&T bought $200m of Sun
stock at 35% over market but Sun had to dump SunOS and got to SVR4.

I don't know if Scooter knew what he was dumping or not, I suspect not
but all those late nights when he came over to egg us kernel geeks on,
maybe he did know.  I don't think he had a choice.  

On Sun, Oct 01, 2017 at 12:59:42PM -0400, Arthur Krewat via TUHSmangle wrote:
> From Sun's point of view, what was the REAL reason to move from SunOS to
> Solaris?
> 
> I don't think I've read anything anywhere as to a real technical reason. Was
> it just some stuffed-shirt's "great idea"?
> 
> Or was it really a standards-based or other reality-based reason?
> 
> As of SunOS 4.1.4, it seemed ready to go whole-hog into SMP, so that wasn't
> the sole reason.
> 
> thanks!
> art k.
> 
> 

-- 
---
Larry McVoy            	     lm at mcvoy.com             http://www.mcvoy.com/lm 


From dave at horsfall.org  Mon Oct  2 11:01:50 2017
From: dave at horsfall.org (Dave Horsfall)
Date: Mon, 2 Oct 2017 12:01:50 +1100 (EST)
Subject: Mangled and non-mangled TUHS mail lists
In-Reply-To: <20171001032536.GB31930@minnie.tuhs.org>
References: <20171001032536.GB31930@minnie.tuhs.org>
Message-ID: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710021157530.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>

On Sun, 1 Oct 2017, Warren Toomey wrote:

> The main TUHS list now:
> - doesn't strip incoming DKIM headers
> - doesn't alter the From: line
> - doesn't alter the Subject: line
> and hopefully will keep most mail systems happy.

I was under the impression that the main list would remain as it was,
and those with fussy clients would use the new one.

> The alternative, "mangled", TUHS list:
> - strips incoming DKIM headers
> - alters the From: line
> - alters the Subject: line to say [TUHS]
> - puts in DKIM headers once this is done
> and hopefully will keep most mail systems happy but in a different way.

I really like seeing the "[TUHS]" tag (I can optically sort mailing lists) 
so I'll probably migrate, but I'll wait a bit for them to settle down.

-- 
Dave Horsfall DTM (VK2KFU)  "Those who don't understand security will suffer."


From itz at very.loosely.org  Mon Oct  2 14:04:48 2017
From: itz at very.loosely.org (Ian Zimmerman)
Date: Sun, 1 Oct 2017 21:04:48 -0700
Subject: SunOS to Solaris - why?
In-Reply-To: <20171002003854.GU16755@mcvoy.com>
References: <14fc91a9-922c-c73a-0fb1-78e8c3cd92ea@kilonet.net>
 <20171002003854.GU16755@mcvoy.com>
Message-ID: <20171002040448.cx4ijj2fcmtqton4@matica.foolinux.mooo.com>

On 2017-10-01 17:38, Larry McVoy wrote:

> On Sun, Oct 01, 2017 at 12:59:42PM -0400, Arthur Krewat via TUHSmangle wrote:
> > From Sun's point of view, what was the REAL reason to move from
> > SunOS to Solaris?

> As I've said elsewhere, Sun was out of money.  AT&T bought $200m of
> Sun stock at 35% over market but Sun had to dump SunOS and got to
> SVR4.
> 
> I don't know if Scooter knew what he was dumping or not, I suspect not
> but all those late nights when he came over to egg us kernel geeks on,
> maybe he did know.  I don't think he had a choice.

I seem to be missing one or two messages per day on this list to
complete the threads.  No big deal, but I'm a perfectionist and it
grates.

The message by Arthur to which Larry was replying had been one of the
missing ones.  I have checked my MTA log and there is no trace of the
Message-ID of Arthur's message.  So it is definitely _not_ the case that
I received it but it went "into the spam bin".

As far as I can tell I'm on the "non-mangled" part of the team.

-- 
Please don't Cc: me privately on mailing lists and Usenet,
if you also post the followup to the list or newsgroup.
Do obvious transformation on domain to reply privately _only_ on Usenet.


From jason-tuhs at shalott.net  Mon Oct  2 18:22:21 2017
From: jason-tuhs at shalott.net (jason-tuhs at shalott.net)
Date: Mon, 2 Oct 2017 01:22:21 -0700 (PDT)
Subject: Mangled and non-mangled TUHS mail lists
In-Reply-To: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710021157530.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
References: <20171001032536.GB31930@minnie.tuhs.org>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710021157530.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
Message-ID: <alpine.LRH.2.21.1710020117180.6255@waffle.shalott.net>


>> The main TUHS list now:
>> [...]
>> - doesn't alter the Subject: line

> I was under the impression that the main list would remain as it was, 
> and those with fussy clients would use the new one.

+1

All else being equal, I would prefer the old list retain the old behaviour 
(i.e., to add the "[TUHS]" string to the Subject line) if possible.

But if there's a strong reason to prefer to change the behaviour of the 
old list (which, based on the Subject lines, still seems to have the 
majority of users), that's fine to.

I really appreciate all the contributions from everyone who participates 
on this list, and especially Warren for his onoing work to maintain the 
list and the related resources.

So thanks!

Cheers.


  -Jason



From jason-tuhs at shalott.net  Mon Oct  2 18:44:50 2017
From: jason-tuhs at shalott.net (jason-tuhs at shalott.net)
Date: Mon, 2 Oct 2017 01:44:50 -0700 (PDT)
Subject: Favorite UNIX
In-Reply-To: <20171001180500.GD16755@mcvoy.com>
References: <20171001175106.5FE3318C0A6@mercury.lcs.mit.edu>
 <20171001180500.GD16755@mcvoy.com>
Message-ID: <alpine.LRH.2.21.1710020135340.6255@waffle.shalott.net>


>>    > Solaris: so bad I left the company.

>> Why was Solaris so much worse than SunOS?

> But that was a kick in the nuts to us engineers.  The sytem v source 
> base was crap compared to sunos, a huge step backwards.
>
> So my crowd pretty much all left in disgust.  There was a lot of 
> heartache over it.  None of us knew about the business deal at the time, 
> in fact I think a lot of management didn't know.
> [...]
> Instead, they repeated the SunOS journey.  Bryan and crew polished that 
> turd for years and got it sort of reasonable. [...] but they went for it 
> and got it better.  Only to have it tossed away again.  Yuck.

For anyone who hasn't seen it, there's a pretty good talk that gives the 
two-minute version of what Larry has described, and then picks up the 
story from there and runs with it over the next twentyish years:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-zRN7XLCRhc


  -Jason



From kevin.bowling at kev009.com  Mon Oct  2 21:52:41 2017
From: kevin.bowling at kev009.com (Kevin Bowling)
Date: Mon, 2 Oct 2017 04:52:41 -0700
Subject: Favorite UNIX
In-Reply-To: <alpine.LRH.2.21.1710020135340.6255@waffle.shalott.net>
References: <20171001175106.5FE3318C0A6@mercury.lcs.mit.edu>
 <20171001180500.GD16755@mcvoy.com>
 <alpine.LRH.2.21.1710020135340.6255@waffle.shalott.net>
Message-ID: <CAK7dMtArd8jVmdt50hPU3DNZ9SQQWLoiPkjt3QCrwy5W2xFNjQ@mail.gmail.com>

Bryan’s talks are unparalleled entertainment, but it’s hard for me not to
laugh at some of this with the benefit of more time passage.

There’s a lot of clean code worthy of inspection in Illumos, but I think
it’s bordering on the threshold of a historical project.  Key subsystems
like the VM and network stack have seen little development since 2009.  Sun
was a giant benevolent benefactor and nobody’s filled the void of working
on general infrastructure.

My gut feeling is Sun’s early ‘90s choices were inevitable death wish.
I’ve had the unsettling thoughts lately that Sun after this era was a
brilliant marketing company more so than anything else.

On Monday, October 2, 2017, <jason-tuhs at shalott.net> wrote:

>
>    > Solaris: so bad I left the company.
>>>
>>
> Why was Solaris so much worse than SunOS?
>>>
>>
> But that was a kick in the nuts to us engineers.  The sytem v source base
>> was crap compared to sunos, a huge step backwards.
>>
>> So my crowd pretty much all left in disgust.  There was a lot of
>> heartache over it.  None of us knew about the business deal at the time, in
>> fact I think a lot of management didn't know.
>> [...]
>> Instead, they repeated the SunOS journey.  Bryan and crew polished that
>> turd for years and got it sort of reasonable. [...] but they went for it
>> and got it better.  Only to have it tossed away again.  Yuck.
>>
>
> For anyone who hasn't seen it, there's a pretty good talk that gives the
> two-minute version of what Larry has described, and then picks up the story
> from there and runs with it over the next twentyish years:
>
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-zRN7XLCRhc
>
>
>  -Jason
>
>
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From usotsuki at buric.co  Mon Oct  2 22:38:26 2017
From: usotsuki at buric.co (Steve Nickolas)
Date: Mon, 2 Oct 2017 08:38:26 -0400 (EDT)
Subject: Mangled and non-mangled TUHS mail lists
In-Reply-To: <alpine.LRH.2.21.1710020117180.6255@waffle.shalott.net>
References: <20171001032536.GB31930@minnie.tuhs.org>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710021157530.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <alpine.LRH.2.21.1710020117180.6255@waffle.shalott.net>
Message-ID: <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710020837230.94910@frieza.hoshinet.org>

On Mon, 2 Oct 2017, jason-tuhs at shalott.net wrote:

> All else being equal, I would prefer the old list retain the old behaviour 
> (i.e., to add the "[TUHS]" string to the Subject line) if possible.

Same.  My mailbox gets a lot of input from a lot of places and I generally 
use the subject line to optically filter - the tag really helps.

-uso.


From lm at mcvoy.com  Mon Oct  2 23:31:46 2017
From: lm at mcvoy.com (Larry McVoy)
Date: Mon, 2 Oct 2017 06:31:46 -0700
Subject: SunOS to Solaris - why?
In-Reply-To: <20171002040448.cx4ijj2fcmtqton4@matica.foolinux.mooo.com>
References: <14fc91a9-922c-c73a-0fb1-78e8c3cd92ea@kilonet.net>
 <20171002003854.GU16755@mcvoy.com>
 <20171002040448.cx4ijj2fcmtqton4@matica.foolinux.mooo.com>
Message-ID: <20171002133146.GX16755@mcvoy.com>

On Sun, Oct 01, 2017 at 09:04:48PM -0700, Ian Zimmerman wrote:
> On 2017-10-01 17:38, Larry McVoy wrote:
> 
> > On Sun, Oct 01, 2017 at 12:59:42PM -0400, Arthur Krewat via TUHSmangle wrote:
> > > From Sun's point of view, what was the REAL reason to move from
> > > SunOS to Solaris?
> 
> > As I've said elsewhere, Sun was out of money.  AT&T bought $200m of
> > Sun stock at 35% over market but Sun had to dump SunOS and got to
> > SVR4.
> > 
> > I don't know if Scooter knew what he was dumping or not, I suspect not
> > but all those late nights when he came over to egg us kernel geeks on,
> > maybe he did know.  I don't think he had a choice.
> 
> I seem to be missing one or two messages per day on this list to
> complete the threads.  No big deal, but I'm a perfectionist and it
> grates.

Yeah, me too, I find myself jumping into the middle of a thread and 
feeling like I'm "late" :)


From d235j.1 at gmail.com  Mon Oct  2 23:34:18 2017
From: d235j.1 at gmail.com (David Ryskalczyk)
Date: Mon, 2 Oct 2017 09:34:18 -0400
Subject: Mangled and non-mangled TUHS mail lists
In-Reply-To: <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710020837230.94910@frieza.hoshinet.org>
References: <20171001032536.GB31930@minnie.tuhs.org>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710021157530.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <alpine.LRH.2.21.1710020117180.6255@waffle.shalott.net>
 <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710020837230.94910@frieza.hoshinet.org>
Message-ID: <EE7FBA19-0C8A-4138-9E63-C3271BFCB2A8@gmail.com>

Unfortunately if DKIM is to be preserved, and the DKIM signature covers the Subject line (which it usually does), changing the Subject would break the signature and cause the bouncing problem to start happening again.

Looking at Warren's message at the beginning of this thread, I see the following DKIM signature:

DKIM-Signature: v=1; a=rsa-sha256; c=simple/simple; d=tuhs.org; s=dkim;
	t=1506828345; bh=JrrWTXe8/s8WUvyQhbjteoiXK8kMtqkyNHZyzoe+YwE=;
	h=Date:From:To:Subject:List-Id:List-Unsubscribe:List-Archive:
	 List-Post:List-Help:List-Subscribe:From;
	b=1bchv7u0p3glxS5aOdV2a2LcTPR/UNiVdxne762fZ8jTn8/PY6UDE0CEqfP1rS20G
	 t6uVy6iNk/xoDDKPeKGH4Tt8lSKqujoN682dKcAkHsM8/1ADamNo9ep/J7qiLUQIm7
	 62+lEKp7NZL8zsA2H+5iXtlcuKKIWJ3cTvhdhFLA=

This means that changing any of the headers listed under h= will break the signature (and cause bounces). This unfortunately includes the Subject.

For lists the alter the From: line, I prefer if they put the original From: address in the Cc: line as that means a reply-all goes both to the list and the originator. However I'm not sure whether this will cause DKIM issues as well (I haven't dug deep enough).

There's some discussion of this in RFC6377, unfortunately without a good solution given.

David

> On Oct 2, 2017, at 8:38 AM, Steve Nickolas <usotsuki at buric.co> wrote:
> 
> On Mon, 2 Oct 2017, jason-tuhs at shalott.net wrote:
> 
>> All else being equal, I would prefer the old list retain the old behaviour (i.e., to add the "[TUHS]" string to the Subject line) if possible.
> 
> Same.  My mailbox gets a lot of input from a lot of places and I generally use the subject line to optically filter - the tag really helps.
> 
> -uso.

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From imp at bsdimp.com  Tue Oct  3 00:17:03 2017
From: imp at bsdimp.com (Warner Losh)
Date: Mon, 2 Oct 2017 08:17:03 -0600
Subject: Favorite UNIX
In-Reply-To: <alpine.LRH.2.21.1710020135340.6255@waffle.shalott.net>
References: <20171001175106.5FE3318C0A6@mercury.lcs.mit.edu>
 <20171001180500.GD16755@mcvoy.com>
 <alpine.LRH.2.21.1710020135340.6255@waffle.shalott.net>
Message-ID: <CANCZdfq_fuk+3C3Nk7M53FGpGq-oQoPjkV4eOupOB9=3tFB9=A@mail.gmail.com>

Good talk. Best quote...

"Don't make the mistake of anthropomorphizing Larry Ellison."

Warner

On Mon, Oct 2, 2017 at 2:44 AM, <jason-tuhs at shalott.net> wrote:

>
>    > Solaris: so bad I left the company.
>>>
>>
> Why was Solaris so much worse than SunOS?
>>>
>>
> But that was a kick in the nuts to us engineers.  The sytem v source base
>> was crap compared to sunos, a huge step backwards.
>>
>> So my crowd pretty much all left in disgust.  There was a lot of
>> heartache over it.  None of us knew about the business deal at the time, in
>> fact I think a lot of management didn't know.
>> [...]
>> Instead, they repeated the SunOS journey.  Bryan and crew polished that
>> turd for years and got it sort of reasonable. [...] but they went for it
>> and got it better.  Only to have it tossed away again.  Yuck.
>>
>
> For anyone who hasn't seen it, there's a pretty good talk that gives the
> two-minute version of what Larry has described, and then picks up the story
> from there and runs with it over the next twentyish years:
>
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-zRN7XLCRhc
>
>
>  -Jason
>
>
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From dave at horsfall.org  Tue Oct  3 10:51:20 2017
From: dave at horsfall.org (Dave Horsfall)
Date: Tue, 3 Oct 2017 11:51:20 +1100 (EST)
Subject: Mangled and non-mangled TUHS mail lists
In-Reply-To: <EE7FBA19-0C8A-4138-9E63-C3271BFCB2A8@gmail.com>
References: <20171001032536.GB31930@minnie.tuhs.org>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710021157530.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <alpine.LRH.2.21.1710020117180.6255@waffle.shalott.net>
 <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710020837230.94910@frieza.hoshinet.org>
 <EE7FBA19-0C8A-4138-9E63-C3271BFCB2A8@gmail.com>
Message-ID: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710031147250.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>

On Mon, 2 Oct 2017, David Ryskalczyk wrote:

> For lists the alter the From: line, I prefer if they put the original 
> From: address in the Cc: line as that means a reply-all goes both to the 
> list and the originator. However I'm not sure whether this will cause 
> DKIM issues as well (I haven't dug deep enough).

I really hate it when people use reply-all and are too lazy to edit the 
recipient list; I get my copy via the list, thank you, and I don't need my 
own personal copy as well (there's a reason for the Reply-To: header).

-- 
Dave Horsfall DTM (VK2KFU)  "Those who don't understand security will suffer."


From usotsuki at buric.co  Tue Oct  3 12:19:02 2017
From: usotsuki at buric.co (Steve Nickolas)
Date: Mon, 2 Oct 2017 22:19:02 -0400 (EDT)
Subject: Mangled and non-mangled TUHS mail lists
In-Reply-To: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710031147250.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
References: <20171001032536.GB31930@minnie.tuhs.org>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710021157530.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <alpine.LRH.2.21.1710020117180.6255@waffle.shalott.net>
 <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710020837230.94910@frieza.hoshinet.org>
 <EE7FBA19-0C8A-4138-9E63-C3271BFCB2A8@gmail.com>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710031147250.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
Message-ID: <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710022218400.43253@frieza.hoshinet.org>

On Tue, 3 Oct 2017, Dave Horsfall wrote:

> On Mon, 2 Oct 2017, David Ryskalczyk wrote:
>
>> For lists the alter the From: line, I prefer if they put the original From: 
>> address in the Cc: line as that means a reply-all goes both to the list and 
>> the originator. However I'm not sure whether this will cause DKIM issues as 
>> well (I haven't dug deep enough).
>
> I really hate it when people use reply-all and are too lazy to edit the 
> recipient list; I get my copy via the list, thank you, and I don't need my 
> own personal copy as well (there's a reason for the Reply-To: header).

For me at least, in such cases, I have never gotten duplicates.

-uso.


From gtaylor at tnetconsulting.net  Tue Oct  3 13:25:21 2017
From: gtaylor at tnetconsulting.net (Grant Taylor)
Date: Mon, 2 Oct 2017 21:25:21 -0600
Subject: Mangled and non-mangled TUHS mail lists
In-Reply-To: <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710022218400.43253@frieza.hoshinet.org>
References: <20171001032536.GB31930@minnie.tuhs.org>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710021157530.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <alpine.LRH.2.21.1710020117180.6255@waffle.shalott.net>
 <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710020837230.94910@frieza.hoshinet.org>
 <EE7FBA19-0C8A-4138-9E63-C3271BFCB2A8@gmail.com>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710031147250.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710022218400.43253@frieza.hoshinet.org>
Message-ID: <209ed252-49ff-aff4-dd0a-614397907418@tnetconsulting.net>

On 10/02/2017 08:19 PM, Steve Nickolas wrote:
> For me at least, in such cases, I have never gotten duplicates.

Steve:

Do you receive the email from the list?  Or the person that hit 
Reply-to-All?

Mailman has a feature to not send you a copy from the list if you were a 
direct recipient (To or Cc.)

Dave:

You might consider a filter that will filter messages (to trash so it's 
recoverable?) to you and to the list.  That way you would rely on the 
list copy.  (But you could fetch the message out of trash if you needed to.)



-- 
Grant. . . .
unix || die


From dave at horsfall.org  Tue Oct  3 13:33:38 2017
From: dave at horsfall.org (Dave Horsfall)
Date: Tue, 3 Oct 2017 14:33:38 +1100 (EST)
Subject: Mangled and non-mangled TUHS mail lists
In-Reply-To: <209ed252-49ff-aff4-dd0a-614397907418@tnetconsulting.net>
References: <20171001032536.GB31930@minnie.tuhs.org>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710021157530.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <alpine.LRH.2.21.1710020117180.6255@waffle.shalott.net>
 <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710020837230.94910@frieza.hoshinet.org>
 <EE7FBA19-0C8A-4138-9E63-C3271BFCB2A8@gmail.com>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710031147250.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710022218400.43253@frieza.hoshinet.org>
 <209ed252-49ff-aff4-dd0a-614397907418@tnetconsulting.net>
Message-ID: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710031432421.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>

On Mon, 2 Oct 2017, Grant Taylor wrote:

> Dave:
>
> You might consider a filter that will filter messages (to trash so it's 
> recoverable?) to you and to the list.  That way you would rely on the list 
> copy.  (But you could fetch the message out of trash if you needed to.)

Yeah, I did use a Procmail filter for that, but Procmail is dead.  I must
take a closer look at Sieve.

-- 
Dave Horsfall DTM (VK2KFU)  "Those who don't understand security will suffer."


From gtaylor at tnetconsulting.net  Tue Oct  3 13:55:09 2017
From: gtaylor at tnetconsulting.net (Grant Taylor)
Date: Mon, 2 Oct 2017 21:55:09 -0600
Subject: Mangled and non-mangled TUHS mail lists
In-Reply-To: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710031432421.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
References: <20171001032536.GB31930@minnie.tuhs.org>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710021157530.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <alpine.LRH.2.21.1710020117180.6255@waffle.shalott.net>
 <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710020837230.94910@frieza.hoshinet.org>
 <EE7FBA19-0C8A-4138-9E63-C3271BFCB2A8@gmail.com>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710031147250.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710022218400.43253@frieza.hoshinet.org>
 <209ed252-49ff-aff4-dd0a-614397907418@tnetconsulting.net>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710031432421.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
Message-ID: <ece4ffb1-7021-d005-7b73-e84e8877f3f7@tnetconsulting.net>

On 10/02/2017 09:33 PM, Dave Horsfall wrote:
> Yeah, I did use a Procmail filter for that, but Procmail is dead.  I must 
> take a closer look at Sieve.

Please don't tell my (zombie?) Procmail that.  I've got thousands 2300 
lines of Procmail that I'm still happily using every single day.

I keep bumping into Sieve.  I've not had a reason to migrate to it yet.



-- 
Grant. . . .
unix || die


From khm at sciops.net  Tue Oct  3 14:12:16 2017
From: khm at sciops.net (Kurt H Maier)
Date: Mon, 2 Oct 2017 21:12:16 -0700
Subject: Mangled and non-mangled TUHS mail lists
In-Reply-To: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710031432421.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
References: <20171001032536.GB31930@minnie.tuhs.org>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710021157530.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <alpine.LRH.2.21.1710020117180.6255@waffle.shalott.net>
 <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710020837230.94910@frieza.hoshinet.org>
 <EE7FBA19-0C8A-4138-9E63-C3271BFCB2A8@gmail.com>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710031147250.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710022218400.43253@frieza.hoshinet.org>
 <209ed252-49ff-aff4-dd0a-614397907418@tnetconsulting.net>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710031432421.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
Message-ID: <20171003041216.GA22899@wopr>

On Tue, Oct 03, 2017 at 02:33:38PM +1100, Dave Horsfall wrote:
> 
> Yeah, I did use a Procmail filter for that, but Procmail is dead.  I must
> take a closer look at Sieve.
> 

Courier's maildrop MDA is also still developed, and has the advantage of
not being another network protocol to manage.

khm


From dave at horsfall.org  Tue Oct  3 14:17:07 2017
From: dave at horsfall.org (Dave Horsfall)
Date: Tue, 3 Oct 2017 15:17:07 +1100 (EST)
Subject: Mangled and non-mangled TUHS mail lists
In-Reply-To: <ece4ffb1-7021-d005-7b73-e84e8877f3f7@tnetconsulting.net>
References: <20171001032536.GB31930@minnie.tuhs.org>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710021157530.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <alpine.LRH.2.21.1710020117180.6255@waffle.shalott.net>
 <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710020837230.94910@frieza.hoshinet.org>
 <EE7FBA19-0C8A-4138-9E63-C3271BFCB2A8@gmail.com>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710031147250.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710022218400.43253@frieza.hoshinet.org>
 <209ed252-49ff-aff4-dd0a-614397907418@tnetconsulting.net>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710031432421.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <ece4ffb1-7021-d005-7b73-e84e8877f3f7@tnetconsulting.net>
Message-ID: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710031510370.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>

On Mon, 2 Oct 2017, Grant Taylor wrote:

>> Yeah, I did use a Procmail filter for that, but Procmail is dead.  I 
>> must take a closer look at Sieve.
>
> Please don't tell my (zombie?) Procmail that.  I've got thousands 2300 
> lines of Procmail that I'm still happily using every single day.
>
> I keep bumping into Sieve.  I've not had a reason to migrate to it yet.

Even the last maintainer advises against using it:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Procmail

``Procmail is stable, but no longer maintained.[1] Users who wish to use a
   maintained program are advised by procmail's author, Philip Guenther,[2]
   to use an alternative tool.''

``Procmail was an early example of a mail filtering tool and language.
   Procmail is no longer maintained and has unfixed security
   vulnerabilities. Procmail's last maintainers suggest using alternative
   tools.''

Given FreeBSD's philosophy re: dead ports, I guess it will be removed
soon.

With a mailserver facing the Internet, the last thing I need are security
vulnerabilities...

-- 
Dave Horsfall DTM (VK2KFU)  "Those who don't understand security will suffer."

From itz at very.loosely.org  Tue Oct  3 17:40:13 2017
From: itz at very.loosely.org (Ian Zimmerman)
Date: Tue, 3 Oct 2017 00:40:13 -0700
Subject: Mangled and non-mangled TUHS mail lists
In-Reply-To: <20171003041216.GA22899@wopr>
References: <20171001032536.GB31930@minnie.tuhs.org>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710021157530.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <alpine.LRH.2.21.1710020117180.6255@waffle.shalott.net>
 <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710020837230.94910@frieza.hoshinet.org>
 <EE7FBA19-0C8A-4138-9E63-C3271BFCB2A8@gmail.com>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710031147250.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710022218400.43253@frieza.hoshinet.org>
 <209ed252-49ff-aff4-dd0a-614397907418@tnetconsulting.net>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710031432421.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <20171003041216.GA22899@wopr>
Message-ID: <20171003074013.a3x5tz4cxjthh265@matica.foolinux.mooo.com>

On 2017-10-02 21:12, Kurt H Maier wrote:

> Courier's maildrop MDA is also still developed, and has the advantage
> of not being another network protocol to manage.

Sieve doesn't necessarily imply another protocol.  Do not confuse Sieve
and ManageSieve.

For example exim's implementation is entirely local; it is just a
different syntax for .forward files.  exim also provides another syntax
which is specific to it but has more features than Sieve.  Gory details
are at [1].

dovecot provides ManageSieve but you don't have to enable it.  Again,
you can simply drop the rules file on the server via whatever file
transfer protocol you normally use - scp, rsync, etc.

[1]
http://exim.org/exim-html-current/doc/html/spec_html/filter.html

-- 
Please don't Cc: me privately on mailing lists and Usenet,
if you also post the followup to the list or newsgroup.
Do obvious transformation on domain to reply privately _only_ on Usenet.


From usotsuki at buric.co  Tue Oct  3 20:12:03 2017
From: usotsuki at buric.co (Steve Nickolas)
Date: Tue, 3 Oct 2017 06:12:03 -0400 (EDT)
Subject: Mangled and non-mangled TUHS mail lists
In-Reply-To: <209ed252-49ff-aff4-dd0a-614397907418@tnetconsulting.net>
References: <20171001032536.GB31930@minnie.tuhs.org>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710021157530.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <alpine.LRH.2.21.1710020117180.6255@waffle.shalott.net>
 <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710020837230.94910@frieza.hoshinet.org>
 <EE7FBA19-0C8A-4138-9E63-C3271BFCB2A8@gmail.com>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710031147250.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710022218400.43253@frieza.hoshinet.org>
 <209ed252-49ff-aff4-dd0a-614397907418@tnetconsulting.net>
Message-ID: <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710030611290.70836@frieza.hoshinet.org>

On Mon, 2 Oct 2017, Grant Taylor wrote:

> On 10/02/2017 08:19 PM, Steve Nickolas wrote:
>> For me at least, in such cases, I have never gotten duplicates.
>
> Steve:
>
> Do you receive the email from the list?  Or the person that hit Reply-to-All?
>
> Mailman has a feature to not send you a copy from the list if you were a 
> direct recipient (To or Cc.)

That's as it should be. ;)

-uso.


From steffen at sdaoden.eu  Wed Oct  4 00:08:53 2017
From: steffen at sdaoden.eu (Steffen Nurpmeso)
Date: Tue, 03 Oct 2017 16:08:53 +0200
Subject: Mangled and non-mangled TUHS mail lists
In-Reply-To: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710031432421.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
References: <20171001032536.GB31930@minnie.tuhs.org>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710021157530.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <alpine.LRH.2.21.1710020117180.6255@waffle.shalott.net>
 <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710020837230.94910@frieza.hoshinet.org>
 <EE7FBA19-0C8A-4138-9E63-C3271BFCB2A8@gmail.com>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710031147250.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710022218400.43253@frieza.hoshinet.org>
 <209ed252-49ff-aff4-dd0a-614397907418@tnetconsulting.net>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710031432421.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
Message-ID: <20171003140853.IrkS4%steffen@sdaoden.eu>

Dave Horsfall <dave at horsfall.org> wrote:
 |On Mon, 2 Oct 2017, Grant Taylor wrote:
 |> You might consider a filter that will filter messages (to trash so it's 
 |> recoverable?) to you and to the list.  That way you would rely on \
 |> the list 
 |> copy.  (But you could fetch the message out of trash if you needed to.)
 |
 |Yeah, I did use a Procmail filter for that, but Procmail is dead.  I must
 |take a closer look at Sieve.

The BSD Mail clone i maintain can perform simple filtering, too.
Gunnar Ritter implemented IMAP-style search expressions.  We are
far from being so powerful as mutt regarding filtering, but
i think automatization should work a bit better already today.

Because TUHS changed its policy i have added :Ll colon modifiers
to search for mailing-lists which are known (`mlist') or
subscribed (`mlsubscribe') just yesterday.  This is not on
[master] yet but just works (true for the [next] branch as of
today as such).  E.g.,

  $ printf 'File+download\nmove :Ll +lists\nxit' | s-nail -#

It is a bit of a pity, since almost all MLs really worth reading
use this tagging (e.g., ih, leapsecs, tz, the security lists,
groff, as well as pcc and tinycc-devel, to name a few).  And DKIM
is no problem at all if you use G....e groups over HTTPS and give
the business some opportunities to actually make some of the money
necessary to drive the environment you use, HEH???  DKIM should
have been designed to create DKIM envelopes, so that lists could
simply create an encapsulating DKIM layer, and all would be fine.
But it has not, evil to him who evil thinks, the future is bright,
isn't it.  I for one admire those old standards which worked for
a few dozen boxes and still scale further on.

--steffen
|
|Der Kragenbaer,                The moon bear,
|der holt sich munter           he cheerfully and one by one
|einen nach dem anderen runter  wa.ks himself off
|(By Robert Gernhardt)


From gtaylor at tnetconsulting.net  Wed Oct  4 04:20:15 2017
From: gtaylor at tnetconsulting.net (Grant Taylor)
Date: Tue, 3 Oct 2017 12:20:15 -0600
Subject: Mangled and non-mangled TUHS mail lists
In-Reply-To: <20171003140853.IrkS4%steffen@sdaoden.eu>
References: <20171001032536.GB31930@minnie.tuhs.org>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710021157530.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <alpine.LRH.2.21.1710020117180.6255@waffle.shalott.net>
 <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710020837230.94910@frieza.hoshinet.org>
 <EE7FBA19-0C8A-4138-9E63-C3271BFCB2A8@gmail.com>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710031147250.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710022218400.43253@frieza.hoshinet.org>
 <209ed252-49ff-aff4-dd0a-614397907418@tnetconsulting.net>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710031432421.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <20171003140853.IrkS4%steffen@sdaoden.eu>
Message-ID: <472d5571-8093-e02c-4478-a97accc8e632@tnetconsulting.net>

On 10/03/2017 08:08 AM, Steffen Nurpmeso wrote:
> It is a bit of a pity, since almost all MLs really worth reading
> use this tagging (e.g., ih, leapsecs, tz, the security lists,
> groff, as well as pcc and tinycc-devel, to name a few).

I think that modifying the subject to add a tag is a perfectly valid 
thing.  As such, provisions should make such modifications /possible/. 
Then leave the choice of doing so or not up to each list's administrator.

> And DKIM
> is no problem at all if you use G....e groups over HTTPS and give
> the business some opportunities to actually make some of the money
> necessary to drive the environment you use, HEH???

I think that GG is an option.  Just an option that I choose not to use.

I also vehemently in the option to host things yourself.  -  Email is 
not too complex that people can't successfully run their own server if 
they want to do so.

> DKIM should
> have been designed to create DKIM envelopes, so that lists could
> simply create an encapsulating DKIM layer, and all would be fine.

I believe that Mailman has an option to attach the DKIM signed message 
much like I (mis?)understand the wrapper that you're talking about.

In such case, DKIM has no say.  DKIM is designed to validate that a 
message has not been modified in source.  -  The wrapper message is a 
new message that happens to have an attachment.  Since DKIM filters are 
looking for a DKIM-Signature header in the outer most message, it does 
not matter what's in the inner / attached message.

I also staunchly believe that Mailing lists are an entity unto 
themselves.  Said entity is what sends the emails, not me.  As such, my 
opinion is that said entity should draft completely new messages using 
textual content from source material that I provided.  Thus there is 
nothing about the original message envelope to be a problem.

This also means that mailing lists could support things like subject 
modification / SPF / DKIM / DMARC / ARC / S/MIME / PGP, etc. directly.

But ... that's just me and my opinion.



-- 
Grant. . . .
unix || die

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From itz at very.loosely.org  Wed Oct  4 04:43:45 2017
From: itz at very.loosely.org (Ian Zimmerman)
Date: Tue, 3 Oct 2017 11:43:45 -0700
Subject: Mangled and non-mangled TUHS mail lists
In-Reply-To: <472d5571-8093-e02c-4478-a97accc8e632@tnetconsulting.net>
References: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710021157530.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <alpine.LRH.2.21.1710020117180.6255@waffle.shalott.net>
 <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710020837230.94910@frieza.hoshinet.org>
 <EE7FBA19-0C8A-4138-9E63-C3271BFCB2A8@gmail.com>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710031147250.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710022218400.43253@frieza.hoshinet.org>
 <209ed252-49ff-aff4-dd0a-614397907418@tnetconsulting.net>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710031432421.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <20171003140853.IrkS4%steffen@sdaoden.eu>
 <472d5571-8093-e02c-4478-a97accc8e632@tnetconsulting.net>
Message-ID: <20171003184345.rout343iwjwc57e4@matica.foolinux.mooo.com>

On 2017-10-03 12:20, Grant Taylor wrote:

> I also staunchly believe that Mailing lists are an entity unto
> themselves.  Said entity is what sends the emails, not me.  As such,
> my opinion is that said entity should draft completely new messages
> using textual content from source material that I provided.  Thus
> there is nothing about the original message envelope to be a problem.

It's a valid viewpoint, but one of its consequences is that there is no
straight way of relating multiple copies of the original message.  Not
only in the somewhat shady case of personal reply+list followup, but
also in the quite legitimate case of posting the same message to
multiple lists.

A related situation is list managers that act as 2-way gateways from/to
Usenet groups.  Mailman can do that, and when it does it rewrites the
Message-ID.  The result is that all threads with mixed participants
(posting both via Unsenet and via email) are broken.

This is why I stopped reading the core GNU lists (help-gnu-emacs et al.)
when they adopted Mailman.

-- 
Please don't Cc: me privately on mailing lists and Usenet,
if you also post the followup to the list or newsgroup.
Do obvious transformation on domain to reply privately _only_ on Usenet.


From steffen at sdaoden.eu  Wed Oct  4 04:49:19 2017
From: steffen at sdaoden.eu (Steffen Nurpmeso)
Date: Tue, 03 Oct 2017 20:49:19 +0200
Subject: Mangled and non-mangled TUHS mail lists
In-Reply-To: <472d5571-8093-e02c-4478-a97accc8e632@tnetconsulting.net>
References: <20171001032536.GB31930@minnie.tuhs.org>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710021157530.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <alpine.LRH.2.21.1710020117180.6255@waffle.shalott.net>
 <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710020837230.94910@frieza.hoshinet.org>
 <EE7FBA19-0C8A-4138-9E63-C3271BFCB2A8@gmail.com>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710031147250.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710022218400.43253@frieza.hoshinet.org>
 <209ed252-49ff-aff4-dd0a-614397907418@tnetconsulting.net>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710031432421.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <20171003140853.IrkS4%steffen@sdaoden.eu>
 <472d5571-8093-e02c-4478-a97accc8e632@tnetconsulting.net>
Message-ID: <20171003184919.1QJzu%steffen@sdaoden.eu>

Grant Taylor <gtaylor at tnetconsulting.net> wrote:
 |On 10/03/2017 08:08 AM, Steffen Nurpmeso wrote:
 |> It is a bit of a pity, since almost all MLs really worth reading
 |> use this tagging (e.g., ih, leapsecs, tz, the security lists,
 |> groff, as well as pcc and tinycc-devel, to name a few).
 |
 |I think that modifying the subject to add a tag is a perfectly valid 
 |thing.  As such, provisions should make such modifications /possible/. 
 |Then leave the choice of doing so or not up to each list's administrator.

As has happened recently.  Sure.

 |> And DKIM
 |> is no problem at all if you use G....e groups over HTTPS and give
 |> the business some opportunities to actually make some of the money
 |> necessary to drive the environment you use, HEH???
 |
 |I think that GG is an option.  Just an option that I choose not to use.
 |
 |I also vehemently in the option to host things yourself.  -  Email is 
 |not too complex that people can't successfully run their own server if 
 |they want to do so.
 |
 |> DKIM should
 |> have been designed to create DKIM envelopes, so that lists could
 |> simply create an encapsulating DKIM layer, and all would be fine.
 |
 |I believe that Mailman has an option to attach the DKIM signed message 
 |much like I (mis?)understand the wrapper that you're talking about.
 |
 |In such case, DKIM has no say.  DKIM is designed to validate that a 
 |message has not been modified in source.  -  The wrapper message is a 
 |new message that happens to have an attachment.  Since DKIM filters are 
 |looking for a DKIM-Signature header in the outer most message, it does 
 |not matter what's in the inner / attached message.
 |
 |I also staunchly believe that Mailing lists are an entity unto 
 |themselves.  Said entity is what sends the emails, not me.  As such, my 
 |opinion is that said entity should draft completely new messages using 
 |textual content from source material that I provided.  Thus there is 
 |nothing about the original message envelope to be a problem.

I was not involved in the process of creating that standard, nor
have i yet really thought about the problem, and especially not
did i have to manage real-world problems originating in that.

 |This also means that mailing lists could support things like subject 
 |modification / SPF / DKIM / DMARC / ARC / S/MIME / PGP, etc. directly.

But mailing-lists are a, possibly the most vivid part of email
since a very long time, and designing a standard that does not
play nice with mailing-lists is grotesque.  I was not thinking
about enwrapping the message, but rather of a mechanism like the
stacking of Received: headers which also follows standard.
Something like renaming all DKIM headers stackwise (DKIM ->
DKIM-LVL1, DKIM-LVL1 -> DKIM-LVL2 etc.) and creating new DKIM
headers for the updated message, also covering the DKIM stack.
Something like that.  Like this the existence of a stack that
would need to become unrolled would be known to verifying parties,
which were all newly created for this then new standard.  A stack
level could even be used to save-away tracked headers, like
Subject:, too.  But SHOULD not.  ^.^  Anyway.

 |But ... that's just me and my opinion.

Yep.  Let's just stop draggin' my heart around.

--steffen
|
|Der Kragenbaer,                The moon bear,
|der holt sich munter           he cheerfully and one by one
|einen nach dem anderen runter  wa.ks himself off
|(By Robert Gernhardt)


From bakul at bitblocks.com  Wed Oct  4 05:21:23 2017
From: bakul at bitblocks.com (Bakul Shah)
Date: Tue, 3 Oct 2017 12:21:23 -0700
Subject: Mangled and non-mangled TUHS mail lists
In-Reply-To: <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710030611290.70836@frieza.hoshinet.org>
References: <20171001032536.GB31930@minnie.tuhs.org>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710021157530.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <alpine.LRH.2.21.1710020117180.6255@waffle.shalott.net>
 <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710020837230.94910@frieza.hoshinet.org>
 <EE7FBA19-0C8A-4138-9E63-C3271BFCB2A8@gmail.com>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710031147250.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710022218400.43253@frieza.hoshinet.org>
 <209ed252-49ff-aff4-dd0a-614397907418@tnetconsulting.net>
 <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710030611290.70836@frieza.hoshinet.org>
Message-ID: <C608B801-0E80-45D0-BD98-045225B81223@bitblocks.com>


> On Oct 3, 2017, at 3:12 AM, Steve Nickolas <usotsuki at buric.co> wrote:
> 
> On Mon, 2 Oct 2017, Grant Taylor wrote:
> 
>> On 10/02/2017 08:19 PM, Steve Nickolas wrote:
>>> For me at least, in such cases, I have never gotten duplicates.
>> 
>> Steve:
>> 
>> Do you receive the email from the list?  Or the person that hit Reply-to-All?
>> 
>> Mailman has a feature to not send you a copy from the list if you were a direct recipient (To or Cc.)
> 
> That's as it should be. ;)

I prioritize mail directly addressed to me; while reading most
mailing lists is an idle time process. For this reason I move
list messages to list specific folders via mail filters.  I
dispose of my own copy after responding to it (if also posted
to a mailing list). Given this style, I prefer receiving a
directly addressed copy as well as one re-sent via the list
manager and most lists do do this.  For groups like TUHS I have
to remember to manually move a message from inbox after I deal
with it. Not a big deal but....


From gtaylor at tnetconsulting.net  Wed Oct  4 07:54:44 2017
From: gtaylor at tnetconsulting.net (Grant Taylor)
Date: Tue, 3 Oct 2017 15:54:44 -0600
Subject: Mangled and non-mangled TUHS mail lists
In-Reply-To: <20171003184919.1QJzu%steffen@sdaoden.eu>
References: <20171001032536.GB31930@minnie.tuhs.org>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710021157530.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <alpine.LRH.2.21.1710020117180.6255@waffle.shalott.net>
 <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710020837230.94910@frieza.hoshinet.org>
 <EE7FBA19-0C8A-4138-9E63-C3271BFCB2A8@gmail.com>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710031147250.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710022218400.43253@frieza.hoshinet.org>
 <209ed252-49ff-aff4-dd0a-614397907418@tnetconsulting.net>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710031432421.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <20171003140853.IrkS4%steffen@sdaoden.eu>
 <472d5571-8093-e02c-4478-a97accc8e632@tnetconsulting.net>
 <20171003184919.1QJzu%steffen@sdaoden.eu>
Message-ID: <9294cf0a-41bc-5f5a-7da9-ec9233c5848f@tnetconsulting.net>

On 10/03/2017 12:49 PM, Steffen Nurpmeso wrote:
> But mailing-lists are a, possibly the most vivid part of email
> since a very long time, and designing a standard that does not
> play nice with mailing-lists is grotesque.  I was not thinking
> about enwrapping the message, but rather of a mechanism like the
> stacking of Received: headers which also follows standard.
> Something like renaming all DKIM headers stackwise (DKIM ->
> DKIM-LVL1, DKIM-LVL1 -> DKIM-LVL2 etc.) and creating new DKIM
> headers for the updated message, also covering the DKIM stack.
> Something like that.  Like this the existence of a stack that
> would need to become unrolled would be known to verifying parties,
> which were all newly created for this then new standard.  A stack
> level could even be used to save-away tracked headers, like
> Subject:, too.  But SHOULD not.  ^.^  Anyway.

I recently became aware that DKIM does have an option (l= length 
parameter) to specify how much of the body is covered by the DKIM signature.

I wonder if this would help in what you're describing.

It's my understanding that the motivation behind it is to allow things 
to append content to the body without breaking the DKIM signature.

Granted, it would still protect other headers.



-- 
Grant. . . .
unix || die

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From gtaylor at tnetconsulting.net  Wed Oct  4 07:59:46 2017
From: gtaylor at tnetconsulting.net (Grant Taylor)
Date: Tue, 3 Oct 2017 15:59:46 -0600
Subject: Mangled and non-mangled TUHS mail lists
In-Reply-To: <20171003184345.rout343iwjwc57e4@matica.foolinux.mooo.com>
References: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710021157530.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <alpine.LRH.2.21.1710020117180.6255@waffle.shalott.net>
 <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710020837230.94910@frieza.hoshinet.org>
 <EE7FBA19-0C8A-4138-9E63-C3271BFCB2A8@gmail.com>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710031147250.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710022218400.43253@frieza.hoshinet.org>
 <209ed252-49ff-aff4-dd0a-614397907418@tnetconsulting.net>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710031432421.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <20171003140853.IrkS4%steffen@sdaoden.eu>
 <472d5571-8093-e02c-4478-a97accc8e632@tnetconsulting.net>
 <20171003184345.rout343iwjwc57e4@matica.foolinux.mooo.com>
Message-ID: <d9a04642-b035-8369-2415-423fd33f177a@tnetconsulting.net>

On 10/03/2017 12:43 PM, Ian Zimmerman wrote:
> It's a valid viewpoint, but one of its consequences is that there is no
> straight way of relating multiple copies of the original message.  Not
> only in the somewhat shady case of personal reply+list followup, but
> also in the quite legitimate case of posting the same message to
> multiple lists.

You bring up a valid point.  Something I've not specifically thought 
about before, mainly because I've not wanted to maintain a MLM.

> A related situation is list managers that act as 2-way gateways from/to
> Usenet groups.  Mailman can do that, and when it does it rewrites the
> Message-ID.  The result is that all threads with mixed participants
> (posting both via Unsenet and via email) are broken.

I see no reason that the hypothetical MLM that I'm alluding to couldn't 
re-use the message ID or at least cite it in the References: header 
rather than making something arbitrary up.

I think that would help with the problem that you're describing.

> This is why I stopped reading the core GNU lists (help-gnu-emacs et al.)
> when they adopted Mailman.

I'm sorry.  That makes me believe that the list has failed in it's 
purpose of enabling communications.  :-(



-- 
Grant. . . .
unix || die

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From jon at fourwinds.com  Wed Oct  4 08:00:06 2017
From: jon at fourwinds.com (Jon Steinhart)
Date: Tue, 03 Oct 2017 15:00:06 -0700
Subject: Mangled and non-mangled TUHS mail lists [ enough already? ]
In-Reply-To: <9294cf0a-41bc-5f5a-7da9-ec9233c5848f@tnetconsulting.net>
References: <20171001032536.GB31930@minnie.tuhs.org>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710021157530.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <alpine.LRH.2.21.1710020117180.6255@waffle.shalott.net>
 <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710020837230.94910@frieza.hoshinet.org>
 <EE7FBA19-0C8A-4138-9E63-C3271BFCB2A8@gmail.com>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710031147250.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710022218400.43253@frieza.hoshinet.org>
 <209ed252-49ff-aff4-dd0a-614397907418@tnetconsulting.net>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710031432421.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <20171003140853.IrkS4%steffen@sdaoden.eu>
 <472d5571-8093-e02c-4478-a97accc8e632@tnetconsulting.net>
 <20171003184919.1QJzu%steffen@sdaoden.eu>
 <9294cf0a-41bc-5f5a-7da9-ec9233c5848f@tnetconsulting.net>
Message-ID: <201710032200.v93M06ib007796@darkstar.fourwinds.com>

While I haven't been on this list for very long I've seen several discussions
shut down.  Can we shut this one down?  Seen more messages on mailing lists,
DKIM, headers, procmail, and so on than anything else.  Not really UNIX stuff.

Jon


From dave at horsfall.org  Wed Oct  4 12:28:57 2017
From: dave at horsfall.org (Dave Horsfall)
Date: Wed, 4 Oct 2017 13:28:57 +1100 (EST)
Subject: Mangled and non-mangled TUHS mail lists
In-Reply-To: <20171003184919.1QJzu%steffen@sdaoden.eu>
References: <20171001032536.GB31930@minnie.tuhs.org>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710021157530.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <alpine.LRH.2.21.1710020117180.6255@waffle.shalott.net>
 <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710020837230.94910@frieza.hoshinet.org>
 <EE7FBA19-0C8A-4138-9E63-C3271BFCB2A8@gmail.com>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710031147250.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710022218400.43253@frieza.hoshinet.org>
 <209ed252-49ff-aff4-dd0a-614397907418@tnetconsulting.net>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710031432421.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <20171003140853.IrkS4%steffen@sdaoden.eu>
 <472d5571-8093-e02c-4478-a97accc8e632@tnetconsulting.net>
 <20171003184919.1QJzu%steffen@sdaoden.eu>
Message-ID: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710041326421.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>

On Tue, 3 Oct 2017, Steffen Nurpmeso wrote:

> |I think that modifying the subject to add a tag is a perfectly valid 
> |thing.  As such, provisions should make such modifications /possible/. 
> |Then leave the choice of doing so or not up to each list's 
> |administrator.
>
> As has happened recently.  Sure.

Except Warren did it backwards; he should've left the original list as it 
was, and migrated those with fussy clients to the new list.

-- 
Dave Horsfall DTM (VK2KFU)  "Those who don't understand security will suffer."


From kevin.bowling at kev009.com  Wed Oct  4 15:14:16 2017
From: kevin.bowling at kev009.com (Kevin Bowling)
Date: Tue, 3 Oct 2017 22:14:16 -0700
Subject: NUMA, Sequent NUMA-Q, etc
Message-ID: <CAK7dMtACwghFSG5aDz16nMhspbuuWxdR0W1ab3HmeBps+MucSQ@mail.gmail.com>

NUMA is something that's been on my mind a lot lately.  Partially in
seeding beastie ideas into Larry McVoy's brain.

I asked Paul McKenney for some history on what went down at Sequent
since that's before my time.  He sent me this, which I think the group
will enjoy:  http://www2.rdrop.com/users/paulmck/techreports/stingcacm3.1999.08.04a.pdf

It looks pretty nice.  Not sure anyone's come as close as Irix to
solving and productizing "easy" NUMA but that's the one I have the
most hands on experience with.  They can affine, place, migrate, and
even replicate many types of resources including vnodes.  I'm actually
surprised all that code seems to have been spiked and it doesn't seem
like either Sequent née IBM nor SGI brought forward any of their
architecture to Linux.  Paul did RCU which is a tour de force, but the
 Linux topology and MM code looks like the product of sustaining
engineers instead of architectural decree.  Maybe the SCO lawsuit
snubbed all of that?

HP has an out of date competitive analysis that's worth a look
http://h20566.www2.hpe.com/hpsc/doc/public/display?sp4ts.oid=5060289&docLocale=en_US&docId=emr_na-c02670417.
I don't have enough seat time with Tru64 but maybe they had some good
ideas.

As open source, I do like Illumos' locality groups.  I can't make much
sense of Linux on this, too much seems to be in arch/ vs a first class
concept like locality groups.

Regards,
Kevin


From tih at hamartun.priv.no  Wed Oct  4 15:58:31 2017
From: tih at hamartun.priv.no (Tom Ivar Helbekkmo)
Date: Wed, 04 Oct 2017 07:58:31 +0200
Subject: And now ... Weirdnix?
In-Reply-To: <8AA943A2-D6C0-4812-9C16-C09D1298754F@tuhs.org> (Warren Toomey's
 message of "Sun, 17 Sep 2017 17:03:16 +1000")
References: <8AA943A2-D6C0-4812-9C16-C09D1298754F@tuhs.org>
Message-ID: <m260bvjvy0.fsf@thuvia.hamartun.priv.no>

Warren Toomey <wkt at tuhs.org> writes:

> To kick a more relevant thread off, what was the "weirdest" Unix
> system you used & why? Could be an emulation like Eunice, could be the
> hardware e.g NULL was not zero, NUXI byte ordering etc.

That would be the userland Unix from the Norwegian company Norsk Data.
For years, they made excellent mini machines with their own operating
system, SINTRAN.  People kept telling them that that time was passing,
and they needed to get with the times and adopt a standardized OS, like
Unix, but they insisted that there was no need.

When they finally started trying to do that, it was too late.

They made two attempts.  One was a System V port to their hardware, the
other a port to SINTRAN, having Unix run as an application under it.
Neither attempt got any real traction, and today, the company is only a
fond memory.

Oh, and when Tim Berners-Lee invented the World Wide Web, he did it
on a Norsk Data computer running SINTRAN.  :)

-tih
-- 
Most people who graduate with CS degrees don't understand the significance
of Lisp.  Lisp is the most important idea in computer science.  --Alan Kay


From wes.parish at paradise.net.nz  Wed Oct  4 18:30:46 2017
From: wes.parish at paradise.net.nz (Wesley Parish)
Date: Wed, 04 Oct 2017 21:30:46 +1300 (NZDT)
Subject: Unix witticisms
Message-ID: <1507105846.59d49c3693e82@www.paradise.net.nz>

I've just visited Slashdot and found this little gem at the bottom of the page:
Unix is a Registered Bell of AT&T Trademark Laboratories. -- Donn Seeley

Unix seems to have garnered witticisms: Salus throws in a few on the front cover
of his book. Has anyone made a collection of them?

Wesley Parish

"I have supposed that he who buys a Method means to learn it." - Ferdinand Sor,
Method for Guitar

"A verbal contract isn't worth the paper it's written on." -- Samuel Goldwyn


From ggm at algebras.org  Thu Oct  5 02:15:35 2017
From: ggm at algebras.org (George Michaelson)
Date: Wed, 4 Oct 2017 09:15:35 -0700
Subject: And now ... Weirdnix?
In-Reply-To: <m260bvjvy0.fsf@thuvia.hamartun.priv.no>
References: <8AA943A2-D6C0-4812-9C16-C09D1298754F@tuhs.org>
 <m260bvjvy0.fsf@thuvia.hamartun.priv.no>
Message-ID: <CAKr6gn0ry6uZEgKXzxuwJFGx9azqro2AV1LiTO+V45mp4EC=OA@mail.gmail.com>

I think the dual-boot state of the perq was pretty wierd. From memory,
you could peek into some UNIX state from the other OS, but not the
other way.

The weird bit was the 'hacky' nature of the OS/memory/screen boundary.
Compile? ok, you clearly don't need your screen memory because who
would think they could do useful mouse/keyboard work while compiling?
So.. I'll just rob that memory buffer to do this compilation... Very
interesting bitblt implications all over the screen. I suspect this
was considered a 'feature' because you got a free meter of your
compilation progress by crud on the screen..

On Tue, Oct 3, 2017 at 10:58 PM, Tom Ivar Helbekkmo
<tih at hamartun.priv.no> wrote:
> Warren Toomey <wkt at tuhs.org> writes:
>
>> To kick a more relevant thread off, what was the "weirdest" Unix
>> system you used & why? Could be an emulation like Eunice, could be the
>> hardware e.g NULL was not zero, NUXI byte ordering etc.
>
> That would be the userland Unix from the Norwegian company Norsk Data.
> For years, they made excellent mini machines with their own operating
> system, SINTRAN.  People kept telling them that that time was passing,
> and they needed to get with the times and adopt a standardized OS, like
> Unix, but they insisted that there was no need.
>
> When they finally started trying to do that, it was too late.
>
> They made two attempts.  One was a System V port to their hardware, the
> other a port to SINTRAN, having Unix run as an application under it.
> Neither attempt got any real traction, and today, the company is only a
> fond memory.
>
> Oh, and when Tim Berners-Lee invented the World Wide Web, he did it
> on a Norsk Data computer running SINTRAN.  :)
>
> -tih
> --
> Most people who graduate with CS degrees don't understand the significance
> of Lisp.  Lisp is the most important idea in computer science.  --Alan Kay


From steffen at sdaoden.eu  Thu Oct  5 06:17:44 2017
From: steffen at sdaoden.eu (Steffen Nurpmeso)
Date: Wed, 04 Oct 2017 22:17:44 +0200
Subject: Mangled and non-mangled TUHS mail lists
In-Reply-To: <9294cf0a-41bc-5f5a-7da9-ec9233c5848f@tnetconsulting.net>
References: <20171001032536.GB31930@minnie.tuhs.org>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710021157530.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <alpine.LRH.2.21.1710020117180.6255@waffle.shalott.net>
 <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710020837230.94910@frieza.hoshinet.org>
 <EE7FBA19-0C8A-4138-9E63-C3271BFCB2A8@gmail.com>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710031147250.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710022218400.43253@frieza.hoshinet.org>
 <209ed252-49ff-aff4-dd0a-614397907418@tnetconsulting.net>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710031432421.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <20171003140853.IrkS4%steffen@sdaoden.eu>
 <472d5571-8093-e02c-4478-a97accc8e632@tnetconsulting.net>
 <20171003184919.1QJzu%steffen@sdaoden.eu>
 <9294cf0a-41bc-5f5a-7da9-ec9233c5848f@tnetconsulting.net>
Message-ID: <20171004201744.bRFv5%steffen@sdaoden.eu>

Grant Taylor <gtaylor at tnetconsulting.net> wrote:
 |On 10/03/2017 12:49 PM, Steffen Nurpmeso wrote:
 |> But mailing-lists are a, possibly the most vivid part of email
 |> since a very long time, and designing a standard that does not
 |> play nice with mailing-lists is grotesque.  I was not thinking
 |> about enwrapping the message, but rather of a mechanism like the
 |> stacking of Received: headers which also follows standard.
 |> Something like renaming all DKIM headers stackwise (DKIM ->
 |> DKIM-LVL1, DKIM-LVL1 -> DKIM-LVL2 etc.) and creating new DKIM
 |> headers for the updated message, also covering the DKIM stack.
 |> Something like that.  Like this the existence of a stack that
 |> would need to become unrolled would be known to verifying parties,
 |> which were all newly created for this then new standard.  A stack
 |> level could even be used to save-away tracked headers, like
 |> Subject:, too.  But SHOULD not.  ^.^  Anyway.
 |
 |I recently became aware that DKIM does have an option (l= length 
 |parameter) to specify how much of the body is covered by the DKIM signature.
 |
 |I wonder if this would help in what you're describing.
 |
 |It's my understanding that the motivation behind it is to allow things 
 |to append content to the body without breaking the DKIM signature.
 |
 |Granted, it would still protect other headers.

Nonetheless it is notable that even the IETF uses subject prefixes
for their own lists, for example [Spasm] (now dead).  It is just
too much politics and business interests and rooster, well,
sometimes even pissings, wouldn't you agree there.

I mean, it is a chain of trust: the user sends to the ML, the ML
verifies DKIM, performs adjustments and applies DKIM on its own,
including the stacked original data, but keeping From: intact.
What to do with added MIME attachments?  Into the great wide open:
apply or use Content-ID, add a DKIM header which mentions all MIME
parts of the original message in correct order, a DKIM verifier
can use that to select the MIME parts of the original message and
apply checksum verification on that very part only.  Would work,
huh?  What is missing from that, Mr. Taylor?

--steffen
|
|Der Kragenbaer,                The moon bear,
|der holt sich munter           he cheerfully and one by one
|einen nach dem anderen runter  wa.ks himself off
|(By Robert Gernhardt)


From steffen at sdaoden.eu  Thu Oct  5 06:59:22 2017
From: steffen at sdaoden.eu (Steffen Nurpmeso)
Date: Wed, 04 Oct 2017 22:59:22 +0200
Subject: Mangled and non-mangled TUHS mail lists
In-Reply-To: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710041326421.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
References: <20171001032536.GB31930@minnie.tuhs.org>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710021157530.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <alpine.LRH.2.21.1710020117180.6255@waffle.shalott.net>
 <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710020837230.94910@frieza.hoshinet.org>
 <EE7FBA19-0C8A-4138-9E63-C3271BFCB2A8@gmail.com>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710031147250.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710022218400.43253@frieza.hoshinet.org>
 <209ed252-49ff-aff4-dd0a-614397907418@tnetconsulting.net>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710031432421.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <20171003140853.IrkS4%steffen@sdaoden.eu>
 <472d5571-8093-e02c-4478-a97accc8e632@tnetconsulting.net>
 <20171003184919.1QJzu%steffen@sdaoden.eu>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710041326421.73049@aneurin.horsfall.org>
Message-ID: <20171004205922.oHRB1%steffen@sdaoden.eu>

Dave Horsfall <dave at horsfall.org> wrote:
 |On Tue, 3 Oct 2017, Steffen Nurpmeso wrote:
 |>|I think that modifying the subject to add a tag is a perfectly valid 
 |>|thing.  As such, provisions should make such modifications /possible/. 
 |>|Then leave the choice of doing so or not up to each list's 
 |>|administrator.
 |>
 |> As has happened recently.  Sure.
 |
 |Except Warren did it backwards; he should've left the original list as it 
 |was, and migrated those with fussy clients to the new list.

Waves and material of various nature pervades us, for example
100 billion Neutrinos per second per fingertip i have learned
a few days ago.  To let it be consciously can thus not only be
seen as waving a red flag, but also as an indication of maturity,
as could have been teached by a ML guru.  Is that exaggerated.

I have turned on DKIM stripping for these tiny lists of mine.
That is not polite to people who use DKIM to say the least, shall
there be any, but i am not (experienced as) an administrator,
i have a very restricted (ridiculous to most of you for sure)
working environment and all i want is that this mess works
smoothly, so that i can spend time on things i have interest in.
And whereas i avoid a footer that would introduce a MIME multipart
where otherwise there would be none, i do prepend something to the
subject, because i like to see this.  It is a small project, and
people should have the possibility to visually degrade it and come
back when they have time for it.  Or something like this.  You
know, small projects of little interest cannot act as if they were
giants.  Of course you can pre-select on headers as in 'from
@<@tuhs\.org', but i never used this style of inbox stuff, i am
reading top-down, some mails keep lingering for later, but they
will be read and then dispatched, not vice versa, and this way of
doing things requires some easy visual thread methody.  Hm.

--steffen
|
|Der Kragenbaer,                The moon bear,
|der holt sich munter           he cheerfully and one by one
|einen nach dem anderen runter  wa.ks himself off
|(By Robert Gernhardt)


From wkt at tuhs.org  Thu Oct  5 11:54:56 2017
From: wkt at tuhs.org (Warren Toomey)
Date: Thu, 5 Oct 2017 11:54:56 +1000
Subject: Please .. no DKIM chatter here
Message-ID: <20171005015456.GB6269@minnie.tuhs.org>

Hi all. First up, it's TUHS so please no DKIM/email chatter here. Only a
few of you are involved and it's not relevant to Unix history.

Grant Taylor and Tom Ivar Helbekkmo having been working behind the scenes to
find a good solution. We are hoping to a) merge the two lists back together,
b) reinstate [TUHS] and non-mangled From: lines, and c) keep most MTAs
happy in the process.

With some luck, all of this will be resolved. So, let's get back to the
discussion of old Unix systems :)

Thanks, Warren


From don at DonHopkins.com  Thu Oct  5 19:22:48 2017
From: don at DonHopkins.com (Don Hopkins)
Date: Thu, 5 Oct 2017 11:22:48 +0200
Subject: Unix witticisms
In-Reply-To: <1507105846.59d49c3693e82@www.paradise.net.nz>
References: <1507105846.59d49c3693e82@www.paradise.net.nz>
Message-ID: <7637D3DE-57D3-447B-AF40-D6644C1BBFDA@gmail.com>

Linux is only free if your time is worthless.

-Don

> On 4 Oct 2017, at 10:30, Wesley Parish <wes.parish at paradise.net.nz> wrote:
> 
> I've just visited Slashdot and found this little gem at the bottom of the page:
> Unix is a Registered Bell of AT&T Trademark Laboratories. -- Donn Seeley
> 
> Unix seems to have garnered witticisms: Salus throws in a few on the front cover
> of his book. Has anyone made a collection of them?
> 
> Wesley Parish
> 
> "I have supposed that he who buys a Method means to learn it." - Ferdinand Sor,
> Method for Guitar
> 
> "A verbal contract isn't worth the paper it's written on." -- Samuel Goldwyn



From RussellPage at foxhat.net  Thu Oct  5 20:43:36 2017
From: RussellPage at foxhat.net (Russell Page)
Date: Thu, 5 Oct 2017 21:43:36 +1100
Subject: Unix witticisms
In-Reply-To: <1507105846.59d49c3693e82@www.paradise.net.nz>
References: <1507105846.59d49c3693e82@www.paradise.net.nz>
Message-ID: <992f0fc5-1fd5-38e2-5f60-2ff15eb9c633@foxhat.net>

I can't remember where, but I once saw "UNIX is a registered footnote of 
Bell Laboratories".


On 4/10/2017 7:30 PM, Wesley Parish wrote:
> I've just visited Slashdot and found this little gem at the bottom of the page:
> Unix is a Registered Bell of AT&T Trademark Laboratories. -- Donn Seeley
>
> Unix seems to have garnered witticisms: Salus throws in a few on the front cover
> of his book. Has anyone made a collection of them?
>
> Wesley Parish
>
> "I have supposed that he who buys a Method means to learn it." - Ferdinand Sor,
> Method for Guitar
>
> "A verbal contract isn't worth the paper it's written on." -- Samuel Goldwyn
>
>

-- 
Russell Page
RussellPage at foxhat.net
+61 405 148 325



From tih at hamartun.priv.no  Thu Oct  5 20:53:53 2017
From: tih at hamartun.priv.no (Tom Ivar Helbekkmo)
Date: Thu, 05 Oct 2017 12:53:53 +0200
Subject: Unix witticisms
In-Reply-To: <1507105846.59d49c3693e82@www.paradise.net.nz> (Wesley Parish's
 message of "Wed, 4 Oct 2017 21:30:46 +1300 (NZDT)")
References: <1507105846.59d49c3693e82@www.paradise.net.nz>
Message-ID: <m2d161uapq.fsf@thuvia.hamartun.priv.no>

Wesley Parish <wes.parish at paradise.net.nz> writes:

> Unix is a Registered Bell of AT&T Trademark Laboratories. -- Donn Seeley

That reminds me of this one (I don't know where I picked it up, though):

"UNIX is a registered trade mark of AT&T.  AT&T is a modem test command."

-tih
-- 
Most people who graduate with CS degrees don't understand the significance
of Lisp.  Lisp is the most important idea in computer science.  --Alan Kay


From usotsuki at buric.co  Thu Oct  5 20:54:18 2017
From: usotsuki at buric.co (Steve Nickolas)
Date: Thu, 5 Oct 2017 06:54:18 -0400 (EDT)
Subject: Unix witticisms
In-Reply-To: <992f0fc5-1fd5-38e2-5f60-2ff15eb9c633@foxhat.net>
References: <1507105846.59d49c3693e82@www.paradise.net.nz>
 <992f0fc5-1fd5-38e2-5f60-2ff15eb9c633@foxhat.net>
Message-ID: <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710050653240.41542@frieza.hoshinet.org>

The one that comes to mind is "Unix is user-friendly; it's just picky 
about who its friends are."

-uso.


From ron at ronnatalie.com  Fri Oct  6 00:26:54 2017
From: ron at ronnatalie.com (Ron Natalie)
Date: Thu, 5 Oct 2017 10:26:54 -0400
Subject: Unix witticisms
In-Reply-To: <7637D3DE-57D3-447B-AF40-D6644C1BBFDA@gmail.com>
References: <1507105846.59d49c3693e82@www.paradise.net.nz>
 <7637D3DE-57D3-447B-AF40-D6644C1BBFDA@gmail.com>
Message-ID: <00ff01d33de5$fe5ae050$fb10a0f0$@ronnatalie.com>

At the 83 USENIX Sun handed out buttons that said the "The Joy of UNIX."
Peter Langston thought that was a bit conceited on Bill's part, so  he made
up buttons for the next show that read "The PSL of UNIX", "The DMR of UNIX,"
etc... and handed them out.    I still have the Joy of UNIX button, but I
lost my "Ron of UNIX" button shortly after the show.

The "is a  trademark of bell labs" generated lots of jokes over the year.
I have somewhere a button that says "Eunuchs are a hallmark of the Ottoman
Empire."    At one of the early UUGs someone tried to make "UNIX is a
Trademark of Bell Labs" pencils except the custom pencil place only allowed
18 letters or something so the pencils just ended up saying "UNIX is a
Trademark."     I'm not sure I've ever come across another Trademark that
the footnote status was as widely propagated as UNIX's.    AT&T's lawyers
even got up at one of the conferences (in a talk about licensing changes or
such) and thanked the community for defending the trademark.

There was a contest back on UNIX-WIZARDS in the day to generate new errno
codes.    My favorite was ELECTROLUX - Your code needs cleaning up.

A joke issue of the Computation Center at UT Austin's newsletter
(Universally Plexus at Autism) had an item about UNIX Pipes not permitted in
non-smoking areas.   I think that was also the source of the "Cannot fork--
Try again during lunch" quote.





From crossd at gmail.com  Fri Oct  6 00:37:28 2017
From: crossd at gmail.com (Dan Cross)
Date: Thu, 5 Oct 2017 10:37:28 -0400
Subject: Unix witticisms
In-Reply-To: <00ff01d33de5$fe5ae050$fb10a0f0$@ronnatalie.com>
References: <1507105846.59d49c3693e82@www.paradise.net.nz>
 <7637D3DE-57D3-447B-AF40-D6644C1BBFDA@gmail.com>
 <00ff01d33de5$fe5ae050$fb10a0f0$@ronnatalie.com>
Message-ID: <CAEoi9W7_7c2WCX7bioHjxVR3z13SMahEtF+ovWBvbuhT59VRWQ@mail.gmail.com>

On Thu, Oct 5, 2017 at 10:26 AM, Ron Natalie <ron at ronnatalie.com> wrote:
> At the 83 USENIX Sun handed out buttons that said the "The Joy of UNIX."
> Peter Langston thought that was a bit conceited on Bill's part, so  he made
> up buttons for the next show that read "The PSL of UNIX", "The DMR of UNIX,"
> etc... and handed them out.    I still have the Joy of UNIX button, but I
> lost my "Ron of UNIX" button shortly after the show.
>
> The "is a  trademark of bell labs" generated lots of jokes over the year.
> I have somewhere a button that says "Eunuchs are a hallmark of the Ottoman
> Empire."    At one of the early UUGs someone tried to make "UNIX is a
> Trademark of Bell Labs" pencils except the custom pencil place only allowed
> 18 letters or something so the pencils just ended up saying "UNIX is a
> Trademark."     I'm not sure I've ever come across another Trademark that
> the footnote status was as widely propagated as UNIX's.    AT&T's lawyers
> even got up at one of the conferences (in a talk about licensing changes or
> such) and thanked the community for defending the trademark.

A running gag throughout the Mel Brooks movie, "Spaceballs" is
recurring product spots for the film's promotional materials
("Spaceballs: the toiler paper" was my favorite:
https://i.pinimg.com/474x/c3/53/c3/c353c3a52c70a66b2d7cf456756a361c--movie-drinking-games-s-movies.jpg).
This sounds similar in both character and execution.

        - Dan C.


From jon at fourwinds.com  Fri Oct  6 00:48:50 2017
From: jon at fourwinds.com (Jon Steinhart)
Date: Thu, 05 Oct 2017 07:48:50 -0700
Subject: Unix witticisms
In-Reply-To: <00ff01d33de5$fe5ae050$fb10a0f0$@ronnatalie.com>
References: <1507105846.59d49c3693e82@www.paradise.net.nz>
 <7637D3DE-57D3-447B-AF40-D6644C1BBFDA@gmail.com>
 <00ff01d33de5$fe5ae050$fb10a0f0$@ronnatalie.com>
Message-ID: <201710051448.v95EmoOL011583@darkstar.fourwinds.com>

Favorite bumper sticker: "Reach out and grep someone".


From ron at ronnatalie.com  Fri Oct  6 01:33:31 2017
From: ron at ronnatalie.com (Ron Natalie)
Date: Thu, 5 Oct 2017 11:33:31 -0400
Subject: Unix witticisms
In-Reply-To: <CAEoi9W7_7c2WCX7bioHjxVR3z13SMahEtF+ovWBvbuhT59VRWQ@mail.gmail.com>
References: <1507105846.59d49c3693e82@www.paradise.net.nz>
 <7637D3DE-57D3-447B-AF40-D6644C1BBFDA@gmail.com>
 <00ff01d33de5$fe5ae050$fb10a0f0$@ronnatalie.com>
 <CAEoi9W7_7c2WCX7bioHjxVR3z13SMahEtF+ovWBvbuhT59VRWQ@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <011d01d33def$4d1bc520$e7534f60$@ronnatalie.com>



> A running gag throughout the Mel Brooks movie, "Spaceballs" is recurring product spots for the film's promotional materials

>From IMDB:

In a 2013 television interview (shorty before receiving the AFI Lifetime Achievement Award), Mel Brooks stated that he personally obtained George Lucas' full permission to parody any and all things Star Wars-related but, on one condition, that absolutely no merchandise of any kind be produced from the film. This is the reason why all Yogurt and the Dinks do is merchandising (it is also why none of the merchandise seen in the film was ever mass produced or publicly sold in any way).



From rminnich at gmail.com  Fri Oct  6 03:11:41 2017
From: rminnich at gmail.com (ron minnich)
Date: Thu, 05 Oct 2017 17:11:41 +0000
Subject: [TUHS] Unix witticisms
In-Reply-To: <011d01d33def$4d1bc520$e7534f60$@ronnatalie.com>
References: <1507105846.59d49c3693e82@www.paradise.net.nz>
 <7637D3DE-57D3-447B-AF40-D6644C1BBFDA@gmail.com>
 <00ff01d33de5$fe5ae050$fb10a0f0$@ronnatalie.com>
 <CAEoi9W7_7c2WCX7bioHjxVR3z13SMahEtF+ovWBvbuhT59VRWQ@mail.gmail.com>
 <011d01d33def$4d1bc520$e7534f60$@ronnatalie.com>
Message-ID: <CAP6exYKbvu_4JbVjTKQQsMHrmvZ9cGiP70RD=v0nJ7STh5FBwA@mail.gmail.com>

"System V, consider it sub-standard"

On Thu, Oct 5, 2017 at 8:34 AM Ron Natalie <ron at ronnatalie.com> wrote:

>
>
> > A running gag throughout the Mel Brooks movie, "Spaceballs" is recurring
> product spots for the film's promotional materials
>
> >From IMDB:
>
> In a 2013 television interview (shorty before receiving the AFI Lifetime
> Achievement Award), Mel Brooks stated that he personally obtained George
> Lucas' full permission to parody any and all things Star Wars-related but,
> on one condition, that absolutely no merchandise of any kind be produced
> from the film. This is the reason why all Yogurt and the Dinks do is
> merchandising (it is also why none of the merchandise seen in the film was
> ever mass produced or publicly sold in any way).
>
>
>
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From a.phillip.garcia at gmail.com  Fri Oct  6 05:06:40 2017
From: a.phillip.garcia at gmail.com (A. P. Garcia)
Date: Thu, 5 Oct 2017 14:06:40 -0500
Subject: [TUHS] Unix witticisms
In-Reply-To: <CAP6exYKbvu_4JbVjTKQQsMHrmvZ9cGiP70RD=v0nJ7STh5FBwA@mail.gmail.com>
References: <1507105846.59d49c3693e82@www.paradise.net.nz>
 <7637D3DE-57D3-447B-AF40-D6644C1BBFDA@gmail.com>
 <00ff01d33de5$fe5ae050$fb10a0f0$@ronnatalie.com>
 <CAEoi9W7_7c2WCX7bioHjxVR3z13SMahEtF+ovWBvbuhT59VRWQ@mail.gmail.com>
 <011d01d33def$4d1bc520$e7534f60$@ronnatalie.com>
 <CAP6exYKbvu_4JbVjTKQQsMHrmvZ9cGiP70RD=v0nJ7STh5FBwA@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <CAFCBnZvNuv7BXjcw1StfHGXPLHuAttEdZx4H0AZvMgVowwEWsg@mail.gmail.com>

My favorite has always been Henry Spencer's famous quote: "Those who
do not understand Unix are condemned to reinvent it, poorly."

On Thu, Oct 5, 2017 at 12:11 PM, ron minnich <rminnich at gmail.com> wrote:
> "System V, consider it sub-standard"
>
> On Thu, Oct 5, 2017 at 8:34 AM Ron Natalie <ron at ronnatalie.com> wrote:
>>
>>
>>
>> > A running gag throughout the Mel Brooks movie, "Spaceballs" is recurring
>> > product spots for the film's promotional materials
>>
>> >From IMDB:
>>
>> In a 2013 television interview (shorty before receiving the AFI Lifetime
>> Achievement Award), Mel Brooks stated that he personally obtained George
>> Lucas' full permission to parody any and all things Star Wars-related but,
>> on one condition, that absolutely no merchandise of any kind be produced
>> from the film. This is the reason why all Yogurt and the Dinks do is
>> merchandising (it is also why none of the merchandise seen in the film was
>> ever mass produced or publicly sold in any way).
>>
>>
>
>
>


From grog at lemis.com  Fri Oct  6 08:38:53 2017
From: grog at lemis.com (Greg 'groggy' Lehey)
Date: Fri, 6 Oct 2017 09:38:53 +1100
Subject: Unix witticisms
In-Reply-To: <992f0fc5-1fd5-38e2-5f60-2ff15eb9c633@foxhat.net>
References: <1507105846.59d49c3693e82@www.paradise.net.nz>
 <992f0fc5-1fd5-38e2-5f60-2ff15eb9c633@foxhat.net>
Message-ID: <20171005223853.GL8225@eureka.lemis.com>

On Thursday,  5 October 2017 at 21:43:36 +1100, Russell Page wrote:
> I can't remember where, but I once saw "UNIX is a registered footnote of
> Bell Laboratories".

My favourite was:

UNIX is a registered trade mark of AT&T
AT&T is a modem test command.

Greg
--
Sent from my desktop computer.
Finger grog at lemis.com for PGP public key.
See complete headers for address and phone numbers.
This message is digitally signed.  If your Microsoft mail program
reports problems, please read http://lemis.com/broken-MUA
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From robert at timetraveller.org  Fri Oct  6 09:28:23 2017
From: robert at timetraveller.org (Robert Brockway)
Date: Fri, 6 Oct 2017 09:28:23 +1000 (AEST)
Subject: Unix witticisms
In-Reply-To: <201710051448.v95EmoOL011583@darkstar.fourwinds.com>
References: <1507105846.59d49c3693e82@www.paradise.net.nz>
 <7637D3DE-57D3-447B-AF40-D6644C1BBFDA@gmail.com>
 <00ff01d33de5$fe5ae050$fb10a0f0$@ronnatalie.com>
 <201710051448.v95EmoOL011583@darkstar.fourwinds.com>
Message-ID: <alpine.DEB.2.11.1710060924100.28328@sirius.opentrend.net>

On Thu, 5 Oct 2017, Jon Steinhart wrote:

> Favorite bumper sticker: "Reach out and grep someone".

Back at university a friend lost his keys.  He told a group of us in the 
caffeteria that he'd grepped the house for them.  It occured to me that he 
went around the house picking everything up and comparing it to a known 
set of keys.

Rob


From steve at quintile.net  Fri Oct  6 11:01:12 2017
From: steve at quintile.net (Steve Simon)
Date: Fri, 6 Oct 2017 02:01:12 +0100
Subject: Unix witticisms
In-Reply-To: <alpine.DEB.2.11.1710060924100.28328@sirius.opentrend.net>
Message-ID: <8df224c9c86d80c9ab8fc395b67e70c7@quintile.net>

I remember:

	"Version 7 was an improved on everything that preceeded it,
	and everything that followed".

We regarded Sys-V as rather, well, "untidy" at the time.

-Steve



From bakul at bitblocks.com  Fri Oct  6 11:33:23 2017
From: bakul at bitblocks.com (Bakul Shah)
Date: Thu, 5 Oct 2017 18:33:23 -0700
Subject: Unix witticisms
In-Reply-To: <8df224c9c86d80c9ab8fc395b67e70c7@quintile.net>
References: <8df224c9c86d80c9ab8fc395b67e70c7@quintile.net>
Message-ID: <2B4589F3-E3F8-4D88-A247-0BA1204AE873@bitblocks.com>



> On Oct 5, 2017, at 6:01 PM, Steve Simon <steve at quintile.net> wrote:
> 
> I remember:
> 
> 	"Version 7 was an improved on everything that preceeded it,
> 	and everything that followed".

A variation of C.A.R.Hoare's quip in his 1973 paper "Hints on
Programming Language Design" 

  The more I ponder the principles of language design, and
  the techniques which put them into practice, the more is my
  amazement and admiration of ALGOL 60. Here is a language so
  far ahead of its time, that it was not only an improvement
  on its predecessors, but also on nearly all its successors.


From dario at darioniedermann.it  Sat Oct  7 02:01:09 2017
From: dario at darioniedermann.it (Dario Niedermann)
Date: Fri, 6 Oct 2017 18:01:09 +0200
Subject: Unix witticisms
In-Reply-To: <1507105846.59d49c3693e82@www.paradise.net.nz>
References: <1507105846.59d49c3693e82@www.paradise.net.nz>
Message-ID: <20171006160108.GA3799@darioniedermann.it>

Il 04/10/2017 alle 10:30, Wesley Parish ha scritto:

> Unix seems to have garnered witticisms: Salus throws in a few on the
> front cover of his book. Has anyone made a collection of them?

For a good start, I would suggest:

$ fortune -im unix

-- 
Dario Niedermann.                 Also on the Internet at:

gopher://darioniedermann.it/  <>  https://www.darioniedermann.it/


From ggm at algebras.org  Sat Oct  7 02:48:28 2017
From: ggm at algebras.org (George Michaelson)
Date: Fri, 6 Oct 2017 09:48:28 -0700
Subject: Unix witticisms
In-Reply-To: <20171006160108.GA3799@darioniedermann.it>
References: <1507105846.59d49c3693e82@www.paradise.net.nz>
 <20171006160108.GA3799@darioniedermann.it>
Message-ID: <CAKr6gn0Aq7PtKkP4wsPEZC5UZkov5-SUq5iRvcB0ZZVVX=_Ozw@mail.gmail.com>

I loved the man page for the ching program had in BUGS: "it futhers
one to seek the great man"

On Fri, Oct 6, 2017 at 9:01 AM, Dario Niedermann
<dario at darioniedermann.it> wrote:
> Il 04/10/2017 alle 10:30, Wesley Parish ha scritto:
>
>> Unix seems to have garnered witticisms: Salus throws in a few on the
>> front cover of his book. Has anyone made a collection of them?
>
> For a good start, I would suggest:
>
> $ fortune -im unix
>
> --
> Dario Niedermann.                 Also on the Internet at:
>
> gopher://darioniedermann.it/  <>  https://www.darioniedermann.it/


From imp at bsdimp.com  Sat Oct  7 02:54:21 2017
From: imp at bsdimp.com (Warner Losh)
Date: Fri, 6 Oct 2017 09:54:21 -0700
Subject: Unix witticisms
In-Reply-To: <CAKr6gn0Aq7PtKkP4wsPEZC5UZkov5-SUq5iRvcB0ZZVVX=_Ozw@mail.gmail.com>
References: <1507105846.59d49c3693e82@www.paradise.net.nz>
 <20171006160108.GA3799@darioniedermann.it>
 <CAKr6gn0Aq7PtKkP4wsPEZC5UZkov5-SUq5iRvcB0ZZVVX=_Ozw@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <CANCZdfoeC52h90UDWObs0arB6s1xBdccbMCcOHeu61RE_4+OWQ@mail.gmail.com>

On Fri, Oct 6, 2017 at 9:48 AM, George Michaelson <ggm at algebras.org> wrote:

> I loved the man page for the ching program had in BUGS: "it futhers
> one to seek the great man"


"You can tune a piano, but you can't tune a fish." -- tunefs(8)
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From dave at horsfall.org  Sat Oct  7 08:25:18 2017
From: dave at horsfall.org (Dave Horsfall)
Date: Sat, 7 Oct 2017 09:25:18 +1100 (EST)
Subject: Unix witticisms
In-Reply-To: <CANCZdfoeC52h90UDWObs0arB6s1xBdccbMCcOHeu61RE_4+OWQ@mail.gmail.com>
References: <1507105846.59d49c3693e82@www.paradise.net.nz>
 <20171006160108.GA3799@darioniedermann.it>
 <CAKr6gn0Aq7PtKkP4wsPEZC5UZkov5-SUq5iRvcB0ZZVVX=_Ozw@mail.gmail.com>
 <CANCZdfoeC52h90UDWObs0arB6s1xBdccbMCcOHeu61RE_4+OWQ@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710070924340.876@aneurin.horsfall.org>

On Fri, 6 Oct 2017, Warner Losh wrote:

> "You can tune a piano, but you can't tune a fish." -- tunefs(8)

Wasn't it "tuna fish"?

-- 
Dave Horsfall DTM (VK2KFU)  "Those who don't understand security will suffer."


From jason-tuhs at shalott.net  Sat Oct  7 08:58:13 2017
From: jason-tuhs at shalott.net (jason-tuhs at shalott.net)
Date: Fri, 6 Oct 2017 15:58:13 -0700 (PDT)
Subject: Unix witticisms
In-Reply-To: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710070924340.876@aneurin.horsfall.org>
References: <1507105846.59d49c3693e82@www.paradise.net.nz>
 <20171006160108.GA3799@darioniedermann.it>
 <CAKr6gn0Aq7PtKkP4wsPEZC5UZkov5-SUq5iRvcB0ZZVVX=_Ozw@mail.gmail.com>
 <CANCZdfoeC52h90UDWObs0arB6s1xBdccbMCcOHeu61RE_4+OWQ@mail.gmail.com>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710070924340.876@aneurin.horsfall.org>
Message-ID: <alpine.LRH.2.21.1710061556380.6255@waffle.shalott.net>


>> "You can tune a piano, but you can't tune a fish." -- tunefs(8)

> Wasn't it "tuna fish"?

Nope:

"You can tune a file system, but you can't tune a fish."

https://github.com/weiss/original-bsd/blob/master/sbin/tunefs/tunefs.8


Interestingly, in FreeBSD 6.0, they (apparently) decided that the 
contraction was lazy:

"You can tune a file system, but you cannot tune a fish."

https://svn0.us-west.freebsd.org/base/release/6.0.0/sbin/tunefs/tunefs.8


  -Jason



From dave at horsfall.org  Sat Oct  7 09:28:06 2017
From: dave at horsfall.org (Dave Horsfall)
Date: Sat, 7 Oct 2017 10:28:06 +1100 (EST)
Subject: Unix witticisms
In-Reply-To: <alpine.LRH.2.21.1710061556380.6255@waffle.shalott.net>
References: <1507105846.59d49c3693e82@www.paradise.net.nz>
 <20171006160108.GA3799@darioniedermann.it>
 <CAKr6gn0Aq7PtKkP4wsPEZC5UZkov5-SUq5iRvcB0ZZVVX=_Ozw@mail.gmail.com>
 <CANCZdfoeC52h90UDWObs0arB6s1xBdccbMCcOHeu61RE_4+OWQ@mail.gmail.com>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710070924340.876@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <alpine.LRH.2.21.1710061556380.6255@waffle.shalott.net>
Message-ID: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710071023160.876@aneurin.horsfall.org>

On Fri, 6 Oct 2017, jason-tuhs at shalott.net wrote:

>>> "You can tune a piano, but you can't tune a fish." -- tunefs(8)
>
>> Wasn't it "tuna fish"?
>
> Nope:
>
> "You can tune a file system, but you can't tune a fish."
>
> https://github.com/weiss/original-bsd/blob/master/sbin/tunefs/tunefs.8

Hmmm...  Looks like organic bit-rot on my part :-(

Then again: http://www.rhymes.net/rhyme/tunafish refers to 4.2 BSD 
tunefs(8).

-- 
Dave Horsfall DTM (VK2KFU)  "Those who don't understand security will suffer."


From ron at ronnatalie.com  Sat Oct  7 12:33:59 2017
From: ron at ronnatalie.com (Ron Natalie)
Date: Fri, 6 Oct 2017 22:33:59 -0400
Subject: Unix witticisms
In-Reply-To: <CAKr6gn0Aq7PtKkP4wsPEZC5UZkov5-SUq5iRvcB0ZZVVX=_Ozw@mail.gmail.com>
References: <1507105846.59d49c3693e82@www.paradise.net.nz>
 <20171006160108.GA3799@darioniedermann.it>
 <CAKr6gn0Aq7PtKkP4wsPEZC5UZkov5-SUq5iRvcB0ZZVVX=_Ozw@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <001001d33f14$bbfe0900$33fa1b00$@ronnatalie.com>

"Roff is the simplest of the run off programs but is utterly frozen " appeared in the V6 man pages.

This led to a whole slew (at least at JHU) comments in program documents about being "utterly frozen."
The large freshman "Models and Simulation" class used basic plus and a special command called "lnmns" was created to link the necessary files into the user's home dir.
Our docs said that "lnmns was the simplenst of the transcendental programs but is utterly frozen."

For those who know nroff/troff, we had fun in that our senior programmer "Michael John Muuss" wrote a macro package called tmac.jm which was invoked with nroff -mjm (his initials).
This lead to all kinds of jokes including calling lnmns "bill" after its programmers.

Many years later there was a proposal to rename the concept of freeware "Flugelware" after some guy named "Flugel" who alledgedly came up with the idea.
I suggested that we call the C compiler "Ritchie" after its creator.    I got an immediate reponse from dmr telling me to nip that idea in the bud.




From ggm at algebras.org  Sat Oct  7 12:40:00 2017
From: ggm at algebras.org (George Michaelson)
Date: Fri, 6 Oct 2017 19:40:00 -0700
Subject: Unix witticisms
In-Reply-To: <001001d33f14$bbfe0900$33fa1b00$@ronnatalie.com>
References: <1507105846.59d49c3693e82@www.paradise.net.nz>
 <20171006160108.GA3799@darioniedermann.it>
 <CAKr6gn0Aq7PtKkP4wsPEZC5UZkov5-SUq5iRvcB0ZZVVX=_Ozw@mail.gmail.com>
 <001001d33f14$bbfe0900$33fa1b00$@ronnatalie.com>
Message-ID: <CAKr6gn16u+C9z5WaRN_BOg5kV70pzf6Bv23h_CnQPLt3R38o5Q@mail.gmail.com>

Mike Lesk told me, (so this is now officially apocryphal because its
friend-of-a-friend) that TBL had stuff in there, to specifically
address a faulty throw-back action in the linotronic output device,
and thats why troff/tbl output on more modern things like the wet
process benson varian printer we had, drew some of the lines out of
whack: it was adjusting for another typesetters mechanical positioning
faults.

I'd love to know if this is true. I did look under the hood at T/Roff
and it was indescribably weirder than I imagined. I thought the macros
were weird, then I discovered what the expanded to.

On Fri, Oct 6, 2017 at 7:33 PM, Ron Natalie <ron at ronnatalie.com> wrote:
> "Roff is the simplest of the run off programs but is utterly frozen " appeared in the V6 man pages.
>
> This led to a whole slew (at least at JHU) comments in program documents about being "utterly frozen."
> The large freshman "Models and Simulation" class used basic plus and a special command called "lnmns" was created to link the necessary files into the user's home dir.
> Our docs said that "lnmns was the simplenst of the transcendental programs but is utterly frozen."
>
> For those who know nroff/troff, we had fun in that our senior programmer "Michael John Muuss" wrote a macro package called tmac.jm which was invoked with nroff -mjm (his initials).
> This lead to all kinds of jokes including calling lnmns "bill" after its programmers.
>
> Many years later there was a proposal to rename the concept of freeware "Flugelware" after some guy named "Flugel" who alledgedly came up with the idea.
> I suggested that we call the C compiler "Ritchie" after its creator.    I got an immediate reponse from dmr telling me to nip that idea in the bud.
>
>


From ron at ronnatalie.com  Sat Oct  7 12:48:54 2017
From: ron at ronnatalie.com (Ron Natalie)
Date: Fri, 6 Oct 2017 22:48:54 -0400
Subject: Unix witticisms
In-Reply-To: <CAKr6gn16u+C9z5WaRN_BOg5kV70pzf6Bv23h_CnQPLt3R38o5Q@mail.gmail.com>
References: <1507105846.59d49c3693e82@www.paradise.net.nz>
 <20171006160108.GA3799@darioniedermann.it>
 <CAKr6gn0Aq7PtKkP4wsPEZC5UZkov5-SUq5iRvcB0ZZVVX=_Ozw@mail.gmail.com>
 <001001d33f14$bbfe0900$33fa1b00$@ronnatalie.com>
 <CAKr6gn16u+C9z5WaRN_BOg5kV70pzf6Bv23h_CnQPLt3R38o5Q@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <001201d33f16$d36999e0$7a3ccda0$@ronnatalie.com>


tbl was a real hack.    It wasn't so much designed for the troff CAT output as it was to drive nroff on a daisy wheel printer.      Oddly, decades after I thought everbody (including me as a last troff holdout) had abandoned it for more wisiwyg text formatters someone sends me a manual.    Tbl had a slight telltale glitch in that the vertical lines on the left and right side of the table almost always protruded one pixel too high.    "Did you use tbl|troff to generate this?" I asked.   Sure enough it was.




From ggm at algebras.org  Sat Oct  7 12:55:28 2017
From: ggm at algebras.org (George Michaelson)
Date: Fri, 6 Oct 2017 19:55:28 -0700
Subject: Unix witticisms
In-Reply-To: <001201d33f16$d36999e0$7a3ccda0$@ronnatalie.com>
References: <1507105846.59d49c3693e82@www.paradise.net.nz>
 <20171006160108.GA3799@darioniedermann.it>
 <CAKr6gn0Aq7PtKkP4wsPEZC5UZkov5-SUq5iRvcB0ZZVVX=_Ozw@mail.gmail.com>
 <001001d33f14$bbfe0900$33fa1b00$@ronnatalie.com>
 <CAKr6gn16u+C9z5WaRN_BOg5kV70pzf6Bv23h_CnQPLt3R38o5Q@mail.gmail.com>
 <001201d33f16$d36999e0$7a3ccda0$@ronnatalie.com>
Message-ID: <CAKr6gn0HZaWOEiegEfycspMfQzSLneiUFcRXH2omouybfiG5Yg@mail.gmail.com>

that may be what I am referring to. if you transpose horizontal and
vertical, this may be a hack, to get around a mispositioning logic.

-g

On Fri, Oct 6, 2017 at 7:48 PM, Ron Natalie <ron at ronnatalie.com> wrote:
>
> tbl was a real hack.    It wasn't so much designed for the troff CAT output as it was to drive nroff on a daisy wheel printer.      Oddly, decades after I thought everbody (including me as a last troff holdout) had abandoned it for more wisiwyg text formatters someone sends me a manual.    Tbl had a slight telltale glitch in that the vertical lines on the left and right side of the table almost always protruded one pixel too high.    "Did you use tbl|troff to generate this?" I asked.   Sure enough it was.
>
>


From ggm at algebras.org  Sat Oct  7 12:59:23 2017
From: ggm at algebras.org (George Michaelson)
Date: Fri, 6 Oct 2017 19:59:23 -0700
Subject: Unix witticisms
In-Reply-To: <CAKr6gn0HZaWOEiegEfycspMfQzSLneiUFcRXH2omouybfiG5Yg@mail.gmail.com>
References: <1507105846.59d49c3693e82@www.paradise.net.nz>
 <20171006160108.GA3799@darioniedermann.it>
 <CAKr6gn0Aq7PtKkP4wsPEZC5UZkov5-SUq5iRvcB0ZZVVX=_Ozw@mail.gmail.com>
 <001001d33f14$bbfe0900$33fa1b00$@ronnatalie.com>
 <CAKr6gn16u+C9z5WaRN_BOg5kV70pzf6Bv23h_CnQPLt3R38o5Q@mail.gmail.com>
 <001201d33f16$d36999e0$7a3ccda0$@ronnatalie.com>
 <CAKr6gn0HZaWOEiegEfycspMfQzSLneiUFcRXH2omouybfiG5Yg@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <CAKr6gn3iykC-05dFNaHNn6ZRMvkSOcpuLgafe3oh1JjbQ1a9AA@mail.gmail.com>

My greatest hack of creation/origination was to combine EQN, TBL and
TROFF to make a phone directory with giant ellipsis around people
sharing offices and phone extensions, because the new PABX produced a
visually boring directory and I was asked to re-produce the handmade
version, after the typesetter who did it had retired. (this was a
university)

I didn't get remotely close to his hand-set product, but I did ok. I
did wind up doing horrendous cheats which morally feel like a GOTO.
Probably, somebody wiser could have done it more honestly. I only had
to make one, nobody cared after we did that one but it was a thing of
beauty. You've made me very happy recalling it.

These tools were arcane, but damn, it was fun making them work.

G

On Fri, Oct 6, 2017 at 7:55 PM, George Michaelson <ggm at algebras.org> wrote:
> that may be what I am referring to. if you transpose horizontal and
> vertical, this may be a hack, to get around a mispositioning logic.
>
> -g
>
> On Fri, Oct 6, 2017 at 7:48 PM, Ron Natalie <ron at ronnatalie.com> wrote:
>>
>> tbl was a real hack.    It wasn't so much designed for the troff CAT output as it was to drive nroff on a daisy wheel printer.      Oddly, decades after I thought everbody (including me as a last troff holdout) had abandoned it for more wisiwyg text formatters someone sends me a manual.    Tbl had a slight telltale glitch in that the vertical lines on the left and right side of the table almost always protruded one pixel too high.    "Did you use tbl|troff to generate this?" I asked.   Sure enough it was.
>>
>>


From RussellPage at foxhat.net  Sat Oct  7 18:51:25 2017
From: RussellPage at foxhat.net (Russell Page)
Date: Sat, 7 Oct 2017 19:51:25 +1100
Subject: Unix witticisms
In-Reply-To: <00ff01d33de5$fe5ae050$fb10a0f0$@ronnatalie.com>
References: <1507105846.59d49c3693e82@www.paradise.net.nz>
 <7637D3DE-57D3-447B-AF40-D6644C1BBFDA@gmail.com>
 <00ff01d33de5$fe5ae050$fb10a0f0$@ronnatalie.com>
Message-ID: <758b1669-e134-5e76-1bbd-75001dbfd5f9@foxhat.net>

ENOTOBACCO - call would block on empty pipe.


On 6/10/2017 1:26 AM, Ron Natalie wrote:
> At the 83 USENIX Sun handed out buttons that said the "The Joy of UNIX."
> Peter Langston thought that was a bit conceited on Bill's part, so  he made
> up buttons for the next show that read "The PSL of UNIX", "The DMR of UNIX,"
> etc... and handed them out.    I still have the Joy of UNIX button, but I
> lost my "Ron of UNIX" button shortly after the show.
>
> The "is a  trademark of bell labs" generated lots of jokes over the year.
> I have somewhere a button that says "Eunuchs are a hallmark of the Ottoman
> Empire."    At one of the early UUGs someone tried to make "UNIX is a
> Trademark of Bell Labs" pencils except the custom pencil place only allowed
> 18 letters or something so the pencils just ended up saying "UNIX is a
> Trademark."     I'm not sure I've ever come across another Trademark that
> the footnote status was as widely propagated as UNIX's.    AT&T's lawyers
> even got up at one of the conferences (in a talk about licensing changes or
> such) and thanked the community for defending the trademark.
>
> There was a contest back on UNIX-WIZARDS in the day to generate new errno
> codes.    My favorite was ELECTROLUX - Your code needs cleaning up.
>
> A joke issue of the Computation Center at UT Austin's newsletter
> (Universally Plexus at Autism) had an item about UNIX Pipes not permitted in
> non-smoking areas.   I think that was also the source of the "Cannot fork--
> Try again during lunch" quote.
>
>
>
>
>

-- 
Russell Page
RussellPage at foxhat.net
+61 405 148 325



From don at DonHopkins.com  Sat Oct  7 22:21:40 2017
From: don at DonHopkins.com (Don Hopkins)
Date: Sat, 7 Oct 2017 14:21:40 +0200
Subject: Unix witticisms
In-Reply-To: <001001d33f14$bbfe0900$33fa1b00$@ronnatalie.com>
References: <1507105846.59d49c3693e82@www.paradise.net.nz>
 <20171006160108.GA3799@darioniedermann.it>
 <CAKr6gn0Aq7PtKkP4wsPEZC5UZkov5-SUq5iRvcB0ZZVVX=_Ozw@mail.gmail.com>
 <001001d33f14$bbfe0900$33fa1b00$@ronnatalie.com>
Message-ID: <A27C4E20-36B3-4114-8239-4609318F8AD7@gmail.com>

We used to use “rms” as a verb, to log in to somebody else’s account with a well known password, as in “I rms’ed into the box and rebooted it.”

-Don


> On 7 Oct 2017, at 04:33, Ron Natalie <ron at ronnatalie.com> wrote:
> 
> "Roff is the simplest of the run off programs but is utterly frozen " appeared in the V6 man pages.
> 
> This led to a whole slew (at least at JHU) comments in program documents about being "utterly frozen."
> The large freshman "Models and Simulation" class used basic plus and a special command called "lnmns" was created to link the necessary files into the user's home dir.
> Our docs said that "lnmns was the simplenst of the transcendental programs but is utterly frozen."
> 
> For those who know nroff/troff, we had fun in that our senior programmer "Michael John Muuss" wrote a macro package called tmac.jm which was invoked with nroff -mjm (his initials).
> This lead to all kinds of jokes including calling lnmns "bill" after its programmers.
> 
> Many years later there was a proposal to rename the concept of freeware "Flugelware" after some guy named "Flugel" who alledgedly came up with the idea.
> I suggested that we call the C compiler "Ritchie" after its creator.    I got an immediate reponse from dmr telling me to nip that idea in the bud.
> 
> 



From don at DonHopkins.com  Sat Oct  7 23:22:42 2017
From: don at DonHopkins.com (Don Hopkins)
Date: Sat, 7 Oct 2017 15:22:42 +0200
Subject: Unix witticisms
In-Reply-To: <758b1669-e134-5e76-1bbd-75001dbfd5f9@foxhat.net>
References: <1507105846.59d49c3693e82@www.paradise.net.nz>
 <7637D3DE-57D3-447B-AF40-D6644C1BBFDA@gmail.com>
 <00ff01d33de5$fe5ae050$fb10a0f0$@ronnatalie.com>
 <758b1669-e134-5e76-1bbd-75001dbfd5f9@foxhat.net>
Message-ID: <6D5EF428-E655-4A5B-BE0C-465531B2AE4A@gmail.com>


> On 7 Oct 2017, at 10:51, Russell Page <RussellPage at foxhat.net> wrote:
> 
> ENOTOBACCO - call would block on empty pipe.

That’s at AT&T System V error code. The corresponding BSD error code is ENOWEED.

-Don



From ron at ronnatalie.com  Sat Oct  7 23:30:37 2017
From: ron at ronnatalie.com (Ron Natalie)
Date: Sat, 7 Oct 2017 09:30:37 -0400
Subject: Unix witticisms
In-Reply-To: <6D5EF428-E655-4A5B-BE0C-465531B2AE4A@gmail.com>
References: <1507105846.59d49c3693e82@www.paradise.net.nz>
 <7637D3DE-57D3-447B-AF40-D6644C1BBFDA@gmail.com>
 <00ff01d33de5$fe5ae050$fb10a0f0$@ronnatalie.com>
 <758b1669-e134-5e76-1bbd-75001dbfd5f9@foxhat.net>
 <6D5EF428-E655-4A5B-BE0C-465531B2AE4A@gmail.com>
Message-ID: <003501d33f70$76896840$639c38c0$@ronnatalie.com>

While not quite a UNIX witticism, we did have a USENIX fun and game.    When I was playing university administrator at Rutgers, I had a student who decided that in order to get a good job he needed to go to USENIX and hang out with all the high powered hackers there.    He convinced some professor to actually fund his attendance, but he wanted to make a good impression.    He got on a rather popular (non-UNIX) mailing list and asked what people wore to the conference.    He thought that he'd actually have to wear a suit.   I pointed out that it was really casual.     Then Erik Fair got a hold of him and told him, yes, you wear shorts and a t-shirt, and sandals, and they had to be Birkenstocks.   So off goes this kid in the dead of winter in New Jersey looking for Birkenstocks.    I think he finally found them.

He went out to the show and had a pretty good time hanging out.    A week after we got back he comes in sporting a new haircut.    I made a polite inquiry about what was up, but he didn't catch my drift.   My then girlfriend bluntly asked him why he had a homosexual (not the word she used) haircut.    He said that all the hackers we hung out with at the conference had that hairstyle.   I had to point out to him that they were all gay.

Never did find out what happened to that kid after graduation.



From don at DonHopkins.com  Sat Oct  7 23:34:17 2017
From: don at DonHopkins.com (Don Hopkins)
Date: Sat, 7 Oct 2017 15:34:17 +0200
Subject: Unix witticisms
In-Reply-To: <003501d33f70$76896840$639c38c0$@ronnatalie.com>
References: <1507105846.59d49c3693e82@www.paradise.net.nz>
 <7637D3DE-57D3-447B-AF40-D6644C1BBFDA@gmail.com>
 <00ff01d33de5$fe5ae050$fb10a0f0$@ronnatalie.com>
 <758b1669-e134-5e76-1bbd-75001dbfd5f9@foxhat.net>
 <6D5EF428-E655-4A5B-BE0C-465531B2AE4A@gmail.com>
 <003501d33f70$76896840$639c38c0$@ronnatalie.com>
Message-ID: <6DC81D48-F9A3-4797-BC78-4C7805708040@gmail.com>

> Never did find out what happened to that kid after graduation.
> 

He was last seen going up to John Draper’s hotel room for back exercises. c(-;

-Don



From lm at mcvoy.com  Sun Oct  8 00:12:17 2017
From: lm at mcvoy.com (Larry McVoy)
Date: Sat, 7 Oct 2017 07:12:17 -0700
Subject: Unix witticisms
In-Reply-To: <6D5EF428-E655-4A5B-BE0C-465531B2AE4A@gmail.com>
References: <1507105846.59d49c3693e82@www.paradise.net.nz>
 <7637D3DE-57D3-447B-AF40-D6644C1BBFDA@gmail.com>
 <00ff01d33de5$fe5ae050$fb10a0f0$@ronnatalie.com>
 <758b1669-e134-5e76-1bbd-75001dbfd5f9@foxhat.net>
 <6D5EF428-E655-4A5B-BE0C-465531B2AE4A@gmail.com>
Message-ID: <20171007141217.GR2609@mcvoy.com>

On Sat, Oct 07, 2017 at 03:22:42PM +0200, Don Hopkins wrote:
> 
> > On 7 Oct 2017, at 10:51, Russell Page <RussellPage at foxhat.net> wrote:
> > 
> > ENOTOBACCO - call would block on empty pipe.
> 
> That???s at AT&T System V error code. The corresponding BSD error code is ENOWEED.
> 
> -Don

Annnnnnnd, that's the thread, noone can top that!  ROTFL.

--lm


From jnc at mercury.lcs.mit.edu  Sun Oct  8 00:17:02 2017
From: jnc at mercury.lcs.mit.edu (Noel Chiappa)
Date: Sat,  7 Oct 2017 10:17:02 -0400 (EDT)
Subject: Unix witticisms
Message-ID: <20171007141702.C818218C085@mercury.lcs.mit.edu>

    > From: Larry McVoy

    > Annnnnnnd, that's the thread, noone can top that! 

"EMACS - Editor too big"

	Noel


From steffen at sdaoden.eu  Sun Oct  8 00:21:31 2017
From: steffen at sdaoden.eu (Steffen Nurpmeso)
Date: Sat, 07 Oct 2017 16:21:31 +0200
Subject: Unix witticisms
In-Reply-To: <758b1669-e134-5e76-1bbd-75001dbfd5f9@foxhat.net>
References: <1507105846.59d49c3693e82@www.paradise.net.nz>
 <7637D3DE-57D3-447B-AF40-D6644C1BBFDA@gmail.com>
 <00ff01d33de5$fe5ae050$fb10a0f0$@ronnatalie.com>
 <758b1669-e134-5e76-1bbd-75001dbfd5f9@foxhat.net>
Message-ID: <20171007142131.SYXcR%steffen@sdaoden.eu>

Russell Page <RussellPage at foxhat.net> wrote:
 |On 6/10/2017 1:26 AM, Ron Natalie wrote:
 ...
 |> There was a contest back on UNIX-WIZARDS in the day to generate new errno
 |> codes.    My favorite was ELECTROLUX - Your code needs cleaning up.
 |>
 |> A joke issue of the Computation Center at UT Austin's newsletter
 |> (Universally Plexus at Autism) had an item about UNIX Pipes not permitted \
 |> in
 |> non-smoking areas.   I think that was also the source of the "Cannot \
 |> fork--
 |> Try again during lunch" quote.
 ...
 |ENOTOBACCO - call would block on empty pipe.

You know, i liked that so much when i have heard this first that
the BSD Mail i maintain uses the following as a catch-all error:

  ?0!0/NONE[#/var/spool/mail/steffen]? echo \
      $^ERR-1000: $^ERRNAME-1000: $^ERRDOC-1000
  255: NOTOBACCO: Snorkeling on empty pipe

--steffen
|
|Der Kragenbaer,                The moon bear,
|der holt sich munter           he cheerfully and one by one
|einen nach dem anderen runter  wa.ks himself off
|(By Robert Gernhardt)


From pnr at planet.nl  Sun Oct  8 22:42:02 2017
From: pnr at planet.nl (Paul Ruizendaal)
Date: Sun, 8 Oct 2017 14:42:02 +0200
Subject: 4.2BSD steering committee members
Message-ID: <C32FB859-584C-4C03-BD80-594ED889EC3A@planet.nl>

According to the Unix Tree web pages, the development of 4.2BSD was at the request of DARPA guided by a steering committee consisting of:

Bob Fabry, Bill Joy and Sam Leffler from UCB
Alan Nemeth and Rob Gurwitz from BBN
Dennis Ritchie from Bell Labs
Keith Lantz from Stanford
Rick Rashid from Carnegie-Mellon
Bert Halstead from MIT
Dan Lynch from ISI
Gerald J. Popek of UCLA

Although I can place most people on the list, for some names I’m in the dark:

* Alan Nemeth - apparently the designer of the BBN C-series mini’s (I think the C30 was designed to replace the 316/516 as IMP). It is hard to find any info on the C-series, but I understand it to be a mini with 10 bit bytes, 20 bit words and 20 bit address space, more or less modeled after the PDP11 and an instruction set optimised to be an easy target for the C compilers of the day. Any other links to Unix?

* Keith Lantz - apparently specialised in distributed computing. No clear links to Unix that I can find.

* Rick Rashid - driving force behind message passing micro-kernels and the Accent operating systems. Evolved into Mach. Link to Unix seems to be that Accent was an influential design around 81/82

* Bert Halstead - seems to have built a shared memory multiprocessor around that time, “Concert”.

* Dan Lynch - ISI program manager for TCP/IP and the switch-over from NCP on Arpanet.

* Gerald Popek - worked on a secure version of (Arpanet enabled) Unix and on distributed systems (LOCUS) at the time.

Next to networking, the link between these people seems to have been distributed computing — yet I don’t think 4.2BSD had a goal of being multiprocessor ready.

All recollections about the steering committee, its goals and its members welcome.

Paul





From ron at ronnatalie.com  Sun Oct  8 22:51:12 2017
From: ron at ronnatalie.com (Ron Natalie)
Date: Sun, 8 Oct 2017 08:51:12 -0400
Subject: 4.2BSD steering committee members
In-Reply-To: <C32FB859-584C-4C03-BD80-594ED889EC3A@planet.nl>
References: <C32FB859-584C-4C03-BD80-594ED889EC3A@planet.nl>
Message-ID: <001301d34034$1f70a770$5e51f650$@ronnatalie.com>


* Alan Nemeth - apparently the designer of the BBN C-series mini’s (I think the C30 was designed to replace the 316/516 as IMP). It is hard to find any info on the C-series, but I understand it to be a mini with 10 bit bytes, 20 bit words and 20 bit address space, more or less modeled after the PDP11 and an instruction set optimised to be an easy target for the C compilers of the day. Any other links to Unix?

The C machine was a generic emulation box if I recall properly.   The C-30 was indeed an attempt to emulate the 316/516 for IMPS/TACS.   In BBNs long history of selling the same thing to the government over and over, they tweaked the firmware with the goal of allegedly coming up with the perfect instruction set for running C programs and dubbed that model the C- 70.    I had use of a few in the Army.     They were kind of "meh" processors and frankly, I don't recall them running a BSD-ish version of UNIX.

* Dan Lynch - ISI program manager for TCP/IP and the switch-over from NCP on Arpanet.

And eventually running the Interop TCP/IP promotion organization.

* Gerald Popek - worked on a secure version of (Arpanet enabled) Unix and on distributed systems (LOCUS) at the time.

>  Next to networking, the link between these people seems to have been distributed computing — yet I don’t think 4.2BSD had a goal of being multiprocessor ready.

But it wasn't particularly ill suited for that.    George Gobels had little problem getting the dual-vax running.    We ported 4.2 to the MIMD HEP early on as well.   All of these worked fine as long as you guaranteed that no more than one processor went into the core kernel at one time.     It didn't always need to be the same CPU, but just that you didn't have concurrency.    The HEP and a later product I worked on with four i860 processors, the kernel would bounce around among the different processors.




From jnc at mercury.lcs.mit.edu  Mon Oct  9 01:16:30 2017
From: jnc at mercury.lcs.mit.edu (Noel Chiappa)
Date: Sun,  8 Oct 2017 11:16:30 -0400 (EDT)
Subject: 4.2BSD steering committee members
Message-ID: <20171008151630.8274D18C09C@mercury.lcs.mit.edu>

    > From: Paul Ruizendaal

    > * Alan Nemeth - apparently the designer of the BBN C-series mini's

ISTR him from some other context at BBN; don't recall off the top of my
head, though.

    > (I think the C30 was designed to replace the 316/516 as IMP).

They _did_ replace the Honeywell's. At MIT, they eventually came and took away
the 516 (I offered it to the MIT Museum, but they didn't want it, as the work
on it hadn't been done by MIT - idiots!), and replaced it with a
C/30. (Actually, we had a couple of C/30 IMPs - the start was adding a C/30,
to which the MIT Internet IP gateway was connected - the other two IMPs were
full, and the only way to get another port for the gateway was to get another
IMP - something which caused a very long delay in getting MIT connected to the
Internet, to my intense frustration. I seem to recall DARPA/DCVA had stopped
buying Honeywell machines, and the C/30 was late, or something like that.)
	  
    > It is hard to find any info on the C-series, but I understand it to be a
    > mini with 10 bit bytes, 20 bit words and 20 bit address space, more or
    > less modeled after the PDP11 and an instruction set optimised to be an
    > easy target for the C compilers of the day.

Yes and no. It was a general microprogrammed machine, but supported a
daughter-board on the CPU to help with instruction decoding, etc; so the C/30
and C/70 had different daughter-boards, specific to their function.

There's a paper on the C/70, I don't recall if I have a copy - let me look.

    > Any other links to Unix?

I think the C/70 was intended to run Unix, as a general-purpose timesharing
resource at BBN (and did).


    > * Bert Halstead - seems to have built a shared memory multiprocessor
    > around that time

He was, as a grad student, a member of Steve Ward's group at MIT, the ones who
did the Nu machine Unix 68K port. (He wrote the Unix V6/PWB1 driver for the
Diva controller for the CalChomps they had on their -11/70, the former of
which I eventually inherited.)  After he got his PhD (I forget the topic; I
know he did a language called 'D', the origin of the name should be obvious),
he became a faculty member at MIT.


    > * Dan Lynch - ISI program manager for TCP/IP and the switch-over from
    > NCP on Arpanet.

He was actually their facilities manager (or some title to that effect; he was
in charge of all their TENEX/TWENEX machines, too). He was part of the early
Internet crowd - I vividly remember him at a bar with Phill Gross and I in the
DC suburbs, at a _very_ early IETF meeting, discussing how this Internet thing
was going to reallly take off, and the IETF had got to get itself organized to
be ready for that.


    > Next to networking, the link between these people seems to have been
    > distributed computing

That wasn't really the tie - the tie was they were all part of the
DARPA-funded circle. Now, as to why whomever at DARPA picked them - I think
they probably looked for people with recognized competence, who had a need for
a good VAX Unix for their research/organization.

	Noel


From reed at reedmedia.net  Tue Oct 10 06:47:53 2017
From: reed at reedmedia.net (Jeremy C. Reed)
Date: Mon, 9 Oct 2017 15:47:53 -0500 (CDT)
Subject: 4.2BSD steering committee members
In-Reply-To: <C32FB859-584C-4C03-BD80-594ED889EC3A@planet.nl>
References: <C32FB859-584C-4C03-BD80-594ED889EC3A@planet.nl>
Message-ID: <alpine.NEB.2.20.1710091514250.7325@t1.m.reedmedia.net>

Other names:

Duane Adams formed the committee. He was DARPA's first VLSI program 
manager and then the Deputy Director of ARPA's Information Processing 
Techniques Office (IPTO).

Colonel Robert Baker, the R&D Program Manager for DARPA's Distributed 
Computing Program later became DARPA's representative on the steering 
committee.

Are Adams and Baker excluded because they weren't technical 
participants?

Mike Karels later joined.

and I was told that Mike O'Brien represented CSNET.

Or maybe the "steering committee" terminology was still used as this 
morphed into the Dave Clark (of MIT) led meetings?



From dave at horsfall.org  Thu Oct 12 14:45:58 2017
From: dave at horsfall.org (Dave Horsfall)
Date: Thu, 12 Oct 2017 15:45:58 +1100 (EST)
Subject: RIP Dennis Ritchie
Message-ID: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710121540510.876@aneurin.horsfall.org>

We lost co-inventor of Unix and sheer genius Dennis Ritchie on this day in 
2011; there's not really much more that I can say...

Sic transit gloria mundi.

-- 
Dave Horsfall DTM (VK2KFU)  "Those who don't understand security will suffer."


From will.senn at gmail.com  Thu Oct 12 15:08:54 2017
From: will.senn at gmail.com (Will Senn)
Date: Thu, 12 Oct 2017 00:08:54 -0500
Subject: New PDF version of Installing and Using Research Unix Version 7 In
 the SimH PDP-11/45 and 11/70 Emulators
Message-ID: <00712ca5-edd5-c198-4628-4bcd71669a64@gmail.com>

Hi all,

I just finished creating an updated PDF version of a blog post I did a 
couple of years back, describing how to install and use Unix v7 in SimH. 
It's updated for 2017 and MacOS High Sierra 10.13. I started the update 
because I was wanting to do some research in v7 and thought it would be 
good to have a current set of instructions but really because I was 
interested in learning a bit about LaTeX and creating prettier, more 
useful documents. The notes still work fine as originally written, but I 
organized things a little differently and tweaked some of the language. 
I thought somebody else might like having a PDF version around so I 
uploaded the result, call it revision 1.1, and made it publicly 
accessible (the blog still needs updating, somebody oughta do something 
about link impermanence, but that's all for another day). Feel free to 
comment or complain. I added a section in honor of dmr at one 
commenter's suggestion. Here's the link:

https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B1_Jn6Hlzym-Zmx1TjR3TENDQTA

Later,

Will

-- 
GPG Fingerprint: 68F4 B3BD 1730 555A 4462  7D45 3EAA 5B6D A982 BAAF



From gregg.drwho8 at gmail.com  Thu Oct 12 15:32:58 2017
From: gregg.drwho8 at gmail.com (Gregg Levine)
Date: Thu, 12 Oct 2017 01:32:58 -0400
Subject: [TUHS] New PDF version of Installing and Using Research Unix
 Version 7 In the SimH PDP-11/45 and 11/70 Emulators
In-Reply-To: <00712ca5-edd5-c198-4628-4bcd71669a64@gmail.com>
References: <00712ca5-edd5-c198-4628-4bcd71669a64@gmail.com>
Message-ID: <CAC5iaNFjvmd4eS+ntDngzWHLWt8b-0SPRfBHKNHnD9ZZwi1Fjw@mail.gmail.com>

Hello!
(If this is seen twice, then that's because Google complained that the
mangle list wasn't accepting messages.)
Will, has this been idea been tested on any of the platforms that the
emulator runs on? (Not going to mention one in particular by name
since it's sore spot around here.)
-----
Gregg C Levine gregg.drwho8 at gmail.com
"This signature fought the Time Wars, time and again."


On Thu, Oct 12, 2017 at 1:08 AM, Will Senn <will.senn at gmail.com> wrote:
> Hi all,
>
> I just finished creating an updated PDF version of a blog post I did a
> couple of years back, describing how to install and use Unix v7 in SimH.
> It's updated for 2017 and MacOS High Sierra 10.13. I started the update
> because I was wanting to do some research in v7 and thought it would be good
> to have a current set of instructions but really because I was interested in
> learning a bit about LaTeX and creating prettier, more useful documents. The
> notes still work fine as originally written, but I organized things a little
> differently and tweaked some of the language. I thought somebody else might
> like having a PDF version around so I uploaded the result, call it revision
> 1.1, and made it publicly accessible (the blog still needs updating,
> somebody oughta do something about link impermanence, but that's all for
> another day). Feel free to comment or complain. I added a section in honor
> of dmr at one commenter's suggestion. Here's the link:
>
> https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B1_Jn6Hlzym-Zmx1TjR3TENDQTA
>
> Later,
>
> Will
>
> --
> GPG Fingerprint: 68F4 B3BD 1730 555A 4462  7D45 3EAA 5B6D A982 BAAF
>
>


From mj at mjturner.net  Thu Oct 12 23:04:43 2017
From: mj at mjturner.net (Michael-John Turner)
Date: Thu, 12 Oct 2017 14:04:43 +0100
Subject: SGI Software Usability II (IRIX 5.1 memo)
Message-ID: <20171012130443.2s7xnhughyj5667s@saucer.turnde.net>

Hi,

I came across this on Lobsters[1] today and thought it may be of interest 
to the list: 
http://www.art.net/~hopkins/Don/unix-haters/tirix/embarrassing-memo.html

It appears to be an internal SGI memo that's rather critical of IRIX 5.1.  
Does anyone know if it's true?

[1] https://lobste.rs/

Cheers, MJ 
-- 
Michael-John Turner * mj at mjturner.net * http://mjturner.net/ 



From ggm at algebras.org  Sat Oct  7 12:55:28 2017
From: ggm at algebras.org (George Michaelson)
Date: Fri, 6 Oct 2017 19:55:28 -0700
Subject: Unix witticisms
In-Reply-To: <001201d33f16$d36999e0$7a3ccda0$@ronnatalie.com>
References: <1507105846.59d49c3693e82@www.paradise.net.nz>
 <20171006160108.GA3799@darioniedermann.it>
 <CAKr6gn0Aq7PtKkP4wsPEZC5UZkov5-SUq5iRvcB0ZZVVX=_Ozw@mail.gmail.com>
 <001001d33f14$bbfe0900$33fa1b00$@ronnatalie.com>
 <CAKr6gn16u+C9z5WaRN_BOg5kV70pzf6Bv23h_CnQPLt3R38o5Q@mail.gmail.com>
 <001201d33f16$d36999e0$7a3ccda0$@ronnatalie.com>
Message-ID: <CAKr6gn0HZaWOEiegEfycspMfQzSLneiUFcRXH2omouybfiG5Yg@mail.gmail.com>

that may be what I am referring to. if you transpose horizontal and
vertical, this may be a hack, to get around a mispositioning logic.

-g

On Fri, Oct 6, 2017 at 7:48 PM, Ron Natalie <ron at ronnatalie.com> wrote:
>
> tbl was a real hack.    It wasn't so much designed for the troff CAT output as it was to drive nroff on a daisy wheel printer.      Oddly, decades after I thought everbody (including me as a last troff holdout) had abandoned it for more wisiwyg text formatters someone sends me a manual.    Tbl had a slight telltale glitch in that the vertical lines on the left and right side of the table almost always protruded one pixel too high.    "Did you use tbl|troff to generate this?" I asked.   Sure enough it was.
>
>


From don at DonHopkins.com  Thu Oct 12 23:43:12 2017
From: don at DonHopkins.com (Don Hopkins)
Date: Thu, 12 Oct 2017 15:43:12 +0200
Subject: SGI Software Usability II (IRIX 5.1 memo)
In-Reply-To: <AC831F18-D52F-4C0F-9E31-E4C7CD3F4A1E@gmail.com>
References: <20171012130443.2s7xnhughyj5667s@saucer.turnde.net>
 <AC831F18-D52F-4C0F-9E31-E4C7CD3F4A1E@gmail.com>
Message-ID: <25699284-0F7B-4AFD-B37E-F8606CF94678@gmail.com>

When I was working at UniPress in New Jersey, we had an SGI Iris named pink on which we developed the 4Sight versions of NeWS Emacs (NeMACS). 

Speaking of SGI leaks:

Those things are fucking heavy! 

It was raining torrentially outside and the UniPress office started to flood, so we had to keep taking shelves down off the wall and wedging them underneath the Iris to jack it up above the water, as it kept getting deeper and deeper.

Ron will remember the emergency bailing technique MG and I developed of repeatedly filling the shop vac with water then flushing it down the toilet. 

The Indigos were another story entirely: They couldn't touch the raw graphics performance of an Iris, since the rendering was all in software, but you could actually stuff one of them in the overhead compartment on an airplane!

And then there was the SGI Indy... They made up for being small on the outside, by being HUGE and BLOATED in the inside:

"Indy: an Indigo without the 'go'". -- Mark Hughes (?)

This legendary leaked SGI memo has become required reading for operating system and programming language design courses:

http://www.cs.virginia.edu/~cs415/reading/irix-bloat.txt <http://www.cs.virginia.edu/~cs415/reading/irix-bloat.txt>

-Don


> On 12 Oct 2017, at 15:16, Don Hopkins <SimHacker at gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hLDnPiXyME0 <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hLDnPiXyME0>
> 
>> On 12 Oct 2017, at 15:04, Michael-John Turner <mj at mjturner.net <mailto:mj at mjturner.net>> wrote:
>> 
>> Hi,
>> 
>> I came across this on Lobsters[1] today and thought it may be of interest to the list: http://www.art.net/~hopkins/Don/unix-haters/tirix/embarrassing-memo.html <http://www.art.net/~hopkins/Don/unix-haters/tirix/embarrassing-memo.html>
>> 
>> It appears to be an internal SGI memo that's rather critical of IRIX 5.1.  Does anyone know if it's true?
>> 
>> [1] https://lobste.rs/ <https://lobste.rs/>
>> 
>> Cheers, MJ -- 
>> Michael-John Turner * mj at mjturner.net <mailto:mj at mjturner.net> * http://mjturner.net/ <http://mjturner.net/> 
> 

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From lm at mcvoy.com  Fri Oct 13 00:00:21 2017
From: lm at mcvoy.com (Larry McVoy)
Date: Thu, 12 Oct 2017 07:00:21 -0700
Subject: SGI Software Usability II (IRIX 5.1 memo)
In-Reply-To: <20171012130443.2s7xnhughyj5667s@saucer.turnde.net>
References: <20171012130443.2s7xnhughyj5667s@saucer.turnde.net>
Message-ID: <20171012140021.GK17135@mcvoy.com>

I strongly suspect it was true, Tom Davis was an SGI employee as
were the other people mentioned.  

On Thu, Oct 12, 2017 at 02:04:43PM +0100, Michael-John Turner wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> I came across this on Lobsters[1] today and thought it may be of interest to
> the list:
> http://www.art.net/~hopkins/Don/unix-haters/tirix/embarrassing-memo.html
> 
> It appears to be an internal SGI memo that's rather critical of IRIX 5.1.
> Does anyone know if it's true?
> 
> [1] https://lobste.rs/
> 
> Cheers, MJ
> -- 
> Michael-John Turner * mj at mjturner.net * http://mjturner.net/

-- 
---
Larry McVoy            	     lm at mcvoy.com             http://www.mcvoy.com/lm 


From don at DonHopkins.com  Fri Oct 13 00:16:38 2017
From: don at DonHopkins.com (Don Hopkins)
Date: Thu, 12 Oct 2017 16:16:38 +0200
Subject: SGI Software Usability II (IRIX 5.1 memo)
In-Reply-To: <20171012140021.GK17135@mcvoy.com>
References: <20171012130443.2s7xnhughyj5667s@saucer.turnde.net>
 <20171012140021.GK17135@mcvoy.com>
Message-ID: <09E69ADC-17BC-4944-A3D6-BB553C6F2333@gmail.com>

The version of the embarrassing memo on the University of Virginia CS415 reading list that I linked to is an email response from the author Tom Davis, posted to comp.sys.next.advocacy on 25 Apr 1994, which includes his extremely interesting inline comments that he added after the memo was leaked, following up about what happened at SGI in response to the leak! 

http://www.cs.virginia.edu/~cs415/reading/irix-bloat.txt <http://www.cs.virginia.edu/~cs415/reading/irix-bloat.txt>

SGI the institution was embarrassed, but I don’t think Tom Davis has anything to be embarrassed about personally: he handled it well and honestly, told the unvarnished truth to management, which had a positive effect, and his candid write-up and response now serves as a great example for students learning how things work in the real world! 

It should be required reading in all computer science programs (and management programs too)!

-Don


> On 12 Oct 2017, at 16:00, Larry McVoy <lm at mcvoy.com> wrote:
> 
> I strongly suspect it was true, Tom Davis was an SGI employee as
> were the other people mentioned.  
> 
> On Thu, Oct 12, 2017 at 02:04:43PM +0100, Michael-John Turner wrote:
>> Hi,
>> 
>> I came across this on Lobsters[1] today and thought it may be of interest to
>> the list:
>> http://www.art.net/~hopkins/Don/unix-haters/tirix/embarrassing-memo.html
>> 
>> It appears to be an internal SGI memo that's rather critical of IRIX 5.1.
>> Does anyone know if it's true?
>> 
>> [1] https://lobste.rs/
>> 
>> Cheers, MJ
>> -- 
>> Michael-John Turner * mj at mjturner.net * http://mjturner.net/
> 
> -- 
> ---
> Larry McVoy            	     lm at mcvoy.com             http://www.mcvoy.com/lm 

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From don at DonHopkins.com  Fri Oct 13 00:22:42 2017
From: don at DonHopkins.com (Don Hopkins)
Date: Thu, 12 Oct 2017 16:22:42 +0200
Subject: AT&T taking over Sun: Panic!
In-Reply-To: <20171012140021.GK17135@mcvoy.com>
References: <20171012130443.2s7xnhughyj5667s@saucer.turnde.net>
 <20171012140021.GK17135@mcvoy.com>
Message-ID: <6E24EF10-C5FF-4CDF-98B3-090E5BEDF1AE@gmail.com>

Here’s an old interactive joke about how the costly AT&T System V way of doing things was taking a toll on the free old BSD ways of Unix at Sun.

It was better when the <BLINK> tag used to work. But now you can just click on the non-blinking cursor.

-Don

http://www.art.net/~hopkins/Don/unix-haters/panic.html <http://www.art.net/~hopkins/Don/unix-haters/panic.html>

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From don at DonHopkins.com  Fri Oct 13 00:55:27 2017
From: don at DonHopkins.com (Don Hopkins)
Date: Thu, 12 Oct 2017 16:55:27 +0200
Subject: SGI Software Usability II (IRIX 5.1 memo)
In-Reply-To: <09E69ADC-17BC-4944-A3D6-BB553C6F2333@gmail.com>
References: <20171012130443.2s7xnhughyj5667s@saucer.turnde.net>
 <20171012140021.GK17135@mcvoy.com>
 <09E69ADC-17BC-4944-A3D6-BB553C6F2333@gmail.com>
Message-ID: <EA4553C1-B3A7-433B-ADC7-36AC6F562A19@gmail.com>

https://www.cs.virginia.edu/~cs415/reading/irix-bloat.txt <https://www.cs.virginia.edu/~cs415/reading/irix-bloat.txt>
> x The window system (Xsgi + 4Dwm) is up from 3.2 MB to 3.6 MB, and
> x the miscellaneous stuff has grown as well.  As I type now, I have the
> x default non-toto environment plus a single shell and a single text
> x editor, jot.  The total physical memory usage is 21.9 megabytes, and
> x only because I rebooted IRIX yesterday evening to reduce the kernel
> x size.  Luckily, I'm on a 32 megabyte system without Toto, or I'd be
> x swamped by paging.
> x
> x Much of the problem seems to be due to DSOs that load whole libraries
> x instead of individual routines.  Many SGI applications link with 20 or
> x so large DSOs, virtually guaranteeing enormous executables.
> x
> x In spite of the DSOs, large chunks of Motif programs remain unshared,
> x and duplicated in all Motif applications.
One of the main advantages of NeWS was that all the apps shared the same user interface code. 
SGI went down that road a little bit but not far enough with 4Sight, their own merged X11 + NeWS + GL window system they did before Sun developed OpenWindows X11/NeWS.
The 4Sight window frames and desktop pop-up menu were implemented in NeWS by PostScript code running in the server, and the menus used a NeWS overlay canvas to draw the menus in a hardware overlay plane, so it didn’t have to repaint the graphics underneath when the menu popped down.
But SGI’s desktop apps and clients themselves didn’t use a NeWS user interface toolkit (except for NeMACS of course), and they eventually gave up on NeWS because Sun wasn’t being very helpful or supportive, and went down the path of Bloatif instead. 
Shared libraries weren’t universally supported, and even when they were, the ecosystem hadn’t completely converted yet. 
The SunView libraries were so big, that in the absence of shared libraries, Sun would compile all the common SunView desktop applications into one giant happy executable “tooltool", to simulate monolithic shared libraries just between those apps. The names of all the different tools were hard linked together to the same giant universal desktop mega-app clusterfuck, which would run a different main loop depending the name it was invoked with. 
-Don

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From lm at mcvoy.com  Fri Oct 13 00:59:10 2017
From: lm at mcvoy.com (Larry McVoy)
Date: Thu, 12 Oct 2017 07:59:10 -0700
Subject: SGI Software Usability II (IRIX 5.1 memo)
In-Reply-To: <EA4553C1-B3A7-433B-ADC7-36AC6F562A19@gmail.com>
References: <20171012130443.2s7xnhughyj5667s@saucer.turnde.net>
 <20171012140021.GK17135@mcvoy.com>
 <09E69ADC-17BC-4944-A3D6-BB553C6F2333@gmail.com>
 <EA4553C1-B3A7-433B-ADC7-36AC6F562A19@gmail.com>
Message-ID: <20171012145910.GL17135@mcvoy.com>

On Thu, Oct 12, 2017 at 04:55:27PM +0200, Don Hopkins wrote:
> https://www.cs.virginia.edu/~cs415/reading/irix-bloat.txt <https://www.cs.virginia.edu/~cs415/reading/irix-bloat.txt>
> > x The window system (Xsgi + 4Dwm) is up from 3.2 MB to 3.6 MB, and
> > x the miscellaneous stuff has grown as well.  As I type now, I have the
> > x default non-toto environment plus a single shell and a single text
> > x editor, jot.  The total physical memory usage is 21.9 megabytes, and
> > x only because I rebooted IRIX yesterday evening to reduce the kernel
> > x size.  Luckily, I'm on a 32 megabyte system without Toto, or I'd be
> > x swamped by paging.
> > x
> > x Much of the problem seems to be due to DSOs that load whole libraries
> > x instead of individual routines.  Many SGI applications link with 20 or
> > x so large DSOs, virtually guaranteeing enormous executables.
> > x
> > x In spite of the DSOs, large chunks of Motif programs remain unshared,
> > x and duplicated in all Motif applications.
> One of the main advantages of NeWS was that all the apps shared the same user interface code. 
> SGI went down that road a little bit but not far enough with 4Sight, their own merged X11 + NeWS + GL window system they did before Sun developed OpenWindows X11/NeWS.
> The 4Sight window frames and desktop pop-up menu were implemented in NeWS by PostScript code running in the server, and the menus used a NeWS overlay canvas to draw the menus in a hardware overlay plane, so it didn???t have to repaint the graphics underneath when the menu popped down.
> But SGI???s desktop apps and clients themselves didn???t use a NeWS user interface toolkit (except for NeMACS of course), and they eventually gave up on NeWS because Sun wasn???t being very helpful or supportive, and went down the path of Bloatif instead. 
> Shared libraries weren???t universally supported, and even when they were, the ecosystem hadn???t completely converted yet. 
> The SunView libraries were so big, that in the absence of shared libraries, Sun would compile all the common SunView desktop applications into one giant happy executable ???tooltool", to simulate monolithic shared libraries just between those apps. The names of all the different tools were hard linked together to the same giant universal desktop mega-app clusterfuck, which would run a different main loop depending the name it was invoked with. 

That must have been really early on because by the time I got to Sun (4.0?
Maybe 4.1?) shared libraries worked properly.


From don at DonHopkins.com  Fri Oct 13 01:09:39 2017
From: don at DonHopkins.com (Don Hopkins)
Date: Thu, 12 Oct 2017 17:09:39 +0200
Subject: SGI Software Usability II (IRIX 5.1 memo)
In-Reply-To: <20171012145910.GL17135@mcvoy.com>
References: <20171012130443.2s7xnhughyj5667s@saucer.turnde.net>
 <20171012140021.GK17135@mcvoy.com>
 <09E69ADC-17BC-4944-A3D6-BB553C6F2333@gmail.com>
 <EA4553C1-B3A7-433B-ADC7-36AC6F562A19@gmail.com>
 <20171012145910.GL17135@mcvoy.com>
Message-ID: <210DE044-1849-44C2-848C-76EF310F305A@gmail.com>


> On 12 Oct 2017, at 16:59, Larry McVoy <lm at mcvoy.com> wrote:
> 
> That must have been really early on because by the time I got to Sun (4.0?
> Maybe 4.1?) shared libraries worked properly.

Yeah, I remember that being a SunOS 3.x limitation. 4.x was a whole lot nicer! 

Wikipedia says: 

SunOS 4.0: Dec 1988: New virtual memory system, dynamic linking, automounter, System V STREAMS I/O. Sun386i support.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SunOS#History <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SunOS#History>

Then it all went downhill from there… ;(

-Don

http://www.art.net/~hopkins/Don/unix-haters/slowlaris/sunos-died.html <http://www.art.net/~hopkins/Don/unix-haters/slowlaris/sunos-died.html>

The Day SunOS Died

Lyrics by N. R. "Norm" Lunde.
Apologies to Don McLean.

Remember when those guys out West
With their longish hair and paisley vests
Were starting up, straight out of UCB?
They used those Motorola chips
Which at the time were really hip
And looked upon the world through VME.
Their first attempt ran like a pig
But it was the start of something big;
They called the next one the Sun-2
And though they only sold a few
It soon gave birth unto the new
Sun-3 which was their pride
And now they're singing

[chorus]

"Bye, bye, SunOS 4.1.3!
ATT System V has replaced BSD.
You can cling to the standards of the industry
But only if you pay the right fee -- 
Only if you pay the right fee . . ."

The hardware wasn't all they sold.
Their Berkeley port was solid gold
And interfaced with System V, no less!
They implemented all the stuff
That Berkeley thought would be enough
Then added RPC and NFS.
It was a lot of code to cram
Into just four megs of RAM.
The later revs were really cool
With added values like SunTools
But then they took us all for fools
By peddling Solaris . . .
And they were singing,

[chorus]

They took a RISC and kindled SPARC.
The difference was like light and dark.
The Sun-4s were the fastest and the best.
The user base was having fun
Installing SunOS 4.1
But what was coming no one could have guessed.
The installed base was sound
And software did abound.
While all the hackers laughed and played
Already plans were being made
To make the dubious "upgrade" 
To Sun's new Solaris . . .
And Sun was singing,

[chorus]

The cartridge tapes were first to go --
The CD-ROM's a must, you know
And floppy drives will soon go out the door.
I tried to call and ask them why
But they took away my TTY
And left my modem lying on the floor.
While they were on a roll
They moved the damned Control.
The Ethernet's now twisted pair
Which no one uses anywhere.
ISDN is still more rare -- 
The bandwidth's even less!
But still they're singing

[chorus]

But worst of all is what they've done
To software that we used to run
Like dbx and even /bin/cc.
Compilers now have license locks
Wrapped up in OpenWindows crocks --
We even have to pay for GCC!
The applications broke;
/usr/local went up in smoke.
The features we've depended on
Before too long will all be gone
But Sun, I'm sure, will carry on 
By peddling Solaris,
Forever singing,

[chorus]

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From don at DonHopkins.com  Fri Oct 13 01:20:20 2017
From: don at DonHopkins.com (Don Hopkins)
Date: Thu, 12 Oct 2017 17:20:20 +0200
Subject: SGI Software Usability II (IRIX 5.1 memo)
In-Reply-To: <210DE044-1849-44C2-848C-76EF310F305A@gmail.com>
References: <20171012130443.2s7xnhughyj5667s@saucer.turnde.net>
 <20171012140021.GK17135@mcvoy.com>
 <09E69ADC-17BC-4944-A3D6-BB553C6F2333@gmail.com>
 <EA4553C1-B3A7-433B-ADC7-36AC6F562A19@gmail.com>
 <20171012145910.GL17135@mcvoy.com>
 <210DE044-1849-44C2-848C-76EF310F305A@gmail.com>
Message-ID: <9582F0BA-C3BB-4BEB-9C25-1103D9C26B59@gmail.com>

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SunOS#History <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SunOS#History>

The SunOS 3.x => 4.x transition was also the BSD 4.2 => 4.3 transition.

Sun operating system version numbers seemed to parallel the version of Unix it was based on for a while there, until it started spinning out of control and got sucked up into the System V death star. 

Sun UNIX 0.7: UniSoftUNIX v7
SunOS 1.x: 4.1 BSD
SunOS 2.x: 4.2 BSD
SunOS 3.x: 4.2 BSD + some 4.3 BSD and some System V
SunOS 4.x: 4.3 BSD + even more System V 
SunOS 5.0: SVR4

-Don


> On 12 Oct 2017, at 17:09, Don Hopkins <SimHacker at gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> 
>> On 12 Oct 2017, at 16:59, Larry McVoy <lm at mcvoy.com <mailto:lm at mcvoy.com>> wrote:
>> 
>> That must have been really early on because by the time I got to Sun (4.0?
>> Maybe 4.1?) shared libraries worked properly.
> 
> Yeah, I remember that being a SunOS 3.x limitation. 4.x was a whole lot nicer! 
> 
> Wikipedia says: 
> 
> SunOS 4.0: Dec 1988: New virtual memory system, dynamic linking, automounter, System V STREAMS I/O. Sun386i support.
> 
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SunOS#History <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SunOS#History>
> 
> Then it all went downhill from there… ;(
> 
> -Don
> 
> http://www.art.net/~hopkins/Don/unix-haters/slowlaris/sunos-died.html <http://www.art.net/~hopkins/Don/unix-haters/slowlaris/sunos-died.html>
> 
> The Day SunOS Died
> 
> Lyrics by N. R. "Norm" Lunde.
> Apologies to Don McLean.
> 
> Remember when those guys out West
> With their longish hair and paisley vests
> Were starting up, straight out of UCB?
> They used those Motorola chips
> Which at the time were really hip
> And looked upon the world through VME.
> Their first attempt ran like a pig
> But it was the start of something big;
> They called the next one the Sun-2
> And though they only sold a few
> It soon gave birth unto the new
> Sun-3 which was their pride
> And now they're singing
> 
> [chorus]
> 
> "Bye, bye, SunOS 4.1.3!
> ATT System V has replaced BSD.
> You can cling to the standards of the industry
> But only if you pay the right fee -- 
> Only if you pay the right fee . . ."
> 
> The hardware wasn't all they sold.
> Their Berkeley port was solid gold
> And interfaced with System V, no less!
> They implemented all the stuff
> That Berkeley thought would be enough
> Then added RPC and NFS.
> It was a lot of code to cram
> Into just four megs of RAM.
> The later revs were really cool
> With added values like SunTools
> But then they took us all for fools
> By peddling Solaris . . .
> And they were singing,
> 
> [chorus]
> 
> They took a RISC and kindled SPARC.
> The difference was like light and dark.
> The Sun-4s were the fastest and the best.
> The user base was having fun
> Installing SunOS 4.1
> But what was coming no one could have guessed.
> The installed base was sound
> And software did abound.
> While all the hackers laughed and played
> Already plans were being made
> To make the dubious "upgrade" 
> To Sun's new Solaris . . .
> And Sun was singing,
> 
> [chorus]
> 
> The cartridge tapes were first to go --
> The CD-ROM's a must, you know
> And floppy drives will soon go out the door.
> I tried to call and ask them why
> But they took away my TTY
> And left my modem lying on the floor.
> While they were on a roll
> They moved the damned Control.
> The Ethernet's now twisted pair
> Which no one uses anywhere.
> ISDN is still more rare -- 
> The bandwidth's even less!
> But still they're singing
> 
> [chorus]
> 
> But worst of all is what they've done
> To software that we used to run
> Like dbx and even /bin/cc.
> Compilers now have license locks
> Wrapped up in OpenWindows crocks --
> We even have to pay for GCC!
> The applications broke;
> /usr/local went up in smoke.
> The features we've depended on
> Before too long will all be gone
> But Sun, I'm sure, will carry on 
> By peddling Solaris,
> Forever singing,
> 
> [chorus]
> 

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From will.senn at gmail.com  Fri Oct 13 03:34:36 2017
From: will.senn at gmail.com (Will Senn)
Date: Thu, 12 Oct 2017 12:34:36 -0500
Subject: [TUHS] New PDF version of Installing and Using Research Unix
 Version 7 In the SimH PDP-11/45 and 11/70 Emulators
In-Reply-To: <CAC5iaNFjvmd4eS+ntDngzWHLWt8b-0SPRfBHKNHnD9ZZwi1Fjw@mail.gmail.com>
References: <00712ca5-edd5-c198-4628-4bcd71669a64@gmail.com>
 <CAC5iaNFjvmd4eS+ntDngzWHLWt8b-0SPRfBHKNHnD9ZZwi1Fjw@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <cb79a1a1-030c-8984-a0eb-c01871a7029a@gmail.com>

Gregg,

I'm not sure I understand your question exactly, but as mentioned in the 
note, I tested the instructions on Mac OS X Mavericks through MacOS High 
Sierra as well as multiple flavors of FreeBSD 10-11. Your comment 
sparked my interest in trying it out on Windows (maybe that's the OS 
non-grata?), so I tested it there as well. Seems to work, although I 
found the experience distasteful in the extreme . The number of tools 
missing on that OS are mind boggling... but I did get it working. In 
full disclosure, I couldn't bring myself to run it on metal. I just ran 
the Windows  8.1 Enterprise environment in a VM running on Linux Mint 
18.2 (a debian/ubuntu variant).

Just so you know, I have to have a *nix like set of tools on any OS I 
use, these days, or I feel like my left arm is missing, so the minimal 
workable set for me in this case was Git with unix tools (a version on 
MinGW, I think). I used to use Cygwin, but it's so bloated it's 
sickening and the installer is unfriendly to say the least (I would be 
satisfied with a button that said "reasonable set of unix tools", but 
the minimal selection is minimalist, not reasonable). Anyhow, Git with 
unix tools will get you a bash shell that has an almost reasonable set 
of tools. Enough the do the work required for this note anyway. SimH has 
binaries for windows to download. I picked the one that was created 29 
days ago, unzipped it, put it on the path and it just worked. Quite a 
few steps in the prep required minor tweakage (no vi, no emacs - see 
what I mean about minimal not being reasonable, but notepad++ worked ok; 
no gunzip, but gzip -d < zipfile > unzipped worked, perl script didn't 
seem to work right, not sure what that's about - may look into it later, 
since I wrote it, but in the meantime I just downloaded the tap file 
from the archive and it worked fine)...

Bottom line for windows, download the tap file from the archive, create 
two ini files, one for first boot, the other for normal boot and the 
rest of the instructions work verbatim.

I haven't bothered with linux, just cuz I somehow didn't, but I gather 
it will probably work about as well as on the BSD's.

Is that what you were asking, or something more subtle?

Regards,
Will

On 10/12/17 12:32 AM, Gregg Levine wrote:
> Hello!
> (If this is seen twice, then that's because Google complained that the
> mangle list wasn't accepting messages.)
> Will, has this been idea been tested on any of the platforms that the
> emulator runs on? (Not going to mention one in particular by name
> since it's sore spot around here.)
> -----
> Gregg C Levine gregg.drwho8 at gmail.com
> "This signature fought the Time Wars, time and again."
>
>
> On Thu, Oct 12, 2017 at 1:08 AM, Will Senn <will.senn at gmail.com> wrote:
>> Hi all,
>>
>> I just finished creating an updated PDF version of a blog post I did a
>> couple of years back, describing how to install and use Unix v7 in SimH.
>> It's updated for 2017 and MacOS High Sierra 10.13. I started the update
>> because I was wanting to do some research in v7 and thought it would be good
>> to have a current set of instructions but really because I was interested in
>> learning a bit about LaTeX and creating prettier, more useful documents. The
>> notes still work fine as originally written, but I organized things a little
>> differently and tweaked some of the language. I thought somebody else might
>> like having a PDF version around so I uploaded the result, call it revision
>> 1.1, and made it publicly accessible (the blog still needs updating,
>> somebody oughta do something about link impermanence, but that's all for
>> another day). Feel free to comment or complain. I added a section in honor
>> of dmr at one commenter's suggestion. Here's the link:
>>
>> https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B1_Jn6Hlzym-Zmx1TjR3TENDQTA
>>
>> Later,
>>
>> Will
>>
>> --
>> GPG Fingerprint: 68F4 B3BD 1730 555A 4462  7D45 3EAA 5B6D A982 BAAF
>>
>>

-- 
GPG Fingerprint: 68F4 B3BD 1730 555A 4462  7D45 3EAA 5B6D A982 BAAF



From mutiny.mutiny at rediffmail.com  Thu Oct 12 18:34:39 2017
From: mutiny.mutiny at rediffmail.com (Mutiny )
Date: 12 Oct 2017 08:34:39 -0000
Subject: =?utf-8?B?UmU6IFJJUCBEZW5uaXMgUml0Y2hpZQ==?=
In-Reply-To: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710121540510.876@aneurin.horsfall.org>
Message-ID: <1507783605.S.4566.32303.f4-234-184.1507797279.10212@webmail.rediffmail.com>

&#39;We lost co-inventor of Unix and sheer genius Dennis Ritchie on this day in2011; there&#39;s not really much more that I can say...&#39;RIP Dennis. All I ever read about him is, that he was a very smart and very nice person, a real Mensch.--Don
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From gregg.drwho8 at gmail.com  Fri Oct 13 05:11:57 2017
From: gregg.drwho8 at gmail.com (Gregg Levine)
Date: Thu, 12 Oct 2017 15:11:57 -0400
Subject: [TUHS] New PDF version of Installing and Using Research Unix
 Version 7 In the SimH PDP-11/45 and 11/70 Emulators
In-Reply-To: <cb79a1a1-030c-8984-a0eb-c01871a7029a@gmail.com>
References: <00712ca5-edd5-c198-4628-4bcd71669a64@gmail.com>
 <CAC5iaNFjvmd4eS+ntDngzWHLWt8b-0SPRfBHKNHnD9ZZwi1Fjw@mail.gmail.com>
 <cb79a1a1-030c-8984-a0eb-c01871a7029a@gmail.com>
Message-ID: <CAC5iaNFJAhQHeS7vy0FbJvkwnWS=us0KH+C28GGipE26g2WZ9g@mail.gmail.com>

Hello!
I was thinking of Linux, since it and FreeBSD, and even NetBSD, are
next door neighbors of a sort. But at least it is a start. Thank you!
-----
Gregg C Levine gregg.drwho8 at gmail.com
"This signature fought the Time Wars, time and again."


On Thu, Oct 12, 2017 at 1:34 PM, Will Senn <will.senn at gmail.com> wrote:
> Gregg,
>
> I'm not sure I understand your question exactly, but as mentioned in the
> note, I tested the instructions on Mac OS X Mavericks through MacOS High
> Sierra as well as multiple flavors of FreeBSD 10-11. Your comment sparked my
> interest in trying it out on Windows (maybe that's the OS non-grata?), so I
> tested it there as well. Seems to work, although I found the experience
> distasteful in the extreme . The number of tools missing on that OS are mind
> boggling... but I did get it working. In full disclosure, I couldn't bring
> myself to run it on metal. I just ran the Windows  8.1 Enterprise
> environment in a VM running on Linux Mint 18.2 (a debian/ubuntu variant).
>
> Just so you know, I have to have a *nix like set of tools on any OS I use,
> these days, or I feel like my left arm is missing, so the minimal workable
> set for me in this case was Git with unix tools (a version on MinGW, I
> think). I used to use Cygwin, but it's so bloated it's sickening and the
> installer is unfriendly to say the least (I would be satisfied with a button
> that said "reasonable set of unix tools", but the minimal selection is
> minimalist, not reasonable). Anyhow, Git with unix tools will get you a bash
> shell that has an almost reasonable set of tools. Enough the do the work
> required for this note anyway. SimH has binaries for windows to download. I
> picked the one that was created 29 days ago, unzipped it, put it on the path
> and it just worked. Quite a few steps in the prep required minor tweakage
> (no vi, no emacs - see what I mean about minimal not being reasonable, but
> notepad++ worked ok; no gunzip, but gzip -d < zipfile > unzipped worked,
> perl script didn't seem to work right, not sure what that's about - may look
> into it later, since I wrote it, but in the meantime I just downloaded the
> tap file from the archive and it worked fine)...
>
> Bottom line for windows, download the tap file from the archive, create two
> ini files, one for first boot, the other for normal boot and the rest of the
> instructions work verbatim.
>
> I haven't bothered with linux, just cuz I somehow didn't, but I gather it
> will probably work about as well as on the BSD's.
>
> Is that what you were asking, or something more subtle?
>
> Regards,
> Will
>
> On 10/12/17 12:32 AM, Gregg Levine wrote:
>>
>> Hello!
>> (If this is seen twice, then that's because Google complained that the
>> mangle list wasn't accepting messages.)
>> Will, has this been idea been tested on any of the platforms that the
>> emulator runs on? (Not going to mention one in particular by name
>> since it's sore spot around here.)
>> -----
>> Gregg C Levine gregg.drwho8 at gmail.com
>> "This signature fought the Time Wars, time and again."
>>
>>
>> On Thu, Oct 12, 2017 at 1:08 AM, Will Senn <will.senn at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>
>>> Hi all,
>>>
>>> I just finished creating an updated PDF version of a blog post I did a
>>> couple of years back, describing how to install and use Unix v7 in SimH.
>>> It's updated for 2017 and MacOS High Sierra 10.13. I started the update
>>> because I was wanting to do some research in v7 and thought it would be
>>> good
>>> to have a current set of instructions but really because I was interested
>>> in
>>> learning a bit about LaTeX and creating prettier, more useful documents.
>>> The
>>> notes still work fine as originally written, but I organized things a
>>> little
>>> differently and tweaked some of the language. I thought somebody else
>>> might
>>> like having a PDF version around so I uploaded the result, call it
>>> revision
>>> 1.1, and made it publicly accessible (the blog still needs updating,
>>> somebody oughta do something about link impermanence, but that's all for
>>> another day). Feel free to comment or complain. I added a section in
>>> honor
>>> of dmr at one commenter's suggestion. Here's the link:
>>>
>>> https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B1_Jn6Hlzym-Zmx1TjR3TENDQTA
>>>
>>> Later,
>>>
>>> Will
>>>
>>> --
>>> GPG Fingerprint: 68F4 B3BD 1730 555A 4462  7D45 3EAA 5B6D A982 BAAF
>>>
>>>
>
> --
> GPG Fingerprint: 68F4 B3BD 1730 555A 4462  7D45 3EAA 5B6D A982 BAAF
>


From will.senn at gmail.com  Fri Oct 13 06:50:55 2017
From: will.senn at gmail.com (Will Senn)
Date: Thu, 12 Oct 2017 15:50:55 -0500
Subject: [TUHS] New PDF version of Installing and Using Research Unix
 Version 7 In the SimH PDP-11/45 and 11/70 Emulators
In-Reply-To: <CAC5iaNFJAhQHeS7vy0FbJvkwnWS=us0KH+C28GGipE26g2WZ9g@mail.gmail.com>
References: <00712ca5-edd5-c198-4628-4bcd71669a64@gmail.com>
 <CAC5iaNFjvmd4eS+ntDngzWHLWt8b-0SPRfBHKNHnD9ZZwi1Fjw@mail.gmail.com>
 <cb79a1a1-030c-8984-a0eb-c01871a7029a@gmail.com>
 <CAC5iaNFJAhQHeS7vy0FbJvkwnWS=us0KH+C28GGipE26g2WZ9g@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <f9c6e50a-804b-6846-3288-e982ecff6db4@gmail.com>

Oh, ok. I tested it on Linux Mint 18.2, just now and it works fine. No 
tweaks needed. I recommend installing simh from source vs sudo apt-get 
install simh because there have been some enhancements since 3.8.1... 
particularly in the 4.0-0 Beta line... If you have a c compiler and git, 
just:

$ git clone https://github.com/simh/simh
$ cd simh
$ make clean
$ make pdp11
$ cp BIN/pdp11 ~/bin
$ pdp11

PDP-11 simulator V4.0-0 Beta        git commit id: 247bd8d5

sim>

Later,

Will



On 10/12/2017 02:11 PM, Gregg Levine wrote:
> Hello!
> I was thinking of Linux, since it and FreeBSD, and even NetBSD, are
> next door neighbors of a sort. But at least it is a start. Thank you!
> -----
> Gregg C Levine gregg.drwho8 at gmail.com
> "This signature fought the Time Wars, time and again."
>
>
> On Thu, Oct 12, 2017 at 1:34 PM, Will Senn <will.senn at gmail.com> wrote:
>> Gregg,
>>
>> I'm not sure I understand your question exactly, but as mentioned in the
>> note, I tested the instructions on Mac OS X Mavericks through MacOS High
>> Sierra as well as multiple flavors of FreeBSD 10-11. Your comment sparked my
>> interest in trying it out on Windows (maybe that's the OS non-grata?), so I
>> tested it there as well. Seems to work, although I found the experience
>> distasteful in the extreme . The number of tools missing on that OS are mind
>> boggling... but I did get it working. In full disclosure, I couldn't bring
>> myself to run it on metal. I just ran the Windows  8.1 Enterprise
>> environment in a VM running on Linux Mint 18.2 (a debian/ubuntu variant).
>>
>> Just so you know, I have to have a *nix like set of tools on any OS I use,
>> these days, or I feel like my left arm is missing, so the minimal workable
>> set for me in this case was Git with unix tools (a version on MinGW, I
>> think). I used to use Cygwin, but it's so bloated it's sickening and the
>> installer is unfriendly to say the least (I would be satisfied with a button
>> that said "reasonable set of unix tools", but the minimal selection is
>> minimalist, not reasonable). Anyhow, Git with unix tools will get you a bash
>> shell that has an almost reasonable set of tools. Enough the do the work
>> required for this note anyway. SimH has binaries for windows to download. I
>> picked the one that was created 29 days ago, unzipped it, put it on the path
>> and it just worked. Quite a few steps in the prep required minor tweakage
>> (no vi, no emacs - see what I mean about minimal not being reasonable, but
>> notepad++ worked ok; no gunzip, but gzip -d < zipfile > unzipped worked,
>> perl script didn't seem to work right, not sure what that's about - may look
>> into it later, since I wrote it, but in the meantime I just downloaded the
>> tap file from the archive and it worked fine)...
>>
>> Bottom line for windows, download the tap file from the archive, create two
>> ini files, one for first boot, the other for normal boot and the rest of the
>> instructions work verbatim.
>>
>> I haven't bothered with linux, just cuz I somehow didn't, but I gather it
>> will probably work about as well as on the BSD's.
>>
>> Is that what you were asking, or something more subtle?
>>
>> Regards,
>> Will
>>
>> On 10/12/17 12:32 AM, Gregg Levine wrote:
>>> Hello!
>>> (If this is seen twice, then that's because Google complained that the
>>> mangle list wasn't accepting messages.)
>>> Will, has this been idea been tested on any of the platforms that the
>>> emulator runs on? (Not going to mention one in particular by name
>>> since it's sore spot around here.)
>>> -----
>>> Gregg C Levine gregg.drwho8 at gmail.com
>>> "This signature fought the Time Wars, time and again."
>>>
>>>
>>> On Thu, Oct 12, 2017 at 1:08 AM, Will Senn <will.senn at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>> Hi all,
>>>>
>>>> I just finished creating an updated PDF version of a blog post I did a
>>>> couple of years back, describing how to install and use Unix v7 in SimH.
>>>> It's updated for 2017 and MacOS High Sierra 10.13. I started the update
>>>> because I was wanting to do some research in v7 and thought it would be
>>>> good
>>>> to have a current set of instructions but really because I was interested
>>>> in
>>>> learning a bit about LaTeX and creating prettier, more useful documents.
>>>> The
>>>> notes still work fine as originally written, but I organized things a
>>>> little
>>>> differently and tweaked some of the language. I thought somebody else
>>>> might
>>>> like having a PDF version around so I uploaded the result, call it
>>>> revision
>>>> 1.1, and made it publicly accessible (the blog still needs updating,
>>>> somebody oughta do something about link impermanence, but that's all for
>>>> another day). Feel free to comment or complain. I added a section in
>>>> honor
>>>> of dmr at one commenter's suggestion. Here's the link:
>>>>
>>>> https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B1_Jn6Hlzym-Zmx1TjR3TENDQTA
>>>>
>>>> Later,
>>>>
>>>> Will
>>>>
>>>> --
>>>> GPG Fingerprint: 68F4 B3BD 1730 555A 4462  7D45 3EAA 5B6D A982 BAAF
>>>>
>>>>
>> --
>> GPG Fingerprint: 68F4 B3BD 1730 555A 4462  7D45 3EAA 5B6D A982 BAAF
>>



From camille.paloque-berges at lecnam.net  Fri Oct 13 02:21:49 2017
From: camille.paloque-berges at lecnam.net (Camille Paloque-Berges)
Date: Thu, 12 Oct 2017 18:21:49 +0200
Subject: History of Unix symposium - Paris, France, October 19th 2017
In-Reply-To: <CA+kQp6En-e1acjS6T5N9b5KDoTPmyw3hsPiiHBk-CYUbEU=cqQ@mail.gmail.com>
References: <CA+kQp6En-e1acjS6T5N9b5KDoTPmyw3hsPiiHBk-CYUbEU=cqQ@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <d979998d-9383-4220-0422-a872aad7a095@lecnam.net>



Dear THUS members,

An international conference on the history of Unix will be held in 
Paris, Oct. 19th, at the Conservatoire National des Arts & Métiers. Here 
is the link to the (bilingual) program :
http://technique-societe.cnam.fr/colloque-international-unix-en-france-et-aux-etats-unis-innovation-diffusion-et-appropriation--945215.kjsp 
<http://technique-societe.cnam.fr/medias/fichier/programme-colloque-unix-bilingue_1506698407125-pdf>

There will be audio recordings of the symposium available afterwards - 
check the program page to know where and when.

It will be followed, the next day, by a kick-off meeting of the research 
project “What is a computer program?”:
http://technique-societe.cnam.fr/table-ronde-qu-est-ce-qu-un-programme-informatique-perspectives-historiques-et-philosophiques--945355.kjsp 
<http://technique-societe.cnam.fr/table-ronde-qu-est-ce-qu-un-programme-informatique-perspectives-historiques-et-philosophiques--945355.kjsp?RH=1500478967516>

Please note that an active member of this list, Clem Cole, will be 
giving a much awaited talk!


Best,
Camille Paloque-Bergès, for the orgazining committee(a THUS lurker !).

-- 
Institutional email address : camille.paloque_berges at cnam.fr 
<mailto:camille.paloque_berges at cnam.fr>
*Laboratory for the History of Techno-Sciences (HT2S), Conservatoire 
national des arts et métiers, 2 rue Conté, 75003 Paris, France
*Associate researcher at the Digital Paths cluster of CNRS' Institute 
for Communication Sciences (ISCC)
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From jrvalverde at cnb.csic.es  Sat Oct 14 01:59:55 2017
From: jrvalverde at cnb.csic.es (Jose R. Valverde)
Date: Fri, 13 Oct 2017 17:59:55 +0200
Subject: SGI Software Usability II (IRIX 5.1 memo)
In-Reply-To: <20171012140021.GK17135@mcvoy.com>
References: <20171012130443.2s7xnhughyj5667s@saucer.turnde.net>
 <20171012140021.GK17135@mcvoy.com>
Message-ID: <20171013175955.71cd06bf@cnb.csic.es>

Talking out of memory, but I still remember hacking the system to make
it work.

We had bought two SGI systems, a large one (a Power Challenge) with
16 CPUs and 768MB and an Indy with 16MB. Each had its own version
of the system. We also had several Indigos to which I had access.

The Indy wouldn't boot correctly or fail miserably very soon after
booting after I had installed a number of FLOSS software packages 
on it. I don't remember what triggered the problem, some kind of
interaction with the hardware. So I took to the header files and
assembler code that came with the system, deduced what each parameter
meant and, from that what the original code should have looked like to
explain the behaviour, then compared with the (meager) code for the
other systems, and came up with a patch that would ensure that the
system would boot and run without crashing.

So, yes, as shipped 5.1 was unusable on an Indy. I have looked to see
if I still keep the patches around, but it was so long ago that I can't
find anything from the date (and besides, I've switched through many
other systems since).

				j

It allowed me to work fairly well until 5.3. 


On Thu, 12 Oct 2017 07:00:21 -0700
Larry McVoy <lm at mcvoy.com> wrote:
> I strongly suspect it was true, Tom Davis was an SGI employee as
> were the other people mentioned.  
> 
> On Thu, Oct 12, 2017 at 02:04:43PM +0100, Michael-John Turner wrote:
> > Hi,
> > 
> > I came across this on Lobsters[1] today and thought it may be of
> > interest to the list:
> > http://www.art.net/~hopkins/Don/unix-haters/tirix/embarrassing-memo.html
> > 
> > It appears to be an internal SGI memo that's rather critical of
> > IRIX 5.1. Does anyone know if it's true?
> > 
> > [1] https://lobste.rs/
> > 
> > Cheers, MJ
> > -- 
> > Michael-John Turner * mj at mjturner.net * http://mjturner.net/  
> 
> -- 
> ---
> Larry McVoy            	     lm at mcvoy.com
> http://www.mcvoy.com/lm 


-- 
		Scientific Computing Service
	Solving all your computer needs for Scientific
			Research.

		http://bioportal.cnb.csic.es


From will.senn at gmail.com  Sat Oct 14 03:58:52 2017
From: will.senn at gmail.com (Will Senn)
Date: Fri, 13 Oct 2017 12:58:52 -0500
Subject: [TUHS] New PDF version of Installing and Using Research Unix
 Version 7 In the SimH PDP-11/45 and 11/70 Emulators
In-Reply-To: <CAC5iaNFJAhQHeS7vy0FbJvkwnWS=us0KH+C28GGipE26g2WZ9g@mail.gmail.com>
References: <00712ca5-edd5-c198-4628-4bcd71669a64@gmail.com>
 <CAC5iaNFjvmd4eS+ntDngzWHLWt8b-0SPRfBHKNHnD9ZZwi1Fjw@mail.gmail.com>
 <cb79a1a1-030c-8984-a0eb-c01871a7029a@gmail.com>
 <CAC5iaNFJAhQHeS7vy0FbJvkwnWS=us0KH+C28GGipE26g2WZ9g@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <e7f0bd08-1142-be76-93f4-efd4fc6a9675@gmail.com>

Hi Gregg,

In addition to Mint, I just confirmed the instructions work without 
modification on a Raspberry Pi 2 Model B (the $30 dollar pi comes with a 
quad core 900MHz 32 bit ARM processor with 1GB Ram and a slot for my 32 
GB Micro SD for storage). I'm sure the rpi3 works, but faster (quad core 
1GHz, 64 bit ARM, better design...). My system reports:

uname -a
Linux raspberrypi 4.9.41-v7+ #1023 SMP Tue Aug 8 16:00:15 BST 2017 
armv7l GNU/Linux

cat /etc/debian_version
9.1

Sure, it's slower than my MacBook Pro, but that just makes it seem more 
realistic (pseudo realistic for sure, it's still orders of magnitude 
faster than a real PDP 11).

Later,

Will

On 10/12/17 2:11 PM, Gregg Levine wrote:
> Hello!
> I was thinking of Linux, since it and FreeBSD, and even NetBSD, are
> next door neighbors of a sort. But at least it is a start. Thank you!
> -----
> Gregg C Levine gregg.drwho8 at gmail.com
> "This signature fought the Time Wars, time and again."
>
>
> On Thu, Oct 12, 2017 at 1:34 PM, Will Senn <will.senn at gmail.com> wrote:
>> Gregg,
>>
>> I'm not sure I understand your question exactly, but as mentioned in the
>> note, I tested the instructions on Mac OS X Mavericks through MacOS High
>> Sierra as well as multiple flavors of FreeBSD 10-11. Your comment sparked my
>> interest in trying it out on Windows (maybe that's the OS non-grata?), so I
>> tested it there as well. Seems to work, although I found the experience
>> distasteful in the extreme . The number of tools missing on that OS are mind
>> boggling... but I did get it working. In full disclosure, I couldn't bring
>> myself to run it on metal. I just ran the Windows  8.1 Enterprise
>> environment in a VM running on Linux Mint 18.2 (a debian/ubuntu variant).
>>
>> Just so you know, I have to have a *nix like set of tools on any OS I use,
>> these days, or I feel like my left arm is missing, so the minimal workable
>> set for me in this case was Git with unix tools (a version on MinGW, I
>> think). I used to use Cygwin, but it's so bloated it's sickening and the
>> installer is unfriendly to say the least (I would be satisfied with a button
>> that said "reasonable set of unix tools", but the minimal selection is
>> minimalist, not reasonable). Anyhow, Git with unix tools will get you a bash
>> shell that has an almost reasonable set of tools. Enough the do the work
>> required for this note anyway. SimH has binaries for windows to download. I
>> picked the one that was created 29 days ago, unzipped it, put it on the path
>> and it just worked. Quite a few steps in the prep required minor tweakage
>> (no vi, no emacs - see what I mean about minimal not being reasonable, but
>> notepad++ worked ok; no gunzip, but gzip -d < zipfile > unzipped worked,
>> perl script didn't seem to work right, not sure what that's about - may look
>> into it later, since I wrote it, but in the meantime I just downloaded the
>> tap file from the archive and it worked fine)...
>>
>> Bottom line for windows, download the tap file from the archive, create two
>> ini files, one for first boot, the other for normal boot and the rest of the
>> instructions work verbatim.
>>
>> I haven't bothered with linux, just cuz I somehow didn't, but I gather it
>> will probably work about as well as on the BSD's.
>>
>> Is that what you were asking, or something more subtle?
>>
>> Regards,
>> Will
>>
>> On 10/12/17 12:32 AM, Gregg Levine wrote:
>>> Hello!
>>> (If this is seen twice, then that's because Google complained that the
>>> mangle list wasn't accepting messages.)
>>> Will, has this been idea been tested on any of the platforms that the
>>> emulator runs on? (Not going to mention one in particular by name
>>> since it's sore spot around here.)
>>> -----
>>> Gregg C Levine gregg.drwho8 at gmail.com
>>> "This signature fought the Time Wars, time and again."
>>>
>>>
>>> On Thu, Oct 12, 2017 at 1:08 AM, Will Senn <will.senn at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>> Hi all,
>>>>
>>>> I just finished creating an updated PDF version of a blog post I did a
>>>> couple of years back, describing how to install and use Unix v7 in SimH.
>>>> It's updated for 2017 and MacOS High Sierra 10.13. I started the update
>>>> because I was wanting to do some research in v7 and thought it would be
>>>> good
>>>> to have a current set of instructions but really because I was interested
>>>> in
>>>> learning a bit about LaTeX and creating prettier, more useful documents.
>>>> The
>>>> notes still work fine as originally written, but I organized things a
>>>> little
>>>> differently and tweaked some of the language. I thought somebody else
>>>> might
>>>> like having a PDF version around so I uploaded the result, call it
>>>> revision
>>>> 1.1, and made it publicly accessible (the blog still needs updating,
>>>> somebody oughta do something about link impermanence, but that's all for
>>>> another day). Feel free to comment or complain. I added a section in
>>>> honor
>>>> of dmr at one commenter's suggestion. Here's the link:
>>>>
>>>> https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B1_Jn6Hlzym-Zmx1TjR3TENDQTA
>>>>
>>>> Later,
>>>>
>>>> Will
>>>>
>>>> --
>>>> GPG Fingerprint: 68F4 B3BD 1730 555A 4462  7D45 3EAA 5B6D A982 BAAF
>>>>
>>>>
>> --
>> GPG Fingerprint: 68F4 B3BD 1730 555A 4462  7D45 3EAA 5B6D A982 BAAF
>>

-- 
GPG Fingerprint: 68F4 B3BD 1730 555A 4462  7D45 3EAA 5B6D A982 BAAF



From will.senn at gmail.com  Sat Oct 14 12:59:25 2017
From: will.senn at gmail.com (Will Senn)
Date: Fri, 13 Oct 2017 21:59:25 -0500
Subject: stty erase '^?' in v7
Message-ID: <8de0efc7-0a45-02f2-5db3-7b3bbbe4b815@gmail.com>

Does anyone know why stty won't accept '^?' in v7? It will accept '^h', 
but then the shell expects ^h to "backspace". I am trying to get the 
delete key on my mac to do the backing up and it's '^?'. # isn't my 
favorite since it's used in C programs, but pressing CTRL-h to backup is 
a pain too. If you've read this far, I have three more questions:

1. How do you escape # in order to write a C program if # is the erase 
character in the terminal?
2. How do you enter a literal character in the v7 shell (I am used to 
CTRL-v CTRL-DEL to enter the delete character on other unices)?
3. Is there a way to echo the ascii value of a keypress in v7?

Thanks,

Will

-- 
GPG Fingerprint: 68F4 B3BD 1730 555A 4462  7D45 3EAA 5B6D A982 BAAF



From gtaylor at tnetconsulting.net  Sat Oct 14 14:08:14 2017
From: gtaylor at tnetconsulting.net (Grant Taylor)
Date: Fri, 13 Oct 2017 22:08:14 -0600
Subject: stty erase '^?' in v7
In-Reply-To: <8de0efc7-0a45-02f2-5db3-7b3bbbe4b815@gmail.com>
References: <8de0efc7-0a45-02f2-5db3-7b3bbbe4b815@gmail.com>
Message-ID: <3ab264ee-e46d-0de4-a000-0d59291f8fb6@tnetconsulting.net>

On 10/13/2017 08:59 PM, Will Senn wrote:
> 2. How do you enter a literal character in the v7 shell (I am used to 
> CTRL-v CTRL-DEL to enter the delete character on other unices)?

I don't know if it will help you or not, but I always dealt with this 
problem (allbeit on more modern unixes) via the following:

stty erase <Control>+<v><Backspace>

It seems as if the Control v tells the shell to insert the following key 
literally.  You may not need to do that if the shell is not interpreting ^h.



-- 
Grant. . . .
unix || die


From jnc at mercury.lcs.mit.edu  Sat Oct 14 14:25:17 2017
From: jnc at mercury.lcs.mit.edu (Noel Chiappa)
Date: Sat, 14 Oct 2017 00:25:17 -0400 (EDT)
Subject: stty erase '^?' in v7
Message-ID: <20171014042517.3938A18C09E@mercury.lcs.mit.edu>

    > From: Will Senn

    > 1. How do you escape # in order to write a C program if # is the erase 
    > character in the terminal?

"Use the source, Luke!" V7 is simple enough that it's pretty quick to find
the answers to things like this. E.g.

  http://minnie.tuhs.org/cgi-bin/utree.pl?file=V7/usr/sys/dev/tty.c>

will answer this question (in "canon()").

    > 3. Is there a way to echo the ascii value of a keypress in v7?

A quick look through tty.c suggests this doesn't exist in V7 - without running
a user program that puts the TTY in 'raw' mode and prints out what it
sees. Not sure if there is one off the rack, or if you'd have to whip up a
20-line program to do it.

       Noel


From random832 at fastmail.com  Sat Oct 14 14:39:05 2017
From: random832 at fastmail.com (Random832)
Date: Sat, 14 Oct 2017 00:39:05 -0400
Subject: stty erase '^?' in v7
In-Reply-To: <8de0efc7-0a45-02f2-5db3-7b3bbbe4b815@gmail.com>
References: <8de0efc7-0a45-02f2-5db3-7b3bbbe4b815@gmail.com>
Message-ID: <1507955945.3625743.1138420416.3859F903@webmail.messagingengine.com>

On Fri, Oct 13, 2017, at 22:59, Will Senn wrote:
> Does anyone know why stty won't accept '^?' in v7? It will accept '^h', 
> but then the shell expects ^h to "backspace". I am trying to get the 
> delete key on my mac to do the backing up and it's '^?'. # isn't my 
> favorite since it's used in C programs, but pressing CTRL-h to backup is 
> a pain too. If you've read this far, I have three more questions:

First, you'd need to remove it as the *interrupt* character, which I
don't think the stty command in V7 can do, though the kernel supports it
with TIOCSETC. Signal characters are processed before input control
ones.

#include <sgtty.h>
struct sgttyb buf;
main() {
ioctl(1, TIOCSETC, "\3\34\21\23\4\377");
gtty(1, &buf);
buf.sg_erase = 0177;
buf.sg_kill = 025;
stty(1, &buf);
}

Also, it won't actually erase the character (unless your terminal
interprets an echoed ^? that way - to my knowledge only putty does) -
the crterase flag [and feature], which echoes space-backspace-space on
erase was added later than V7.

> 1. How do you escape # in order to write a C program if # is the erase 
> character in the terminal?

IIRC, it doesn't have effect on the first character of the line, which
is enough for C. Looking through the TTY driver, it looks like there's
code for backslash to escape it.

> 2. How do you enter a literal character in the v7 shell (I am used to 
> CTRL-v CTRL-DEL to enter the delete character on other unices)?

> 3. Is there a way to echo the ascii value of a keypress in v7?

You could probably put something together with stty raw, od, and sed q
(head didn't exist in v7, and you need *something* to cut things off
because ctrl-d won't work with stty raw), but it may be easier to figure
out what all your keys produce outside of your classic unix environment.


From will.senn at gmail.com  Sat Oct 14 14:48:08 2017
From: will.senn at gmail.com (Will Senn)
Date: Fri, 13 Oct 2017 23:48:08 -0500
Subject: stty erase '^?' in v7
In-Reply-To: <20171014042517.3938A18C09E@mercury.lcs.mit.edu>
References: <20171014042517.3938A18C09E@mercury.lcs.mit.edu>
Message-ID: <35f1bf13-3466-9836-7665-099f4d5c3576@gmail.com>

On 10/13/17 11:25 PM, Noel Chiappa wrote:
>      > From: Will Senn
>
>      > 1. How do you escape # in order to write a C program if # is the erase
>      > character in the terminal?
>
> "Use the source, Luke!" V7 is simple enough that it's pretty quick to find
> the answers to things like this. E.g.
>
>    http://minnie.tuhs.org/cgi-bin/utree.pl?file=V7/usr/sys/dev/tty.c>
>
> will answer this question (in "canon()").

Duh! I see it now... backslash. All that cooked and raw stuff is 
gobbledegook that I'll have to read up on.
>      > 3. Is there a way to echo the ascii value of a keypress in v7?
>
> A quick look through tty.c suggests this doesn't exist in V7 - without running
> a user program that puts the TTY in 'raw' mode and prints out what it
> sees. Not sure if there is one off the rack, or if you'd have to whip up a
> 20-line program to do it.
>
>         Noel

Maybe later :).

-- 
GPG Fingerprint: 68F4 B3BD 1730 555A 4462  7D45 3EAA 5B6D A982 BAAF



From will.senn at gmail.com  Sat Oct 14 15:03:04 2017
From: will.senn at gmail.com (Will Senn)
Date: Sat, 14 Oct 2017 00:03:04 -0500
Subject: stty erase '^?' in v7
In-Reply-To: <1507955945.3625743.1138420416.3859F903@webmail.messagingengine.com>
References: <8de0efc7-0a45-02f2-5db3-7b3bbbe4b815@gmail.com>
 <1507955945.3625743.1138420416.3859F903@webmail.messagingengine.com>
Message-ID: <35ca5cb3-b2ec-8573-ee94-b710d6c61e9f@gmail.com>

On 10/13/17 11:39 PM, Random832 wrote:
> On Fri, Oct 13, 2017, at 22:59, Will Senn wrote:
>> Does anyone know why stty won't accept '^?' in v7? It will accept '^h',
>> but then the shell expects ^h to "backspace". I am trying to get the
>> delete key on my mac to do the backing up and it's '^?'. # isn't my
>> favorite since it's used in C programs, but pressing CTRL-h to backup is
>> a pain too. If you've read this far, I have three more questions:
> First, you'd need to remove it as the *interrupt* character, which I
> don't think the stty command in V7 can do, though the kernel supports it
> with TIOCSETC. Signal characters are processed before input control
> ones.
>
> #include <sgtty.h>
> struct sgttyb buf;
> main() {
> ioctl(1, TIOCSETC, "\3\34\21\23\4\377");
> gtty(1, &buf);
> buf.sg_erase = 0177;
> buf.sg_kill = 025;
> stty(1, &buf);
> }
>
> Also, it won't actually erase the character (unless your terminal
> interprets an echoed ^? that way - to my knowledge only putty does) -
> the crterase flag [and feature], which echoes space-backspace-space on
> erase was added later than V7.
Yeeha, I actually understood your answer :). I didn't know that the 
delete key served a purpose, interrupt, which is good to know. The code 
works, but it's odd without the backing up and erasing, I may just stick 
with # and @.
>
>> 1. How do you escape # in order to write a C program if # is the erase
>> character in the terminal?
> IIRC, it doesn't have effect on the first character of the line, which
> is enough for C. Looking through the TTY driver, it looks like there's
> code for backslash to escape it.
Great answer, didn't even cross my mind, but of course a # at the start 
of a line is ignored, the backslash is obvious in retrospect too.
>> 2. How do you enter a literal character in the v7 shell (I am used to
>> CTRL-v CTRL-DEL to enter the delete character on other unices)?
>> 3. Is there a way to echo the ascii value of a keypress in v7?
> You could probably put something together with stty raw, od, and sed q
> (head didn't exist in v7, and you need *something* to cut things off
> because ctrl-d won't work with stty raw), but it may be easier to figure
> out what all your keys produce outside of your classic unix environment.

I'll go with easier :).

Thanks!

-- 
GPG Fingerprint: 68F4 B3BD 1730 555A 4462  7D45 3EAA 5B6D A982 BAAF



From dave at horsfall.org  Sat Oct 14 16:31:51 2017
From: dave at horsfall.org (Dave Horsfall)
Date: Sat, 14 Oct 2017 17:31:51 +1100 (EST)
Subject: stty erase '^?' in v7
In-Reply-To: <20171014042517.3938A18C09E@mercury.lcs.mit.edu>
References: <20171014042517.3938A18C09E@mercury.lcs.mit.edu>
Message-ID: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710141730460.36873@aneurin.horsfall.org>

On Sat, 14 Oct 2017, Noel Chiappa wrote:

>    > 3. Is there a way to echo the ascii value of a keypress in v7?
>
> A quick look through tty.c suggests this doesn't exist in V7 - without 
> running a user program that puts the TTY in 'raw' mode and prints out 
> what it sees. Not sure if there is one off the rack, or if you'd have to 
> whip up a 20-line program to do it.

Check out horsfall.org/keytest.c for something I wrote years ago.

-- 
Dave Horsfall DTM (VK2KFU)  "Those who don't understand security will suffer."


From jnc at mercury.lcs.mit.edu  Sat Oct 14 22:52:46 2017
From: jnc at mercury.lcs.mit.edu (Noel Chiappa)
Date: Sat, 14 Oct 2017 08:52:46 -0400 (EDT)
Subject: stty erase '^?' in v7
Message-ID: <20171014125246.8373318C09A@mercury.lcs.mit.edu>

    > From: Will Senn

    > I didn't know that the delete key served a purpose, interrupt

At MIT, the PWB1 (effectively) system that was standard at Tech Sq had had its
teletype driver completely re-written by the time I started using it, and that
was changed, so I never saw this IRL.

Recently, I needed a Unix to run under Ersatz-11, to talk to physical QBUS
-11's and download them over their console line, so I went with V6 (since I
had not at that point managed to recover the MIT system). Wow. Talk about
a rude awakening!

That was one of the things that was, ah, problematic - and in V6, there's no
way to change the interrupt character. (And no, I didn't feel like switching
to a later version!)

An even bigger problem was that in vanilla V6, there's _no way_ to do 8-bit
input _and_ output. Sheesh. I managed to fix that too, after a certain amount
of pain. (I missed a code path, or something like that, and it took me quite a
while to figure out why my fixes didn't work.)

    Noel


From will.senn at gmail.com  Sun Oct 15 00:03:01 2017
From: will.senn at gmail.com (Will Senn)
Date: Sat, 14 Oct 2017 09:03:01 -0500
Subject: stty erase '^?' in v7
In-Reply-To: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710141730460.36873@aneurin.horsfall.org>
References: <20171014042517.3938A18C09E@mercury.lcs.mit.edu>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710141730460.36873@aneurin.horsfall.org>
Message-ID: <1e335a74-8141-3936-a2fb-4cd0b5987f26@gmail.com>

On 10/14/17 1:31 AM, Dave Horsfall wrote:
> On Sat, 14 Oct 2017, Noel Chiappa wrote:
>
>>    > 3. Is there a way to echo the ascii value of a keypress in v7?
>>
>> A quick look through tty.c suggests this doesn't exist in V7 - 
>> without running a user program that puts the TTY in 'raw' mode and 
>> prints out what it sees. Not sure if there is one off the rack, or if 
>> you'd have to whip up a 20-line program to do it.
>
> Check out horsfall.org/keytest.c for something I wrote years ago.
>
Works great on my macbook, not valid in V7, but that's ok, now at least 
I know what key value is being sent (0x7f).

Thanks,

Will

-- 
GPG Fingerprint: 68F4 B3BD 1730 555A 4462  7D45 3EAA 5B6D A982 BAAF



From clemc at ccc.com  Sun Oct 15 00:40:55 2017
From: clemc at ccc.com (Clem Cole)
Date: Sat, 14 Oct 2017 10:40:55 -0400
Subject: stty erase '^?' in v7
In-Reply-To: <20171014125246.8373318C09A@mercury.lcs.mit.edu>
References: <20171014125246.8373318C09A@mercury.lcs.mit.edu>
Message-ID: <CAC20D2PunkgrY4Q+d-bgSjOc7eqGm00ksmrfEEpCGemhC=CQbg@mail.gmail.com>

On Sat, Oct 14, 2017 at 8:52 AM, Noel Chiappa <jnc at mercury.lcs.mit.edu>
wrote:

>
> At MIT, the PWB1 (effectively) system that was standard at Tech Sq had had
> its
> ​ ​
> teletype driver completely re-written by the time I started using it, and
> that
> ​ ​
> was changed, so I never saw this IRL.
>
​Didn't Steve Zimmerman (of Zimmerman emacs) fame​ have his hand in this?
He hacked the MSCP tty handler heavily with a lot MIT features.

It was probably post the MIT job control stuff, but the tty handler I
remember and somewhat miss was a TENEX-like ^T feature that did a one line
ps of the jobs attached to your terminal.


> An even bigger problem was that in vanilla V6, there's _no way_ to do 8-bit
> input _and_ output. Sheesh.

Painful memories ... I remember seeing that early on too V5​ too and
thinking 'what a hack' as we had many glass TTY's with only an ASR33 on the
console back then.  And we were also trying to download binaries (to other
processors) so an 8-bit path was wanted.
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From ron at ronnatalie.com  Sun Oct 15 00:44:16 2017
From: ron at ronnatalie.com (Ronald Natalie)
Date: Sat, 14 Oct 2017 10:44:16 -0400
Subject: stty erase '^?' in v7
In-Reply-To: <CAC20D2PunkgrY4Q+d-bgSjOc7eqGm00ksmrfEEpCGemhC=CQbg@mail.gmail.com>
References: <20171014125246.8373318C09A@mercury.lcs.mit.edu>
 <CAC20D2PunkgrY4Q+d-bgSjOc7eqGm00ksmrfEEpCGemhC=CQbg@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <B12F2924-0495-4DB8-BA00-2B529DA03EE3@ronnatalie.com>

When Mike Muuss was working on the scheduler he added the ^T ala TENEX process list.    What was displayed changed over time.    I think I finally moved a “snippet” of the arg list over from the user structure to the proc structure so ^T would be able to get it.



From will.senn at gmail.com  Sun Oct 15 02:40:14 2017
From: will.senn at gmail.com (Will Senn)
Date: Sat, 14 Oct 2017 11:40:14 -0500
Subject: help building kernel after fresh install of V7
Message-ID: <fd1304e9-6e13-1637-476f-e4619120dcff@gmail.com>

After installing a fresh simh V7 instance with 2 RP06's and a TU10, I 
tried building the kernel and running it. I got a panic. I didn't mess 
with the defaults, so I'm at a loss as to how the stock kernel is 
different from the one I built. I tried building as root, then sys, same 
effect. Here's what I did:

nboot.ini contents:

    set cpu 11/70
    set cpu 2M
    set cpu idle
    set rp0 rp06
    att rp0 rp06-0.disk
    set rp1 rp06
    att rp1 rp06-1.disk
    boot rp0

pdp11 nboot.ini
boot
hp(0,0)unix (actually renamed hptmunix)
mem = 2020544
CTRL-D
login: root
cd /usr/sys/conf
make allsystems
... build stuff, no errors or warnings

mv hptmunix /
sync
sync
CTRL-E

quit the sim

pdp11 nboot.ini
boot
hp(0,0)hptmunix
mem = 2021696
err on dev 0/0
bn=1 er=100000,4507
err on dev 0/0
bn=1 er=100000,4521
err on dev 0/0
... etc.

Am I doing something wrong or missing an important configuration step. I 
am just trying to rebuild the stock kernel before I try any 
reconfigurations.

-- 
GPG Fingerprint: 68F4 B3BD 1730 555A 4462  7D45 3EAA 5B6D A982 BAAF



From will.senn at gmail.com  Sun Oct 15 05:45:39 2017
From: will.senn at gmail.com (Will Senn)
Date: Sat, 14 Oct 2017 14:45:39 -0500
Subject: help building kernel after fresh install of V7
In-Reply-To: <fd1304e9-6e13-1637-476f-e4619120dcff@gmail.com>
References: <fd1304e9-6e13-1637-476f-e4619120dcff@gmail.com>
Message-ID: <aa889dac-e785-1c6c-7c0a-b430443263c0@gmail.com>

On 10/14/17 11:40 AM, Will Senn wrote:
> After installing a fresh simh V7 instance with 2 RP06's and a TU10, I 
> tried building the kernel and running it. I got a panic. I didn't mess 
> with the defaults, so I'm at a loss as to how the stock kernel is 
> different from the one I built. I tried building as root, then sys, 
> same effect.
...
> Am I doing something wrong or missing an important configuration step. 
> I am just trying to rebuild the stock kernel before I try any 
> reconfigurations.
>
Figured out to rm c.o and l.o first...

rm c.o l.o
mkconf < hptmconf
console at 60
clock at 100
clock at 104
parity at 114
tm at 224
hp at 254
make unix
cp unix /new

etc...

-- 
GPG Fingerprint: 68F4 B3BD 1730 555A 4462  7D45 3EAA 5B6D A982 BAAF



From dave at horsfall.org  Sun Oct 15 08:01:49 2017
From: dave at horsfall.org (Dave Horsfall)
Date: Sun, 15 Oct 2017 09:01:49 +1100 (EST)
Subject: stty erase '^?' in v7
In-Reply-To: <1e335a74-8141-3936-a2fb-4cd0b5987f26@gmail.com>
References: <20171014042517.3938A18C09E@mercury.lcs.mit.edu>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710141730460.36873@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <1e335a74-8141-3936-a2fb-4cd0b5987f26@gmail.com>
Message-ID: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710150857150.36873@aneurin.horsfall.org>

On Sat, 14 Oct 2017, Will Senn wrote:

>> Check out horsfall.org/keytest.c for something I wrote years ago.
>> 
> Works great on my macbook, not valid in V7, but that's ok, now at least 
> I know what key value is being sent (0x7f).

I never claimed that it was portable :-)  Going by the date, I'd say it 
was written for a CCI Power-6/32 (sorta SysV-ish) with some odd terminals 
that I had to incorporate into TERMINFO for our office software; I dimly 
recall posting it to aus.sources in case others could use it.

-- 
Dave Horsfall DTM (VK2KFU)  "Those who don't understand security will suffer."


From pnr at planet.nl  Sun Oct 15 18:44:26 2017
From: pnr at planet.nl (Paul Ruizendaal)
Date: Sun, 15 Oct 2017 10:44:26 +0200
Subject: 4.2BSD steering committee members
Message-ID: <70A462C1-1728-4492-8EE1-41CD8E283556@planet.nl>

Many thanks for on and off list replies to my query.

I happened to stumble across a paper by Krik McKusick (right here in the THUS archives) that has some more background:
http://www.tuhs.org/Archive/Documentation/Unix_Review/Berkeley_Unix_History.pdf
and in particular on page 38 of the magazine (page 6 of the PDF).

It says (with some reformatting for clarity):

"The contract called for major work to be done on the system so the
DARPA research community could better do its work. Based on the needs
of the DARPA community, goals were set and work began to define the
modifications to the system.

In particular, the new system:
- was expected to include a faster file system that would raise
  throughput to the speed of available disk technology,
- would support processes with multi-gigabyte address space requirements,
- would provide flexible interprocess communication facilities that
  would allow researchers to do work in distributed systems,
- would integrate networking support so that machines running the new
  system could easily participate in the ARPAnet.”

So, IPC facilities to support distributed systems were apparently an explicit goal, and that helps explain the composition of the committee.

It continues:

"To assist in defining the new system, Duane Adams, Berkeley's contract
monitor at DARPA, formed a group known as the "steering committee” to
help guide the design work and ensure that the research community's needs
were addressed.

This committee met twice a year between April, 1981 and June, 1983, and
included [name list as before]. Beginning in 1984, these meetings were
supplanted by workshops that were expanded to include many more people.”

This shift in membership after 4.2BSD shipped had already been noted. The committee seems to have had a productive start:

"An initial document proposing facilities to be included in the new system
was circulated to the steering committee and other people outside Berkeley
in July, 1981, sparking many lengthy debates.”

I would assume that those initial discussions included debates on what would become the socket API. I’ve asked Kirk McKusick if he still remembered that initial discussion document. The reply was:

"The document to which you refer became known as the "BSD System
Manual". The earliest version that I could find was the one
distributed with 4.2BSD in July 1983 which I have attached.”

If anyone knows of earlier versions of that document (prior to 1982), I’d be highly interested.

The paper also notes:

"During the summer, Joy concentrated on implementing a prototype version
of the interprocess communication facilities.”

I’ll scan the early (partial) SCCS logs for remnants of that (a long shot, but worth a try).

Paul









From don at DonHopkins.com  Sun Oct 15 23:10:26 2017
From: don at DonHopkins.com (Don Hopkins)
Date: Sun, 15 Oct 2017 15:10:26 +0200
Subject: stty erase '^?' in v7
In-Reply-To: <B12F2924-0495-4DB8-BA00-2B529DA03EE3@ronnatalie.com>
References: <20171014125246.8373318C09A@mercury.lcs.mit.edu>
 <CAC20D2PunkgrY4Q+d-bgSjOc7eqGm00ksmrfEEpCGemhC=CQbg@mail.gmail.com>
 <B12F2924-0495-4DB8-BA00-2B529DA03EE3@ronnatalie.com>
Message-ID: <6C18EDF4-7532-4C56-B566-D1C1A0C0A81C@gmail.com>

I loved ^T on Unix! I remember when somebody at UMCP added that feature to our 4.2 BSD Vax mimsy. The early version had the fun side-effect of being unregulated. Who added the one-second delay between responding to ^T so you couldn’t any longer hold down ^T with auto-repeat to drive the CPU load through the ceiling and watch as it got higher and higher trying to respond to all those ^T's? (Does that qualify as a Heizenbug, or is that a denial of self service?)

-Don


> On 14 Oct 2017, at 16:44, Ronald Natalie <ron at ronnatalie.com> wrote:
> 
> When Mike Muuss was working on the scheduler he added the ^T ala TENEX process list.    What was displayed changed over time.    I think I finally moved a “snippet” of the arg list over from the user structure to the proc structure so ^T would be able to get it.
> 



From jnc at mercury.lcs.mit.edu  Mon Oct 16 00:39:54 2017
From: jnc at mercury.lcs.mit.edu (Noel Chiappa)
Date: Sun, 15 Oct 2017 10:39:54 -0400 (EDT)
Subject: stty erase '^?' in v7
Message-ID: <20171015143954.C507218C0BB@mercury.lcs.mit.edu>

    > From: Will Senn

    > All that cooked and raw stuff is gobbledegook that I'll have to read up
    > on.

The raw/cooked stuff isn't the source of the worst hair in the TTY driver;
that would be delays (on the output side), and delimiter processing (on the
input side).

The delays are for mechanical terminals, because they need delays after a
motion command (e.g. NL, CR, etc) before the next printing character is sent;
differing for different motion control commands, further complexified by the
current print head position - a Carriage Return from column 70 taking a lot
longer than one from column 10. The driver keeps track of the current column,
so it can calculate this! It does the delays by putting in the output queue a
chacter with the high bit set, and the delay in the low bits; the output start
routine looks for these, and does the delay.

On the input side, every time it sees a delimiter (NL, EOF), it inserts a 0xFF
byte in the input queue, and increments a counter to keep track of how many it
has inserted. I _think_ this is so that any given read call on a 'cooked'
terminal will return at most one line of input (although I don't know why they
don't just parse the buffer contents at read time - although I guess they need
the delimiter count so the read call will wait if there is not a complete line
there yet).

I should look and see how the MIT TTY driver (which also supported 8-bit input
and output) dealt with these...

    Noel


From will.senn at gmail.com  Mon Oct 16 07:51:28 2017
From: will.senn at gmail.com (Will Senn)
Date: Sun, 15 Oct 2017 16:51:28 -0500
Subject: Running V8 - is a distro runnable directly, or does it need BSD 4.1
Message-ID: <a6804733-1972-3d6a-f5ed-668f2c37bbaf@gmail.com>

I remember a thread on the mailing list a while back where Warren 
announced the availability of the V8-V10 source code and being intrigued 
at the possibility of running it. Then I recently came across a note by 
dmr referring to V8 and further tweaking my interest:

http://minnie.tuhs.org/pipermail/tuhs/2003-June/002195.html

Here's what he said:

As for the system aspects: K&R 1 (1978) was done on
what would soon be 7th edition Unix, on 11/70;
K&R 2 (1988) using 9th edition on VAX 8550.
Kernighan and Pike's Unix Programming
Evironment (1984) used 8th edition
on VAX 11/750.

About the releases (or pseudo releases) that
Norman mentions: actually 8th edition was
somewhat real, in that a consistent tape
and captured, probably corresponds fairly
well with its manual, and was educationally
licensed for real, though not in large quantity.
9th and 10th were indeed more conceptual in that
we sent stuff to people (e.g. Norman) who asked,
but they weren't collected in complete and
coherent form.

This combined with my tinkering with V7 and working through K&R (1978) 
got me hankering to go through K&P (1984) on a Vax running V8. Then, I 
came across this:

https://virtuallyfun.com/2017/03/30/research-unix-v8/

and decided to jump in and start running V8. Then it hit me - is it even 
possible to run a V8 instance (similarly to V5/V6/V7, from tape) or is 
it as this note says, necessary to run the bits on a 4.1 BSD base? How 
realistic would the experience be to actually running the system 
described in the Unix Programming Environment if it's actually running 
BSD 4.1... Thanks for any insights y'all might have on this.

Thanks,

Will



-- 
GPG Fingerprint: 68F4 B3BD 1730 555A 4462  7D45 3EAA 5B6D A982 BAAF



From doug at cs.dartmouth.edu  Mon Oct 16 21:58:40 2017
From: doug at cs.dartmouth.edu (Doug McIlroy)
Date: Mon, 16 Oct 2017 07:58:40 -0400
Subject: [TUHS} Running V8 ...
Message-ID: <201710161158.v9GBweD4005539@coolidge.cs.Dartmouth.EDU>

> How realistic would the experience be to actually running the system
> described in the Unix Programming Environment [v8] if it's actually
running > BSD 4.1... Thanks for any insights y'all might have on this.

This question bears on a recent thread about favorite flavors of Unix. My
favorite flavor is Universal Unix, namely the stuff that just works
everywhere. That's essentially what K&P is about.

That's also what allowed me to use a giant Cray with no instruction
whatsoever. And to do everyday "programmering" on the previously
inscrutable Macintosh, thanks to OS X.

The advent of non-typewriter input put a damper on Universal Unix. One has
to learn something to get started with a novel device. I am impressed,
though, by the breadth of Universal Unix that survives behind those
disparate facades.


From camille.paloque-berges at lecnam.net  Mon Oct 16 18:14:16 2017
From: camille.paloque-berges at lecnam.net (Paloque-berges Camille)
Date: Mon, 16 Oct 2017 10:14:16 +0200
Subject: History of Unix symposium - Paris, France, October 19th 2017
In-Reply-To: <d979998d-9383-4220-0422-a872aad7a095@lecnam.net>
References: <CA+kQp6En-e1acjS6T5N9b5KDoTPmyw3hsPiiHBk-CYUbEU=cqQ@mail.gmail.com>
 <d979998d-9383-4220-0422-a872aad7a095@lecnam.net>
Message-ID: <f31ffa92-099c-8a64-b04a-19616e3c61cb@lecnam.net>

Hi again,

sorry the link wasn't working, here is the correct one: 
http://technique-societe.cnam.fr/colloque-international-unix-en-france-et-aux-etats-unis-innovation-diffusion-et-appropriation--945215.kjsp

Very best,

Camille


Le 12/10/2017 à 18:21, Camille Paloque-Berges a écrit :
>
>
> Dear THUS members,
>
> An international conference on the history of Unix will be held in 
> Paris, Oct. 19th, at the Conservatoire National des Arts & Métiers. 
> Here is the link to the (bilingual) program :
> http://technique-societe.cnam.fr/colloque-international-unix-en-france-et-aux-etats-unis-innovation-diffusion-et-appropriation--945215.kjsp 
> <http://technique-societe.cnam.fr/medias/fichier/programme-colloque-unix-bilingue_1506698407125-pdf>
>
> There will be audio recordings of the symposium available afterwards - 
> check the program page to know where and when.
>
> It will be followed, the next day, by a kick-off meeting of the 
> research project “What is a computer program?”:
> http://technique-societe.cnam.fr/table-ronde-qu-est-ce-qu-un-programme-informatique-perspectives-historiques-et-philosophiques--945355.kjsp 
> <http://technique-societe.cnam.fr/table-ronde-qu-est-ce-qu-un-programme-informatique-perspectives-historiques-et-philosophiques--945355.kjsp?RH=1500478967516>
>
> Please note that an active member of this list, Clem Cole, will be 
> giving a much awaited talk!
>
>
> Best,
> Camille Paloque-Bergès, for the orgazining committee(a THUS lurker !).
>
> -- 
> Institutional email address : camille.paloque_berges at cnam.fr 
> <mailto:camille.paloque_berges at cnam.fr>
> *Laboratory for the History of Techno-Sciences (HT2S), Conservatoire 
> national des arts et métiers, 2 rue Conté, 75003 Paris, France
> *Associate researcher at the Digital Paths cluster of CNRS' Institute 
> for Communication Sciences (ISCC)

-- 
Laboratoire Histoire des Techno-Sciences en Société (HT2S)
Conservatoire National des Arts et Métiers (Cnam), Case 1LAB10, 2 rue Conté, 75003 Paris
http://technique-societe.cnam.fr
01.40.27.29.66
***
Membre du Labex HASTEC
Chercheuse associée au pôle Trajectoires Numériques de l'ISCC
***
06 66 84 67 50

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From random832 at fastmail.com  Tue Oct 17 00:46:00 2017
From: random832 at fastmail.com (Random832)
Date: Mon, 16 Oct 2017 10:46:00 -0400
Subject: stty erase '^?' in v7
In-Reply-To: <35ca5cb3-b2ec-8573-ee94-b710d6c61e9f@gmail.com>
References: <8de0efc7-0a45-02f2-5db3-7b3bbbe4b815@gmail.com>
 <1507955945.3625743.1138420416.3859F903@webmail.messagingengine.com>
 <35ca5cb3-b2ec-8573-ee94-b710d6c61e9f@gmail.com>
Message-ID: <1508165160.3775306.1140354568.3D3D55BF@webmail.messagingengine.com>

On Sat, Oct 14, 2017, at 01:03, Will Senn wrote:
> Yeeha, I actually understood your answer :). I didn't know that the 
> delete key served a purpose, interrupt, which is good to know. The code 
> works, but it's odd without the backing up and erasing, I may just stick 
> with # and @.

Well the obvious next step is to patch the kernel to do the backing up
and erasing.

I implemented this for myself once, but I've lost the code since then. I
*think* the right place is in tty.c, around line 489 (that's where it
currently handles the special echo rule for the kill character, anyway).
You'll just want to check for the erase character (and the same modes
that are checked for the kill character) and echo
backspace/space/backspace.


From mj at mjturner.net  Tue Oct 17 01:09:50 2017
From: mj at mjturner.net (Michael-John Turner)
Date: Mon, 16 Oct 2017 16:09:50 +0100
Subject: ARPANET Information Brochure (December 1985)
Message-ID: <20171016150950.frblrgi6crrco3vm@saucer.turnde.net>

Hi,

It's not 100% on topic, but I thought this December 1985 ARPANET 
Information Brochure would be of interest to the list:
http://www.dtic.mil/dtic/tr/fulltext/u2/a164353.pdf

Cheers, MJ 
-- 
Michael-John Turner * mj at mjturner.net * http://mjturner.net/ 



From don at DonHopkins.com  Tue Oct 17 01:35:37 2017
From: don at DonHopkins.com (Don Hopkins)
Date: Mon, 16 Oct 2017 17:35:37 +0200
Subject: ARPANET Information Brochure (December 1985)
In-Reply-To: <20171016150950.frblrgi6crrco3vm@saucer.turnde.net>
References: <20171016150950.frblrgi6crrco3vm@saucer.turnde.net>
Message-ID: <C9C15B90-04C8-4CCE-92F1-CDCE7D2529DD@gmail.com>

That episode of “The Americans” sure made it seem to difficult to break into the ARPANET — they had to kill some poor dude who was in the wrong place in the wrong time. 

But in reality they would gladly mail you all those documents by request for a small fee. You just had to ask. And there were no passwords on the TIPs. 

It makes me wonder if you can really pass a polygraph test by tightening your anus. 

-Don

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hVth6T3gMa0 <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hVth6T3gMa0>

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L0pIUvbyvr8 <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L0pIUvbyvr8>


> On 16 Oct 2017, at 17:09, Michael-John Turner <mj at mjturner.net> wrote:
> 
> Hi,
> 
> It's not 100% on topic, but I thought this December 1985 ARPANET Information Brochure would be of interest to the list:
> http://www.dtic.mil/dtic/tr/fulltext/u2/a164353.pdf
> 
> Cheers, MJ -- 
> Michael-John Turner * mj at mjturner.net * http://mjturner.net/ 

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From don at DonHopkins.com  Tue Oct 17 01:38:30 2017
From: don at DonHopkins.com (Don Hopkins)
Date: Mon, 16 Oct 2017 17:38:30 +0200
Subject: ARPANET Information Brochure (December 1985)
In-Reply-To: <C9C15B90-04C8-4CCE-92F1-CDCE7D2529DD@gmail.com>
References: <20171016150950.frblrgi6crrco3vm@saucer.turnde.net>
 <C9C15B90-04C8-4CCE-92F1-CDCE7D2529DD@gmail.com>
Message-ID: <BEF011B5-4F7C-407D-99D4-C38998CC7385@gmail.com>

> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hVth6T3gMa0 <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hVth6T3gMa0>

I love the way that geeky guy smugly rubs his hands together, leans back and chuckles when he say “We have our very own IMP. (Huh, huh huh, sigh.)”

I would totally chuckle that way if I had my own IMP.

-Don

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From don at DonHopkins.com  Tue Oct 17 01:41:53 2017
From: don at DonHopkins.com (Don Hopkins)
Date: Mon, 16 Oct 2017 17:41:53 +0200
Subject: [TUHS} Running V8 ...
In-Reply-To: <201710161158.v9GBweD4005539@coolidge.cs.Dartmouth.EDU>
References: <201710161158.v9GBweD4005539@coolidge.cs.Dartmouth.EDU>
Message-ID: <891F89F0-051A-453E-8BFC-9AC99A038C73@gmail.com>


> On 16 Oct 2017, at 13:58, Doug McIlroy <doug at cs.dartmouth.edu> wrote:
> 
>> How realistic would the experience be to actually running the system
>> described in the Unix Programming Environment [v8] if it's actually
> running > BSD 4.1... Thanks for any insights y'all might have on this.
> 
> This question bears on a recent thread about favorite flavors of Unix. My
> favorite flavor is Universal Unix, namely the stuff that just works
> everywhere. That's essentially what K&P is about.
> 
> That's also what allowed me to use a giant Cray with no instruction
> whatsoever. And to do everyday "programmering" on the previously
> inscrutable Macintosh, thanks to OS X.
> 
> The advent of non-typewriter input put a damper on Universal Unix. One has
> to learn something to get started with a novel device. I am impressed,
> though, by the breadth of Universal Unix that survives behind those
> disparate facades.

I love the OpenFirmware “L1-A Forth” built into SparcStations. It has the “SEE” word, that decompiles FORTH words and disassembles FORTH primitives. You can start with “SEE SEE”, and then recursively climb down and see each of the words and primitives that defines it, or anything else! 

-Don



From clemc at ccc.com  Tue Oct 17 02:09:50 2017
From: clemc at ccc.com (Clem Cole)
Date: Mon, 16 Oct 2017 12:09:50 -0400
Subject: ARPANET Information Brochure (December 1985)
In-Reply-To: <BEF011B5-4F7C-407D-99D4-C38998CC7385@gmail.com>
References: <20171016150950.frblrgi6crrco3vm@saucer.turnde.net>
 <C9C15B90-04C8-4CCE-92F1-CDCE7D2529DD@gmail.com>
 <BEF011B5-4F7C-407D-99D4-C38998CC7385@gmail.com>
Message-ID: <CAC20D2Or1oNQuNmDE4HuoJDt_nOa61fu3NwaNZ112NNod3UQvA@mail.gmail.com>

Don't forget the cost of the IMP itself was just the beginning.  The fees
to 'TPC' for the 1/2 duplex 9600 serial lines in those days were very, very
expensive.   DARPA paid for them for each site in a large deal it had with
AT&T.    I don't remember where I saw it, but what sticks out in my mind
for those days was that cost of a site (host) on the ARPAnet was approx
$125K / year per host in an ARPA grant.

Which really explains 'security.' In practice nobody was going to risk
letting just anyone hack their system so much that it put the site at
risk.   Truth is we did not try to break in because we all had access, but
if it you needed a $.5-2M PDP-10 to connect to the internet, a free IMP
slot (each IMP supplied 4) and the leases on the wires.  So it was just not
practical to think like we do today, much less act that way.

It was not so much security by obscurity, as security by practical
economics.  Moore's law, Ethernet and cheap processing power is what blow
that up.

On Mon, Oct 16, 2017 at 11:38 AM, Don Hopkins <don at donhopkins.com> wrote:

> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hVth6T3gMa0
>
>
> I love the way that geeky guy smugly rubs his hands together, leans back
> and chuckles when he say “We have our very own IMP. (Huh, huh huh, sigh.)”
>
> I would totally chuckle that way if I had my own IMP.
>
> -Don
>
>
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From clemc at ccc.com  Tue Oct 17 02:28:23 2017
From: clemc at ccc.com (Clem Cole)
Date: Mon, 16 Oct 2017 12:28:23 -0400
Subject: [TUHS} Running V8 ...
In-Reply-To: <201710161158.v9GBweD4005539@coolidge.cs.Dartmouth.EDU>
References: <201710161158.v9GBweD4005539@coolidge.cs.Dartmouth.EDU>
Message-ID: <CAC20D2PBkRgoyrmQ+wDpqfZ7kXCUqNWdJgm08EO2djmwFp4Fng@mail.gmail.com>

On Mon, Oct 16, 2017 at 7:58 AM, Doug McIlroy <doug at cs.dartmouth.edu> wrote:

>
> This question bears on a recent thread about favorite flavors of Unix. My
> favorite flavor is Universal Unix, namely the stuff that just works
> everywhere. That's essentially what K&P is about.


​+1 I would add, to me that's what the 'standardization' efforts were
really about as a >>user<<.   To settle on the minimum subset needed to the
get the job do and stop adding 'sugar' because you could.​  The ISVs wanted
to maximize (SPEC1170 et al), but to me 'Universal' was what do I really
need/use every day.

In fact, its why I switch from EMACS to vi early in my UNIX career.   Vi
and (ed) were everywhere (K&P style).  EMACS was not and if I found a
flavor for that system, it was always 'different.'  I could sit down at
anything from MS-DOS to a Cray and stuff worked well enough that I could do
what I needed to do.  [I'm not a great fan of "vim" for that reason either
BTW -- I just want the basics to 'be there' and 'be reliable' - do what I
want without me having to rethink].
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From will.senn at gmail.com  Tue Oct 17 02:38:48 2017
From: will.senn at gmail.com (Will Senn)
Date: Mon, 16 Oct 2017 11:38:48 -0500
Subject: [TUHS} Running V8 ...
In-Reply-To: <201710161158.v9GBweD4005539@coolidge.cs.Dartmouth.EDU>
References: <201710161158.v9GBweD4005539@coolidge.cs.Dartmouth.EDU>
Message-ID: <314e66e3-c357-0e05-f0ed-75dd386366a5@gmail.com>

On 10/16/17 6:58 AM, Doug McIlroy wrote:
> The advent of non-typewriter input put a damper on Universal Unix. One has
> to learn something to get started with a novel device. I am impressed,
> though, by the breadth of Universal Unix that survives behind those
> disparate facades.

Doug,

I totally agree. In 2005, I bought a Powerbook because I liked the 
aesthetics of it over Windows laptops of that era. I had been using 
Linux for fun but not without a significant bit of pain since the early 
1990's (0.9 kernel), but never seriously. When I opened up my first 
terminal on the Powerbook, I began to love my Powerbook and Unix - 
beauty AND power! As a result of that exposure, I'm comfortable with 
pretty much any *nix and am only frustrated when distributions mess with 
the core tools or leave out system documentation.

To digress a little, my recent exposure to V6 an V7 have only served to 
reinforce my appreciation for the universal aspects of Unix. How is it 
remotely possible that OS's that are approaching 40 years old have so 
much in common with their modern ancestors? The thing that most 
impresses me though, is the durability of the documentation. I was 
reading K&R's "Programming Unix" in volume 2 of the V7 programmer's 
guide. When I came across a concise and informative description of fork:

    Now  we  will  show  how  to regain  control  after  running a 
    program  with execl or execv.   Since  these  routines simply 
    overlay  the new  program  on  the  old  one,  to  save the  old 
    one  requires  that  it  first  be  split  into  two copies;  one  of
    these  can  be  overlaid,  while  the  other  waits  for  the new, 
    overlaying  program  to  finish.   The  splitting  is
    done  by  a  routine  called fork.

Nowadays, fork is usually discussed first, with exec seeming to be 
included as a second class citizen (see Rago & Stevens APUE), which to 
me always seemed a little inverted. The K&R note shows exec first and 
then fork - seems logical - which is how most of K&R and most of the V6 
& V7 documentation is - too bad most of today's documentation is either 
deemed unnecessary (vis a vis the intuitiveness of the Mac/iPhone or is 
of poor quality.

Your note makes me wonder what you thought of Plan 9's mouse input, or 
what K&R thought of it, about "having" to use a mouse for input. I'm 
playing with Plan 9 on my raspberry pi 2 model b and while it seems to 
work, I find the interface constantly getting in the way of my mind and 
fingers :). You even have to use the mouse to wake the screen up! Don't 
get me wrong, I find Plan 9 to be quite interesting and parts of it  
conceptually elegant, but not the interface!

Later,

Will




-- 
GPG Fingerprint: 68F4 B3BD 1730 555A 4462  7D45 3EAA 5B6D A982 BAAF

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From jon at fourwinds.com  Tue Oct 17 02:39:55 2017
From: jon at fourwinds.com (Jon Steinhart)
Date: Mon, 16 Oct 2017 09:39:55 -0700
Subject: [TUHS} Running V8 ... [ really basic tools ]
In-Reply-To: <CAC20D2PBkRgoyrmQ+wDpqfZ7kXCUqNWdJgm08EO2djmwFp4Fng@mail.gmail.com>
References: <201710161158.v9GBweD4005539@coolidge.cs.Dartmouth.EDU>
 <CAC20D2PBkRgoyrmQ+wDpqfZ7kXCUqNWdJgm08EO2djmwFp4Fng@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <201710161639.v9GGdtTg014500@darkstar.fourwinds.com>

Clem Cole writes:
> On Mon, Oct 16, 2017 at 7:58 AM, Doug McIlroy <doug at cs.dartmouth.edu> wrote:
> 
>     This question bears on a recent thread about favorite flavors of Unix. My
>     favorite flavor is Universal Unix, namely the stuff that just works
>     everywhere. That's essentially what K&P is about.
> 
> +1 I would add, to me that's what the 'standardization' efforts were really
> about as a >>user<<.   To settle on the minimum subset needed to the get the
> job do and stop adding 'sugar' because you could.  The ISVs wanted to maximize
> (SPEC1170 et al), but to me 'Universal' was what do I really need/use every
> day.
> 
> In fact, its why I switch from EMACS to vi early in my UNIX career.   Vi and
> (ed) were everywhere (K&P style).  EMACS was not and if I found a flavor for
> that system, it was always 'different.'  I could sit down at anything from
> MS-DOS to a Cray and stuff worked well enough that I could do what I needed to
> do.  [I'm not a great fan of "vim" for that reason either BTW -- I just want
> the basics to 'be there' and 'be reliable' - do what I want without me having
> to rethink].

I have a similar and maybe even more extreme position.  When I was a manager
I placed restrictions on the tools and customizations for members of my team.
My goal was to make sure that any team member could go over to any other team
member's desk and get stuff done.  I strongly pushed vi as an editor because
it was "standard"; as Clem said every emacs seemed to be different.  I prohibited
the redefinition of the vi key bindings and also any shell aliases that replaced
standard commands.  Nothing worse for productivity than going to help out a
colleague and then discovering that they the redefined "ls" as "rm"!

Jon


From don at DonHopkins.com  Tue Oct 17 02:44:33 2017
From: don at DonHopkins.com (Don Hopkins)
Date: Mon, 16 Oct 2017 18:44:33 +0200
Subject: ARPANET Information Brochure (December 1985)
In-Reply-To: <CAC20D2Or1oNQuNmDE4HuoJDt_nOa61fu3NwaNZ112NNod3UQvA@mail.gmail.com>
References: <20171016150950.frblrgi6crrco3vm@saucer.turnde.net>
 <C9C15B90-04C8-4CCE-92F1-CDCE7D2529DD@gmail.com>
 <BEF011B5-4F7C-407D-99D4-C38998CC7385@gmail.com>
 <CAC20D2Or1oNQuNmDE4HuoJDt_nOa61fu3NwaNZ112NNod3UQvA@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <0B1F7901-AE75-4243-9C57-0FAC1D5FC12A@gmail.com>


On 16 Oct 2017, at 18:09, Clem Cole <clemc at ccc.com> wrote:

Don't forget the cost of the IMP itself was just the beginning.  The fees to 'TPC' for the 1/2 duplex 9600 serial lines in those days were very, very expensive.   DARPA paid for them for each site in a large deal it had with AT&T.    I don't remember where I saw it, but what sticks out in my mind for those days was that cost of a site (host) on the ARPAnet was approx $125K / year per host in an ARPA grant. 

Which really explains 'security.' In practice nobody was going to risk letting just anyone hack their system so much that it put the site at risk.   Truth is we did not try to break in because we all had access, but if it you needed a $.5-2M PDP-10 to connect to the internet, a free IMP slot (each IMP supplied 4) and the leases on the wires.  So it was just not practical to think like we do today, much less act that way.

It was not so much security by obscurity, as security by practical economics.  Moore's law, Ethernet and cheap processing power is what blow that up.

On Mon, Oct 16, 2017 at 11:38 AM, Don Hopkins <don at donhopkins.com <mailto:don at donhopkins.com>> wrote:
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hVth6T3gMa0 <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hVth6T3gMa0>

I love the way that geeky guy smugly rubs his hands together, leans back and chuckles when he say “We have our very own IMP. (Huh, huh huh, sigh.)”

I would totally chuckle that way if I had my own IMP.

-Don


My uncle worked at the German Space Operations Center, which had DATEX-P, so I asked a mailing list about how to connect with him, and got some interesting replies that give a glimpse of the topologies and costs of the time:

-Don

Date: 31-Oct-1986 0451
From: covert%covert.DEC at decwrl.dec.com  (John R. Covert)
To: don at brillig.umd.edu
Subject: Re: datex-p

Datex-P costs money to use.

Go to any VMS system on Telenet running PSI, and send mail to
PSI%26245815390037::USERNAME

You'll have to find someone willing to spend a buck or two for every
message you send.

You had the  breakdown of the address wrong:
2624 is for Germany (Germany leaves the 262 off within the country)
581 is for the town (the same as the telephone code for the major nearby town)
53900 is the site
37 is the subaddress

No free service to X.25 networks, sorry.

/john


Date: Fri, 31 Oct 86 14:13:22 EST
From: rick at seismo.css.gov (Rick Adams)
To: don at brillig.umd.edu
Subject: Re:  datex-p

There is nothing magic about datex-p. Its not a network anymore than C&P telephone is a network. You keep trying to make something special
out of it. Think of datex-p as MCI or ATT or SPRINT. Its just a common carrier.

For about $1500/month you could arrange a tymnet/telenet link at
maryland for them to call up. It would them cost the orignator of the
transmission $12/hour and about $.70 per kilocharacters to connect to you.
—rick


Date:  Fri, 31 Oct 86 10:03 EST
From: John C Klensin <Klensin at mit-multics.arpa>
Subject:  Re: datex-p
To: Don Hopkins <don at brillig.umd.edu>

This is going to get pretty complicated, and I'm at a disadvantage in
not knowing what you know already.  So, I apologize if some of the
following is obvious.  I'm going to try to anticipate questions and
answer then as a possibly-efficient way of doing this.

"...  telnet to the states":  Strictly speaking, no.  X.25 protocols,
not TCP/IP, and I think the Bundespost would have fits if someone
started passing TCP/IP traffic over their network.  Moreover, if anyone
has a VMS VAX in the entire world that is capable of accepting an
incoming X.25/X.29 call and then handling TCP/IP traffic over it, we'd
love to know about it, and how they are doing it.  But, I doubt it:  VAX
PSI could not be a more hostile environment to this sort of thing if
they had designed it with that in mind, and one cannot just write and
install X.29 software -- it has to be certified by the network vendors.
GTE Telenet might do so, Tymnet might, but I haven't heard of either of
them being asked.  And you would also need to certify the outgoing
TCP/IP over X.25 package at the far end, and the Deutschebundespost?
Well, "never" somewhat understates the situation.

How about using a datex-p connection to connect to a machine in the US
as a remote user?  Certainly feasible.  This is what is called in the
trade an X.3 -> X.25 -> X.3 or X.29 connection, should you need to know.
All you need is
 a) a machine at this end with incoming Tymnet or Telenet access (or
maybe a few other things, but I don't know).  Some universities have
them, some don't, some commercial firms have them, some don't, etc.  The
minimum charge for those connections is circa $10K per month, $5K to
some educational sites, so they are not real common in places that have
not discovered a large need.
 b) an account at that end, with Datex-P, that has international access
authorization.  That costs extra, incidentally.
 c) The machine address here (a long string of numbers, the first four
of which identify the network).
 d) And, of course, an account on the machine here, since one will be
logging into it.

What can you do once you get here?  Anything that the local user can do,
no more, no less.

Can files be transferred over the VAX/PSI (X.3) ->X.25->X.29 link?  Yep.
Either things like "go into an editor at the remote and pretend someone
is typing very fast" or things like kermit work.  The latter very slowly
because of the long packet-acknowledgement delays.

How about mail over that connection?  Not unless you invent some
protocols such as the ones MAILNET uses (this relies that you have a
daemon at the far end that you can take over and that the remote system
knows about) or cook something up yourself.  You are basically logged
into the remote machine and using yours transparently, or you are logged
into you machine and not the remote.

And how are these things tariffed?  Ignoring the fact that the charges
are for kilopackets and connect time, rather than connect time and
distance, just like long-distance voice phone:  Either originator pays
or remote machine pays ("collect call") service is possible.  Sites that
are willing to accept collect calls essentially sign up in advance,
making it more like an in-WATS service - metered, but invisible to the
caller.  The norm in the US is collect call service, although the major
packet switched networks all support login and password services for
users who need to have accounts and pay the charges themselves
(presumably because they are dealing with remote sites who refuse
"collect" incoming calls).  Internationally, there are three separate
sets of charges, each of which can be charged to either the originator
or the receiver (at least in principle).  Assuming that a call
originates in Germany and is bound for Maryland...
 a) Kilopacket and connect time charges for connecting to Datex-P.  This
is the same charge that would be incurred if you were making a local
connection in Germany.  For moderate use, it averages about $3/connect
hour, last I checked.  Datex-P does not accept any "collect" traffic at
all, so you have to pay then.
 b) Kilopacket and connect time charges for crossing from Datex-P into a
network that serves the US (the "X.75 gateway").  Here, they get you
through the nose.  Again, since Datex-P does not accept "collect"
traffic and the originating network has to be responsible for these
charges, they get passed to the Datex-P account holder.
 c) Kilopacket and connect time charges for connecting to the remote
machine in Maryland.  These charges correspond to domestic rates
(typically $5 - $9 per connect hour), and are typically charged to the
Maryland site (Telenet or Tymnet send them a bill at the end of the
month).  If the Maryland site declines to accept the collect charge,
they can be charged to the Datex-P account also, just like the voice
phone.
  The other way works the same way except that, since Datex-P refuses
any collect traffic, ALL charges are assessed to the account at the US
end.  It tends to be a bit cheaper to call from Europe to the US than
vice versa (backwards from voice), but I have not reviewed the numbers
since the dollar collapsed.

  If you can find a local GTE Telenet access number (don't know where
you are, or I could look it up), dial them up, type MAIL when you see @,
type INTL/ASSOCIATES when it asks for a user name, and give INTL as a
password.  Then track through their little menus until you find the
Federal Republic of Germany -- it should give you information on
tariffs, etc.
 (in case you wonder, those accessing instructions are public
information and appear on the second page of GTE Telenet's give-away "US
Access telephone numbers" brochure).

  that is probably about the end of my knowledge.
  good luck
   john



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From clemc at ccc.com  Tue Oct 17 03:52:50 2017
From: clemc at ccc.com (Clem Cole)
Date: Mon, 16 Oct 2017 13:52:50 -0400
Subject: [TUHS] basic tools / Universal Unix
Message-ID: <CAC20D2NNsM6jGGD_7=yXq=oUVrvD741Rt=B-Q4-F-xR5Nb-Fkw@mail.gmail.com>

On Mon, Oct 16, 2017 at 12:39 PM, Jon Steinhart <jon at fourwinds.com> wrote:

>
> I have a similar and maybe even more extreme position.  When I was a
> manager
> I placed restrictions on the tools and customizations for members of my
> team.
> My goal was to make sure that any team member could go over to any other
> team
> member's desk and get stuff done.


​And I think this loops back to what started some of this threat.  The idea
of a programmer with 'good taste.'
Rob (and Brian) railed on BSD in cat -v considered harmful
<http://harmful.cat-v.org/cat-v/> and ‘*Program Design in the UNIX
Environment*’ (pdf version
<http://harmful.cat-v.org/cat-v/unix_prog_design.pdf>, ps version
<http://harmful.cat-v.org/cat-v/unix_prog_design.ps>) but the points in it
was then and are still now, fresh:  What is it that you need to get the job
done - to me, that is Doug's "Universal Unix" concept.

When I answer questions on quora about learning Linux and other UNIX
derivative, I still point them at their  book:   *The Unix Programming
Environment
<http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/013937681X?ie=UTF8&tag=catv-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=013937681X>*

I would say, if the can login into the system and complete the exercises in
UPE without having to make changes, you are pretty close to Doug's
"Universal UNIX" environment.  And if you can use the tools, without having
to think about them and they pretty much are what you rely upon everyday,
you are getting close to my ideal of 'good taste.'

Clem
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From tih at hamartun.priv.no  Tue Oct 17 04:16:31 2017
From: tih at hamartun.priv.no (Tom Ivar Helbekkmo)
Date: Mon, 16 Oct 2017 20:16:31 +0200
Subject: basic tools / Universal Unix
In-Reply-To: <CAC20D2NNsM6jGGD_7=yXq=oUVrvD741Rt=B-Q4-F-xR5Nb-Fkw@mail.gmail.com>
 (Clem Cole's message of "Mon, 16 Oct 2017 13:52:50 -0400")
References: <CAC20D2NNsM6jGGD_7=yXq=oUVrvD741Rt=B-Q4-F-xR5Nb-Fkw@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <m2inff556o.fsf@thuvia.hamartun.priv.no>

Clem Cole <clemc at ccc.com> writes:

> When I answer questions on quora about learning Linux and other UNIX
> derivative, I still point them at their book: *The Unix Programming
> Environment*

I never got around to reading that book until I'd been a sysadmin for
about twenty years, and it was still a revelation.  I thought I'd just
skim through it to sort of check it off the list, but I ended up
learning a lot of great stuff.

That one, and Kernighan and Pike: "The Practice of Programming", are two
books I keep recommending to people.

-tih
-- 
Most people who graduate with CS degrees don't understand the significance
of Lisp.  Lisp is the most important idea in computer science.  --Alan Kay


From crossd at gmail.com  Tue Oct 17 04:54:33 2017
From: crossd at gmail.com (Dan Cross)
Date: Mon, 16 Oct 2017 14:54:33 -0400
Subject: [TUHS] basic tools / Universal Unix
In-Reply-To: <CAC20D2NNsM6jGGD_7=yXq=oUVrvD741Rt=B-Q4-F-xR5Nb-Fkw@mail.gmail.com>
References: <CAC20D2NNsM6jGGD_7=yXq=oUVrvD741Rt=B-Q4-F-xR5Nb-Fkw@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <CAEoi9W67FAnonXt0-nBPiC_H3c6c5qsUOSvp6rbmzq4E0vcTkQ@mail.gmail.com>

On Mon, Oct 16, 2017 at 1:52 PM, Clem Cole <clemc at ccc.com> wrote:
> On Mon, Oct 16, 2017 at 12:39 PM, Jon Steinhart <jon at fourwinds.com> wrote:
>> I have a similar and maybe even more extreme position.  When I was a
>> manager
>> I placed restrictions on the tools and customizations for members of my
>> team.
>> My goal was to make sure that any team member could go over to any other
>> team
>> member's desk and get stuff done.
>
>
> And I think this loops back to what started some of this threat.  The idea
> of a programmer with 'good taste.'
> Rob (and Brian) railed on BSD in cat -v considered harmful and ‘Program
> Design in the UNIX Environment’ (pdf version, ps version) but the points in
> it was then and are still now, fresh:  What is it that you need to get the
> job done - to me, that is Doug's "Universal Unix" concept.

This is an aside, but I must admit -- with a sense of mild shame --
that the '-v' option to cat is one that I use with some regularity.
The irony is that I probably would not have done so had it NOT been
for the aforementioned paper, which made me aware of it (and how ugly
it is). That is, whenever I want to do the sort of thing that 'cat -v'
does, I remember that paper and think to myself, "oh yeah...`cat -v`
does that."

The suggested alternative of a special-purpose tool never struck me as
satisfactory since such a tool did not exist as a matter of course on
the multitude of machines that I might log into, and/or I didn't have
time or was too lazy to write it myself. Cue segue to lamentation of
the loss of systems promoting a network-aware filesystem namespace
where such things could be written once and then follow me around....

        - Dan C.


From itz at very.loosely.org  Tue Oct 17 05:16:40 2017
From: itz at very.loosely.org (Ian Zimmerman)
Date: Mon, 16 Oct 2017 12:16:40 -0700
Subject: Running V8 ... [ really basic tools ]
In-Reply-To: <201710161639.v9GGdtTg014500@darkstar.fourwinds.com>
References: <201710161158.v9GBweD4005539@coolidge.cs.Dartmouth.EDU>
 <CAC20D2PBkRgoyrmQ+wDpqfZ7kXCUqNWdJgm08EO2djmwFp4Fng@mail.gmail.com>
 <201710161639.v9GGdtTg014500@darkstar.fourwinds.com>
Message-ID: <20171016191640.mqqbf7cp6yfyb6se@matica.foolinux.mooo.com>

On 2017-10-16 09:39, Jon Steinhart wrote:
> 
> I have a similar and maybe even more extreme position.  When I was a
> manager I placed restrictions on the tools and customizations for
> members of my team.  My goal was to make sure that any team member
> could go over to any other team member's desk and get stuff done.  I
> strongly pushed vi as an editor because it was "standard"; as Clem
> said every emacs seemed to be different.  I prohibited the
> redefinition of the vi key bindings and also any shell aliases that
> replaced standard commands.  Nothing worse for productivity than going
> to help out a colleague and then discovering that they the redefined
> "ls" as "rm"!

As an Emacs user, obviously I disagree :P

How many keystrokes are needed to do a given edit with Emacs versus vi,
and in particular such an artificially frozen version of vi?

This is not just laziness (though as we know laziness is a virtue in
programmers).  It's a health issue with RSI.

And I disagree with restrictions on shell tools as well.  They may
have made for a uniform predictable environment on one project and one
job.  But what if an engineer moved on?  Do you really expect him to
reinvent the wheel all over again everytime?

As an example of the level of tool I mean: today I decided I had to stop
using the perl-rename program in my scripts, because different
distributions install it under different names.  It is very painful to
do this: there is no such tool in basic Unix.  Of course I can hack my
own in maybe 10-15 lines of shell code, but that is exactly the kind of
thing you would prohibit.

-- 
Please don't Cc: me privately on mailing lists and Usenet,
if you also post the followup to the list or newsgroup.
Do obvious transformation on domain to reply privately _only_ on Usenet.


From jon at fourwinds.com  Tue Oct 17 05:28:11 2017
From: jon at fourwinds.com (Jon Steinhart)
Date: Mon, 16 Oct 2017 12:28:11 -0700
Subject: Running V8 ... [ really basic tools ]
In-Reply-To: <20171016191640.mqqbf7cp6yfyb6se@matica.foolinux.mooo.com>
References: <201710161158.v9GBweD4005539@coolidge.cs.Dartmouth.EDU>
 <CAC20D2PBkRgoyrmQ+wDpqfZ7kXCUqNWdJgm08EO2djmwFp4Fng@mail.gmail.com>
 <201710161639.v9GGdtTg014500@darkstar.fourwinds.com>
 <20171016191640.mqqbf7cp6yfyb6se@matica.foolinux.mooo.com>
Message-ID: <201710161928.v9GJSB8Y028111@darkstar.fourwinds.com>

Ian Zimmerman writes:
> On 2017-10-16 09:39, Jon Steinhart wrote:
> > 
> > I have a similar and maybe even more extreme position.  When I was a
> > manager I placed restrictions on the tools and customizations for
> > members of my team.  My goal was to make sure that any team member
> > could go over to any other team member's desk and get stuff done.  I
> > strongly pushed vi as an editor because it was "standard"; as Clem
> > said every emacs seemed to be different.  I prohibited the
> > redefinition of the vi key bindings and also any shell aliases that
> > replaced standard commands.  Nothing worse for productivity than going
> > to help out a colleague and then discovering that they the redefined
> > "ls" as "rm"!
> 
> As an Emacs user, obviously I disagree :P
> 
> How many keystrokes are needed to do a given edit with Emacs versus vi,
> and in particular such an artificially frozen version of vi?
> 
> This is not just laziness (though as we know laziness is a virtue in
> programmers).  It's a health issue with RSI.
> 
> And I disagree with restrictions on shell tools as well.  They may
> have made for a uniform predictable environment on one project and one
> job.  But what if an engineer moved on?  Do you really expect him to
> reinvent the wheel all over again everytime?
> 
> As an example of the level of tool I mean: today I decided I had to stop
> using the perl-rename program in my scripts, because different
> distributions install it under different names.  It is very painful to
> do this: there is no such tool in basic Unix.  Of course I can hack my
> own in maybe 10-15 lines of shell code, but that is exactly the kind of
> thing you would prohibit.

Emacs is a lot more "stable" these days; there aren't as many versions
floating around.

No way to answer your question about keystrokes; it really depends on what
you're doing.  I would guess that it's a wash.  Of course, this depends on
your point of view.  I remember a big argument decades ago with Ed Post of
Real Programmers Don't Use Pascal fame.  He was claiming that emacs was
superior because it was "modeless".  Someone else in the car stumped him by
asking the question "Isn't holding down the meta key a mode?"  So vi may
require hitting escape, but emacs is very heavy on the shift key usage so
as I said, it's likely a wash.

I didn't prohibit people from creating their own tools and shortcuts.
I prevented them from using existing utility names for their tools and
shortcuts.  That meant that when they asked someone else in the group
to take a look at a problem that that person could actually do so instead
of causing damage.

And yes, I would prohibit you making a program called perl-rename if it
did something different than perl-rename.  I wouldn't care if it was
identical.  Not sure why you wouldn't set your path to find it wherever
it was or just make a link.

Jon


From bakul at bitblocks.com  Tue Oct 17 06:05:41 2017
From: bakul at bitblocks.com (Bakul Shah)
Date: Mon, 16 Oct 2017 13:05:41 -0700
Subject: [TUHS] basic tools / Universal Unix
In-Reply-To: <CAC20D2NNsM6jGGD_7=yXq=oUVrvD741Rt=B-Q4-F-xR5Nb-Fkw@mail.gmail.com>
References: <CAC20D2NNsM6jGGD_7=yXq=oUVrvD741Rt=B-Q4-F-xR5Nb-Fkw@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <2962D014-8FF9-4E53-8000-EF49C49817E9@bitblocks.com>

vi editing is in my fingers by now but one unixy “good taste” I missed in
it is composability. External filters didn’t quite hit the right spot. As an
example, you can map a key to do a sequence of operations but you
you can’t then use it in conjunction with search to repeat them over a
range of lines. Eventually nvi added optional support for scripting but
full power of a general PL is not quite what I wanted. And vi didn’t have
to become another Emacs. May be an ability to define new commands,
If/while control structures, expressing its notion of objects (lines, para,
Sections etc) in this DSL and an ability use user commands just like
builtins would’ve gone a long way. Of course, the hard part is coming up
with a clear conceptual model.

> On Oct 16, 2017, at 10:52 AM, Clem Cole <clemc at ccc.com> wrote:
> 
> 
> 
>> On Mon, Oct 16, 2017 at 12:39 PM, Jon Steinhart <jon at fourwinds.com> wrote:
>> 
>> I have a similar and maybe even more extreme position.  When I was a manager
>> I placed restrictions on the tools and customizations for members of my team.
>> My goal was to make sure that any team member could go over to any other team
>> member's desk and get stuff done.  
> 
> ​And I think this loops back to what started some of this threat.  The idea of a programmer with 'good taste.'
> Rob (and Brian) railed on BSD in cat -v considered harmful and ‘Program Design in the UNIX Environment’ (pdf version, ps version) but the points in it was then and are still now, fresh:  What is it that you need to get the job done - to me, that is Doug's "Universal Unix" concept.
> 
> When I answer questions on quora about learning Linux and other UNIX derivative, I still point them at their  book:   The Unix Programming Environment 
> 
> I would say, if the can login into the system and complete the exercises in UPE without having to make changes, you are pretty close to Doug's "Universal UNIX" environment.  And if you can use the tools, without having to think about them and they pretty much are what you rely upon everyday, you are getting close to my ideal of 'good taste.' 
> 
> Clem
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From toby at telegraphics.com.au  Tue Oct 17 06:39:04 2017
From: toby at telegraphics.com.au (Toby Thain)
Date: Mon, 16 Oct 2017 16:39:04 -0400
Subject: basic tools / Universal Unix
In-Reply-To: <m2inff556o.fsf@thuvia.hamartun.priv.no>
References: <CAC20D2NNsM6jGGD_7=yXq=oUVrvD741Rt=B-Q4-F-xR5Nb-Fkw@mail.gmail.com>
 <m2inff556o.fsf@thuvia.hamartun.priv.no>
Message-ID: <2843a46b-9524-a1a8-1d62-f0a5f7daca92@telegraphics.com.au>

On 2017-10-16 2:16 PM, Tom Ivar Helbekkmo wrote:
> Clem Cole <clemc at ccc.com> writes:
> 
>> When I answer questions on quora about learning Linux and other UNIX
>> derivative, I still point them at their book: *The Unix Programming
>> Environment*
> 
> I never got around to reading that book until I'd been a sysadmin for
> about twenty years, and it was still a revelation.  I thought I'd just
> skim through it to sort of check it off the list, but I ended up
> learning a lot of great stuff.
> 
> That one, and Kernighan and Pike: "The Practice of Programming", are two
> books I keep recommending to people.

"The Elements of Programming Style" remains as relevant as ever.

--Toby


> 
> -tih
> 



From akosela at andykosela.com  Tue Oct 17 06:39:36 2017
From: akosela at andykosela.com (Andy Kosela)
Date: Mon, 16 Oct 2017 22:39:36 +0200
Subject: [TUHS] basic tools / Universal Unix
In-Reply-To: <CAC20D2NNsM6jGGD_7=yXq=oUVrvD741Rt=B-Q4-F-xR5Nb-Fkw@mail.gmail.com>
References: <CAC20D2NNsM6jGGD_7=yXq=oUVrvD741Rt=B-Q4-F-xR5Nb-Fkw@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <CALMnNGhAprqLTw13KVaGj=KRWWfVKiQy7cyYoYv679g=3W+jxg@mail.gmail.com>

On Monday, October 16, 2017, Clem Cole <clemc at ccc.com> wrote:

>
>
> On Mon, Oct 16, 2017 at 12:39 PM, Jon Steinhart <jon at fourwinds.com
> <javascript:_e(%7B%7D,'cvml','jon at fourwinds.com');>> wrote:
>
>>
>> I have a similar and maybe even more extreme position.  When I was a
>> manager
>> I placed restrictions on the tools and customizations for members of my
>> team.
>> My goal was to make sure that any team member could go over to any other
>> team
>> member's desk and get stuff done.
>
>
> ​And I think this loops back to what started some of this threat.  The
> idea of a programmer with 'good taste.'
> Rob (and Brian) railed on BSD in cat -v considered harmful
> <http://harmful.cat-v.org/cat-v/> and ‘*Program Design in the UNIX
> Environment*’ (pdf version
> <http://harmful.cat-v.org/cat-v/unix_prog_design.pdf>, ps version
> <http://harmful.cat-v.org/cat-v/unix_prog_design.ps>) but the points in
> it was then and are still now, fresh:  What is it that you need to get the
> job done - to me, that is Doug's "Universal Unix" concept.
>
> When I answer questions on quora about learning Linux and other UNIX
> derivative, I still point them at their  book:   *The Unix Programming
> Environment
> <http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/013937681X?ie=UTF8&tag=catv-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=013937681X>*
>
> I would say, if the can login into the system and complete the exercises
> in UPE without having to make changes, you are pretty close to Doug's
> "Universal UNIX" environment.  And if you can use the tools, without having
> to think about them and they pretty much are what you rely upon everyday,
> you are getting close to my ideal of 'good taste.'
>
>
"The UNIX Programming Environment" is still one of my favorite books of all
times.  That is the essence of Universal Unix philosophy.

If only Linux, which is de facto standard Unix operating system these days,
would strive towards that simplicity and compatibility with this Universal
Unix instead of going systemd route -- that would make me forever happy.

--Andy
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From lm at mcvoy.com  Tue Oct 17 10:27:01 2017
From: lm at mcvoy.com (Larry McVoy)
Date: Mon, 16 Oct 2017 17:27:01 -0700
Subject: ARPANET Information Brochure (December 1985)
In-Reply-To: <20171016150950.frblrgi6crrco3vm@saucer.turnde.net>
References: <20171016150950.frblrgi6crrco3vm@saucer.turnde.net>
Message-ID: <20171017002701.GH29793@mcvoy.com>

I love the picture of the nodes on the net.  I was told, by someone that I
don't remember, that uwisc was the 11th node on the net.  I bet it was
Larry Landweber https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawrence_Landweber who told
me that.  But I don't know.  If anyone can confirm or deny that I'd love
to know.

Either way, thanks for posting this, I think this is very on topic.

On Mon, Oct 16, 2017 at 04:09:50PM +0100, Michael-John Turner wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> It's not 100% on topic, but I thought this December 1985 ARPANET Information
> Brochure would be of interest to the list:
> http://www.dtic.mil/dtic/tr/fulltext/u2/a164353.pdf
> 
> Cheers, MJ
> -- 
> Michael-John Turner * mj at mjturner.net * http://mjturner.net/

-- 
---
Larry McVoy            	     lm at mcvoy.com             http://www.mcvoy.com/lm 


From gtaylor at tnetconsulting.net  Tue Oct 17 10:34:10 2017
From: gtaylor at tnetconsulting.net (Grant Taylor)
Date: Mon, 16 Oct 2017 18:34:10 -0600
Subject: ARPANET Information Brochure (December 1985)
In-Reply-To: <0B1F7901-AE75-4243-9C57-0FAC1D5FC12A@gmail.com>
References: <20171016150950.frblrgi6crrco3vm@saucer.turnde.net>
 <C9C15B90-04C8-4CCE-92F1-CDCE7D2529DD@gmail.com>
 <BEF011B5-4F7C-407D-99D4-C38998CC7385@gmail.com>
 <CAC20D2Or1oNQuNmDE4HuoJDt_nOa61fu3NwaNZ112NNod3UQvA@mail.gmail.com>
 <0B1F7901-AE75-4243-9C57-0FAC1D5FC12A@gmail.com>
Message-ID: <57a340b4-c381-29d8-a5af-ede5ec90e1a8@tnetconsulting.net>

On 10/16/2017 10:44 AM, Don Hopkins wrote:
> My uncle worked at the German Space Operations Center, which had 
> DATEX-P, so I asked a mailing list about how to connect with him, and 
> got some interesting replies that give a glimpse of the topologies and 
> costs of the time:

Oh my.  That's intriguing and a number of new acronyms / terms that I 
need to look up.

X.29
X.75

Does anyone know of a good place to discuss networking history, routing, 
email, dns, etc.  I'd like to avoid getting too far off topic for TUHS.



-- 
Grant. . . .
unix || die

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From jnc at mercury.lcs.mit.edu  Tue Oct 17 10:44:02 2017
From: jnc at mercury.lcs.mit.edu (Noel Chiappa)
Date: Mon, 16 Oct 2017 20:44:02 -0400 (EDT)
Subject: ARPANET Information Brochure (December 1985)
Message-ID: <20171017004402.F11E518C08C@mercury.lcs.mit.edu>

    > From: Larry McVoy

    > I was told, by someone that I don't remember, that uwisc was the 11th
    > node on the net. ... If anyone can confirm or deny that I'd love to know.

There's a copy of the July '77 revision of the HOSTS.TXT file as an appendix
here:

  http://www.walden-family.com/dave/archive/bbn-tip-man.txt

The IMPs are numbered in order of deployment; so UCLA is #1, SRI is #2, Utah
is #4, BBN is #5, etc.

I don't see Wisconsin in the list at all. Maybe the person meant CSNET?

	Noel


From itz at very.loosely.org  Tue Oct 17 11:15:54 2017
From: itz at very.loosely.org (Ian Zimmerman)
Date: Mon, 16 Oct 2017 18:15:54 -0700
Subject: Running V8 ... [ really basic tools ]
In-Reply-To: <201710161928.v9GJSB8Y028111@darkstar.fourwinds.com>
References: <201710161158.v9GBweD4005539@coolidge.cs.Dartmouth.EDU>
 <CAC20D2PBkRgoyrmQ+wDpqfZ7kXCUqNWdJgm08EO2djmwFp4Fng@mail.gmail.com>
 <201710161639.v9GGdtTg014500@darkstar.fourwinds.com>
 <20171016191640.mqqbf7cp6yfyb6se@matica.foolinux.mooo.com>
 <201710161928.v9GJSB8Y028111@darkstar.fourwinds.com>
Message-ID: <20171017011554.76ffxpcotcxlxeeo@matica.foolinux.mooo.com>

On 2017-10-16 12:28, Jon Steinhart wrote:

> I didn't prohibit people from creating their own tools and shortcuts.
> I prevented them from using existing utility names for their tools and
> shortcuts.  That meant that when they asked someone else in the group
> to take a look at a problem that that person could actually do so
> instead of causing damage.

I see - I have misunderstood you.  No problem with this policy.

-- 
Please don't Cc: me privately on mailing lists and Usenet,
if you also post the followup to the list or newsgroup.
Do obvious transformation on domain to reply privately _only_ on Usenet.


From lm at mcvoy.com  Tue Oct 17 12:00:36 2017
From: lm at mcvoy.com (Larry McVoy)
Date: Mon, 16 Oct 2017 19:00:36 -0700
Subject: ARPANET Information Brochure (December 1985)
In-Reply-To: <20171017004402.F11E518C08C@mercury.lcs.mit.edu>
References: <20171017004402.F11E518C08C@mercury.lcs.mit.edu>
Message-ID: <20171017020036.GO29793@mcvoy.com>

On Mon, Oct 16, 2017 at 08:44:02PM -0400, Noel Chiappa wrote:
>     > From: Larry McVoy
> 
>     > I was told, by someone that I don't remember, that uwisc was the 11th
>     > node on the net. ... If anyone can confirm or deny that I'd love to know.
> 
> There's a copy of the July '77 revision of the HOSTS.TXT file as an appendix
> here:
> 
>   http://www.walden-family.com/dave/archive/bbn-tip-man.txt
> 
> The IMPs are numbered in order of deployment; so UCLA is #1, SRI is #2, Utah
> is #4, BBN is #5, etc.
> 
> I don't see Wisconsin in the list at all. Maybe the person meant CSNET?

I dunno.  That 1985 map has uwisc in there and I know from being there
that they were in because they were doing a lot of useful work, there
was the uwisc-bsd+NFS release, there was the uwisc bsd port to the IBM
rt, I watched Joe Moran do a port of BSD to a 68K in a couple of days
(literally, he stayed up for 2 days and got it to work), uwisc was the
shit back in the day.  I'm not bragging because of me, I was nobody,
but a lot of somebodies came out of uwisc.  Most of them went to Sun.
Joe went on to do the SunOS 4.x VM system which to this day I have not
seen a better one.

So maybe they weren't the 11th IMP on the net.  I dunno, I do know
that someone told me that.

I do know that prior to the net there was uucp and ....!uwisc was a
useful prefix like ...!rutgers and ...!ucbvax.

I think they were in the mix.  11th?  Dunno, just what I've been told.

--lm


From don at DonHopkins.com  Tue Oct 17 14:20:57 2017
From: don at DonHopkins.com (Don Hopkins)
Date: Tue, 17 Oct 2017 06:20:57 +0200
Subject: UNIX version 2*pi
In-Reply-To: <20171017011554.76ffxpcotcxlxeeo@matica.foolinux.mooo.com>
References: <201710161158.v9GBweD4005539@coolidge.cs.Dartmouth.EDU>
 <CAC20D2PBkRgoyrmQ+wDpqfZ7kXCUqNWdJgm08EO2djmwFp4Fng@mail.gmail.com>
 <201710161639.v9GGdtTg014500@darkstar.fourwinds.com>
 <20171016191640.mqqbf7cp6yfyb6se@matica.foolinux.mooo.com>
 <201710161928.v9GJSB8Y028111@darkstar.fourwinds.com>
 <20171017011554.76ffxpcotcxlxeeo@matica.foolinux.mooo.com>
Message-ID: <81DB1DA1-D194-4A5B-9253-D8EE6E85CC26@gmail.com>

From Andy Glew’s LinkedIn:

https://www.linkedin.com/in/andyglew/ <https://www.linkedin.com/in/andyglew/>

UNIX lab manager
Company Name: McGill
Dates Employed: 1982 – 1985
Employment Duration: 3 yrs
McGill University EE UNIX lab systems administration, PDP-11 running UNIX version 2*pi (>6, <7, irrational)

-Don

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From dave at horsfall.org  Tue Oct 17 16:08:58 2017
From: dave at horsfall.org (Dave Horsfall)
Date: Tue, 17 Oct 2017 17:08:58 +1100 (EST)
Subject: UNIX version 2*pi
In-Reply-To: <81DB1DA1-D194-4A5B-9253-D8EE6E85CC26@gmail.com>
References: <201710161158.v9GBweD4005539@coolidge.cs.Dartmouth.EDU>
 <CAC20D2PBkRgoyrmQ+wDpqfZ7kXCUqNWdJgm08EO2djmwFp4Fng@mail.gmail.com>
 <201710161639.v9GGdtTg014500@darkstar.fourwinds.com>
 <20171016191640.mqqbf7cp6yfyb6se@matica.foolinux.mooo.com>
 <201710161928.v9GJSB8Y028111@darkstar.fourwinds.com>
 <20171017011554.76ffxpcotcxlxeeo@matica.foolinux.mooo.com>
 <81DB1DA1-D194-4A5B-9253-D8EE6E85CC26@gmail.com>
Message-ID: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710171703250.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>

On Tue, 17 Oct 2017, Don Hopkins wrote:

> McGill University EE UNIX lab systems administration, PDP-11 running 
> UNIX version 2*pi (>6, <7, irrational)

Sounds like the one I was maintaining at UNSW: Edition 6, with the bits of 
Edition 7 that would fit on an 11/40 and 11/60, plus local AUSAM stuff.

-- 
Dave Horsfall DTM (VK2KFU)  "Those who don't understand security will suffer."


From dot at dotat.at  Tue Oct 17 21:47:53 2017
From: dot at dotat.at (Tony Finch)
Date: Tue, 17 Oct 2017 12:47:53 +0100
Subject: [TUHS} Running V8 ...
In-Reply-To: <891F89F0-051A-453E-8BFC-9AC99A038C73@gmail.com>
References: <201710161158.v9GBweD4005539@coolidge.cs.Dartmouth.EDU>
 <891F89F0-051A-453E-8BFC-9AC99A038C73@gmail.com>
Message-ID: <alpine.DEB.2.11.1710171245170.22527@grey.csi.cam.ac.uk>

Don Hopkins <don at DonHopkins.com> wrote:
>
> I love the OpenFirmware “L1-A Forth” built into SparcStations. It has
> the “SEE” word, that decompiles FORTH words and disassembles FORTH
> primitives. You can start with “SEE SEE”, and then recursively climb
> down and see each of the words and primitives that defines it, or
> anything else!

Nice. OpenFirmware was also used in PowerMacs and in IBM POWER systems.
I thought it was a great shame that Intel didn't adopt OpenFirmware but
instead created EFI.

Tony.
-- 
f.anthony.n.finch  <dot at dotat.at>  http://dotat.at/  -  I xn--zr8h punycode
Lundy, Fastnet: Variable 3 or 4, becoming east or southeast 5 or 6. Moderate
or rough, occasionally slight. Occasional rain. Good, occasionally poor.

From jnc at mercury.lcs.mit.edu  Tue Oct 17 22:57:15 2017
From: jnc at mercury.lcs.mit.edu (Noel Chiappa)
Date: Tue, 17 Oct 2017 08:57:15 -0400 (EDT)
Subject: ARPANET Information Brochure (December 1985)
Message-ID: <20171017125715.5F50818C0C3@mercury.lcs.mit.edu>

    > From: Larry McVoy

    >>> I was told, by someone that I don't remember, that uwisc was the 11th
    >>> node on the net. ... If anyone can confirm or deny that I'd love to know.

    > I dunno.

I don't have any axe to grind here. I don't care if they were the first, or
the last. You asked "If anyone can confirm or deny that I'd love to know",
and all I'm trying to do is _accurately_ answer that.


    > That 1985 map has uwisc in there

I have a large collection of ARPANET maps here:

  http://www.chiappa.net/~jnc/tech/arpanet.html

and the first one on which UWisc shows up is the October, 1981 geographical
map - over ten years since the ARPANet went up (December, 1969 is the earliest
map I have there).

    > I do know that prior to the net there was uucp

Which "net" are we talking about here? ARPANET? CSNET? Internet? The UUCP network
long post-dated the ARPANET - I think it was started in the late 70's, no?

The earliest Internet map I have is from 1982, here:

  https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/60/Internet_map_in_February_82.png

and again UWisc is not on it. (Yes, I know it's on Wikipedia, but I'm the one
who uploaded it, so I can verify it.)


CSNET I don't know much about, that may have been what the comment referred
to.

Wikipedia (for what little we can trust it) says "By 1981, three sites were
connected: University of Delaware, Princeton University, and Purdue
University"; since Lawrence Landweber at UWis was the main driver of CSNET, I
doubt it would have been far behind.

      Noel


From jnc at mercury.lcs.mit.edu  Tue Oct 17 23:01:49 2017
From: jnc at mercury.lcs.mit.edu (Noel Chiappa)
Date: Tue, 17 Oct 2017 09:01:49 -0400 (EDT)
Subject: ARPANET Information Brochure (December 1985)
Message-ID: <20171017130149.CF0E718C0C6@mercury.lcs.mit.edu>

    > From: Grant Taylor

    > Does anyone know of a good place to discuss networking history, routing,
    > email, dns, etc.  I'd like to avoid getting too far off topic for TUHS.

You could try the "Internet History mailing list":

  http://www.postel.org/internet-history/

which covers all of networking, including pre-Internet stuff.

      Noel


From dot at dotat.at  Tue Oct 17 23:51:38 2017
From: dot at dotat.at (Tony Finch)
Date: Tue, 17 Oct 2017 14:51:38 +0100
Subject: [TUHS] basic tools / Universal Unix
In-Reply-To: <CAEoi9W67FAnonXt0-nBPiC_H3c6c5qsUOSvp6rbmzq4E0vcTkQ@mail.gmail.com>
References: <CAC20D2NNsM6jGGD_7=yXq=oUVrvD741Rt=B-Q4-F-xR5Nb-Fkw@mail.gmail.com>
 <CAEoi9W67FAnonXt0-nBPiC_H3c6c5qsUOSvp6rbmzq4E0vcTkQ@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <alpine.DEB.2.11.1710171448410.22527@grey.csi.cam.ac.uk>

Dan Cross <crossd at gmail.com> wrote:

> This is an aside, but I must admit -- with a sense of mild shame --
> that the '-v' option to cat is one that I use with some regularity.

4.4BSD has the vis(1) and unvis(1) utilities which are more principled
implementations of this feature (with corresponding section 3 functions).
It's slightly annoying being on Linux without vis and having to resort to
`cat -v` like some kind of savage.

Tony.
-- 
f.anthony.n.finch  <dot at dotat.at>  http://dotat.at/  -  I xn--zr8h punycode
Malin, Hebrides: North or northwest, veering southeast, 5 to 7, occasionally
gale 8 at first in Hebrides. Moderate or rough, occasionally very rough at
first. Rain or showers. Moderate or good.


From lm at mcvoy.com  Wed Oct 18 00:30:57 2017
From: lm at mcvoy.com (Larry McVoy)
Date: Tue, 17 Oct 2017 07:30:57 -0700
Subject: [TUHS} Running V8 ...
In-Reply-To: <alpine.DEB.2.11.1710171245170.22527@grey.csi.cam.ac.uk>
References: <201710161158.v9GBweD4005539@coolidge.cs.Dartmouth.EDU>
 <891F89F0-051A-453E-8BFC-9AC99A038C73@gmail.com>
 <alpine.DEB.2.11.1710171245170.22527@grey.csi.cam.ac.uk>
Message-ID: <20171017143057.GX29793@mcvoy.com>

On Tue, Oct 17, 2017 at 12:47:53PM +0100, Tony Finch wrote:
> Don Hopkins <don at DonHopkins.com> wrote:
> >
> > I love the OpenFirmware ???L1-A Forth??? built into SparcStations. It has
> > the ???SEE??? word, that decompiles FORTH words and disassembles FORTH
> > primitives. You can start with ???SEE SEE???, and then recursively climb
> > down and see each of the words and primitives that defines it, or
> > anything else!
> 
> Nice. OpenFirmware was also used in PowerMacs and in IBM POWER systems.
> I thought it was a great shame that Intel didn't adopt OpenFirmware but
> instead created EFI.

You and me both.  I always thought forth was a little weird, not bad
weird, just weird.  But I had worked on a forth system before, done
some programming in it, so I could deal.

But when I met EFI I yearned for the good old forth boot proms :(

My guess is that Mitch wanted too much money for Intel to go for it,
Intel is super super cheap.


From lm at mcvoy.com  Wed Oct 18 00:32:48 2017
From: lm at mcvoy.com (Larry McVoy)
Date: Tue, 17 Oct 2017 07:32:48 -0700
Subject: ARPANET Information Brochure (December 1985)
In-Reply-To: <20171017125715.5F50818C0C3@mercury.lcs.mit.edu>
References: <20171017125715.5F50818C0C3@mercury.lcs.mit.edu>
Message-ID: <20171017143248.GY29793@mcvoy.com>

On Tue, Oct 17, 2017 at 08:57:15AM -0400, Noel Chiappa wrote:
>     > From: Larry McVoy
> 
>     >>> I was told, by someone that I don't remember, that uwisc was the 11th
>     >>> node on the net. ... If anyone can confirm or deny that I'd love to know.
> 
>     > I dunno.
> 
> I don't have any axe to grind here. I don't care if they were the first, or
> the last. You asked "If anyone can confirm or deny that I'd love to know",
> and all I'm trying to do is _accurately_ answer that.
> 
> 
>     > That 1985 map has uwisc in there
> 
> I have a large collection of ARPANET maps here:
> 
>   http://www.chiappa.net/~jnc/tech/arpanet.html
> 
> and the first one on which UWisc shows up is the October, 1981 geographical
> map - over ten years since the ARPANet went up (December, 1969 is the earliest
> map I have there).
> 
> Which "net" are we talking about here? ARPANET? CSNET? Internet? The UUCP network
> long post-dated the ARPANET - I think it was started in the late 70's, no?
> 
> The earliest Internet map I have is from 1982, here:
> 
>   https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/60/Internet_map_in_February_82.png
> 
> and again UWisc is not on it. (Yes, I know it's on Wikipedia, but I'm the one
> who uploaded it, so I can verify it.)
> 
> 
> CSNET I don't know much about, that may have been what the comment referred
> to.
> 
> Wikipedia (for what little we can trust it) says "By 1981, three sites were
> connected: University of Delaware, Princeton University, and Purdue
> University"; since Lawrence Landweber at UWis was the main driver of CSNET, I
> doubt it would have been far behind.

Yeah, I bet it was Larry Landweber who told me, so maybe it was CSNET.  I
sent him mail, we'll see if he replies.

--lm


From don at DonHopkins.com  Wed Oct 18 00:50:47 2017
From: don at DonHopkins.com (Don Hopkins)
Date: Tue, 17 Oct 2017 16:50:47 +0200
Subject: [TUHS} Running V8 ...
In-Reply-To: <alpine.DEB.2.11.1710171245170.22527@grey.csi.cam.ac.uk>
References: <201710161158.v9GBweD4005539@coolidge.cs.Dartmouth.EDU>
 <891F89F0-051A-453E-8BFC-9AC99A038C73@gmail.com>
 <alpine.DEB.2.11.1710171245170.22527@grey.csi.cam.ac.uk>
Message-ID: <D31E7F61-97FF-4AF8-AB7F-E3E5C2A622F6@gmail.com>

The OLPC XO-1 also used OpenFirmware! 

Mitch Bradley ported and extended Forthmacs to support secure auto-boot, power management, and used it for debugging the OLPC’s unique hardware and operating system. 

http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Open_Firmware <http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Open_Firmware>

>Open Firmware is the hardware-independent firmware (computer software which loads the operating system) that the XO runs.

>It was developed by Mitch Bradley at Sun Microsystems, and used in post-NuBus PowerPC-based Apple Macintosh computers (though it has been dropped with Apple's transition to Intel processors), Sun Microsystems SPARC based workstations and servers, IBM POWER systems, and PegasosPPC systems, among others. On those computers, Open Firmware fulfills the same tasks as BIOS does on PC computers.

>For example Fedora and Debian use the YaBoot BootLoader for Open Firmware.

>The Open Firmware user interface includes a FORTH-based shell interface. FORTH is a powerful high level language that is remarkably compact. A complete Forth development environment including compiler, decompiler, assembler, disassembler, source level debugger, and assembly language debugger is present in the XO boot ROM (SPI FLASH). With the Open Firmware Forth system, you can directly access all of the hardware devices on the XO, use built-in functions like selftest diagnostics and games, and even write complete applications, without needing any external tools. The bulk of Open Firmware is written in Forth, so the source level debugger can be used to debug Open Firmware itself.

http://wiki.laptop.org/go/OFW_FAQ <http://wiki.laptop.org/go/OFW_FAQ>

OpenFirmware also has its own song to the tune of the Jetson’s theme, and Mitch’s rendition is much more mellifluous than RMS singing his Free Software song:

https://web.archive.org/web/20060213143046/http://bananajr6000.apple.com/1275/misc/ofwsong.au <https://web.archive.org/web/20060213143046/http://bananajr6000.apple.com/1275/misc/ofwsong.au>  

I used the 68K and SPARC versions of Mitch’s “Forthmacs” system under SunOS. 

It had a re-targetable meta-compiler, portably supported targets targets with 16 bits, 32 bits, different byte orders, could dynamically link and call C libraries, also ran in stand-alone mode, could be burnt into ROM and run in framebuffer memory, and and which he later developed into OpenFirmware). 

I worked with Mitch as a summer intern at Sun in ’87, integrating his other pure C “CForth" system into a circuit editor called “CADrioid”. At the University of Maryland, I used Forthmacs to develop a dynamic memory allocator (which I would run diagnostics on in mmap'ed framebuffer memory as a screen saver), a FORTH extensible X10 window manager with pie menus called “piewm” (kind of like NeWS for X10 with FORTH instead of PostScript), a hypermedia brower for NeWS called “HyperTIES”, and a cellular automata machine simulator compatible with Toffoli and Margolus’s CAM6 hardware and Forth rule definitions published in their book (which I’ve since rewritten in JavaScript).

Forthmacs:
http://donhopkins.com/home/archive/forth/forthmacs-doc/ <http://donhopkins.com/home/archive/forth/forthmacs-doc/>
http://www.donhopkins.com/home/code/allocate.f.txt <http://www.donhopkins.com/home/code/allocate.f.txt>
http://www.art.net/~hopkins/Don/lang/forth.html <http://www.art.net/~hopkins/Don/lang/forth.html>

piewm:
http://www.donhopkins.com/home/code/Xlib.forth.txt <http://www.donhopkins.com/home/code/Xlib.forth.txt>
http://www.donhopkins.com/home/code/fuwm-main.forth.txt <http://www.donhopkins.com/home/code/fuwm-main.forth.txt>
http://www.donhopkins.com/home/code/hacks.forth.txt <http://www.donhopkins.com/home/code/hacks.forth.txt>

HyperTIES:
http://www.donhopkins.com/home/ties/fmt.f <http://www.donhopkins.com/home/ties/fmt.f>

CAM6:
http://www.donhopkins.com/home/code/cam.f.txt <http://www.donhopkins.com/home/code/cam.f.txt>
http://www.donhopkins.com/home/code/compile.f.txt <http://www.donhopkins.com/home/code/compile.f.txt>
http://www.donhopkins.com/home/code/rules.f.txt <http://www.donhopkins.com/home/code/rules.f.txt>
https://github.com/SimHacker/CAM6/blob/master/javascript/CAM6.js#L41 <https://github.com/SimHacker/CAM6/blob/master/javascript/CAM6.js#L41>

Here’s an old post extolling the virtues of CForth and Forthmacs, that I posted in response to a question on comp.lang.forth back in ’89.

-Don

https://groups.google.com/forum/#!msg/comp.lang.forth/cAFn_jDDu50/t8wEQeCe4pYJ <https://groups.google.com/forum/#!msg/comp.lang.forth/cAFn_jDDu50/t8wEQeCe4pYJ>

From: don at brillig.umd.edu (Don Hopkins)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.forth
Subject: Re: Forth for VAX, Sun
Summary: Bradley Forthware: 4444 is the number of the best!
Keywords: sun, unix, cforth
Date: 10 May 89 11:06:40 GMT
Organization: U of Maryland, Dept. of Computer Science, Human Computer Interaction Lab

In article <24... at agate.BERKELEY.EDU> w... at garnet.berkeley.edu (William Baxter) writes:

>To my inquiry about Forth systems for the VAX and Sun, I received two
>responses, both mentioning the same programs.  
>
>C Forth 83: 
>
>Runs on both VAX (VMS or Unix) and Sun, and in fact on just about every
>computer with a half decent C compiler.  The price is $50, which gets
>you C kernel source, Forth utilities source, on-line documentation, and
>a printed glossary.  It's a Forth-83 dialect with 32-bit stacks, real
>files, and several utilities.

I used a version of CForth when I was working for Mitch, summer before
last at Sun. It's a very nice Forth system, and quite portable. You
can define your own Forth primatives in C, by adding them to this big
switch statement! We linked CForth together with a schematics CAD
system (CADroid), so you could call the CADroid commands from Forth,
and then we wrote a user-friendly extension language in Forth. It
accepted postfix commands, and prompted for arguments in English. You
could interactivly define macros for laying out circuit bodies and
wiring them up, by typing commands, pointing with the mouse, selecting
from menus, pressing function keys, putting in your own prompts for
arguments, bindings macros to keys, etc. It also supported interactive
loops and conditionals. Mitch came up with a really neat unified
syntax for them:

condition? [ <stuff to do if true> ]

condition? [ <stuff to do if true> ][ <stuff to do if false> ]

count [ <stuff to do in a loop> ]

count [ <stuff to do in a loop> ][ <stuff to do if count is 0> ]

The last one (the loop-with-an-else-clause) was particularly useful
because it could be used instead of the otherwise common construct:
        
count 0= [ 
  <stuff to do if count is 0> 
][ 
  count [ <stuff to do in a loop if count isn't 0> ] 
]

The way these constructs worked interactivly (and during macro
definition) was that you started a loop by typing a count and a [, and
it would execute commands as you typed them in, the first time through
the loop, and once you typed the matching ] (they nested!), it would
re-execute the now-compiled loop count-1 more times, real fast.  The
conditional form had just the same behavior: It would either execute
what you typed as you typed it, or ignore your commands, according to
the condition (|-1| or 0).

So when we carefully consider all of these facts, we are forced
to ask ourselves the following question:  What was today's topic
again? Wait, I remember:  Bradley Forthware.

>
>Sun Forth:
>
>Runs on any Sun 2, Sun 3, or Sun 4, and also on most non-Sun 680x0 Unix
>machines.  The price is $200, which gets you the binary, source code,
>metacompiler, 200+ page printed manual, and a ton of utilities (for
>instance, it can load C object files into the Forth dictionary and
>execute the C subroutines as Forth words.  It also has a disassembler
>and both high level and assembly language debugging tools.)
>
>

Sun Forth is an excellent, rich, fast, fantastic Forth system! I've
used it for all kinds of things, on the Sun-2, the Sun-3 (68K), and
the Sun-4 (SPARC). It also runs on the Atari ST, and the Mac, I think.
(I haven't used those versions) On the Sun-2, I had a good time using
Sun Forth to figure out how to frob the CG1 color graphics card, by
printing out the cg1reg.h file, mmap'ing in the device registers, and
frobbing around with them. (I finally discovered that you could only
write to the color table during vertical retrace, when I got mad and
frustrated that my unsucessful attempts at loading the color table
were taunting me by kinda sorta working occasionaly, and I decided to
punish it by running it in an infinite loop. My color table slowly
faded into view!)

It's got a kick-ass decompiler, that pretty prints forth code and
disassembles primatives! Who needs manuals or source code? (But you
get them anyway! ;-) There are a lot of other nice features, like an
emacs-like command line editor, with history, and command completion
over your Forth vocabularies. It's very well interfaced with Unix. It
also runs stand-alone without Unix. Mitch uses it in the hardware lab
at Sun to debug decadent wayward hardware, by dropping in a Forth ROM,
talking to it through a serial port, and running it in the framebuffer
memory! [It looks real neat munching away on the screen, and it can
work even when the main memory is fried!] The list of features goes on
and on...

The ability to dynamicly load in C object files makes Sun Forth useful
for a whole lot of things you'd normally never think of (or at least
admit to thinking of) using Forth for! On the Sun-3, I linked in a
version of the X10 "uwm" window manager I had modified to do pie
menus. I could call all the window manager functions from Forth,
passing them arguments on the stack, and I could bind mouse actions
and menu selections to Forth functions. I moved the main control loop
that dispatched events into Forth, so I had a crack at the events
before passing them on to uwm. Forth could could respond to window
system events, track the mouse, pop up menus, change the cursor, move
windows around, etc... It had complete access to all the window
manager function and data structures. One thing I used this system for
was to implement an experiment that Jack Callahan designed, comparing
pie menus with linear menus. (A paper describing the experiment is in
the CHI'88 conference proceedings.) The Forthified window manager
administered the experiment by randomizing the order in which the
menus were presented, prompting the test subject to select a certain
item from each menu, and recording the menu selections made and the
time each took, etc...  The Forth system was very useful for
prototyping different mouse tracking techniques for pie menus -- it
would have been very painful to have to go through the old
edit-compile-link cycle every time I wanted to tweak something! NeWS
is an example of how useful it is to have a window manager with an
interactive extension language! (But I didn't have NeWS yet.) X window
managers are big messy programs (even in the X10 days!), but I was
able to plug X10 uwm right into Sun Forth, and start hacking away --
instant extension language! (Though uwm wasn't exactly /designed/ for
that kind of abuse!)

I've also used Sun Forth for other projects, like prototyping a
hypertext markup language interpreter (NeWS HyperTIES), and as a
Cellular Automata Machine rule compiler. I cloned Tom Tofoli's CAM
rule language in Sun Forth, and wrote a tool for computing and
displaying them in NeWS. Not anything like as fast as the real CAM
hardware [256x256 cells @ 60 frames/sec], but if you feed it the right
rules and initial conditions, and wait a while, it will make lots of
pretty patterns that take up lots of disk space.

>Both are available from:
>
>Mitch Bradley
>Bradley Forthware
>P.O. Box 4444
>Mountain View, CA 94040
>

Mitch swears the PO box number was totally coincidental!

>----
>Disclaimer:  Endorsement?  I haven't even used them.
>
>William Baxter
>
>ARPA: web@{garnet,brahms,math}.Berkeley.EDU   
>UUCP: {sun,dual,decwrl,decvax,hplabs,...}!ucbvax!garnet!web

Disclamer: Of course I'm quite biased, since I worked with Mitch for a
summer, and I just love his Forth system. But so does Mitch, or it
wouldn't have so many great features!

        -Don



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From ron at ronnatalie.com  Wed Oct 18 04:23:49 2017
From: ron at ronnatalie.com (Ron Natalie)
Date: Tue, 17 Oct 2017 14:23:49 -0400
Subject: UNIX version 2*pi
In-Reply-To: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710171703250.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>
References: <201710161158.v9GBweD4005539@coolidge.cs.Dartmouth.EDU>
 <CAC20D2PBkRgoyrmQ+wDpqfZ7kXCUqNWdJgm08EO2djmwFp4Fng@mail.gmail.com>
 <201710161639.v9GGdtTg014500@darkstar.fourwinds.com>
 <20171016191640.mqqbf7cp6yfyb6se@matica.foolinux.mooo.com>
 <201710161928.v9GJSB8Y028111@darkstar.fourwinds.com>
 <20171017011554.76ffxpcotcxlxeeo@matica.foolinux.mooo.com>
 <81DB1DA1-D194-4A5B-9253-D8EE6E85CC26@gmail.com>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710171703250.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>
Message-ID: <07b401d34775$14e230b0$3ea69210$@ronnatalie.com>

One of my predecessors at JHU decided 6.06 was a nice symmetrical number and
stuck the version there through many kernel changes.   When he left, our
release numbers started forward again.

The BRL/JHU kernel was based on V6.    It had a kludge to allow more that
256 users but eventually, we widened the UID/GID to 16 bits each.   We then
added a the ability to mount either V6 or V7 file systems (we had a lot of
removable V6 FS media).

-----Original Message-----
From: TUHS [mailto:tuhs-bounces at minnie.tuhs.org] On Behalf Of Dave Horsfall
Sent: Tuesday, October 17, 2017 2:09 AM
To: The Eunuchs Hysterical Society
Subject: Re: UNIX version 2*pi

On Tue, 17 Oct 2017, Don Hopkins wrote:

> McGill University EE UNIX lab systems administration, PDP-11 running 
> UNIX version 2*pi (>6, <7, irrational)

Sounds like the one I was maintaining at UNSW: Edition 6, with the bits of
Edition 7 that would fit on an 11/40 and 11/60, plus local AUSAM stuff.

--
Dave Horsfall DTM (VK2KFU)  "Those who don't understand security will
suffer."



From ron at ronnatalie.com  Wed Oct 18 04:33:00 2017
From: ron at ronnatalie.com (Ron Natalie)
Date: Tue, 17 Oct 2017 14:33:00 -0400
Subject: ARPANET Information Brochure (December 1985)
In-Reply-To: <BEF011B5-4F7C-407D-99D4-C38998CC7385@gmail.com>
References: <20171016150950.frblrgi6crrco3vm@saucer.turnde.net>
 <C9C15B90-04C8-4CCE-92F1-CDCE7D2529DD@gmail.com>
 <BEF011B5-4F7C-407D-99D4-C38998CC7385@gmail.com>
Message-ID: <07c301d34776$5cbcb3a0$16361ae0$@ronnatalie.com>

I love the knobs and intercom panels on the front of the IMP.

 

I actually had my own IMP.   BRL bought four IMPs and four TACs  and set them up as our campus network early on.    I think we were the largest single purchaser of the ACC LH/DH-11 interfaces.

 

I had set up all the modems for the IMPs and as soon as the BBN guy would uncrate them and power them up I’d run around shoving the trunks and host connectors into them.    By the end of the day I wrote my contact at BBN telling him our network was all up and running.   I got a letter back explaining that it would not be possible for me to do that.     This led to my new motto that I kept for a long time:

 

I didn’t know it was impossible when I did it.

 

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From steffen at sdaoden.eu  Wed Oct 18 06:22:27 2017
From: steffen at sdaoden.eu (Steffen Nurpmeso)
Date: Tue, 17 Oct 2017 22:22:27 +0200
Subject: [TUHS] basic tools / Universal Unix
In-Reply-To: <alpine.DEB.2.11.1710171448410.22527@grey.csi.cam.ac.uk>
References: <CAC20D2NNsM6jGGD_7=yXq=oUVrvD741Rt=B-Q4-F-xR5Nb-Fkw@mail.gmail.com>
 <CAEoi9W67FAnonXt0-nBPiC_H3c6c5qsUOSvp6rbmzq4E0vcTkQ@mail.gmail.com>
 <alpine.DEB.2.11.1710171448410.22527@grey.csi.cam.ac.uk>
Message-ID: <20171017202227.GE_gC%steffen@sdaoden.eu>

Tony Finch <dot at dotat.at> wrote:
 |Dan Cross <crossd at gmail.com> wrote:
 |> This is an aside, but I must admit -- with a sense of mild shame --
 |> that the '-v' option to cat is one that I use with some regularity.
 |
 |4.4BSD has the vis(1) and unvis(1) utilities which are more principled
 |implementations of this feature (with corresponding section 3 functions).
 |It's slightly annoying being on Linux without vis and having to resort to
 |`cat -v` like some kind of savage.

Stop!  The inner circle of Unix/POSIX standard developers have
(again) shown great wisdom and have put it down black on white:

  Historical versions of the cat utility include the *e, *t, and
  *v, options which permit the ends of lines, <tab> characters,
  and invisible characters, respectively, to be rendered visible
  in the output. The standard developers omitted these options
  because they provide too fine a degree of control over what is
  made visible, and similar output can be obtained using a command
  such as:

      sed *n l pathname

  The latter also has the advantage that its output is
  unambiguous, whereas the output of historical cat *etv is not.

But mind you, in preparation of this email i found a bug in
Busybox sed(1) which simply echoes nothing for the above.

--steffen
|
|Der Kragenbaer,                The moon bear,
|der holt sich munter           he cheerfully and one by one
|einen nach dem anderen runter  wa.ks himself off
|(By Robert Gernhardt)

From dave at horsfall.org  Wed Oct 18 12:46:07 2017
From: dave at horsfall.org (Dave Horsfall)
Date: Wed, 18 Oct 2017 13:46:07 +1100 (EST)
Subject: UNIX version 2*pi
In-Reply-To: <07b401d34775$14e230b0$3ea69210$@ronnatalie.com>
References: <201710161158.v9GBweD4005539@coolidge.cs.Dartmouth.EDU>
 <CAC20D2PBkRgoyrmQ+wDpqfZ7kXCUqNWdJgm08EO2djmwFp4Fng@mail.gmail.com>
 <201710161639.v9GGdtTg014500@darkstar.fourwinds.com>
 <20171016191640.mqqbf7cp6yfyb6se@matica.foolinux.mooo.com>
 <201710161928.v9GJSB8Y028111@darkstar.fourwinds.com>
 <20171017011554.76ffxpcotcxlxeeo@matica.foolinux.mooo.com>
 <81DB1DA1-D194-4A5B-9253-D8EE6E85CC26@gmail.com>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710171703250.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <07b401d34775$14e230b0$3ea69210$@ronnatalie.com>
Message-ID: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710181344050.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>

On Tue, 17 Oct 2017, Ron Natalie wrote:

> The BRL/JHU kernel was based on V6.    It had a kludge to allow more that
> 256 users but eventually, we widened the UID/GID to 16 bits each.   We then
> added a the ability to mount either V6 or V7 file systems (we had a lot of
> removable V6 FS media).

We dropped the GID (nobody used them) and glued it onto the UID, thus 
making it 16-bit.

-- 
Dave Horsfall DTM (VK2KFU)  "Those who don't understand security will suffer."


From ron at ronnatalie.com  Wed Oct 18 20:15:42 2017
From: ron at ronnatalie.com (Ron Natalie)
Date: Wed, 18 Oct 2017 06:15:42 -0400
Subject: UNIX version 2*pi
In-Reply-To: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710181344050.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>
References: <201710161158.v9GBweD4005539@coolidge.cs.Dartmouth.EDU>
 <CAC20D2PBkRgoyrmQ+wDpqfZ7kXCUqNWdJgm08EO2djmwFp4Fng@mail.gmail.com>
 <201710161639.v9GGdtTg014500@darkstar.fourwinds.com>
 <20171016191640.mqqbf7cp6yfyb6se@matica.foolinux.mooo.com>
 <201710161928.v9GJSB8Y028111@darkstar.fourwinds.com>
 <20171017011554.76ffxpcotcxlxeeo@matica.foolinux.mooo.com>
 <81DB1DA1-D194-4A5B-9253-D8EE6E85CC26@gmail.com>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710171703250.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <07b401d34775$14e230b0$3ea69210$@ronnatalie.com>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710181344050.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>
Message-ID: <085101d347fa$0eae81f0$2c0b85d0$@ronnatalie.com>

JHU ownership was a bit more of a kludge.    If your GID was less than 200,
then everything worked the normal UNIX way.
If your GID was greater than 200, then it was also taken to be part of the
UID.   The student accounts would have a GID based on the class that they
were in.

Of course, newgrp, setuid, setgid (and their related bits) had to be changed
to avoid secuirty fun and games.    I spent a lot of time trying to break
that when I was just a student.
When I became one of the system programmers, I spent a lot of time trying to
fix those holes.

-----Original Message-----


We dropped the GID (nobody used them) and glued it onto the UID, thus making
it 16-bit.

--
Dave Horsfall DTM (VK2KFU)  "Those who don't understand security will
suffer."



From doug at cs.dartmouth.edu  Thu Oct 19 09:03:05 2017
From: doug at cs.dartmouth.edu (Doug McIlroy)
Date: Wed, 18 Oct 2017 19:03:05 -0400
Subject: [TUHS] basic tools / Universal Unix
Message-ID: <201710182303.v9IN35Bv030527@coolidge.cs.Dartmouth.EDU>

>       sed *n l pathname
>
>   The latter also has the advantage that its output is

>   unambiguous, whereas the output of historical cat *etv is not.
>
> But mind you, in preparation of this email i found a bug in
> Busybox sed(1) which simply echoes nothing for the above.

I assume that * is a typo for - . If so, sed did just what
-n tells it to--no printing except as called for by p or P.

And speaking of sed anticipating other tools, the inclusion
of "head" in v7 as a complement to "tail" was a close call
because head is subsumed by sed q.

Doug


From random832 at fastmail.com  Thu Oct 19 13:53:53 2017
From: random832 at fastmail.com (Random832)
Date: Wed, 18 Oct 2017 23:53:53 -0400
Subject: [TUHS] basic tools / Universal Unix
In-Reply-To: <201710182303.v9IN35Bv030527@coolidge.cs.Dartmouth.EDU>
References: <201710182303.v9IN35Bv030527@coolidge.cs.Dartmouth.EDU>
Message-ID: <1508385233.3734780.1143734600.41F5D5EE@webmail.messagingengine.com>

On Wed, Oct 18, 2017, at 19:03, Doug McIlroy wrote:
> > But mind you, in preparation of this email i found a bug in
> > Busybox sed(1) which simply echoes nothing for the above.
> 
> I assume that * is a typo for - . If so, sed did just what
> -n tells it to--no printing except as called for by p or P.

Or, you know, l (the letter ell). Which busybox sed appears to not
support at all, rather than somehow misapplying -n to it.


From steffen at sdaoden.eu  Fri Oct 20 00:32:06 2017
From: steffen at sdaoden.eu (Steffen Nurpmeso)
Date: Thu, 19 Oct 2017 16:32:06 +0200
Subject: [TUHS] basic tools / Universal Unix
In-Reply-To: <201710182303.v9IN35Bv030527@coolidge.cs.Dartmouth.EDU>
References: <201710182303.v9IN35Bv030527@coolidge.cs.Dartmouth.EDU>
Message-ID: <20171019143206.PuxV4%steffen@sdaoden.eu>

Doug McIlroy <doug at cs.dartmouth.edu> wrote:
 |>       sed *n l pathname
 |>
 |>   The latter also has the advantage that its output is
 |
 |>   unambiguous, whereas the output of historical cat *etv is not.
 |>
 |> But mind you, in preparation of this email i found a bug in
 |> Busybox sed(1) which simply echoes nothing for the above.
 |
 |I assume that * is a typo for - . If so, sed did just what
 |-n tells it to--no printing except as called for by p or P.

It seems to be a problem of (the PDF to text conversion and) the
musl C library environment used on this box:

  ?0[steffen at essex tmp]$ echo *e | s-hex
  00000000  e2 88 92 65 0a                                    |...e.|
  00000005
  ?0[steffen at essex tmp]$ echo *e | iconv -f utf8 -t ascii
  *e
  ?0[steffen at essex tmp]$ command -v iconv
  /usr/bin/iconv
  ?0[steffen at essex tmp]$ apk info --who-owns /usr/bin/iconv
  /usr/bin/iconv is owned by musl-utils-1.1.16-r22

And of course because of mailx's "set reply-in-same-charset"
ending up using US-ASCII.

 |And speaking of sed anticipating other tools, the inclusion
 |of "head" in v7 as a complement to "tail" was a close call
 |because head is subsumed by sed q.

The difference being that these can be implemented as shell script
wrappers around (modern) sed easily, whereas the -vet thing would
require painful awk scripting, by reading bytewise and string
comparing each of those bytes against a sprintf("%c",0.255) and
a tree of if conditions, without having tried it.
And then head and tail are self-describing, whereas -vet as
a modifier for file content c(onc)atenation i never had problems
with, but looking for that feature in a stream editor is more
obvious for the unaware.

 |Doug

Ju-hu!

--steffen
|
|Der Kragenbaer,                The moon bear,
|der holt sich munter           he cheerfully and one by one
|einen nach dem anderen runter  wa.ks himself off
|(By Robert Gernhardt)

From steffen at sdaoden.eu  Fri Oct 20 00:33:09 2017
From: steffen at sdaoden.eu (Steffen Nurpmeso)
Date: Thu, 19 Oct 2017 16:33:09 +0200
Subject: [TUHS] basic tools / Universal Unix
In-Reply-To: <1508385233.3734780.1143734600.41F5D5EE@webmail.messagingengine.com>
References: <201710182303.v9IN35Bv030527@coolidge.cs.Dartmouth.EDU>
 <1508385233.3734780.1143734600.41F5D5EE@webmail.messagingengine.com>
Message-ID: <20171019143309.SCysT%steffen@sdaoden.eu>

Random832 <random832 at fastmail.com> wrote:
 |On Wed, Oct 18, 2017, at 19:03, Doug McIlroy wrote:
 |>> But mind you, in preparation of this email i found a bug in
 |>> Busybox sed(1) which simply echoes nothing for the above.
 |> 
 |> I assume that * is a typo for - . If so, sed did just what
 |> -n tells it to--no printing except as called for by p or P.
 |
 |Or, you know, l (the letter ell). Which busybox sed appears to not
 |support at all, rather than somehow misapplying -n to it.

The letter l, yes.  But it does not fail either, so it knows about
it, talking version 1.27.something here.

--steffen
|
|Der Kragenbaer,                The moon bear,
|der holt sich munter           he cheerfully and one by one
|einen nach dem anderen runter  wa.ks himself off
|(By Robert Gernhardt)


From random832 at fastmail.com  Fri Oct 20 00:41:45 2017
From: random832 at fastmail.com (Random832)
Date: Thu, 19 Oct 2017 10:41:45 -0400
Subject: [TUHS] basic tools / Universal Unix
In-Reply-To: <20171019143309.SCysT%steffen@sdaoden.eu>
References: <201710182303.v9IN35Bv030527@coolidge.cs.Dartmouth.EDU>
 <1508385233.3734780.1143734600.41F5D5EE@webmail.messagingengine.com>
 <20171019143309.SCysT%steffen@sdaoden.eu>
Message-ID: <1508424105.2409028.1144261928.5FC3332C@webmail.messagingengine.com>

On Thu, Oct 19, 2017, at 10:33, Steffen Nurpmeso wrote:
> Random832 <random832 at fastmail.com> wrote:
>  |On Wed, Oct 18, 2017, at 19:03, Doug McIlroy wrote:
>  |>> But mind you, in preparation of this email i found a bug in
>  |>> Busybox sed(1) which simply echoes nothing for the above.
>  |> 
>  |> I assume that * is a typo for - . If so, sed did just what
>  |> -n tells it to--no printing except as called for by p or P.
>  |
>  |Or, you know, l (the letter ell). Which busybox sed appears to not
>  |support at all, rather than somehow misapplying -n to it.
> 
> The letter l, yes.  But it does not fail either, so it knows about
> it, talking version 1.27.something here.

If you look at the source, it is in the list that is checked for
printing (or not) the 'unsupported command' error message, but there is
no actual code to handle it (and when called *without* -n, it just falls
through and prints once, just like if you'd had no command at all)

https://git.busybox.net/busybox/plain/editors/sed.c?h=1_3_stable

I think that makes this a legitimate bug in busybox, rather than simply
an artifact of being a minimal tool that doesn't aim for posix (or
historical unix) conformance.


From ron at ronnatalie.com  Fri Oct 20 00:52:29 2017
From: ron at ronnatalie.com (Ron Natalie)
Date: Thu, 19 Oct 2017 10:52:29 -0400
Subject: /bin/true (was [TUHS] basic tools / Universal Unix)
Message-ID: <009a01d348e9$e3dce200$ab96a600$@ronnatalie.com>

My favorite reduction to absurdity was /bin/true.   Someone decided we
needed shell commands for true and false.   Easy enough to add a script that
said "exit 0" or exit 1" as its only line.
Then someone realized that the "exit 0" in /bin true was superfluous, the
default return was 0.  /bin/true turned into an empty, yet executable, file.

Then the lawyers got involved.    We got a version of a packaged UNIX (I
think it was Interactive Systems).    Every shell script got twelve lines of
copyright/license boilerplate.     Including /bin true.
The file had nothing but useless comment in it.



From pete at nomadlogic.org  Fri Oct 20 01:01:46 2017
From: pete at nomadlogic.org (Pete Wright)
Date: Thu, 19 Oct 2017 08:01:46 -0700
Subject: /bin/true (was [TUHS] basic tools / Universal Unix)
In-Reply-To: <009a01d348e9$e3dce200$ab96a600$@ronnatalie.com>
References: <009a01d348e9$e3dce200$ab96a600$@ronnatalie.com>
Message-ID: <16f4f265-a470-5b4c-3cf0-75890e0c8572@nomadlogic.org>



On 10/19/2017 07:52, Ron Natalie wrote:
> My favorite reduction to absurdity was /bin/true.   Someone decided we
> needed shell commands for true and false.   Easy enough to add a script that
> said "exit 0" or exit 1" as its only line.
> Then someone realized that the "exit 0" in /bin true was superfluous, the
> default return was 0.  /bin/true turned into an empty, yet executable, file.
>
> Then the lawyers got involved.    We got a version of a packaged UNIX (I
> think it was Interactive Systems).    Every shell script got twelve lines of
> copyright/license boilerplate.     Including /bin true.
> The file had nothing but useless comment in it.

heh yea it certainly seems pretty funny, but i will say it did present a 
neat opportunity for the NYC BSD user-group back in 2015:
http://www.nycbug.org/index.cgi?action=view&id=10635

it was pretty funny to see how many different implementations one could 
dream up for such a simple program, and it seemed to speak to how each 
project approaches complexity.

-pete

-- 
Pete Wright
pete at nomadlogic.org
@nomadlogicLA



From chet.ramey at case.edu  Fri Oct 20 01:17:22 2017
From: chet.ramey at case.edu (Chet Ramey)
Date: Thu, 19 Oct 2017 11:17:22 -0400
Subject: /bin/true (was [TUHS] basic tools / Universal Unix)
In-Reply-To: <16f4f265-a470-5b4c-3cf0-75890e0c8572@nomadlogic.org>
References: <009a01d348e9$e3dce200$ab96a600$@ronnatalie.com>
 <16f4f265-a470-5b4c-3cf0-75890e0c8572@nomadlogic.org>
Message-ID: <26aaf055-6a02-141d-508b-97fe6abf268f@case.edu>

On 10/19/17 11:01 AM, Pete Wright wrote:

> heh yea it certainly seems pretty funny, but i will say it did present a
> neat opportunity for the NYC BSD user-group back in 2015:
> http://www.nycbug.org/index.cgi?action=view&id=10635
> 
> it was pretty funny to see how many different implementations one could
> dream up for such a simple program, and it seemed to speak to how each
> project approaches complexity.

It's a nitpick, but I notice they didn't use the actual bash code that
implements this, but rather an example template for a loadable shell
builtin.

-- 
``The lyf so short, the craft so long to lerne.'' - Chaucer
		 ``Ars longa, vita brevis'' - Hippocrates
Chet Ramey, UTech, CWRU    chet at case.edu    http://cnswww.cns.cwru.edu/~chet/


From steffen at sdaoden.eu  Fri Oct 20 07:03:40 2017
From: steffen at sdaoden.eu (Steffen Nurpmeso)
Date: Thu, 19 Oct 2017 23:03:40 +0200
Subject: [TUHS] basic tools / Universal Unix
In-Reply-To: <1508424105.2409028.1144261928.5FC3332C@webmail.messagingengine.com>
References: <201710182303.v9IN35Bv030527@coolidge.cs.Dartmouth.EDU>
 <1508385233.3734780.1143734600.41F5D5EE@webmail.messagingengine.com>
 <20171019143309.SCysT%steffen@sdaoden.eu>
 <1508424105.2409028.1144261928.5FC3332C@webmail.messagingengine.com>
Message-ID: <20171019210340.NLwmH%steffen@sdaoden.eu>

Good evening everybody.

Random832 <random832 at fastmail.com> wrote:
 |On Thu, Oct 19, 2017, at 10:33, Steffen Nurpmeso wrote:
 |> Random832 <random832 at fastmail.com> wrote:
 |>|On Wed, Oct 18, 2017, at 19:03, Doug McIlroy wrote:
 |>|>> But mind you, in preparation of this email i found a bug in
 |>|>> Busybox sed(1) which simply echoes nothing for the above.
 |>|> 
 |>|> I assume that * is a typo for - . If so, sed did just what
 |>|> -n tells it to--no printing except as called for by p or P.
 |>|
 |>|Or, you know, l (the letter ell). Which busybox sed appears to not
 |>|support at all, rather than somehow misapplying -n to it.
 |> 
 |> The letter l, yes.  But it does not fail either, so it knows about
 |> it, talking version 1.27.something here.
 |
 |If you look at the source, it is in the list that is checked for
 |printing (or not) the 'unsupported command' error message, but there is
 |no actual code to handle it (and when called *without* -n, it just falls
 |through and prints once, just like if you'd had no command at all)
 |
 |https://git.busybox.net/busybox/plain/editors/sed.c?h=1_3_stable

That is true.

 |I think that makes this a legitimate bug in busybox, rather than simply
 |an artifact of being a minimal tool that doesn't aim for posix (or
 |historical unix) conformance.

Yes, it should error out or implement the stuff i think.  The way
it is is not handable.
The comments in coreutils/cat.c are postable in this thread too:

/* Rob had "cat -v" implemented as a separate applet, catv.
[That is Rob AT Landley DOT NET]
 * See "cat -v considered harmful" at
 * http://cm.bell-labs.com/cm/cs/doc/84/kp.ps.gz
[This server has been killed]
 * From USENIX Summer Conference Proceedings, 1983
 * """
 * The talk reviews reasons for UNIX's popularity and shows, using UCB cat
 * as a primary example, how UNIX has grown fat. cat isn't for printing
 * files with line numbers, it isn't for compressing multiple blank lines,
 * it's not for looking at non-printing ASCII characters, it's for
 * concatenating files.
 * We are reminded that ls isn't the place for code to break a single column
 * into multiple ones, and that mailnews shouldn't have its own more
 * processing or joke encryption code.
 * """
 *
 * I agree with the argument. Unfortunately, this ship has sailed (1983...).
 * There are dozens of Linux distros and each of them has "cat" which supports -v.
 * It's unrealistic for us to "reeducate" them to use our, incompatible way
 * to achieve "cat -v" effect. The actual effect would be "users pissed off
 * by gratuitous incompatibility".

And, indeed sailing (-vet explicitly compiled in):

  ?0[steffen at essex busybox.git]$ echo −e | cat -vet
  M-bM-^HM-^Re$

Then again, you know, i personally have problems with -vet and
think the POSIX sed variant is easier to grasp:

  ?0[steffen at essex busybox.git]$ echo −e | sed -n l
  \342\210\222e$

--steffen
|
|Der Kragenbaer,                The moon bear,
|der holt sich munter           he cheerfully and one by one
|einen nach dem anderen runter  wa.ks himself off
|(By Robert Gernhardt)

From steffen at sdaoden.eu  Fri Oct 20 07:23:53 2017
From: steffen at sdaoden.eu (Steffen Nurpmeso)
Date: Thu, 19 Oct 2017 23:23:53 +0200
Subject: /bin/true (was [TUHS] basic tools / Universal Unix)
In-Reply-To: <009a01d348e9$e3dce200$ab96a600$@ronnatalie.com>
References: <009a01d348e9$e3dce200$ab96a600$@ronnatalie.com>
Message-ID: <20171019212353.bOjzh%steffen@sdaoden.eu>

Mr. Ron Natalie,

"Ron Natalie" <ron at ronnatalie.com> wrote:
 |My favorite reduction to absurdity was /bin/true.   Someone decided we
 |needed shell commands for true and false.   Easy enough to add a script that
 |said "exit 0" or exit 1" as its only line.
 |Then someone realized that the "exit 0" in /bin true was superfluous, the
 |default return was 0.  /bin/true turned into an empty, yet executable, file.

i am actively chewing on this.
These things can be found by the exec family of C functions,
as Chet Ramey points out from time to time (but i think on other
lists).  That even makes things which make no sense but as
a shell builtin a little bit understandable... maybe..
I for one am ever so fascinated of Unix!
I cannot remember what i thought once entering the Unix world,
i remember i first did not understand why and that [ etc. do exist.

 |Then the lawyers got involved.    We got a version of a packaged UNIX (I
 |think it was Interactive Systems).    Every shell script got twelve lines of
 |copyright/license boilerplate.     Including /bin true.
 |The file had nothing but useless comment in it.

Yes.  But then nonetheless quite the opposite, it was very strange
looking at Plan9 source code which does not have such a file
header, after living in the world of BSD and GNU source code for
one and a half decade.  Different to your experience, for me the
lawyers were there first.

--steffen
|
|Der Kragenbaer,                The moon bear,
|der holt sich munter           he cheerfully and one by one
|einen nach dem anderen runter  wa.ks himself off
|(By Robert Gernhardt)


From dave at horsfall.org  Fri Oct 20 07:43:23 2017
From: dave at horsfall.org (Dave Horsfall)
Date: Fri, 20 Oct 2017 08:43:23 +1100 (EST)
Subject: /bin/true (was [TUHS] basic tools / Universal Unix)
In-Reply-To: <009a01d348e9$e3dce200$ab96a600$@ronnatalie.com>
References: <009a01d348e9$e3dce200$ab96a600$@ronnatalie.com>
Message-ID: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710200838450.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>

On Thu, 19 Oct 2017, Ron Natalie wrote:

> My favorite reduction to absurdity was /bin/true.  Someone decided we 
> needed shell commands for true and false.  Easy enough to add a script 
> that said "exit 0" or exit 1" as its only line. Then someone realized 
> that the "exit 0" in /bin true was superfluous, the default return was 
> 0.  /bin/true turned into an empty, yet executable, file.
>
> Then the lawyers got involved.  We got a version of a packaged UNIX (I 
> think it was Interactive Systems).  Every shell script got twelve lines 
> of copyright/license boilerplate.  Including /bin true. The file had 
> nothing but useless comment in it.

I've also seen /bin/true and /bin/false (I've often been tempted to write 
"/bin/maybe" to introduce a little non-determinism) as *separate binaries* 
i.e. not even linked.

These days they appear to be built-ins (as I would expect).

-- 
Dave Horsfall DTM (VK2KFU)  "Those who don't understand security will suffer."


From chet.ramey at case.edu  Fri Oct 20 07:43:34 2017
From: chet.ramey at case.edu (Chet Ramey)
Date: Thu, 19 Oct 2017 17:43:34 -0400
Subject: /bin/true (was [TUHS] basic tools / Universal Unix)
In-Reply-To: <20171019212353.bOjzh%steffen@sdaoden.eu>
References: <009a01d348e9$e3dce200$ab96a600$@ronnatalie.com>
 <20171019212353.bOjzh%steffen@sdaoden.eu>
Message-ID: <741bfdf1-c816-085e-b9ac-c301c8c2d974@case.edu>

On 10/19/17 5:23 PM, Steffen Nurpmeso wrote:

> These things can be found by the exec family of C functions,
> as Chet Ramey points out from time to time (but i think on other
> lists).  

Yes, Posix requires that all builtins be execable. It doesn't require
true and false to be implemented as builtins, though.


-- 
``The lyf so short, the craft so long to lerne.'' - Chaucer
		 ``Ars longa, vita brevis'' - Hippocrates
Chet Ramey, UTech, CWRU    chet at case.edu    http://cnswww.cns.cwru.edu/~chet/


From ron at ronnatalie.com  Fri Oct 20 08:04:00 2017
From: ron at ronnatalie.com (Ronald Natalie)
Date: Thu, 19 Oct 2017 18:04:00 -0400
Subject: /bin/true (was [TUHS] basic tools / Universal Unix)
In-Reply-To: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710200838450.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>
References: <009a01d348e9$e3dce200$ab96a600$@ronnatalie.com>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710200838450.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>
Message-ID: <CABF1D6B-C9DD-422A-8303-04CEB7AA1DCC@ronnatalie.com>

> 
> I've also seen /bin/true and /bin/false (I've often been tempted to write "/bin/maybe" to introduce a little non-determinism) as *separate binaries* i.e. not even linked.
> 

/bin/maybe goes well with the motd that says “You might have mail.”     I told one of my student programmers that he could put that in the motd and I guaranteed that within an hour someone would come in and tell me that he checked and he didn’t have mail.    Sure enough one of my senior programmers came in and said “It said I might have mail and I didn’t have any.”    I pointed out it only said “might.”




From wkt at tuhs.org  Fri Oct 20 08:40:06 2017
From: wkt at tuhs.org (Warren Toomey)
Date: Fri, 20 Oct 2017 08:40:06 +1000
Subject: [TUHS] TUHS list: back to one list
Message-ID: <20171019224006.GA11678@minnie.tuhs.org>

All, behind the scenes we have had Grant Taylor and Tom Ivar Helbekkmo
helping us find a solution to the TUHS list DKIM issues. We have been
running two separate lists (unmangled and mangled TUHS headers) for a
few weeks. It looks like we can now merge them all back together and
use the settings on one to avoid (most of) the DKIM problems.

So that's what I've done: merged back to a single TUHS mailing list.
I've restored the [TUHS] on the Subject line as well.

I'll monitor the logs for further bounces. Fingers crossed there won't
be any further unsubscriptions from the list due to bounce processing.
If there are, I'll manually put you back in.

Cheers all & thanks to Grant and Tom.
	Warren


From dave at horsfall.org  Fri Oct 20 09:00:13 2017
From: dave at horsfall.org (Dave Horsfall)
Date: Fri, 20 Oct 2017 10:00:13 +1100 (EST)
Subject: [TUHS] /bin/true (was  basic tools / Universal Unix)
In-Reply-To: <741bfdf1-c816-085e-b9ac-c301c8c2d974@case.edu>
References: <009a01d348e9$e3dce200$ab96a600$@ronnatalie.com>
 <20171019212353.bOjzh%steffen@sdaoden.eu>
 <741bfdf1-c816-085e-b9ac-c301c8c2d974@case.edu>
Message-ID: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710200959200.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>

On Thu, 19 Oct 2017, Chet Ramey wrote:

> Yes, Posix requires that all builtins be execable. It doesn't require
> true and false to be implemented as builtins, though.

Good luck with "cd"...

-- 
Dave Horsfall DTM (VK2KFU)  "Those who don't understand security will suffer."


From gtaylor at tnetconsulting.net  Fri Oct 20 09:14:49 2017
From: gtaylor at tnetconsulting.net (Grant Taylor)
Date: Thu, 19 Oct 2017 17:14:49 -0600
Subject: [TUHS] /bin/true (was basic tools / Universal Unix)
In-Reply-To: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710200959200.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>
References: <009a01d348e9$e3dce200$ab96a600$@ronnatalie.com>
 <20171019212353.bOjzh%steffen@sdaoden.eu>
 <741bfdf1-c816-085e-b9ac-c301c8c2d974@case.edu>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710200959200.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>
Message-ID: <87a82674-0b26-f275-e9a8-363b63659a38@tnetconsulting.net>

On 10/19/2017 05:00 PM, Dave Horsfall wrote:
> Good luck with "cd"...

There's nothing that states that the executable effectively do anything. 
  ;-)

spawn,
cd to specified directory
exit

}:-)



-- 
Grant. . . .
unix || die

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From lyndon at orthanc.ca  Fri Oct 20 09:23:03 2017
From: lyndon at orthanc.ca (Lyndon Nerenberg)
Date: Thu, 19 Oct 2017 16:23:03 -0700 (PDT)
Subject: [TUHS] /bin/true (was basic tools / Universal Unix)
In-Reply-To: <87a82674-0b26-f275-e9a8-363b63659a38@tnetconsulting.net>
References: <009a01d348e9$e3dce200$ab96a600$@ronnatalie.com>
 <20171019212353.bOjzh%steffen@sdaoden.eu>
 <741bfdf1-c816-085e-b9ac-c301c8c2d974@case.edu>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710200959200.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <87a82674-0b26-f275-e9a8-363b63659a38@tnetconsulting.net>
Message-ID: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710191622420.40023@orthanc.ca>

: lyndon at orthanc:/home/lyndon; cat ./cd
#!/bin/sh

builtin cd $1 && /bin/sh -i



From dave at horsfall.org  Fri Oct 20 09:25:28 2017
From: dave at horsfall.org (Dave Horsfall)
Date: Fri, 20 Oct 2017 10:25:28 +1100 (EST)
Subject: [TUHS] /bin/true (was  basic tools / Universal Unix)
In-Reply-To: <CABF1D6B-C9DD-422A-8303-04CEB7AA1DCC@ronnatalie.com>
References: <009a01d348e9$e3dce200$ab96a600$@ronnatalie.com>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710200838450.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <CABF1D6B-C9DD-422A-8303-04CEB7AA1DCC@ronnatalie.com>
Message-ID: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710201009190.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>

On Thu, 19 Oct 2017, Ronald Natalie wrote:

> /bin/maybe goes well with the motd that says “You might have mail.” I 
> told one of my student programmers that he could put that in the motd 
> and I guaranteed that within an hour someone would come in and tell me 
> that he checked and he didn’t have mail.  Sure enough one of my senior 
> programmers came in and said “It said I might have mail and I didn’t 
> have any.” I pointed out it only said “might.”

Seriously, it could be used in test scripts, to see whether a test depends
implicitly upon a previous one, so if something fails it would be worthy 
of investigation.

     Usage: maybe [p]

     Returns "true" (0) with a probability of "p" [0.0:1.0] (default: 0.5),
     else "false" (1).

C:	exit(**argv != 't');	// Assumes "t*" or not.

-- 
Dave Horsfall DTM (VK2KFU)  "Those who don't understand security will suffer."

From khm at sciops.net  Fri Oct 20 09:27:28 2017
From: khm at sciops.net (Kurt H Maier)
Date: Thu, 19 Oct 2017 16:27:28 -0700
Subject: [TUHS] /bin/true (was basic tools / Universal Unix)
In-Reply-To: <87a82674-0b26-f275-e9a8-363b63659a38@tnetconsulting.net>
References: <009a01d348e9$e3dce200$ab96a600$@ronnatalie.com>
 <20171019212353.bOjzh%steffen@sdaoden.eu>
 <741bfdf1-c816-085e-b9ac-c301c8c2d974@case.edu>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710200959200.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <87a82674-0b26-f275-e9a8-363b63659a38@tnetconsulting.net>
Message-ID: <20171019232728.GB8086@wopr>

On Thu, Oct 19, 2017 at 05:14:49PM -0600, Grant Taylor via TUHS wrote:
> On 10/19/2017 05:00 PM, Dave Horsfall wrote:
> > Good luck with "cd"...
> 
> There's nothing that states that the executable effectively do anything. 

It's still useful.  Minimal example:

[khm at pc ~]$ (exec cd /); echo $?
0
[khm at pc ~]$ (exec cd /nosuchpath); echo $?
/usr/bin/cd: line 2: cd: /nosuchpath: No such file or directory
1

You can use this to dodge some of the crappier shells' problems,
sometimes, or to test for directory accessibility in a clean
environment.  I've run across it in the wild on occasion, even if I
don't really play this sort of game myself.

khm


From krewat at kilonet.net  Fri Oct 20 09:45:42 2017
From: krewat at kilonet.net (Arthur Krewat)
Date: Thu, 19 Oct 2017 19:45:42 -0400
Subject: [TUHS] TUHS list: back to one list
In-Reply-To: <20171019224006.GA11678@minnie.tuhs.org>
References: <20171019224006.GA11678@minnie.tuhs.org>
Message-ID: <33b844f6-5fd1-ac9d-8589-60422fdcbba5@kilonet.net>

Thank you, and Grant and Tom for all you do ;)



On 10/19/2017 6:40 PM, Warren Toomey wrote:
> All, behind the scenes we have had Grant Taylor and Tom Ivar Helbekkmo
> helping us find a solution to the TUHS list DKIM issues. We have been
> running two separate lists (unmangled and mangled TUHS headers) for a
> few weeks. It looks like we can now merge them all back together and
> use the settings on one to avoid (most of) the DKIM problems.
>
> So that's what I've done: merged back to a single TUHS mailing list.
> I've restored the [TUHS] on the Subject line as well.
>
> I'll monitor the logs for further bounces. Fingers crossed there won't
> be any further unsubscriptions from the list due to bounce processing.
> If there are, I'll manually put you back in.
>
> Cheers all & thanks to Grant and Tom.
>     Warren
>



From crossd at gmail.com  Fri Oct 20 11:27:07 2017
From: crossd at gmail.com (Dan Cross)
Date: Thu, 19 Oct 2017 21:27:07 -0400
Subject: [TUHS] /bin/true (was basic tools / Universal Unix)
In-Reply-To: <CAEoi9W4zdJ3+RXjK5-5rAJ6rwx_0kx6N-bn1U61=txJGyLT_mw@mail.gmail.com>
References: <009a01d348e9$e3dce200$ab96a600$@ronnatalie.com>
 <CAEoi9W7YZ7YXUip0JTMGip3Nd0czgdjqRCMRcK2GYmDJsckuDg@mail.gmail.com>
 <CAEoi9W4zdJ3+RXjK5-5rAJ6rwx_0kx6N-bn1U61=txJGyLT_mw@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <CAEoi9W5Z6WDPtD9TuFz8W7KsSrsrLcrXmhhq4h6P2dG4vOAF7Q@mail.gmail.com>

[I tried to send this earlier, but was thwarted by list shenanigans.
Apologies if it's a dup.]

On Thu, Oct 19, 2017 at 10:52 AM, Ron Natalie <ron at ronnatalie.com> wrote:
> My favorite reduction to absurdity was /bin/true.   Someone decided we
> needed shell commands for true and false.   Easy enough to add a script that
> said "exit 0" or exit 1" as its only line.
> Then someone realized that the "exit 0" in /bin true was superfluous, the
> default return was 0.  /bin/true turned into an empty, yet executable, file.
>
> Then the lawyers got involved.    We got a version of a packaged UNIX (I
> think it was Interactive Systems).    Every shell script got twelve lines of
> copyright/license boilerplate.     Including /bin true.
> The file had nothing but useless comment in it.

Gerard Holzmann has something on this that I think is great:

http://spinroot.com/gerard/pdf/Code_Inflation.pdf

        - Dan C.

PS: A couple of thoughts.

The shell script hack on 7th Edition doesn't work if one tries to
'execl("/bin/true", "true", NULL);'.  This is because the behavior of
re-interpreting an execution failure as a request to run a script is
done by the shell, not exec in the kernel. This implies that one could
not directly exec a shell script, but rather must exec the shell and
give the path to the script as the first argument. I vaguely recall we
had a discussion about the origin of the '#!' syntax and how this was
addressed about a year or so ago.

I tried to write a teeny-tiny '/bin/true' on my Mac. Dynamically
linked, the obvious "int main() { return 0; }" is still a little over
4KB. Most of that is zeros; padding for section alignment and the
like. I managed to create a 'statically' linked `true` binary by
writing the program in assembler:

% cat true.s
# /bin/true in x86_64 assembler for Mac OS X
.text
.globl start
start:
mov $0x2000001, %rax # BSD system call #1
mov $0, %rdi # Exit status: 0 = 'true'
syscall

# OS X requires a non-empty data segment.
.data
zero: .word 0 As I recall,
%

macOS requires you to have a data section aligned to 4K, even if you
don't use it. The resulting binary is a little over 8K; again, mostly
zeros.

There are parlor tricks people play to get binary sizes down to
incredibly small values, but I found the results interesting. Building
the obvious C program on a PDP-11 running 7th Edition yields a 136
byte executable, stripped. Still infinitely greater than /bin/true in
the limit, but still svelte by modern standards.


From lyndon at orthanc.ca  Fri Oct 20 11:31:16 2017
From: lyndon at orthanc.ca (Lyndon Nerenberg)
Date: Thu, 19 Oct 2017 18:31:16 -0700
Subject: [TUHS] /bin/true (was basic tools / Universal Unix)
In-Reply-To: <CAEoi9W5Z6WDPtD9TuFz8W7KsSrsrLcrXmhhq4h6P2dG4vOAF7Q@mail.gmail.com>
References: <009a01d348e9$e3dce200$ab96a600$@ronnatalie.com>
 <CAEoi9W7YZ7YXUip0JTMGip3Nd0czgdjqRCMRcK2GYmDJsckuDg@mail.gmail.com>
 <CAEoi9W4zdJ3+RXjK5-5rAJ6rwx_0kx6N-bn1U61=txJGyLT_mw@mail.gmail.com>
 <CAEoi9W5Z6WDPtD9TuFz8W7KsSrsrLcrXmhhq4h6P2dG4vOAF7Q@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <FEE2FA3E-A7F8-484D-81F2-CC390B11E12D@orthanc.ca>


> On Oct 19, 2017, at 6:27 PM, Dan Cross <crossd at gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> macOS requires you to have a data section aligned to 4K, even if you
> don't use it. The resulting binary is a little over 8K; again, mostly
> zeros.
> 
> There are parlor tricks people play to get binary sizes down to
> incredibly small values, but I found the results interesting. Building
> the obvious C program on a PDP-11 running 7th Edition yields a 136
> byte executable, stripped. Still infinitely greater than /bin/true in
> the limit, but still svelte by modern standards.

No matter how tiny you can make the a.out, the kernel's still going to have to map in at least one page to hold it, so you're eating a minimum of 4K on any modern machine, regardless.

From ron at ronnatalie.com  Fri Oct 20 12:05:15 2017
From: ron at ronnatalie.com (Ronald Natalie)
Date: Thu, 19 Oct 2017 22:05:15 -0400
Subject: [TUHS] /bin/true (was basic tools / Universal Unix)
In-Reply-To: <FEE2FA3E-A7F8-484D-81F2-CC390B11E12D@orthanc.ca>
References: <009a01d348e9$e3dce200$ab96a600$@ronnatalie.com>
 <CAEoi9W7YZ7YXUip0JTMGip3Nd0czgdjqRCMRcK2GYmDJsckuDg@mail.gmail.com>
 <CAEoi9W4zdJ3+RXjK5-5rAJ6rwx_0kx6N-bn1U61=txJGyLT_mw@mail.gmail.com>
 <CAEoi9W5Z6WDPtD9TuFz8W7KsSrsrLcrXmhhq4h6P2dG4vOAF7Q@mail.gmail.com>
 <FEE2FA3E-A7F8-484D-81F2-CC390B11E12D@orthanc.ca>
Message-ID: <83C77FBE-A007-4F06-AB2B-0203710576D7@ronnatalie.com>

Of course, 4K is in the noise on a machine with 32 Gig or more of memory.

The old PDP-11 could put a 136 byte executable (assuming the standard UNIX V6 a.out header into two 64 byte chunks of memory.    Not too shabby even in those days.

> On Oct 19, 2017, at 9:31 PM, Lyndon Nerenberg <lyndon at orthanc.ca> wrote:
> 
> 
>> On Oct 19, 2017, at 6:27 PM, Dan Cross <crossd at gmail.com> wrote:
>> 
>> macOS requires you to have a data section aligned to 4K, even if you
>> don't use it. The resulting binary is a little over 8K; again, mostly
>> zeros.
>> 
>> There are parlor tricks people play to get binary sizes down to
>> incredibly small values, but I found the results interesting. Building
>> the obvious C program on a PDP-11 running 7th Edition yields a 136
>> byte executable, stripped. Still infinitely greater than /bin/true in
>> the limit, but still svelte by modern standards.
> 
> No matter how tiny you can make the a.out, the kernel's still going to have to map in at least one page to hold it, so you're eating a minimum of 4K on any modern machine, regardless.



From dave at horsfall.org  Fri Oct 20 16:41:26 2017
From: dave at horsfall.org (Dave Horsfall)
Date: Fri, 20 Oct 2017 17:41:26 +1100 (EST)
Subject: [TUHS] TUHS list: back to one list
In-Reply-To: <20171019224006.GA11678@minnie.tuhs.org>
References: <20171019224006.GA11678@minnie.tuhs.org>
Message-ID: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710201740350.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>

On Fri, 20 Oct 2017, Warren Toomey wrote:

> So that's what I've done: merged back to a single TUHS mailing list.
> I've restored the [TUHS] on the Subject line as well.

Many thanks!  TUHS is one of the first lists I read.

-- 
Dave Horsfall DTM (VK2KFU)  "Those who don't understand security will suffer."


From chet.ramey at case.edu  Fri Oct 20 22:10:03 2017
From: chet.ramey at case.edu (Chet Ramey)
Date: Fri, 20 Oct 2017 08:10:03 -0400
Subject: [TUHS] /bin/true (was basic tools / Universal Unix)
In-Reply-To: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710200959200.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>
References: <009a01d348e9$e3dce200$ab96a600$@ronnatalie.com>
 <20171019212353.bOjzh%steffen@sdaoden.eu>
 <741bfdf1-c816-085e-b9ac-c301c8c2d974@case.edu>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710200959200.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>
Message-ID: <9b4e27d3-afe4-902b-1650-bc85518f3f60@case.edu>

On 10/19/17 7:00 PM, Dave Horsfall wrote:
> On Thu, 19 Oct 2017, Chet Ramey wrote:
> 
>> Yes, Posix requires that all builtins be execable. It doesn't require
>> true and false to be implemented as builtins, though.
> 
> Good luck with "cd"...

It doesn't have to do what you think it should. Using `cd' with something
like `find' or `env' is a fine way to test directory accessibility. The
Posix standard contains several examples of such use.

http://pubs.opengroup.org/onlinepubs/9699919799/xrat/V4_xcu_chap01.html#tag_23_01_07
-- 
``The lyf so short, the craft so long to lerne.'' - Chaucer
		 ``Ars longa, vita brevis'' - Hippocrates
Chet Ramey, UTech, CWRU    chet at case.edu    http://cnswww.cns.cwru.edu/~chet/


From steffen at sdaoden.eu  Sat Oct 21 05:54:04 2017
From: steffen at sdaoden.eu (Steffen Nurpmeso)
Date: Fri, 20 Oct 2017 21:54:04 +0200
Subject: [TUHS] basic tools / Universal Unix
In-Reply-To: <1508424105.2409028.1144261928.5FC3332C@webmail.messagingengine.com>
References: <201710182303.v9IN35Bv030527@coolidge.cs.Dartmouth.EDU>
 <1508385233.3734780.1143734600.41F5D5EE@webmail.messagingengine.com>
 <20171019143309.SCysT%steffen@sdaoden.eu>
 <1508424105.2409028.1144261928.5FC3332C@webmail.messagingengine.com>
Message-ID: <20171020195404.GRiCX%steffen@sdaoden.eu>

Random832 <random832 at fastmail.com> wrote:
 |On Thu, Oct 19, 2017, at 10:33, Steffen Nurpmeso wrote:
 |> Random832 <random832 at fastmail.com> wrote:
 |>|On Wed, Oct 18, 2017, at 19:03, Doug McIlroy wrote:
 |>|>> But mind you, in preparation of this email i found a bug in
 |>|>> Busybox sed(1) which simply echoes nothing for the above.
 |>|> 
 |>|> I assume that * is a typo for - . If so, sed did just what
 |>|> -n tells it to--no printing except as called for by p or P.
 |>|
 |>|Or, you know, l (the letter ell). Which busybox sed appears to not
 |>|support at all, rather than somehow misapplying -n to it.
 ...
 |I think that makes this a legitimate bug[...]

I finally realized that the MUA i maintain never supported these
kind of (output character set) iconv(3) errors for the main body
of the message, even after iconv tweakings (including
a n_ICONV_IGN_NOREVERSE flag).
Thus i could fix that with credit due to Doug McIlroy and you,
and will release v14.9.5 tomorrow.
Yes, so thank you both!

--steffen
|
|Der Kragenbaer,                The moon bear,
|der holt sich munter           he cheerfully and one by one
|einen nach dem anderen runter  wa.ks himself off
|(By Robert Gernhardt)


From dave at horsfall.org  Sat Oct 21 10:52:29 2017
From: dave at horsfall.org (Dave Horsfall)
Date: Sat, 21 Oct 2017 11:52:29 +1100 (EST)
Subject: [TUHS] Trouble wih TUHS rsync
Message-ID: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710211148580.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>

Am I the only one having trouble?  I mirror the site, and I'm now seeing:

aneurin# tuhs
+ rsync -avz minnie.tuhs.org::UA_Root .
rsync: failed to connect to minnie.tuhs.org (45.79.103.53): Operation timed out (60)
rsync error: error in socket IO (code 10) at clientserver.c(125) [Receiver=3.1.2]
+ rsync -avz minnie.tuhs.org::UA_Applications Applications
rsync: failed to connect to minnie.tuhs.org (45.79.103.53): Operation timed out (60)
rsync error: error in socket IO (code 10) at clientserver.c(125) [Receiver=3.1.2]

Etc.

-- 
Dave Horsfall DTM (VK2KFU)  "Those who don't understand security will suffer."


From wkt at tuhs.org  Sat Oct 21 11:37:49 2017
From: wkt at tuhs.org (Warren Toomey)
Date: Sat, 21 Oct 2017 11:37:49 +1000
Subject: [TUHS] Trouble wih TUHS rsync
In-Reply-To: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710211148580.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>
References: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710211148580.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>
Message-ID: <20171021013749.GA30864@minnie.tuhs.org>

On Sat, Oct 21, 2017 at 11:52:29AM +1100, Dave Horsfall wrote:
>Am I the only one having trouble?  I mirror the site, and I'm now seeing:
>aneurin# tuhs

Works for me here:

rsync -av minnie.tuhs.org::UA_Root .

Welcome to the rsync server for the Unix Archive. If you are only interested
in browsing the Unix Archive, then please see the list of mirrors at
http://www.tuhs.org/archive_sites.html.


receiving incremental file list
....

Can you telnet minnie.tuhs.org 873?
	Warren

Trying 45.79.103.53...
Connected to minnie.tuhs.org.
Escape character is '^]'.
@RSYNCD: 31.0


From dave at horsfall.org  Sat Oct 21 12:10:50 2017
From: dave at horsfall.org (Dave Horsfall)
Date: Sat, 21 Oct 2017 13:10:50 +1100 (EST)
Subject: [TUHS] Trouble wih TUHS rsync
In-Reply-To: <20171021013749.GA30864@minnie.tuhs.org>
References: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710211148580.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <20171021013749.GA30864@minnie.tuhs.org>
Message-ID: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710211309190.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>

On Sat, 21 Oct 2017, Warren Toomey wrote:

> Can you telnet minnie.tuhs.org 873?

No, and my firewall allows all outbound connections (and their stateful
responses)...

What are others seeing?

-- 
Dave Horsfall DTM (VK2KFU)  "Those who don't understand security will suffer."


From will.senn at gmail.com  Sat Oct 21 12:17:10 2017
From: will.senn at gmail.com (Will Senn)
Date: Fri, 20 Oct 2017 21:17:10 -0500
Subject: [TUHS] Trouble wih TUHS rsync
In-Reply-To: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710211309190.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>
References: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710211148580.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <20171021013749.GA30864@minnie.tuhs.org>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710211309190.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>
Message-ID: <b6d4c46b-749a-509e-a1cc-7ceb42168d82@gmail.com>

Works for me (Texas).

On 10/20/17 9:10 PM, Dave Horsfall wrote:
> On Sat, 21 Oct 2017, Warren Toomey wrote:
>
>> Can you telnet minnie.tuhs.org 873?
>
> No, and my firewall allows all outbound connections (and their stateful
> responses)...
>
> What are others seeing?
>

-- 
GPG Fingerprint: 68F4 B3BD 1730 555A 4462  7D45 3EAA 5B6D A982 BAAF



From usotsuki at buric.co  Sat Oct 21 12:24:09 2017
From: usotsuki at buric.co (Steve Nickolas)
Date: Fri, 20 Oct 2017 22:24:09 -0400 (EDT)
Subject: [TUHS] Trouble wih TUHS rsync
In-Reply-To: <20171021013749.GA30864@minnie.tuhs.org>
References: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710211148580.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <20171021013749.GA30864@minnie.tuhs.org>
Message-ID: <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710202223140.61414@frieza.hoshinet.org>

On Sat, 21 Oct 2017, Warren Toomey wrote:

> On Sat, Oct 21, 2017 at 11:52:29AM +1100, Dave Horsfall wrote:
>> Am I the only one having trouble?  I mirror the site, and I'm now seeing:
>> aneurin# tuhs
>
> Works for me here:
>
> rsync -av minnie.tuhs.org::UA_Root .
>
> Welcome to the rsync server for the Unix Archive. If you are only interested
> in browsing the Unix Archive, then please see the list of mirrors at
> http://www.tuhs.org/archive_sites.html.
>
>
> receiving incremental file list
> ....
>
> Can you telnet minnie.tuhs.org 873?
> 	Warren
>
> Trying 45.79.103.53...
> Connected to minnie.tuhs.org.
> Escape character is '^]'.
> @RSYNCD: 31.0
>

Works from my PC and from one of my hosted servers.  (Haven't tried 
anything else.)

-uso.


From lyndon at orthanc.ca  Sat Oct 21 13:34:43 2017
From: lyndon at orthanc.ca (Lyndon Nerenberg)
Date: Fri, 20 Oct 2017 20:34:43 -0700
Subject: [TUHS] Trouble wih TUHS rsync
In-Reply-To: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710211309190.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>
References: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710211148580.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <20171021013749.GA30864@minnie.tuhs.org>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710211309190.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>
Message-ID: <820FCB48-212A-4529-B1FF-7BDEC8A9EC78@orthanc.ca>


> On Oct 20, 2017, at 7:10 PM, Dave Horsfall <dave at horsfall.org> wrote:
> 
>> Can you telnet minnie.tuhs.org 873?

Yes, both from Shaw Cable in Vancouver, and ARP Networks in Los Angeles.


From dave at horsfall.org  Sat Oct 21 15:33:14 2017
From: dave at horsfall.org (Dave Horsfall)
Date: Sat, 21 Oct 2017 16:33:14 +1100 (EST)
Subject: [TUHS] Trouble wih TUHS rsync
In-Reply-To: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710211309190.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>
References: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710211148580.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <20171021013749.GA30864@minnie.tuhs.org>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710211309190.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>
Message-ID: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710211632350.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>

Hmmm...  OK, thanks all; looks like I get to debug my firewall.

-- 
Dave Horsfall DTM (VK2KFU)  "Those who don't understand security will suffer."


From wobblygong at gmail.com  Sat Oct 21 19:11:06 2017
From: wobblygong at gmail.com (Wesley Parish)
Date: Sat, 21 Oct 2017 22:11:06 +1300
Subject: [TUHS] Conceivably OT: 80s and 90s era CAD software
Message-ID: <CACNPpebyNGt2y0GKz9EnY9WSX3oNEEj5CLz-FEmJpkw4V-JjoA@mail.gmail.com>

I'm wondering, with 80s and 90s era Unix being discussed, if there are
any copies of the 80s and 90s era CAD software extant in some form or
other? (Preferably free to good archive?)

IIRC it was a major driver of graphics capabilities in Unix
workstations around that time.

Wesley Parish


From beebe at math.utah.edu  Sun Oct 22 00:10:36 2017
From: beebe at math.utah.edu (Nelson H. F. Beebe)
Date: Sat, 21 Oct 2017 08:10:36 -0600
Subject: [TUHS] Trouble wih TUHS rsync
Message-ID: <CMM.0.96.0.1508595036.beebe@gamma.math.utah.edu>

Dave Horsfall reported failures for the TUHS mirror at his site.

I've just looked at our TUHS mirror in Salt Lake City, Utah, USA, and
found that

	% rsync rsync://rsync.math.utah.edu

produces the expected list.

I also checked the mirror cron job logs, and found that they all look
similar for every day this year, with no indication of connection
errors.

I then checked the TUHS filesystem tree, and found only two files
created in the last month (timestamps in UTC):

	-rw-rw-r-- 1 mirror mirror  99565 Oct 20 17:27 UA_Documentation/TUHS/Mail_list/2017-October.txt.gz
	-rw-rw-r-- 1 mirror mirror 400419 Sep 30 17:27 UA_Documentation/TUHS/Mail_list/2017-September.txt.gz

The first of those arrived here late last night (Oct 20 23:15 MDT, Oct
21 05:15 UTC).

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
- Nelson H. F. Beebe                    Tel: +1 801 581 5254                  -
- University of Utah                    FAX: +1 801 581 4148                  -
- Department of Mathematics, 110 LCB    Internet e-mail: beebe at math.utah.edu  -
- 155 S 1400 E RM 233                       beebe at acm.org  beebe at computer.org -
- Salt Lake City, UT 84112-0090, USA    URL: http://www.math.utah.edu/~beebe/ -
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------


From don at DonHopkins.com  Sun Oct 22 03:11:01 2017
From: don at DonHopkins.com (Don Hopkins)
Date: Sat, 21 Oct 2017 19:11:01 +0200
Subject: [TUHS] Conceivably OT: 80s and 90s era CAD software: CADroid
In-Reply-To: <CACNPpebyNGt2y0GKz9EnY9WSX3oNEEj5CLz-FEmJpkw4V-JjoA@mail.gmail.com>
References: <CACNPpebyNGt2y0GKz9EnY9WSX3oNEEj5CLz-FEmJpkw4V-JjoA@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <BBD79D04-4AD7-46E2-8E23-254DBDC8C899@gmail.com>

I have an old copy of CADroid for the Sun-3 from 1987 sitting around, which runs on SunView. (It’s the original version before I worked with Mitch Bradley integrating it with CForth to replace its old icky extension language. Unfortunately I didn’t keep a copy of the source code and our CForth mods.) 

http://www.donhopkins.com/home/cadroid.tgz <http://www.donhopkins.com/home/cadroid.tgz>

Sun licensed it from Lucasfilm, and used it to design various circuit board. That tar file includes a 4 meg board schematic (but not the rest of Sun’s schematics library, alas ;). 

https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/net.lsi/I8aoKvm78-o <https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/net.lsi/I8aoKvm78-o>

https://books.google.nl/books?id=aDCH6OPGmh8C&pg=PA32&lpg=PA32&dq=%22cadroid%22+lucas+schematic&source=bl&ots=oa78HI0TWr&sig=l-o1d91YP70bZWH57yLaHluR3jw&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwi2t-jXkILXAhWEORoKHXAyDXUQ6AEIOzAG#v=onepage&q=%22cadroid%22%20lucas%20schematic&f=false <https://books.google.nl/books?id=aDCH6OPGmh8C&pg=PA32&lpg=PA32&dq=%22cadroid%22+lucas+schematic&source=bl&ots=oa78HI0TWr&sig=l-o1d91YP70bZWH57yLaHluR3jw&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwi2t-jXkILXAhWEORoKHXAyDXUQ6AEIOzAG#v=onepage&q="cadroid" lucas schematic&f=false>

https://www.computer.org/csdl/mags/cg/1984/05/04055788.pdf <https://www.computer.org/csdl/mags/cg/1984/05/04055788.pdf>

-Don


> On 21 Oct 2017, at 11:11, Wesley Parish <wobblygong at gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> I'm wondering, with 80s and 90s era Unix being discussed, if there are
> any copies of the 80s and 90s era CAD software extant in some form or
> other? (Preferably free to good archive?)
> 
> IIRC it was a major driver of graphics capabilities in Unix
> workstations around that time.
> 
> Wesley Parish

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From clemc at ccc.com  Sun Oct 22 03:26:15 2017
From: clemc at ccc.com (Clem cole)
Date: Sat, 21 Oct 2017 19:26:15 +0200
Subject: [TUHS] Conceivably OT: 80s and 90s era CAD software: CADroid
In-Reply-To: <BBD79D04-4AD7-46E2-8E23-254DBDC8C899@gmail.com>
References: <CACNPpebyNGt2y0GKz9EnY9WSX3oNEEj5CLz-FEmJpkw4V-JjoA@mail.gmail.com>
 <BBD79D04-4AD7-46E2-8E23-254DBDC8C899@gmail.com>
Message-ID: <7203B20E-3B89-4458-AF86-8202020DA453@ccc.com>

Warren has the Unix circuit Design system UCSD  from research that Ken used for Belle in Unix/Ts aka V7 and v8.  Rob and Bart L updated/replaced with something else for the bilt on plan 9 which was after me but the core was based on UCSD.  Dan Cross might know more from plan 9 days and I can ask Presotto and Bart

Sent from my PDP-7 Running UNIX V0 expect things to be almost but not quite. 

> On Oct 21, 2017, at 7:11 PM, Don Hopkins <don at DonHopkins.com> wrote:
> 
> I have an old copy of CADroid for the Sun-3 from 1987 sitting around, which runs on SunView. (It’s the original version before I worked with Mitch Bradley integrating it with CForth to replace its old icky extension language. Unfortunately I didn’t keep a copy of the source code and our CForth mods.) 
> 
> http://www.donhopkins.com/home/cadroid.tgz
> 
> Sun licensed it from Lucasfilm, and used it to design various circuit board. That tar file includes a 4 meg board schematic (but not the rest of Sun’s schematics library, alas ;). 
> 
> https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/net.lsi/I8aoKvm78-o
> 
> https://books.google.nl/books?id=aDCH6OPGmh8C&pg=PA32&lpg=PA32&dq=%22cadroid%22+lucas+schematic&source=bl&ots=oa78HI0TWr&sig=l-o1d91YP70bZWH57yLaHluR3jw&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwi2t-jXkILXAhWEORoKHXAyDXUQ6AEIOzAG#v=onepage&q=%22cadroid%22%20lucas%20schematic&f=false
> 
> https://www.computer.org/csdl/mags/cg/1984/05/04055788.pdf
> 
> -Don
> 
> 
>> On 21 Oct 2017, at 11:11, Wesley Parish <wobblygong at gmail.com> wrote:
>> 
>> I'm wondering, with 80s and 90s era Unix being discussed, if there are
>> any copies of the 80s and 90s era CAD software extant in some form or
>> other? (Preferably free to good archive?)
>> 
>> IIRC it was a major driver of graphics capabilities in Unix
>> workstations around that time.
>> 
>> Wesley Parish
> 
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From bakul at bitblocks.com  Sun Oct 22 04:09:48 2017
From: bakul at bitblocks.com (Bakul Shah)
Date: Sat, 21 Oct 2017 11:09:48 -0700
Subject: [TUHS] Trouble wih TUHS rsync
In-Reply-To: Your message of "Sat, 21 Oct 2017 16:33:14 +1100."
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710211632350.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>
References: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710211148580.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <20171021013749.GA30864@minnie.tuhs.org>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710211309190.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710211632350.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>
Message-ID: <20171021181003.CBBA4156E7D7@mail.bitblocks.com>

On Sat, 21 Oct 2017 16:33:14 +1100 Dave Horsfall <dave at horsfall.org> wrote:
Dave Horsfall writes:
> Hmmm...  OK, thanks all; looks like I get to debug my firewall.

This is where a shell acct on a friends' system or your isp
can help.  That rescued me a number of times recently!


From dave at horsfall.org  Sun Oct 22 10:06:33 2017
From: dave at horsfall.org (Dave Horsfall)
Date: Sun, 22 Oct 2017 11:06:33 +1100 (EST)
Subject: [TUHS] Conceivably OT: 80s and 90s era CAD software
In-Reply-To: <CACNPpebyNGt2y0GKz9EnY9WSX3oNEEj5CLz-FEmJpkw4V-JjoA@mail.gmail.com>
References: <CACNPpebyNGt2y0GKz9EnY9WSX3oNEEj5CLz-FEmJpkw4V-JjoA@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710221102270.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>

On Sat, 21 Oct 2017, Wesley Parish wrote:

> I'm wondering, with 80s and 90s era Unix being discussed, if there are 
> any copies of the 80s and 90s era CAD software extant in some form or 
> other? (Preferably free to good archive?)

Dunno if it counts, but Eagle is still available, hence may not qualify; 
it kicked off around the late 80s.

-- 
Dave Horsfall DTM (VK2KFU)  "Those who don't understand security will suffer."


From lm at mcvoy.com  Sun Oct 22 10:16:38 2017
From: lm at mcvoy.com (Larry McVoy)
Date: Sat, 21 Oct 2017 17:16:38 -0700
Subject: [TUHS] Trouble wih TUHS rsync
In-Reply-To: <20171021181003.CBBA4156E7D7@mail.bitblocks.com>
References: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710211148580.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <20171021013749.GA30864@minnie.tuhs.org>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710211309190.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710211632350.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <20171021181003.CBBA4156E7D7@mail.bitblocks.com>
Message-ID: <20171022001638.GI7409@mcvoy.com>

On Sat, Oct 21, 2017 at 11:09:48AM -0700, Bakul Shah wrote:
> On Sat, 21 Oct 2017 16:33:14 +1100 Dave Horsfall <dave at horsfall.org> wrote:
> Dave Horsfall writes:
> > Hmmm...  OK, thanks all; looks like I get to debug my firewall.
> 
> This is where a shell acct on a friends' system or your isp
> can help.  That rescued me a number of times recently!

So I can provide accounts on mcvoy.com if people need a place to ping from.
I'm sort of well connected, 6 milliseconds from berkeley.edu which is not
bad considering I'm in the middle of nowhere.

If you want an account there is no incoming email for you but outgoing 
works.  If that's interesting to you then send me you public key and
I'll set it up.
-- 
---
Larry McVoy            	     lm at mcvoy.com             http://www.mcvoy.com/lm 


From dave at horsfall.org  Sun Oct 22 10:17:01 2017
From: dave at horsfall.org (Dave Horsfall)
Date: Sun, 22 Oct 2017 11:17:01 +1100 (EST)
Subject: [TUHS] Trouble wih TUHS rsync
In-Reply-To: <20171021181003.CBBA4156E7D7@mail.bitblocks.com>
References: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710211148580.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <20171021013749.GA30864@minnie.tuhs.org>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710211309190.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710211632350.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <20171021181003.CBBA4156E7D7@mail.bitblocks.com>
Message-ID: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710221114360.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>

On Sat, 21 Oct 2017, Bakul Shah wrote:

>> Hmmm...  OK, thanks all; looks like I get to debug my firewall.
>
> This is where a shell acct on a friends' system or your isp can help. 
> That rescued me a number of times recently!

Indeed, but I lost my accounts on my friends' systems when they upgraded, 
so I should ask them nicely again (in return for an account, of course).

-- 
Dave Horsfall DTM (VK2KFU)  "Those who don't understand security will suffer."


From usotsuki at buric.co  Sun Oct 22 13:24:34 2017
From: usotsuki at buric.co (Steve Nickolas)
Date: Sat, 21 Oct 2017 23:24:34 -0400 (EDT)
Subject: [TUHS] Trouble wih TUHS rsync
In-Reply-To: <20171021181003.CBBA4156E7D7@mail.bitblocks.com>
References: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710211148580.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <20171021013749.GA30864@minnie.tuhs.org>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710211309190.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710211632350.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <20171021181003.CBBA4156E7D7@mail.bitblocks.com>
Message-ID: <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710212321390.49318@frieza.hoshinet.org>

On Sat, 21 Oct 2017, Bakul Shah wrote:

> On Sat, 21 Oct 2017 16:33:14 +1100 Dave Horsfall <dave at horsfall.org> wrote:
> Dave Horsfall writes:
>> Hmmm...  OK, thanks all; looks like I get to debug my firewall.
>
> This is where a shell acct on a friends' system or your isp
> can help.  That rescued me a number of times recently!
>

I have a combination of such - two of my friends rent a ton of VPSes and 
dedicated hosting servers, and I have access to most of them - plus I have 
two such servers of my own.  That's Linux boxen, FreeBSD boxen, a Solaris 
box, ... I don't know what other unices my Portuguese friend has on his 
servers, but he's quite the aficionado, which comes in handy sometimes. XD

-uso.


From dave at horsfall.org  Sun Oct 22 14:18:33 2017
From: dave at horsfall.org (Dave Horsfall)
Date: Sun, 22 Oct 2017 15:18:33 +1100 (EST)
Subject: [TUHS] /bin/true (was basic tools / Universal Unix)
In-Reply-To: <20171019232728.GB8086@wopr>
References: <009a01d348e9$e3dce200$ab96a600$@ronnatalie.com>
 <20171019212353.bOjzh%steffen@sdaoden.eu>
 <741bfdf1-c816-085e-b9ac-c301c8c2d974@case.edu>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710200959200.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <87a82674-0b26-f275-e9a8-363b63659a38@tnetconsulting.net>
 <20171019232728.GB8086@wopr>
Message-ID: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710221459430.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>

On Thu, 19 Oct 2017, Kurt H Maier wrote:

> It's still useful.  Minimal example:
>
> [khm at pc ~]$ (exec cd /); echo $?
> 0
> [khm at pc ~]$ (exec cd /nosuchpath); echo $?
> /usr/bin/cd: line 2: cd: /nosuchpath: No such file or directory
> 1

And others pointed out the same thing; OK, it's obscure (because "test -x 
{}" doesn't quite fit the bill) but I'm convinced.

-- 
Dave Horsfall DTM (VK2KFU)  "Those who don't understand security will suffer."


From will.senn at gmail.com  Sun Oct 22 15:38:22 2017
From: will.senn at gmail.com (Will Senn)
Date: Sun, 22 Oct 2017 00:38:22 -0500
Subject: [TUHS] Last officially distributed and currently available BSD
	version
Message-ID: <f884b6a5-5c5d-e970-701d-d27c0169ef5e@gmail.com>

All,

I'm not 100% sure how best to ask this, but here goes...

I own a copy of the CSRG Archives CD Set that Kirk McKusick maintained. 
I bought them ages and ages ago  (BTW, they are now all available on 
Archive.org). I dusted them off today because I had the brilliant idea 
that with my significant growth in understanding related to all things 
unix and ancient unix, that I might find them interesting and useful. 
They are interesting, jury's out on useful beyond being a broweasable 
historical archive of individual files. One of the CD's contains a 4.4 
and 4.4BSD-Lite2 folder and is labeled releases (disk 3). I opened the 
4.4 folder and it appears to be a set of folders and files I would 
expect to find on a release tape, but unlike a tape, which one could 
mount and boot from, I have no idea if this would be usable as install 
media (if you do, please let me know how).

I googled about the two releases and although the same text appears all 
over the place about how Berkeley released one version, then removed 
some components, then re-released, and eventually wound up at 
4.4BSD-Lite2, I could not figure out whether the word release meant 
sourcecode, installable media, or what. I gather a lot of this made 
sense back in the early 1990's but it's all a bit muddy to me in 2017. 
In trying to figure it all out, I came across a webpage talking about 
2.11BSD (maintained into this decade) and another about 4.3BSD 
Quasijarus (also maintained in this decade?). Both descriptions 
contained the text, "It is the release of 4.4BSD-Lite, and requires the 
original UNIX license" (see http://damnsmallbsd.org/pub/BSD-UNIX). My 
sense of things after reading and browsing and such is that with regards 
to 4.4, 4.4BSD-Lite, and 4.4BSD-Lite2, they are either not released 
(4.4), encumbered and retracted (4.4BSD-Lite), or not installable 
(4.4BSD-Lite2)...

Dang, so confusing...

My interest is pretty much based on a strong desire to boot up a 4.4 
system that as closely as possible maps to the one described in "The 
Design and Implementation of the 4.4 BSD Operating System" that I can 
experiment with as I'm going through the text. I think I understand the 
version history as it is described in various places, but I just can't 
figure how the last handful of versions relate to real media that is 
available to enthusiasts.

Questions begging answers:

What is the last bootable and installable media, officially distributed 
by Berkeley?

Is that image currently publicly accessible?

What is the closest version, that is currently available, that would 
match the os described in "The Design and Implementation of the 4.4 BSD 
Operating System"?

Many thanks,

Will






-- 
GPG Fingerprint: 68F4 B3BD 1730 555A 4462  7D45 3EAA 5B6D A982 BAAF



From wobblygong at gmail.com  Sun Oct 22 17:53:37 2017
From: wobblygong at gmail.com (Wesley Parish)
Date: Sun, 22 Oct 2017 20:53:37 +1300
Subject: [TUHS] Conceivably OT: 80s and 90s era CAD software
In-Reply-To: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710221102270.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>
References: <CACNPpebyNGt2y0GKz9EnY9WSX3oNEEj5CLz-FEmJpkw4V-JjoA@mail.gmail.com>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710221102270.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>
Message-ID: <CACNPpeZHvdaJfX8qhS7RkUyxqESWnsgtYauh-62SDjg96aWVEw@mail.gmail.com>

Might be worth asking them if they have any objection to having their
80s and 90s releases preserved in the likes of TUHS. It would've been
built on a BSD-based Unix, I take it?

On 10/22/17, Dave Horsfall <dave at horsfall.org> wrote:
> On Sat, 21 Oct 2017, Wesley Parish wrote:
>
>> I'm wondering, with 80s and 90s era Unix being discussed, if there are
>> any copies of the 80s and 90s era CAD software extant in some form or
>> other? (Preferably free to good archive?)
>
> Dunno if it counts, but Eagle is still available, hence may not qualify;
> it kicked off around the late 80s.
>
> --
> Dave Horsfall DTM (VK2KFU)  "Those who don't understand security will
> suffer."
>


From mparson at bl.org  Mon Oct 23 01:18:29 2017
From: mparson at bl.org (Michael Parson)
Date: Sun, 22 Oct 2017 10:18:29 -0500
Subject: [TUHS] Last officially distributed and currently available BSD
	version
In-Reply-To: <f884b6a5-5c5d-e970-701d-d27c0169ef5e@gmail.com>
References: <f884b6a5-5c5d-e970-701d-d27c0169ef5e@gmail.com>
Message-ID: <7f24ccf890ca8ac6fded183eaf95ef3f@bl.org>

On 2017-10-22 00:38, Will Senn wrote:

<snip>

> Questions begging answers:
> 
> What is the last bootable and installable media, officially
> distributed by Berkeley?

As I understood it, there were no bootable 4.4 BSD lite releases from 
Berkley.  The 'lite' releases had the AT&T encumbered stuff removed and 
not replaced, it wasn't a complete and functional OS.

> Is that image currently publicly accessible?
> 
> What is the closest version, that is currently available, that would
> match the os described in "The Design and Implementation of the 4.4
> BSD Operating System"?

If you want something bootable, your closest bet is probably the 1.0 
releases of Free[1] or NetBSD[2].

-- 
Michael Parson
Pflugerville, TX
KF5LGQ

[1] ftp://ftp-archive.freebsd.org/pub/FreeBSD-Archive/old-releases/
[2] ftp://ftp.netbsd.org/pub/NetBSD/NetBSD-archive/NetBSD-1.0/



From imp at bsdimp.com  Mon Oct 23 01:31:37 2017
From: imp at bsdimp.com (Warner Losh)
Date: Sun, 22 Oct 2017 09:31:37 -0600
Subject: [TUHS] Last officially distributed and currently available BSD
	version
In-Reply-To: <7f24ccf890ca8ac6fded183eaf95ef3f@bl.org>
References: <f884b6a5-5c5d-e970-701d-d27c0169ef5e@gmail.com>
 <7f24ccf890ca8ac6fded183eaf95ef3f@bl.org>
Message-ID: <CANCZdfrquTV6JyiMT+fa-zoREEXzT=hg7dPGm7c3VM4XQBjGpw@mail.gmail.com>

On Sun, Oct 22, 2017 at 9:18 AM, Michael Parson <mparson at bl.org> wrote:

> On 2017-10-22 00:38, Will Senn wrote:
>
> <snip>
>
> Questions begging answers:
>>
>> What is the last bootable and installable media, officially
>> distributed by Berkeley?
>>
>
> As I understood it, there were no bootable 4.4 BSD lite releases from
> Berkley.  The 'lite' releases had the AT&T encumbered stuff removed and not
> replaced, it wasn't a complete and functional OS.


It had the 9 files that were trivial to replicate removed, yes.


> Is that image currently publicly accessible?
>>
>> What is the closest version, that is currently available, that would
>> match the os described in "The Design and Implementation of the 4.4
>> BSD Operating System"?
>>
>
> If you want something bootable, your closest bet is probably the 1.0
> releases of Free[1] or NetBSD[2].


Both FreeBSD and NetBSD took different approaches to getting a bootable
system, and to fixing many of the issues in 4.4BSD. While these are close,
the 386BSD releases from Jolitz might be closer still (though technically
based on net2 releases, the delta between that and 4.4 kernel I ).
http://gunkies.org/wiki/386_BSD has pointers to the releases (including
mirrors in TUHS). 386bsd.org doesn't seem to have them, though there's lots
of pointers to the Dr Dobb's articles.

Warner

-- 
> Michael Parson
> Pflugerville, TX
> KF5LGQ
>
> [1] ftp://ftp-archive.freebsd.org/pub/FreeBSD-Archive/old-releases/
> [2] ftp://ftp.netbsd.org/pub/NetBSD/NetBSD-archive/NetBSD-1.0/
>
>
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From steve.mynott at gmail.com  Mon Oct 23 02:02:54 2017
From: steve.mynott at gmail.com (Steve Mynott)
Date: Sun, 22 Oct 2017 17:02:54 +0100
Subject: [TUHS] Last officially distributed and currently available BSD
	version
In-Reply-To: <CANCZdfrquTV6JyiMT+fa-zoREEXzT=hg7dPGm7c3VM4XQBjGpw@mail.gmail.com>
References: <f884b6a5-5c5d-e970-701d-d27c0169ef5e@gmail.com>
 <7f24ccf890ca8ac6fded183eaf95ef3f@bl.org>
 <CANCZdfrquTV6JyiMT+fa-zoREEXzT=hg7dPGm7c3VM4XQBjGpw@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <CANuZA8Rqpp-WbVx77uZ6U5qk0jPFc4MBUvNFryDxdJCvQE-f4Q@mail.gmail.com>

On 22 October 2017 at 16:31, Warner Losh <imp at bsdimp.com> wrote:
>
>
> On Sun, Oct 22, 2017 at 9:18 AM, Michael Parson <mparson at bl.org> wrote:
>>
>> On 2017-10-22 00:38, Will Senn wrote:
>>
>> <snip>
>>
>>> Questions begging answers:
>>>
>>> What is the last bootable and installable media, officially
>>> distributed by Berkeley?
>>
>>
>> As I understood it, there were no bootable 4.4 BSD lite releases from
>> Berkley.  The 'lite' releases had the AT&T encumbered stuff removed and not
>> replaced, it wasn't a complete and functional OS.
>
>
> It had the 9 files that were trivial to replicate removed, yes.

There seems to be some confusion about exactly what was removed to
create 'lite'.

http://minnie.tuhs.org/pipermail/tuhs/2012-April/004227.html lists three files.

and

https://github.com/weiss/original-bsd

appears to have copies of these three files (so they were probably not
actually deleted from the original version control)

https://github.com/weiss/original-bsd/commit/e58c89522e6fbf136e9cdf55a393a6bdbdc4eb45#diff-771e2cfcd8808541adc96aa1fa1a0aae

is interesting!

I wonder how many systems actually ever displayed the "4.4 BSD UNIX"
banner? At least one did at UCB.


From crossd at gmail.com  Mon Oct 23 02:51:55 2017
From: crossd at gmail.com (Dan Cross)
Date: Sun, 22 Oct 2017 12:51:55 -0400
Subject: [TUHS] Last officially distributed and currently available BSD
	version
In-Reply-To: <CAEoi9W5bjmB4Xw8vVEu4kDYELtuc8ciGABNNERoBtzwqnJj+ew@mail.gmail.com>
References: <f884b6a5-5c5d-e970-701d-d27c0169ef5e@gmail.com>
 <CAEoi9W4L2fwV3ukXh+7TGy8y5rwT3Rt4hhTYQxBDyMi1WJg1XQ@mail.gmail.com>
 <CAEoi9W55N8sP-Wnkrq=JCi1kuzYfLY8xp_95uhihOFV_xHKO7A@mail.gmail.com>
 <CAEoi9W7zgGWjbn3V--by+C0XvnYfMEUWj=ieF6bFeKxEgRuFJQ@mail.gmail.com>
 <CAEoi9W4B9TQj+Wfm8MXq-VW=qE5WW999HT1hNye=vaAU+YZHSw@mail.gmail.com>
 <CAEoi9W61+WciC=1+kT+vht+krhrHyWRGJfbmTtYb8h6X_SQUCQ@mail.gmail.com>
 <CAEoi9W5bjmB4Xw8vVEu4kDYELtuc8ciGABNNERoBtzwqnJj+ew@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <CAEoi9W5BqLzf-6ZU=WtYzhYgGMj3RTi8hvfb_j3jmXGDsdkT6w@mail.gmail.com>

On Oct 22, 2017 1:39 AM, "Will Senn" <will.senn at gmail.com> wrote:

[...]
What is the last bootable and installable media, officially distributed by
Berkeley?

Is that image currently publicly accessible?

What is the closest version, that is currently available, that would match
the os described in "The Design and Implementation of the 4.4 BSD Operating
System"?


Probably one of the best ways to get questions about installation media
answered is to simply email Kirk McKusick. He's a really nice guy and will
probably give you an answer pretty quickly.

That said, of the three distributions you mentioned, bootable/installable
media only existed for 4.4BSD (also called the "encumbered" distribution).
-Lite and -Lite2 were "reference distributions." It didn't take *too* much
work to get -Lite working, but it wasn't something that ran out of the box
(or more properly, off of the tape). The original idea was to release
4.4BSD-encumbered to Unix source licensees, and at the same time publish
4.4BSD-Lite sans the redacted bits as an open source distribution. These
were to be the final BSD releases from UCB, but the CSRG found they had
some coin left in the coffers a few months later, so they did -Lite2 as
something of a final hurrah snapshotting some ongoing maintenance work (and
possibly some research?) before officially shutting down.

At one point, I had a copy of a bootable exabyte tape with 4.4-encumbered
installation and source images for SPARC, specifically sun4c machines, that
I had liberated from somewhere. My understanding was that the reference
hardware at Berkeley was 68030- and 68040-based HP 9000 machines, and the
SPARC bits were a contribution from Chris Torek. I got -Lite running on an
older SPARCstation 1, but it wasn't particularly reliable (the compiler
would segfault, and it panic'ed once a day or so), so we put SunOS back on
it pretty quickly.

Hope that helps.

        - Dan C.
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From jnc at mercury.lcs.mit.edu  Mon Oct 23 03:26:31 2017
From: jnc at mercury.lcs.mit.edu (Noel Chiappa)
Date: Sun, 22 Oct 2017 13:26:31 -0400 (EDT)
Subject: [TUHS] Last officially distributed and currently available BSD
	version
Message-ID: <20171022172631.AEBAE18C0B6@mercury.lcs.mit.edu>

    > From: Dan Cross <crossd at gmail.com>

    > Hope that helps.

I don't have anything to add to this discussion, but may I point out that this
is _exactly_ the kind of thing we'd like to make available at the Computer
History Wiki:

  http://gunkies.org/wiki/Main_Page

I'm too busy with other tasks to add it all myself, but I hope you all will be
able to add your pearls there, where it will be available in an organized way,
rather than having to hope Google/Bing/etc can find it in the list archives
among the megatons of other dross on the Internet.

If anyone would like an account there (due to spam issues, anon editing has
been disabled), please let me know, and I'll get you set up right away - just
send me the account name you like (a lot of us use our old time-sharing system
account names :-), and the email address you'd like associated with it.

	Noel



From clemc at ccc.com  Mon Oct 23 03:44:15 2017
From: clemc at ccc.com (Clem Cole)
Date: Sun, 22 Oct 2017 19:44:15 +0200
Subject: [TUHS] Last officially distributed and currently available BSD
	version
In-Reply-To: <CAEoi9W5BqLzf-6ZU=WtYzhYgGMj3RTi8hvfb_j3jmXGDsdkT6w@mail.gmail.com>
References: <f884b6a5-5c5d-e970-701d-d27c0169ef5e@gmail.com>
 <CAEoi9W4L2fwV3ukXh+7TGy8y5rwT3Rt4hhTYQxBDyMi1WJg1XQ@mail.gmail.com>
 <CAEoi9W55N8sP-Wnkrq=JCi1kuzYfLY8xp_95uhihOFV_xHKO7A@mail.gmail.com>
 <CAEoi9W7zgGWjbn3V--by+C0XvnYfMEUWj=ieF6bFeKxEgRuFJQ@mail.gmail.com>
 <CAEoi9W4B9TQj+Wfm8MXq-VW=qE5WW999HT1hNye=vaAU+YZHSw@mail.gmail.com>
 <CAEoi9W61+WciC=1+kT+vht+krhrHyWRGJfbmTtYb8h6X_SQUCQ@mail.gmail.com>
 <CAEoi9W5bjmB4Xw8vVEu4kDYELtuc8ciGABNNERoBtzwqnJj+ew@mail.gmail.com>
 <CAEoi9W5BqLzf-6ZU=WtYzhYgGMj3RTi8hvfb_j3jmXGDsdkT6w@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <CAC20D2MEz9CdMFxwtrNhXpMsWHcL_weP5Lbby9vXzitPzkLhYw@mail.gmail.com>

On Sun, Oct 22, 2017 at 6:51 PM, Dan Cross <crossd at gmail.com> wrote:

> On Oct 22, 2017 1:39 AM, "Will Senn" <will.senn at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> [...]
> What is the last bootable and installable media, officially distributed by
> Berkeley?
>
> Is that image currently publicly accessible?
>
> What is the closest version, that is currently available, that would match
> the os described in "The Design and Implementation of the 4.4 BSD Operating
> System"?
>
>
> Probably one of the best ways to get questions about installation media
> answered is to simply email Kirk McKusick. He's a really nice guy and will
> probably give you an answer pretty quickly.
>
> That said, of the three distributions you mentioned, bootable/installable
> media only existed for 4.4BSD (also called the "encumbered" distribution).
> -Lite and -Lite2 were "reference distributions."
>
​Right.....​





> It didn't take *too* much work to get -Lite working, but it wasn't
> something that ran out of the box (or more properly, off of the tape).
>
​Pretty much, the idea was that if you have 4.3tahoe or reno system
somewhere, it could build 4.4lite assuming you supplied the few missing
files (which were generally available/findable/reasonably easy to intuit.​




> The original idea was to release 4.4BSD-encumbered to Unix source
> licensees, and at the same time publish 4.4BSD-Lite sans the redacted bits
> as an open source distribution.
>
​Exactly....​  And *lite* would fork off the Academic oriented NetBSD
releases with the academic community doing the support for each system.

My understanding was that the reference hardware at Berkeley was 68030- and
> 68040-based HP 9000 machines,
>
​Sounds right... I thought the encumbered bits worked on CCI, Vaxen (and
possibly SUN1s with the *10 upgrade boards), although might not have been
tested as thoroughly as earlier CSRG releases.


​The 386 bits were the sources of a great deal of issue between CSRG and
Jolitiz.  I was friends with all of the protagonists in that drama so I'm
going to try to be careful what I say here.

There was an 'encumbered' 386 distribution on the ftp site for a long time
although installation was definitely experts only (as I said, I helped with
the original disk support if you read the DDJ articles).  And the spurce of
my previous comments on this mailing list that if you knew about it, you
could get it

These bits are basically the pre-FreeBSD starting point.  FWIW: back in the
day, I had it the running on a Wyse 32:16 for a number of years, and might
still have a backup of it on 1/4" QIC tape; but the HW started to get flaky
and FreeBSD superseded it on other HW and it was not supported.​ I had kept
the boot image around as a reference for a book I was working on at the
time; but eventually just switched to using FreeBSD as the 4.4 'definition'
as it was good enough for what we were doing then.
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From clemc at ccc.com  Mon Oct 23 03:46:41 2017
From: clemc at ccc.com (Clem Cole)
Date: Sun, 22 Oct 2017 19:46:41 +0200
Subject: [TUHS] Conceivably OT: 80s and 90s era CAD software
In-Reply-To: <CACNPpeZHvdaJfX8qhS7RkUyxqESWnsgtYauh-62SDjg96aWVEw@mail.gmail.com>
References: <CACNPpebyNGt2y0GKz9EnY9WSX3oNEEj5CLz-FEmJpkw4V-JjoA@mail.gmail.com>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710221102270.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <CACNPpeZHvdaJfX8qhS7RkUyxqESWnsgtYauh-62SDjg96aWVEw@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <CAC20D2OZbEgzciHh=FmXnvfvb0Q_xdOSCHL3+LX6K9k4SyZfiA@mail.gmail.com>

On Sun, Oct 22, 2017 at 9:53 AM, Wesley Parish <wobblygong at gmail.com> wrote:

> Might be worth asking them if they have any objection to having their
> 80s and 90s releases preserved in the likes of TUHS. It would've been
> built on a BSD-based Unix, I take it?
>
> On 10/22/17, Dave Horsfall <dave at horsfall.org> wrote:
> > On Sat, 21 Oct 2017, Wesley Parish wrote:
> >
> >> I'm wondering, with 80s and 90s era Unix being discussed, if there are
> >> any copies of the 80s and 90s era CAD software extant in some form or
> >> other? (Preferably free to good archive?)
> >
> > Dunno if it counts, but Eagle is still available, hence may not qualify;
> > it kicked off around the late 80s.
> >
> > --
> > Dave Horsfall DTM (VK2KFU)  "Those who don't understand security will
> > suffer."
> >
>

​They are now owned by autocad, I'd not put out a lot of hope.​
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From emu at e-bbes.com  Mon Oct 23 03:00:54 2017
From: emu at e-bbes.com (emanuel stiebler)
Date: Sun, 22 Oct 2017 11:00:54 -0600
Subject: [TUHS] Last officially distributed and currently available BSD
 version
In-Reply-To: <CAEoi9W5BqLzf-6ZU=WtYzhYgGMj3RTi8hvfb_j3jmXGDsdkT6w@mail.gmail.com>
References: <f884b6a5-5c5d-e970-701d-d27c0169ef5e@gmail.com>
 <CAEoi9W4L2fwV3ukXh+7TGy8y5rwT3Rt4hhTYQxBDyMi1WJg1XQ@mail.gmail.com>
 <CAEoi9W55N8sP-Wnkrq=JCi1kuzYfLY8xp_95uhihOFV_xHKO7A@mail.gmail.com>
 <CAEoi9W7zgGWjbn3V--by+C0XvnYfMEUWj=ieF6bFeKxEgRuFJQ@mail.gmail.com>
 <CAEoi9W4B9TQj+Wfm8MXq-VW=qE5WW999HT1hNye=vaAU+YZHSw@mail.gmail.com>
 <CAEoi9W61+WciC=1+kT+vht+krhrHyWRGJfbmTtYb8h6X_SQUCQ@mail.gmail.com>
 <CAEoi9W5bjmB4Xw8vVEu4kDYELtuc8ciGABNNERoBtzwqnJj+ew@mail.gmail.com>
 <CAEoi9W5BqLzf-6ZU=WtYzhYgGMj3RTi8hvfb_j3jmXGDsdkT6w@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <8224db85-74ee-a2e8-d219-e405a00105b7@e-bbes.com>

On 2017-10-22 10:51, Dan Cross wrote:

> At one point, I had a copy of a bootable exabyte tape with 
> 4.4-encumbered installation and source images for SPARC, specifically 
> sun4c machines, that I had liberated from somewhere. My understanding 
> was that the reference hardware at Berkeley was 68030- and 68040-based 
> HP 9000 machines, 

Which models exactly?

> and the SPARC bits were a contribution from Chris 
> Torek. I got -Lite running on an older SPARCstation 1, but it wasn't 
> particularly reliable (the compiler would segfault, and it panic'ed once 
> a day or so), so we put SunOS back on it pretty quickly.
> 
> Hope that helps.
> 
>          - Dan C.
> 
> 
> 



From dave at horsfall.org  Mon Oct 23 06:38:22 2017
From: dave at horsfall.org (Dave Horsfall)
Date: Mon, 23 Oct 2017 07:38:22 +1100 (EST)
Subject: [TUHS] Conceivably OT: 80s and 90s era CAD software
In-Reply-To: <CACNPpeZHvdaJfX8qhS7RkUyxqESWnsgtYauh-62SDjg96aWVEw@mail.gmail.com>
References: <CACNPpebyNGt2y0GKz9EnY9WSX3oNEEj5CLz-FEmJpkw4V-JjoA@mail.gmail.com>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710221102270.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <CACNPpeZHvdaJfX8qhS7RkUyxqESWnsgtYauh-62SDjg96aWVEw@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710230735560.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>

On Sun, 22 Oct 2017, Wesley Parish wrote:

[ Eagle CAD ]

> Might be worth asking them if they have any objection to having their 
> 80s and 90s releases preserved in the likes of TUHS. It would've been 
> built on a BSD-based Unix, I take it?

Our clients used it on old Suns (Sun-2, as I recall), so yeah, BSD (before 
they got infected with SysVile).

-- 
Dave Horsfall DTM (VK2KFU)  "Those who don't understand security will suffer."


From ggm at algebras.org  Mon Oct 23 08:33:23 2017
From: ggm at algebras.org (George Michaelson)
Date: Mon, 23 Oct 2017 08:33:23 +1000
Subject: [TUHS] Conceivably OT: 80s and 90s era CAD software
In-Reply-To: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710230735560.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>
References: <CACNPpebyNGt2y0GKz9EnY9WSX3oNEEj5CLz-FEmJpkw4V-JjoA@mail.gmail.com>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710221102270.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <CACNPpeZHvdaJfX8qhS7RkUyxqESWnsgtYauh-62SDjg96aWVEw@mail.gmail.com>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710230735560.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>
Message-ID: <CAKr6gn2MNYqLNjDhu-y9K8kNxBQ3x=2k=u_EN6dHeNSQEwzXYQ@mail.gmail.com>

possibly the last s/w package I saw which had the regents official
stamp logo in the corner, was the BSD tape of magic/spice. I found it
sort-of pleasing that a s/w suite designed to help make chips, was
being distributed with the same licence (US legal paper, that font..)
as the one used to ship the software used to design and make the
software used to design and make the hardware used to ...

Oh NO! Pooh, thats not honey, thats RECURSION!!!!


On Mon, Oct 23, 2017 at 6:38 AM, Dave Horsfall <dave at horsfall.org> wrote:
> On Sun, 22 Oct 2017, Wesley Parish wrote:
>
> [ Eagle CAD ]
>
>> Might be worth asking them if they have any objection to having their 80s
>> and 90s releases preserved in the likes of TUHS. It would've been built on a
>> BSD-based Unix, I take it?
>
>
> Our clients used it on old Suns (Sun-2, as I recall), so yeah, BSD (before
> they got infected with SysVile).
>
>
> --
> Dave Horsfall DTM (VK2KFU)  "Those who don't understand security will
> suffer."


From doug at cs.dartmouth.edu  Mon Oct 23 09:00:39 2017
From: doug at cs.dartmouth.edu (Doug McIlroy)
Date: Sun, 22 Oct 2017 19:00:39 -0400
Subject: [TUHS] /bin/true (was basic tools / Universal Unix)
Message-ID: <201710222300.v9MN0dN4135736@tahoe.cs.Dartmouth.EDU>

> macOS requires you to have a data section aligned to 4K, even if you
> don't use it. The resulting binary is a little over 8K; again, mostly
> zeros.

Not quite. The classic empty executable file for /bin/true works
on OS X. That is not just a clever trick;it's a natural consequence
of Kernighan's ancient prrecept: do nothing gracefully. Conceivably
the 4K data section is, too--if the page has no physical presence
until it is accessed.

Doug


From crossd at gmail.com  Mon Oct 23 11:11:25 2017
From: crossd at gmail.com (Dan Cross)
Date: Sun, 22 Oct 2017 21:11:25 -0400
Subject: [TUHS] /bin/true (was basic tools / Universal Unix)
In-Reply-To: <201710222300.v9MN0dN4135736@tahoe.cs.Dartmouth.EDU>
References: <201710222300.v9MN0dN4135736@tahoe.cs.Dartmouth.EDU>
Message-ID: <CAEoi9W4e_jp3LQ-haRp037v8u=AgzH4KDfj60+bFq1CxHhHwtQ@mail.gmail.com>

On Sun, Oct 22, 2017 at 7:00 PM, Doug McIlroy <doug at cs.dartmouth.edu> wrote:
>> macOS requires you to have a data section aligned to 4K, even if you
>> don't use it. The resulting binary is a little over 8K; again, mostly
>> zeros.
>
> Not quite. The classic empty executable file for /bin/true works
> on OS X. That is not just a clever trick;it's a natural consequence
> of Kernighan's ancient prrecept: do nothing gracefully. Conceivably
> the 4K data section is, too--if the page has no physical presence
> until it is accessed.

Oh sure! Sorry; the mention of the 4K data section was meant to be
orthogonal to the empty-shell file thing. However, one still cannot
'exec' an empty shell script, even on OS X:

: hurricane; mkdir t
: hurricane; cd t
/Users/dcross/t
: hurricane; touch true
: hurricane; cat>dotrue.c
int main() { execl("./true", "true", 0); write(2, "Boo\n", 4); return 1; }
: hurricane; chmod +x ./true
: hurricane; ./true
: hurricane; echo $?
0
: hurricane; make dotrue
cc     dotrue.c   -o dotrue
dotrue.c:1:14: warning: implicit declaration of function 'execl' is
invalid in C99 [-Wimplicit-function-declaration]
int main() { execl("./true", "true", 0); write(2, "Boo\n", 4); return 1; }
             ^
dotrue.c:1:42: warning: implicit declaration of function 'write' is
invalid in C99 [-Wimplicit-function-declaration]
int main() { execl("./true", "true", 0); write(2, "Boo\n", 4); return 1; }
                                         ^
2 warnings generated.
: hurricane; ./dotrue
Boo
: hurricane; echo $?
1
: hurricane; cp /usr/bin/true .
: hurricane; ./dotrue
: hurricane; echo $?
0
: hurricane; file true
true: Mach-O 64-bit executable x86_64
: hurricane; ls -l true
-rwxr-xr-x  1 dcross  eng  17760 Oct 22 21:08 true
: hurricane; cd ..
/Users/dcross
: hurricane; rm -fr t
: hurricane;

(The system-provided /usr/bin/true is >16KB!!)

        - Dan C.


From crossd at gmail.com  Mon Oct 23 11:13:57 2017
From: crossd at gmail.com (Dan Cross)
Date: Sun, 22 Oct 2017 21:13:57 -0400
Subject: [TUHS] Conceivably OT: 80s and 90s era CAD software: CADroid
In-Reply-To: <7203B20E-3B89-4458-AF86-8202020DA453@ccc.com>
References: <CACNPpebyNGt2y0GKz9EnY9WSX3oNEEj5CLz-FEmJpkw4V-JjoA@mail.gmail.com>
 <BBD79D04-4AD7-46E2-8E23-254DBDC8C899@gmail.com>
 <7203B20E-3B89-4458-AF86-8202020DA453@ccc.com>
Message-ID: <CAEoi9W4ipD_d9m+O3KkaMJvod=nOd-+OsO9rYQ=Z1kjsuCRzXg@mail.gmail.com>

On Sat, Oct 21, 2017 at 1:26 PM, Clem cole <clemc at ccc.com> wrote:
> Warren has the Unix circuit Design system UCSD  from research that Ken used
> for Belle in Unix/Ts aka V7 and v8.  Rob and Bart L updated/replaced with
> something else for the bilt on plan 9 which was after me but the core was
> based on UCSD.  Dan Cross might know more from plan 9 days and I can ask
> Presotto and Bart

While I'm flattered, Clem gives me far too much credit. :-) I'm afraid
I've got no knowledge on the CAD story vis Plan 9. Bart or Dave would
know much more on that, I think.

        - Dan C.


From clemc at ccc.com  Mon Oct 23 17:06:04 2017
From: clemc at ccc.com (Clem cole)
Date: Mon, 23 Oct 2017 09:06:04 +0200
Subject: [TUHS] Conceivably OT: 80s and 90s era CAD software
In-Reply-To: <CAKr6gn2MNYqLNjDhu-y9K8kNxBQ3x=2k=u_EN6dHeNSQEwzXYQ@mail.gmail.com>
References: <CACNPpebyNGt2y0GKz9EnY9WSX3oNEEj5CLz-FEmJpkw4V-JjoA@mail.gmail.com>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710221102270.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <CACNPpeZHvdaJfX8qhS7RkUyxqESWnsgtYauh-62SDjg96aWVEw@mail.gmail.com>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710230735560.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <CAKr6gn2MNYqLNjDhu-y9K8kNxBQ3x=2k=u_EN6dHeNSQEwzXYQ@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <0EA3366B-DF1E-4788-8ABC-2768139613CF@ccc.com>

Actually it was the other way around. The BSD releases were based on earlier work by the ILO (Industrial Laison Office) of EE.  Remember the release of SPICE, SPLICE, MOTIS et al from the EE side predate any BSD release from CS.  Releasing code via ILO was started in the 60 by the real father of the ‘open source’ movement - the late Prof Don Pederson  aka dop by this students.  


As dop used to say we always give away our SW because we get to go in the backdoor and really know what the industrial engineers are doing.  If I sell it (like my other alma mater - CMU liked to do) then I have to go in the front door like any other salesman. 

Anyway when CS put together the original BSD (for 6th edition) the ILO was already there and had the mechanics to license and release things.  CS was part of EE and was able to just use the ILO which they did until CSRG was created a few years after 4.1BSD was released. 

Clem

Sent from my PDP-7 Running UNIX V0 expect things to be almost but not quite. 

> On Oct 23, 2017, at 12:33 AM, George Michaelson <ggm at algebras.org> wrote:
> 
> possibly the last s/w package I saw which had the regents official
> stamp logo in the corner, was the BSD tape of magic/spice. I found it
> sort-of pleasing that a s/w suite designed to help make chips, was
> being distributed with the same licence (US legal paper, that font..)
> as the one used to ship the software used to design and make the
> software used to design and make the hardware used to ...
> 
> Oh NO! Pooh, thats not honey, thats RECURSION!!!!
> 
> 
>> On Mon, Oct 23, 2017 at 6:38 AM, Dave Horsfall <dave at horsfall.org> wrote:
>> On Sun, 22 Oct 2017, Wesley Parish wrote:
>> 
>> [ Eagle CAD ]
>> 
>>> Might be worth asking them if they have any objection to having their 80s
>>> and 90s releases preserved in the likes of TUHS. It would've been built on a
>>> BSD-based Unix, I take it?
>> 
>> 
>> Our clients used it on old Suns (Sun-2, as I recall), so yeah, BSD (before
>> they got infected with SysVile).
>> 
>> 
>> --
>> Dave Horsfall DTM (VK2KFU)  "Those who don't understand security will
>> suffer."


From henry.r.bent at gmail.com  Wed Oct 25 04:53:17 2017
From: henry.r.bent at gmail.com (Henry Bent)
Date: Tue, 24 Oct 2017 14:53:17 -0400
Subject: [TUHS] Last officially distributed and currently available BSD
	version
In-Reply-To: <8224db85-74ee-a2e8-d219-e405a00105b7@e-bbes.com>
References: <f884b6a5-5c5d-e970-701d-d27c0169ef5e@gmail.com>
 <CAEoi9W4L2fwV3ukXh+7TGy8y5rwT3Rt4hhTYQxBDyMi1WJg1XQ@mail.gmail.com>
 <CAEoi9W55N8sP-Wnkrq=JCi1kuzYfLY8xp_95uhihOFV_xHKO7A@mail.gmail.com>
 <CAEoi9W7zgGWjbn3V--by+C0XvnYfMEUWj=ieF6bFeKxEgRuFJQ@mail.gmail.com>
 <CAEoi9W4B9TQj+Wfm8MXq-VW=qE5WW999HT1hNye=vaAU+YZHSw@mail.gmail.com>
 <CAEoi9W61+WciC=1+kT+vht+krhrHyWRGJfbmTtYb8h6X_SQUCQ@mail.gmail.com>
 <CAEoi9W5bjmB4Xw8vVEu4kDYELtuc8ciGABNNERoBtzwqnJj+ew@mail.gmail.com>
 <CAEoi9W5BqLzf-6ZU=WtYzhYgGMj3RTi8hvfb_j3jmXGDsdkT6w@mail.gmail.com>
 <8224db85-74ee-a2e8-d219-e405a00105b7@e-bbes.com>
Message-ID: <CAEdTPBdYptDPsiJkVMBfNoAdZyTG0mEns8WLkTX9o=qaCUVE0A@mail.gmail.com>

On 22 October 2017 at 13:00, emanuel stiebler <emu at e-bbes.com> wrote:

> On 2017-10-22 10:51, Dan Cross wrote:
>
> At one point, I had a copy of a bootable exabyte tape with 4.4-encumbered
>> installation and source images for SPARC, specifically sun4c machines, that
>> I had liberated from somewhere. My understanding was that the reference
>> hardware at Berkeley was 68030- and 68040-based HP 9000 machines,
>>
>
> Which models exactly?
>
>
4.4BSD hp300 DOC/Options mentions the following:

HP320
        Support for old hp320 machines: 16mhz 68020, HP MMU, 16mhz 68881
        and VAC.  Compiles in support for a VAC, HP MMU, and the 98620A
        16-bit DMA channel.  Forces the definition of HAVEVAC.

HP350
        Support for old hp350 machines: 25mhz 68020, HP MMU, 20mhz 68881
        and VAC.  Compiles in support for a VAC and the HP MMU.  Differs
        from HP320 in that it has no support for 16-bit DMA controller.
        Forces the definition of HAVEVAC.

HP330
        Support for old hp330 (and 318/319) machines: 16mhz 68020, 68551
PMMU
        and 16mhz 68881.  Compiles in support for PMMU.

HP360
        Support for old hp360 (and 340) machines: 25mhz 68030+MMU and 25mhz
        68882.  Compiles in support for PMMU and 68030.  Differs from HP330
        in support for 68030 on-chip data cache.

HP370
        Support for old hp370 (and current 345/375/400) machines: 33 (50)
mhz
        68030+MMU and 33 (50) mhz 68882.  Compiles in support for PMMU,
68030
        and off-chip physically addressed cache.  Differs from 360 in only
one
        place, in dealing with flushing the external cache.

HP380
        Support for "current" hp380/425 (and 433) machines: 25 (33) mhz
68040
        with MMU/FPU.  Compiles in support for 68040.

-Henry
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From b4 at gewt.net  Wed Oct 25 05:15:48 2017
From: b4 at gewt.net (Cory Smelosky)
Date: Tue, 24 Oct 2017 12:15:48 -0700
Subject: [TUHS] Last officially distributed and currently available BSD
	version
In-Reply-To: <CAEdTPBdYptDPsiJkVMBfNoAdZyTG0mEns8WLkTX9o=qaCUVE0A@mail.gmail.com>
References: <f884b6a5-5c5d-e970-701d-d27c0169ef5e@gmail.com>
 <CAEoi9W4L2fwV3ukXh+7TGy8y5rwT3Rt4hhTYQxBDyMi1WJg1XQ@mail.gmail.com>
 <CAEoi9W55N8sP-Wnkrq=JCi1kuzYfLY8xp_95uhihOFV_xHKO7A@mail.gmail.com>
 <CAEoi9W7zgGWjbn3V--by+C0XvnYfMEUWj=ieF6bFeKxEgRuFJQ@mail.gmail.com>
 <CAEoi9W4B9TQj+Wfm8MXq-VW=qE5WW999HT1hNye=vaAU+YZHSw@mail.gmail.com>
 <CAEoi9W61+WciC=1+kT+vht+krhrHyWRGJfbmTtYb8h6X_SQUCQ@mail.gmail.com>
 <CAEoi9W5bjmB4Xw8vVEu4kDYELtuc8ciGABNNERoBtzwqnJj+ew@mail.gmail.com>
 <CAEoi9W5BqLzf-6ZU=WtYzhYgGMj3RTi8hvfb_j3jmXGDsdkT6w@mail.gmail.com>
 <8224db85-74ee-a2e8-d219-e405a00105b7@e-bbes.com>
 <CAEdTPBdYptDPsiJkVMBfNoAdZyTG0mEns8WLkTX9o=qaCUVE0A@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <D9712B2B-ABE2-42E1-BA02-DDABEDD0D6E3@gewt.net>

There is a binary 4.4BSD distro from Keith Bostic on the CSRG CD set from McKusick that is built for hp300 - including kernel last I saw.

Sent from my iPhone

> On Oct 24, 2017, at 11:53, Henry Bent <henry.r.bent at gmail.com> wrote:
> 
>> On 22 October 2017 at 13:00, emanuel stiebler <emu at e-bbes.com> wrote:
>> On 2017-10-22 10:51, Dan Cross wrote:
>> 
>>> At one point, I had a copy of a bootable exabyte tape with 4.4-encumbered installation and source images for SPARC, specifically sun4c machines, that I had liberated from somewhere. My understanding was that the reference hardware at Berkeley was 68030- and 68040-based HP 9000 machines, 
>> 
>> Which models exactly?
>> 
> 
> 4.4BSD hp300 DOC/Options mentions the following:
> 
> HP320
>         Support for old hp320 machines: 16mhz 68020, HP MMU, 16mhz 68881
>         and VAC.  Compiles in support for a VAC, HP MMU, and the 98620A
>         16-bit DMA channel.  Forces the definition of HAVEVAC.
> 
> HP350
>         Support for old hp350 machines: 25mhz 68020, HP MMU, 20mhz 68881
>         and VAC.  Compiles in support for a VAC and the HP MMU.  Differs
>         from HP320 in that it has no support for 16-bit DMA controller.
>         Forces the definition of HAVEVAC.
> 
> HP330
>         Support for old hp330 (and 318/319) machines: 16mhz 68020, 68551 PMMU
>         and 16mhz 68881.  Compiles in support for PMMU.
> 
> HP360
>         Support for old hp360 (and 340) machines: 25mhz 68030+MMU and 25mhz
>         68882.  Compiles in support for PMMU and 68030.  Differs from HP330
>         in support for 68030 on-chip data cache.
> 
> HP370
>         Support for old hp370 (and current 345/375/400) machines: 33 (50) mhz
>         68030+MMU and 33 (50) mhz 68882.  Compiles in support for PMMU, 68030
>         and off-chip physically addressed cache.  Differs from 360 in only one
>         place, in dealing with flushing the external cache.
> 
> HP380
>         Support for "current" hp380/425 (and 433) machines: 25 (33) mhz 68040
>         with MMU/FPU.  Compiles in support for 68040.
> 
> -Henry
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From crossd at gmail.com  Wed Oct 25 12:51:17 2017
From: crossd at gmail.com (Dan Cross)
Date: Tue, 24 Oct 2017 22:51:17 -0400
Subject: [TUHS] Charles Forsyth on putting Unix on a diet.
Message-ID: <CAEoi9W7LBMZ3ZC-uy8Z2d-dg6NFubdmArBNqNkj0RgS5pY7baw@mail.gmail.com>

I've always enjoyed this paper; recently I found occasion to thumb
through it again. I thought I'd pass it on; I'm curious what some on
the list think about this given their first-hand knowledge of relevant
history (Larry, I'm looking at you; especially with respect his
comments on the VM system).

        - Dan C.

http://www.terzarima.net/doc/taste.pdf


From lm at mcvoy.com  Wed Oct 25 13:14:17 2017
From: lm at mcvoy.com (Larry McVoy)
Date: Tue, 24 Oct 2017 20:14:17 -0700
Subject: [TUHS] Charles Forsyth on putting Unix on a diet.
In-Reply-To: <CAEoi9W7LBMZ3ZC-uy8Z2d-dg6NFubdmArBNqNkj0RgS5pY7baw@mail.gmail.com>
References: <CAEoi9W7LBMZ3ZC-uy8Z2d-dg6NFubdmArBNqNkj0RgS5pY7baw@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <20171025031417.GH9660@mcvoy.com>

I'm in the middle of a family medical thing, I glanced it this, it looks
like it has merit.  Give me some time, if I'm the Larry you meant, maybe
I'm yapping and I have no place to be talking.  I'll give it a read either
way, I love stuff like this.

On Tue, Oct 24, 2017 at 10:51:17PM -0400, Dan Cross wrote:
> I've always enjoyed this paper; recently I found occasion to thumb
> through it again. I thought I'd pass it on; I'm curious what some on
> the list think about this given their first-hand knowledge of relevant
> history (Larry, I'm looking at you; especially with respect his
> comments on the VM system).
> 
>         - Dan C.
> 
> http://www.terzarima.net/doc/taste.pdf

-- 
---
Larry McVoy            	     lm at mcvoy.com             http://www.mcvoy.com/lm 


From doug at cs.dartmouth.edu  Fri Oct 27 00:57:48 2017
From: doug at cs.dartmouth.edu (Doug McIlroy)
Date: Thu, 26 Oct 2017 10:57:48 -0400
Subject: [TUHS] Charles Forsyth on putting Unix on a diet.
Message-ID: <201710261457.v9QEvmqr013778@coolidge.cs.Dartmouth.EDU>

As an admirer of minimalism, who has given talks that extol
Norman Wilson's streamlining of research Unix, I naturally
like Forsythe's thesis.

I noticed unintended irony in one more or less throw-away remark:
"It is dangerous to place too much hope in any improvement coming from just
following new fashions, if we lack insight into what really went wrong
before. Without that insight, I suspect that rewriting UNIX in C++,
for example, could easily become an excuse for increasing complexity
(because by using C++ `we can handle more complexity')."

Bjarne Stroustrup's avowed reason for building cfront, which 
evolved into C++, was to have a tool for building an operating
system in object-oriented style. The tool took on a life of
its own, and arguably became more complex than the old-fashioned
Unix he aspired to improve on.

Doug


From lm at mcvoy.com  Fri Oct 27 03:27:35 2017
From: lm at mcvoy.com (Larry McVoy)
Date: Thu, 26 Oct 2017 10:27:35 -0700
Subject: [TUHS] Charles Forsyth on putting Unix on a diet.
In-Reply-To: <CAEoi9W7LBMZ3ZC-uy8Z2d-dg6NFubdmArBNqNkj0RgS5pY7baw@mail.gmail.com>
References: <CAEoi9W7LBMZ3ZC-uy8Z2d-dg6NFubdmArBNqNkj0RgS5pY7baw@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <20171026172735.GG3206@mcvoy.com>

On Tue, Oct 24, 2017 at 10:51:17PM -0400, Dan Cross wrote:
> I've always enjoyed this paper; recently I found occasion to thumb
> through it again. I thought I'd pass it on; I'm curious what some on
> the list think about this given their first-hand knowledge of relevant
> history (Larry, I'm looking at you; especially with respect his
> comments on the VM system).
> 
>         - Dan C.
> 
> http://www.terzarima.net/doc/taste.pdf

OK, I've read it.  This could have been a great paper if he had included
some performance results.  As it is, I'm sorry that his ideas didn't take
hold, or at least get some discussion.

The paging stuff is neat but it doesn't address the file system page cache
so far as I tell.  It's process based so unless the process had the file
mmap-ed it wouldn't take care of it.  And mmap didn't exist at the time,
so I'm not sure how he handed the page cache.  

He was fixated on code size, and yeah, on 4MB machines, you need to
be even on 8 you need to be (at Sun we called EMACS Eight Megs And
Constantly Swapping).  But I'd like to know if his paging scheme worked.
I went through a period where I wrote over a dozen different pageout
daemons in an effort to do a better job; none did.  They had certain
use cases where they did better but then other work loads made them
perform worse.  That global pageout daemon is still around, it's
depressingly hard to do better than that.  If he succeeded it would
be nice to have numbers.

His pageout scheme could have all forward pointers if he had them in
the vnode along with the process.

I agree with him on fork, there is no reason not do do vfork in fork
that I can think of (other than wnj's hack of putting stats in the 
parent process by the child in csh and that was just gross).

His comments on the file system switch vs VFS sort of miss the point
that the VFS was put in place to allow file systems that don't have
Unix semantics (NFS being the biggest example).  But I agree that 
there perhaps could have been a better approach, this is why it 
would have been nice to have his stuff get a broader audience.

I disagree on the streams/STREAMS stuff, that shit has no place in
anything that wants performance.  I'm working with netflix, trying
to do better than this:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15367421

which is a discussion of their writeup of how they managed to push
~100Gbit/sec of movies on a single machine.  Sticking STREAMS in the
middle of that was a bad idea back in the day and a worse idea today.

But all in all, an interesting paper.  It's pretty amazing how many of
the people in the references I know, lots of them I've worked with, Steve
Kleiman was my mentor at Sun, Rosenthal and I had tons of OS discussions.
I toyed with going to HP Labs to work with John Wilkes, etc.  Definitely
a trip down memory lane and makes me feel super lucky to have gotten to
work with people of that caliber.

Thanks for the pointer.

--lm


From ggm at algebras.org  Fri Oct 27 08:07:29 2017
From: ggm at algebras.org (George Michaelson)
Date: Fri, 27 Oct 2017 08:07:29 +1000
Subject: [TUHS] Charles Forsyth on putting Unix on a diet.
In-Reply-To: <201710261457.v9QEvmqr013778@coolidge.cs.Dartmouth.EDU>
References: <201710261457.v9QEvmqr013778@coolidge.cs.Dartmouth.EDU>
Message-ID: <CAKr6gn2PwwUU2oM_C+ABXySEOYeb2_OXa0S7dYav6WHt3KeN7Q@mail.gmail.com>

wish I hadn't read "Norman Wilson" as "Norman Wisdom" (british
prat-fall comedian in the style of Jerry Lewis)

On Fri, Oct 27, 2017 at 12:57 AM, Doug McIlroy <doug at cs.dartmouth.edu> wrote:
> As an admirer of minimalism, who has given talks that extol
> Norman Wilson's streamlining of research Unix, I naturally
> like Forsythe's thesis.


From ggm at algebras.org  Fri Oct 27 08:12:32 2017
From: ggm at algebras.org (George Michaelson)
Date: Fri, 27 Oct 2017 08:12:32 +1000
Subject: [TUHS] Charles Forsyth on putting Unix on a diet.
In-Reply-To: <20171026172735.GG3206@mcvoy.com>
References: <CAEoi9W7LBMZ3ZC-uy8Z2d-dg6NFubdmArBNqNkj0RgS5pY7baw@mail.gmail.com>
 <20171026172735.GG3206@mcvoy.com>
Message-ID: <CAKr6gn1dCHk5yr0B5-__835barSYLk28S4n3MiVWzbbSwvN=TA@mail.gmail.com>

I worked with Charles in the University of York. he's the guy who said
to me "how can it be simple, if the printout is half an inch thick"
about SMTP.

Charles also enjoyed himself: fancy dress, he had a full on Sun-King
court suit made, to go with his huge head of hair. This, in york, a
city of red-brick terraced houses, back-to-backs, and beer. Louis XIV
walking down t' road for a pint...

I think when he implemented streams in one or two pages of text from
the BLTJ article, and then sighed at the size of STREAMS when it came
to life.. says it all.  he was very very strong on a reductionist
'size matters' world view. His editor of choice in 1984 was ed, with a
command macro to repaint -22 + 22 about the . line.

(I hasten to add, Charles and I worked in totally different areas, and
I use the term "worked" in regards to myself with some trepidation)

On Fri, Oct 27, 2017 at 3:27 AM, Larry McVoy <lm at mcvoy.com> wrote:
> On Tue, Oct 24, 2017 at 10:51:17PM -0400, Dan Cross wrote:
>> I've always enjoyed this paper; recently I found occasion to thumb
>> through it again. I thought I'd pass it on; I'm curious what some on
>> the list think about this given their first-hand knowledge of relevant
>> history (Larry, I'm looking at you; especially with respect his
>> comments on the VM system).
>>
>>         - Dan C.
>>
>> http://www.terzarima.net/doc/taste.pdf
>
> OK, I've read it.  This could have been a great paper if he had included
> some performance results.  As it is, I'm sorry that his ideas didn't take
> hold, or at least get some discussion.
>
> The paging stuff is neat but it doesn't address the file system page cache
> so far as I tell.  It's process based so unless the process had the file
> mmap-ed it wouldn't take care of it.  And mmap didn't exist at the time,
> so I'm not sure how he handed the page cache.
>
> He was fixated on code size, and yeah, on 4MB machines, you need to
> be even on 8 you need to be (at Sun we called EMACS Eight Megs And
> Constantly Swapping).  But I'd like to know if his paging scheme worked.
> I went through a period where I wrote over a dozen different pageout
> daemons in an effort to do a better job; none did.  They had certain
> use cases where they did better but then other work loads made them
> perform worse.  That global pageout daemon is still around, it's
> depressingly hard to do better than that.  If he succeeded it would
> be nice to have numbers.
>
> His pageout scheme could have all forward pointers if he had them in
> the vnode along with the process.
>
> I agree with him on fork, there is no reason not do do vfork in fork
> that I can think of (other than wnj's hack of putting stats in the
> parent process by the child in csh and that was just gross).
>
> His comments on the file system switch vs VFS sort of miss the point
> that the VFS was put in place to allow file systems that don't have
> Unix semantics (NFS being the biggest example).  But I agree that
> there perhaps could have been a better approach, this is why it
> would have been nice to have his stuff get a broader audience.
>
> I disagree on the streams/STREAMS stuff, that shit has no place in
> anything that wants performance.  I'm working with netflix, trying
> to do better than this:
>
> https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15367421
>
> which is a discussion of their writeup of how they managed to push
> ~100Gbit/sec of movies on a single machine.  Sticking STREAMS in the
> middle of that was a bad idea back in the day and a worse idea today.
>
> But all in all, an interesting paper.  It's pretty amazing how many of
> the people in the references I know, lots of them I've worked with, Steve
> Kleiman was my mentor at Sun, Rosenthal and I had tons of OS discussions.
> I toyed with going to HP Labs to work with John Wilkes, etc.  Definitely
> a trip down memory lane and makes me feel super lucky to have gotten to
> work with people of that caliber.
>
> Thanks for the pointer.
>
> --lm


From usotsuki at buric.co  Fri Oct 27 13:49:29 2017
From: usotsuki at buric.co (Steve Nickolas)
Date: Thu, 26 Oct 2017 23:49:29 -0400 (EDT)
Subject: [TUHS] Charles Forsyth on putting Unix on a diet.
In-Reply-To: <CAKr6gn1dCHk5yr0B5-__835barSYLk28S4n3MiVWzbbSwvN=TA@mail.gmail.com>
References: <CAEoi9W7LBMZ3ZC-uy8Z2d-dg6NFubdmArBNqNkj0RgS5pY7baw@mail.gmail.com>
 <20171026172735.GG3206@mcvoy.com>
 <CAKr6gn1dCHk5yr0B5-__835barSYLk28S4n3MiVWzbbSwvN=TA@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710262340520.70332@frieza.hoshinet.org>

On Fri, 27 Oct 2017, George Michaelson wrote:

> I worked with Charles in the University of York. he's the guy who said
> to me "how can it be simple, if the printout is half an inch thick"
> about SMTP.
>
> Charles also enjoyed himself: fancy dress, he had a full on Sun-King
> court suit made, to go with his huge head of hair. This, in york, a
> city of red-brick terraced houses, back-to-backs, and beer. Louis XIV
> walking down t' road for a pint...

This is that guy who did the clone of the v7 Bourne shell that used to be 
used in Minix and PicoBSD and was the basis of pdksh?

(There was, actually, a Korn shell clone for MS-DOS and OS/2 based on it.)

> I think when he implemented streams in one or two pages of text from
> the BLTJ article, and then sighed at the size of STREAMS when it came
> to life.. says it all.  he was very very strong on a reductionist
> 'size matters' world view. His editor of choice in 1984 was ed, with a
> command macro to repaint -22 + 22 about the . line.

I personally believe a lot of code in modern operating systems is larger 
than the task requires.

-uso.


From arnold at skeeve.com  Fri Oct 27 16:55:04 2017
From: arnold at skeeve.com (arnold at skeeve.com)
Date: Fri, 27 Oct 2017 00:55:04 -0600
Subject: [TUHS] Charles Forsyth on putting Unix on a diet.
In-Reply-To: <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710262340520.70332@frieza.hoshinet.org>
References: <CAEoi9W7LBMZ3ZC-uy8Z2d-dg6NFubdmArBNqNkj0RgS5pY7baw@mail.gmail.com>
 <20171026172735.GG3206@mcvoy.com>
 <CAKr6gn1dCHk5yr0B5-__835barSYLk28S4n3MiVWzbbSwvN=TA@mail.gmail.com>
 <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710262340520.70332@frieza.hoshinet.org>
Message-ID: <201710270655.v9R6t44U016411@freefriends.org>

Steve Nickolas <usotsuki at buric.co> wrote:

> On Fri, 27 Oct 2017, George Michaelson wrote:
>
> > I worked with Charles in the University of York. he's the guy who said
> > to me "how can it be simple, if the printout is half an inch thick"
> > about SMTP.
> >
> > ....
>
> This is that guy who did the clone of the v7 Bourne shell that used to be 
> used in Minix and PicoBSD and was the basis of pdksh?

Yes.

Charles is still very active in the Plan 9 world. I don't know if he
still prefers ed over sam or Acme though. :-)

Arnold


From dfawcus+lists-tuhs at employees.org  Fri Oct 27 17:30:55 2017
From: dfawcus+lists-tuhs at employees.org (Derek Fawcus)
Date: Fri, 27 Oct 2017 08:30:55 +0100
Subject: [TUHS] Charles Forsyth on putting Unix on a diet.
In-Reply-To: <20171026172735.GG3206@mcvoy.com>
References: <CAEoi9W7LBMZ3ZC-uy8Z2d-dg6NFubdmArBNqNkj0RgS5pY7baw@mail.gmail.com>
 <20171026172735.GG3206@mcvoy.com>
Message-ID: <20171027073055.GA66865@accordion.employees.org>

On Thu, Oct 26, 2017 at 10:27:35AM -0700, Larry McVoy wrote:
> > http://www.terzarima.net/doc/taste.pdf
> 
> OK, I've read it.  This could have been a great paper if he had included
> some performance results.

Well, once could always ask him if he still has such; since he tends to hang
out on the 9fans list.  I believe his address may be charles.forsyth at gmail.com,
(but I don't have a recent message to verify against).

DF


From davida at pobox.com  Fri Oct 27 19:44:51 2017
From: davida at pobox.com (David Arnold)
Date: Fri, 27 Oct 2017 20:44:51 +1100
Subject: [TUHS] Charles Forsyth on putting Unix on a diet.
In-Reply-To: <20171027073055.GA66865@accordion.employees.org>
References: <CAEoi9W7LBMZ3ZC-uy8Z2d-dg6NFubdmArBNqNkj0RgS5pY7baw@mail.gmail.com>
 <20171026172735.GG3206@mcvoy.com>
 <20171027073055.GA66865@accordion.employees.org>
Message-ID: <B6BC7CC8-1742-4680-92A6-635847DE924E@pobox.com>

He last posted from that address on 18th October. 



d

> On 27 Oct 2017, at 18:30, Derek Fawcus <dfawcus+lists-tuhs at employees.org> wrote:
> 
> On Thu, Oct 26, 2017 at 10:27:35AM -0700, Larry McVoy wrote:
>>> http://www.terzarima.net/doc/taste.pdf
>> 
>> OK, I've read it.  This could have been a great paper if he had included
>> some performance results.
> 
> Well, once could always ask him if he still has such; since he tends to hang
> out on the 9fans list.  I believe his address may be charles.forsyth at gmail.com,
> (but I don't have a recent message to verify against).
> 
> DF



From jnc at mercury.lcs.mit.edu  Fri Oct 27 20:36:48 2017
From: jnc at mercury.lcs.mit.edu (Noel Chiappa)
Date: Fri, 27 Oct 2017 06:36:48 -0400 (EDT)
Subject: [TUHS] Charles Forsyth on putting Unix on a diet.
Message-ID: <20171027103648.4030118C08A@mercury.lcs.mit.edu>

    > From: Steve Nickolas

    > I personally believe a lot of code in modern operating systems is larger
    > than the task requires.

The "operating" is superfluous.

    Noel


From clemc at ccc.com  Fri Oct 27 23:03:39 2017
From: clemc at ccc.com (Clem Cole)
Date: Fri, 27 Oct 2017 09:03:39 -0400
Subject: [TUHS] Charles Forsyth on putting Unix on a diet.
In-Reply-To: <20171027103648.4030118C08A@mercury.lcs.mit.edu>
References: <20171027103648.4030118C08A@mercury.lcs.mit.edu>
Message-ID: <CAC20D2MEkvO_yOYjiR0_reL7VB=GmtHS0RTGCBEf56_ZWPc7Ew@mail.gmail.com>

And to simplify that ...  s/operating systems/SW/


On Fri, Oct 27, 2017 at 6:36 AM, Noel Chiappa <jnc at mercury.lcs.mit.edu>
wrote:

>     > From: Steve Nickolas
>
>     > I personally believe a lot of code in modern operating systems is
> larger
>     > than the task requires.
>
> The "operating" is superfluous.
>
>     Noel
>
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From usotsuki at buric.co  Fri Oct 27 23:23:44 2017
From: usotsuki at buric.co (Steve Nickolas)
Date: Fri, 27 Oct 2017 09:23:44 -0400 (EDT)
Subject: [TUHS] Charles Forsyth on putting Unix on a diet.
In-Reply-To: <CAC20D2MEkvO_yOYjiR0_reL7VB=GmtHS0RTGCBEf56_ZWPc7Ew@mail.gmail.com>
References: <20171027103648.4030118C08A@mercury.lcs.mit.edu>
 <CAC20D2MEkvO_yOYjiR0_reL7VB=GmtHS0RTGCBEf56_ZWPc7Ew@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710270922200.5457@frieza.hoshinet.org>

On Fri, 27 Oct 2017, Clem Cole wrote:

> And to simplify that ...  s/operating systems/SW/

Well, yeah.  Has M$ Word even really gotten much in the way of new 
features since version 6 in the early 1990s?  But it's sure gotten 
bigger... And that seems the way of software in general.

-uso.


From norman at oclsc.org  Sat Oct 28 07:30:43 2017
From: norman at oclsc.org (Norman Wilson)
Date: Fri, 27 Oct 2017 17:30:43 -0400
Subject: [TUHS] Charles Forsyth on putting Unix on a diet.
Message-ID: <1509139846.20661.for-standards-violators@oclsc.org>

George Michaelson:

  wish I hadn't read "Norman Wilson" as "Norman Wisdom" (british
  prat-fall comedian in the style of Jerry Lewis)

===

It's much better than the more-common typo in which
people call me normal.  Neither accurate nor an
aspiration.

Norman Wilson
Toronto ON


From dave at horsfall.org  Sat Oct 28 07:43:27 2017
From: dave at horsfall.org (Dave Horsfall)
Date: Sat, 28 Oct 2017 08:43:27 +1100 (EST)
Subject: [TUHS] Charles Forsyth on putting Unix on a diet.
In-Reply-To: <CAC20D2MEkvO_yOYjiR0_reL7VB=GmtHS0RTGCBEf56_ZWPc7Ew@mail.gmail.com>
References: <20171027103648.4030118C08A@mercury.lcs.mit.edu>
 <CAC20D2MEkvO_yOYjiR0_reL7VB=GmtHS0RTGCBEf56_ZWPc7Ew@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710280839140.30357@aneurin.horsfall.org>

On Fri, 27 Oct 2017, Clem Cole wrote:

> And to simplify that ...  s/operating systems/SW/

Not to mention HW...  I know how a POTS telephone works, but a cellular? 
Only vaguely...  Ditto B/W television vs. colour.  And I stopped 
maintaining my own cars years ago; about the onpy thing I recognise under 
the bonnet these days is the engine.

-- 
Dave Horsfall DTM (VK2KFU)  "Those who don't understand security will suffer."

From akosela at andykosela.com  Sat Oct 28 07:51:12 2017
From: akosela at andykosela.com (Andy Kosela)
Date: Fri, 27 Oct 2017 23:51:12 +0200
Subject: [TUHS] Charles Forsyth on putting Unix on a diet.
In-Reply-To: <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710270922200.5457@frieza.hoshinet.org>
References: <20171027103648.4030118C08A@mercury.lcs.mit.edu>
 <CAC20D2MEkvO_yOYjiR0_reL7VB=GmtHS0RTGCBEf56_ZWPc7Ew@mail.gmail.com>
 <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710270922200.5457@frieza.hoshinet.org>
Message-ID: <CALMnNGiKFq4UpdOxqoit1+24vakP=qH6bn+PsQxtApSQOVKOXg@mail.gmail.com>

On Friday, October 27, 2017, Steve Nickolas <usotsuki at buric.co> wrote:

> On Fri, 27 Oct 2017, Clem Cole wrote:
>
> And to simplify that ...  s/operating systems/SW/
>>
>
> Well, yeah.  Has M$ Word even really gotten much in the way of new
> features since version 6 in the early 1990s?  But it's sure gotten
> bigger... And that seems the way of software in general.
>
>
We don't even have to look at M$.  We can look at our own backyard and find
the same pattern.  UNIX in the 70s was small and simple, the same way Linux
kernel was small and simple in the early 90s.  Now it is a bloated,
fat monster.

It seems that it is very hard to avoid bloat in the software world in the
long run.  Most people don't care, but the original UNIX and C, Plan 9 and
Go projects could be one of the few I can think of that really cared about
minimalism.  It is interesting to note that they were built by the
very same group of people.

Minimalism is the main word here.  If you read personal website of Charles
Forsyth then you will notice he mentions it explicitly as his "overarching
theme".  That is the secret key to beauty and elegance in the software
world.

--Andy
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From torek at elf.torek.net  Sat Oct 28 08:49:40 2017
From: torek at elf.torek.net (Chris Torek)
Date: Fri, 27 Oct 2017 15:49:40 -0700 (PDT)
Subject: [TUHS] Charles Forsyth on putting Unix on a diet.
In-Reply-To: <1509139846.20661.for-standards-violators@oclsc.org>
Message-ID: <201710272249.v9RMneMW006785@elf.torek.net>

>It's much better than the more-common typo in which
>people call me normal.  Neither accurate nor an
>aspiration.

You're not perpendicular to your own surface?  :-)

Chris


From lm at mcvoy.com  Sat Oct 28 09:04:10 2017
From: lm at mcvoy.com (Larry McVoy)
Date: Fri, 27 Oct 2017 16:04:10 -0700
Subject: [TUHS] Charles Forsyth on putting Unix on a diet.
In-Reply-To: <CALMnNGiKFq4UpdOxqoit1+24vakP=qH6bn+PsQxtApSQOVKOXg@mail.gmail.com>
References: <20171027103648.4030118C08A@mercury.lcs.mit.edu>
 <CAC20D2MEkvO_yOYjiR0_reL7VB=GmtHS0RTGCBEf56_ZWPc7Ew@mail.gmail.com>
 <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710270922200.5457@frieza.hoshinet.org>
 <CALMnNGiKFq4UpdOxqoit1+24vakP=qH6bn+PsQxtApSQOVKOXg@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <20171027230410.GG6118@mcvoy.com>

On Fri, Oct 27, 2017 at 11:51:12PM +0200, Andy Kosela wrote:
> It seems that it is very hard to avoid bloat in the software world in the
> long run.  Most people don't care, but the original UNIX and C, Plan 9 and
> Go projects could be one of the few I can think of that really cared about
> minimalism.  

We cared.  We being the BitKeeper guys.  

BK as of 2002 (bk-2.0.5):
33 documented commands
wc *.c
  67633  225563 1565556 total

BK as of 15 years later (bk-7.3.2)
165 documented commands
wc *.c
 125812  444197 3017977 total

So we doubled in size for all the built in commands but we had 5x as many
commands.  A huge amount of functionality over the bk-2.x era.

The only way we did that was by encouraging and rewarding commits that took
out as much as they put in.

It's possible but you have to be disciplined.

--lm


From steve at quintile.net  Sat Oct 28 09:15:29 2017
From: steve at quintile.net (Steve Simon)
Date: Sat, 28 Oct 2017 00:15:29 +0100
Subject: [TUHS] Charles Forsyth on putting Unix on a diet.
In-Reply-To: <20171027230410.GG6118@mcvoy.com>
Message-ID: <ae850e26da050f28a43ba0f3793c93dc@quintile.net>

RE: minimalism

It was put to me that there is a big difference between
complicated and complex.

Complexity may be necessary to deal with difficult problems.
But the solution, built on the complex framework should never
be complicated.

Perhaps I am splitting semantic hairs but the description
appealed to me.

-Steve


From tfb at tfeb.org  Sat Oct 28 09:39:20 2017
From: tfb at tfeb.org (Tim Bradshaw)
Date: Sat, 28 Oct 2017 00:39:20 +0100
Subject: [TUHS] Charles Forsyth on putting Unix on a diet.
In-Reply-To: <ae850e26da050f28a43ba0f3793c93dc@quintile.net>
References: <ae850e26da050f28a43ba0f3793c93dc@quintile.net>
Message-ID: <2FB588AE-7017-4DFE-AE6D-1FA3BB5C470F@tfeb.org>

> On 28 Oct 2017, at 00:15, Steve Simon <steve at quintile.net> wrote:
> 
> It was put to me that there is a big difference between
> complicated and complex.
> 
> Complexity may be necessary to deal with difficult problems.
> But the solution, built on the complex framework should never
> be complicated.

This is half-way (and perhaps more than that) to what the 'worse is better' paper would call 'the MIT approach'.  I think it's fairly obviously the right thing, and equally obviously almost never done.

--tim


From bakul at bitblocks.com  Sat Oct 28 12:00:44 2017
From: bakul at bitblocks.com (Bakul Shah)
Date: Fri, 27 Oct 2017 19:00:44 -0700
Subject: [TUHS] Charles Forsyth on putting Unix on a diet.
In-Reply-To: Your message of "Fri, 27 Oct 2017 23:51:12 +0200."
 <CALMnNGiKFq4UpdOxqoit1+24vakP=qH6bn+PsQxtApSQOVKOXg@mail.gmail.com>
References: <20171027103648.4030118C08A@mercury.lcs.mit.edu>
 <CAC20D2MEkvO_yOYjiR0_reL7VB=GmtHS0RTGCBEf56_ZWPc7Ew@mail.gmail.com>
 <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710270922200.5457@frieza.hoshinet.org>
 <CALMnNGiKFq4UpdOxqoit1+24vakP=qH6bn+PsQxtApSQOVKOXg@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <20171028020100.26A50156E7D7@mail.bitblocks.com>

On Fri, 27 Oct 2017 23:51:12 +0200 Andy Kosela <akosela at andykosela.com> wrote:
> We don't even have to look at M$.  We can look at our own backyard and find
> the same pattern.  UNIX in the 70s was small and simple, the same way Linux
> kernel was small and simple in the early 90s.  Now it is a bloated,
> fat monster.
> 
> It seems that it is very hard to avoid bloat in the software world in the
> long run.  Most people don't care, but the original UNIX and C, Plan 9 and
> Go projects could be one of the few I can think of that really cared about
> minimalism.  It is interesting to note that they were built by the
> very same group of people.
> 
> Minimalism is the main word here.  If you read personal website of Charles
> Forsyth then you will notice he mentions it explicitly as his "overarching
> theme".  That is the secret key to beauty and elegance in the software
> world.

Minimalism as a goal has been long lost in the Unix world.
(Well, everywhere but at least Unix started out lean). Even
the generic FreeBSD kernel is 20MB or so (txtsize).  When you
add in all the loadable kernel modules, it is about 52MB[1].
Linux is of course more bloated. Plan9 is quite lean but other
than a few diehard fans no one uses it. Worse, its leanness
lessons have not been learned by any other OS.

I wish there was a way to evolve plan9 into a modern Unix.
Making an existing modern Unix diet into a lean OS is close to
impossible.

A unix kernel boils down to a few subsystems: device drivers +
device switch, scheduling, VM, networking and network switch,
filesystems + filesystem switch, interrupt handling, process
management. Some graphics support. A bunch of this can be
pushed out of the kernel without much loss of efficiency.  And
may be the original design decisions of Unix need to be
revisited for 21st century hardware.

A comment on Charles Forsyth's paper. I saw most of his work
as essentially re-engineering (or perhaps just engineering).
This is actually pretty important and something we don't seem
to pay a lot of attention to. It is improving the fit and
finish of parts so that they fit well together. It is making
it easy to take things apart or put them together well.  It is
making diagnosis and repair easy.  Make reproducibiliy easy
etc. But we don't have a clear idea of what metrics to focus
on that will help this engineering.  Performance? Number of
lines of code?  Latency?  Energy used?  Maintainability?
Extensibility?  Curiously, what is most tangible to me not
what can be measured but a sense of aesthetics.

Bakul

[1] FreeBSD has some strange things: if_bxe.ko (for the Qlogic
10GBe card) is 2+ MB (larger than zfs.ko)! May be due to
proprietary binary blobs? The next after zfs is a driver for
another Qlogic card.


From lyndon at orthanc.ca  Sat Oct 28 12:34:11 2017
From: lyndon at orthanc.ca (Lyndon Nerenberg)
Date: Fri, 27 Oct 2017 19:34:11 -0700
Subject: [TUHS] Charles Forsyth on putting Unix on a diet.
In-Reply-To: <20171028020100.26A50156E7D7@mail.bitblocks.com>
References: <20171027103648.4030118C08A@mercury.lcs.mit.edu>
 <CAC20D2MEkvO_yOYjiR0_reL7VB=GmtHS0RTGCBEf56_ZWPc7Ew@mail.gmail.com>
 <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710270922200.5457@frieza.hoshinet.org>
 <CALMnNGiKFq4UpdOxqoit1+24vakP=qH6bn+PsQxtApSQOVKOXg@mail.gmail.com>
 <20171028020100.26A50156E7D7@mail.bitblocks.com>
Message-ID: <921D6FFC-DD60-406F-B90E-EC40DB638624@orthanc.ca>

> I wish there was a way to evolve plan9 into a modern Unix.
> Making an existing modern Unix diet into a lean OS is close to
> impossible.

But if you try to turn Plan9 into a lean UNIX, you lose everything that Plan9 advocates.  In particular, I don't see how you can possibly integrate namespaces into UNIX in any meaningful way.  Without those, it's no longer Plan9, and therefore a pointless endeavour.

> A unix kernel boils down to a few subsystems: device drivers +
> device switch, scheduling, VM, networking and network switch,
> filesystems + filesystem switch, interrupt handling, process
> management. Some graphics support. A bunch of this can be
> pushed out of the kernel without much loss of efficiency.  And
> may be the original design decisions of Unix need to be
> revisited for 21st century hardware.

The release of the 10th Edition UNIX source is much more enlightening.  Here you can see a fully functional UNIX with what, 29?, system calls?  And you can see the genesis of many of the Plan9 concepts (/proc, dial(), mk, mux, etc).

--lyndon



From lyndon at orthanc.ca  Sat Oct 28 12:42:28 2017
From: lyndon at orthanc.ca (Lyndon Nerenberg)
Date: Fri, 27 Oct 2017 19:42:28 -0700
Subject: [TUHS] Charles Forsyth on putting Unix on a diet.
In-Reply-To: <921D6FFC-DD60-406F-B90E-EC40DB638624@orthanc.ca>
References: <20171027103648.4030118C08A@mercury.lcs.mit.edu>
 <CAC20D2MEkvO_yOYjiR0_reL7VB=GmtHS0RTGCBEf56_ZWPc7Ew@mail.gmail.com>
 <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710270922200.5457@frieza.hoshinet.org>
 <CALMnNGiKFq4UpdOxqoit1+24vakP=qH6bn+PsQxtApSQOVKOXg@mail.gmail.com>
 <20171028020100.26A50156E7D7@mail.bitblocks.com>
 <921D6FFC-DD60-406F-B90E-EC40DB638624@orthanc.ca>
Message-ID: <34B45923-EA5D-47C9-BF73-90AECEB87171@orthanc.ca>


> On Oct 27, 2017, at 7:34 PM, Lyndon Nerenberg <lyndon at orthanc.ca> wrote:
> 
> But if you try to turn Plan9 into a lean UNIX, you lose everything that Plan9 advocates.  In particular, I don't see how you can possibly integrate namespaces into UNIX in any meaningful way.  Without those, it's no longer Plan9, and therefore a pointless endeavour.

But as a thought experiment, I have long wondered how one might approach the UNIX kernel with the view of removing ioctl(2).  What would the aftermath look like?  That's probably the most invasive attack Plan9 could take on UNIX.  It would be very interesting to see what falls out.  It might be practical to attempt this with 10th Edition, just to see ...

--lyndon



From bakul at bitblocks.com  Sat Oct 28 16:38:23 2017
From: bakul at bitblocks.com (Bakul Shah)
Date: Fri, 27 Oct 2017 23:38:23 -0700
Subject: [TUHS] Charles Forsyth on putting Unix on a diet.
In-Reply-To: Your message of "Fri, 27 Oct 2017 19:34:11 -0700."
 <921D6FFC-DD60-406F-B90E-EC40DB638624@orthanc.ca>
References: <20171027103648.4030118C08A@mercury.lcs.mit.edu>
 <CAC20D2MEkvO_yOYjiR0_reL7VB=GmtHS0RTGCBEf56_ZWPc7Ew@mail.gmail.com>
 <alpine.BSF.2.02.1710270922200.5457@frieza.hoshinet.org>
 <CALMnNGiKFq4UpdOxqoit1+24vakP=qH6bn+PsQxtApSQOVKOXg@mail.gmail.com>
 <20171028020100.26A50156E7D7@mail.bitblocks.com>
 <921D6FFC-DD60-406F-B90E-EC40DB638624@orthanc.ca>
Message-ID: <20171028063838.265B2156E7D7@mail.bitblocks.com>

On Fri, 27 Oct 2017 19:34:11 -0700 Lyndon Nerenberg <lyndon at orthanc.ca> wrote:
Lyndon Nerenberg writes:
> > I wish there was a way to evolve plan9 into a modern Unix.
> > Making an existing modern Unix diet into a lean OS is close to
> > impossible.
> 
> But if you try to turn Plan9 into a lean UNIX, you lose everything that
> Plan9 advocates.  In particular, I don't see how you can possibly
> integrate namespaces into UNIX in any meaningful way.  Without those,
> it's no longer Plan9, and therefore a pointless endeavour.

As you may know I have been a 9fan for a long time & would
love if plan9 became mainstream. But I just don't see any hope
of a wider acceptance of Plan9.  My perception is that plan9
itself has not evolved a lot in 20-30 years. May be its
original structure is good enough or may be it just hasn't had
a large enough set of innovative users. The small group of
plan9 users continue to mostly use the stuff built by the Bell
lab guys.  I think it would be a real shame to see plan9
become a relic. The road not taken. Would be nice if we can do
something about it.

IMHO, the best hope to keep it alive is to pull a reverse C++
trick!  C++, which is now a much more complex beast of a PL,
initally got accepted because "it was compatible with C".  So
the idea here is to provide a Unix compatible (complex) API as
a library to allow running a lot of existing s/w and entice
people to write new s/w to a simpler but more composable API.

It won't make plan9 advocates happy and it won't have a
"plan9" API but this seems doable to me.  Start with the Plan9
kernel so you've already got process centric and mountable
namespaces. Next "port" linux or freebsd API. Write a set of
library functions that implement various Unix API calls by
calling on the plan9 API. Mutate the latter as necessary.  [As
an example, if 9P is found lacking, enhance it or replace it]
This is not unlike implementing linux API on top of a
microkernel. Concurrently port some kernel resident critical
subsystems from Unix to become user mode programs
communicating via 9p (or its child). All the while keeping an
eye on performance and complexity.

If done right, I think we can do away with containers & jails
for cloud based s/w, without any loss of security.o

So that is my pipe dream!

> > A unix kernel boils down to a few subsystems: device drivers +
> > device switch, scheduling, VM, networking and network switch,
> > filesystems + filesystem switch, interrupt handling, process
> > management. Some graphics support. A bunch of this can be
> > pushed out of the kernel without much loss of efficiency.  And
> > may be the original design decisions of Unix need to be
> > revisited for 21st century hardware.
> 
> The release of the 10th Edition UNIX source is much more enlightening. 
> Here you can see a fully functional UNIX with what, 29?, system calls? 
> And you can see the genesis of many of the Plan9 concepts (/proc,
> dial(), mk, mux, etc).

I don't know much about it.

In a separate message you wrote:

> But as a thought experiment, I have long wondered how one might approach
> the UNIX kernel with the view of removing ioctl(2).  What would the
> aftermath look like?  That's probably the most invasive attack Plan9
> could take on UNIX.  It would be very interesting to see what falls out.
>  It might be practical to attempt this with 10th Edition, just to see
> ...

That is the "dieting" approach. Much harder as you have to
constantly watch out you haven't broken anything.  But if you
start with plan9, ioctl() is already gone! However, it can be
implemented as a library function for dusty decks.


From norman at oclsc.org  Sat Oct 28 23:11:30 2017
From: norman at oclsc.org (Norman Wilson)
Date: Sat, 28 Oct 2017 09:11:30 -0400
Subject: [TUHS] Charles Forsyth on putting Unix on a diet.
Message-ID: <1509196294.17508.for-standards-violators@oclsc.org>

Chris Torek:

  You're not perpendicular to your own surface?  :-)

===

I'm not as limber as I used to be.

Besides, I'm left-handed, so what use would I have for
right angles?

Norman Wilson
Toronto ON
(I don't wish to know that)


From dave at horsfall.org  Sun Oct 29 08:13:03 2017
From: dave at horsfall.org (Dave Horsfall)
Date: Sun, 29 Oct 2017 09:13:03 +1100 (EST)
Subject: [TUHS] First ARPAnet transmission
Message-ID: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710290910450.49141@aneurin.horsfall.org>

Of interest to the old farts here...

At 22:30 (but which timezone?) on this day in 1969 the first packet got as 
far as "LO" ("LOGIN"?) then crashed.  More details, anyone?

-- 
Dave Horsfall DTM (VK2KFU)  "Those who don't understand security will suffer."


From ches at cheswick.com  Sun Oct 29 08:40:28 2017
From: ches at cheswick.com (William Cheswick)
Date: Sat, 28 Oct 2017 18:40:28 -0400
Subject: [TUHS] First ARPAnet transmission
In-Reply-To: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710290910450.49141@aneurin.horsfall.org>
References: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710290910450.49141@aneurin.horsfall.org>
Message-ID: <0832BFA3-F5FA-4BDD-9176-4FEDCC64BC8F@cheswick.com>

The third character was “g”, and the ensuing “log" command crashed the server at SRI. As
I recall, the connection was made from UCLA to SRI.  Leonard Kleinrock
tells this story sometimes.

> On 28Oct 2017, at 6:13 PM, Dave Horsfall <dave at horsfall.org> wrote:
> 
> Of interest to the old farts here...
> 
> At 22:30 (but which timezone?) on this day in 1969 the first packet got as far as "LO" ("LOGIN"?) then crashed. More details, anyone?

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From dave at horsfall.org  Sun Oct 29 12:44:27 2017
From: dave at horsfall.org (Dave Horsfall)
Date: Sun, 29 Oct 2017 13:44:27 +1100 (EST)
Subject: [TUHS] First ARPAnet transmission
In-Reply-To: <0832BFA3-F5FA-4BDD-9176-4FEDCC64BC8F@cheswick.com>
References: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710290910450.49141@aneurin.horsfall.org>
 <0832BFA3-F5FA-4BDD-9176-4FEDCC64BC8F@cheswick.com>
Message-ID: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710291329060.49141@aneurin.horsfall.org>

On Sat, 28 Oct 2017, William Cheswick wrote:

> The third character was “g”, and the ensuing “log" command crashed the 
> server at SRI. AsI recall, the connection was made from UCLA to SRI. 
> Leonard Kleinrocktells this story sometimes.

Thanks; here we are:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leonard_Kleinrock#ARPANET

The first message on the ARPANET was sent by UCLA student programmer 
Charley Kline, at 10:30 p.m, on October 29, 1969 from Boelter Hall 3420, 
the school's main engineering building.  Supervised by Kleinrock, Kline 
transmitted from the university's SDS Sigma 7 host computer to the 
Stanford Research Institute's SDS 940 host computer.  The message text was 
the word "login"; the "l" and the "o" letters were transmitted, but the 
system then crashed.  Hence, the literal first message over the ARPANET 
was "lo".  About an hour later, having recovered from the crash, the SDS 
Sigma 7 computer effected a full "login".  The first permanent ARPANET 
link was established on November 21, 1969, between the IMP at UCLA and the 
IMP at the Stanford Research Institute.  By December 5, 1969, the entire 
four-node network was established.

-- 
Dave Horsfall DTM (VK2KFU)  "Those who don't understand security will suffer."

From ralph at inputplus.co.uk  Mon Oct 30 10:55:07 2017
From: ralph at inputplus.co.uk (Ralph Corderoy)
Date: Mon, 30 Oct 2017 00:55:07 +0000
Subject: [TUHS] basic tools / Universal Unix
In-Reply-To: <2962D014-8FF9-4E53-8000-EF49C49817E9@bitblocks.com>
References: <CAC20D2NNsM6jGGD_7=yXq=oUVrvD741Rt=B-Q4-F-xR5Nb-Fkw@mail.gmail.com>
 <2962D014-8FF9-4E53-8000-EF49C49817E9@bitblocks.com>
Message-ID: <20171030005507.D30C620202@orac.inputplus.co.uk>

Hi Bakul,

Regarding vi:
> As an example, you can map a key to do a sequence of operations but
> you you can’t then use it in conjunction with search to repeat them
> over a range of lines.

You can use tail recursion in the macro because a failed search causes
it to stop.  So `qqq' to start recording to register `q', and then
instantly stop recording, clearing it.  Then the real definition, ending
in an execution of the empty `q'.

    qq/4$^Ma2^[@qq

And finally an `@q' to kick off the recursion.

-- 
Cheers, Ralph.
https://plus.google.com/+RalphCorderoy


From bakul at bitblocks.com  Mon Oct 30 12:54:28 2017
From: bakul at bitblocks.com (Bakul Shah)
Date: Sun, 29 Oct 2017 19:54:28 -0700
Subject: [TUHS] basic tools / Universal Unix
In-Reply-To: Your message of "Mon, 30 Oct 2017 00:55:07 -0000."
 <20171030005507.D30C620202@orac.inputplus.co.uk>
References: <CAC20D2NNsM6jGGD_7=yXq=oUVrvD741Rt=B-Q4-F-xR5Nb-Fkw@mail.gmail.com>
 <2962D014-8FF9-4E53-8000-EF49C49817E9@bitblocks.com>
 <20171030005507.D30C620202@orac.inputplus.co.uk>
Message-ID: <20171030025444.16E04156E7D8@mail.bitblocks.com>

On Mon, 30 Oct 2017 00:55:07 -0000 Ralph Corderoy <ralph at inputplus.co.uk> wrote:
Ralph Corderoy writes:
> Hi Bakul,
> 
> Regarding vi:
> > As an example, you can map a key to do a sequence of operations but
> > you you can't then use it in conjunction with search to repeat them
> > over a range of lines.
> 
> You can use tail recursion in the macro because a failed search causes
> it to stop.  So `qqq' to start recording to register `q', and then
> instantly stop recording, clearing it.  Then the real definition, ending
> in an execution of the empty `q'.
> 
>     qq/4$^Ma2^[@qq
> 
> And finally an `@q' to kick off the recursion.

Thanks, didn't know about q. However, nvi doesn't have q.  vim
does (but I rarely ever use it so when I tried the above it
failed). What I was getting at is being able to define
commands that can take one or two arguments like the bulitins,
separate from any key mapping. You need an ability to pass and
refer to arguments as well as refer to the current context.
And to be able to operate on char/word/line/para/sections.  If
this machinery was accessible, may be even many of vi's
builtins can be implemented this way.  E.g "d}" maps to
(delete 1para), "3dd" maps to (delete 3line) and so on.


From ralph at inputplus.co.uk  Tue Oct 31 00:05:28 2017
From: ralph at inputplus.co.uk (Ralph Corderoy)
Date: Mon, 30 Oct 2017 14:05:28 +0000
Subject: [TUHS] basic tools / Universal Unix
In-Reply-To: <20171030025444.16E04156E7D8@mail.bitblocks.com>
References: <CAC20D2NNsM6jGGD_7=yXq=oUVrvD741Rt=B-Q4-F-xR5Nb-Fkw@mail.gmail.com>
 <2962D014-8FF9-4E53-8000-EF49C49817E9@bitblocks.com>
 <20171030005507.D30C620202@orac.inputplus.co.uk>
 <20171030025444.16E04156E7D8@mail.bitblocks.com>
Message-ID: <20171030140528.42DB1218A6@orac.inputplus.co.uk>

Hi Bakul,

> Thanks, didn't know about q.  However, nvi doesn't have q.

It's just a means of recording typing into a register.  Exactly the same
can be achieved by typing into the buffer and then yanking into the
named register, being careful to leave off the LF at the end of the line
if it's not wanted, e.g. «"qy$».

> What I was getting at is being able to define commands that can take
> one or two arguments like the bulitins, separate from any key mapping.

If `3wy' yanked three words then the macro in register `q' could start
with `y' allowing `3w at q' to pass a region to the macro, but it doesn't.
:-)  I think one's left with setting a mark, or using automatic ones set
at various times by vim, and the macro using those to know its region.

-- 
Cheers, Ralph.
https://plus.google.com/+RalphCorderoy


From jnc at mercury.lcs.mit.edu  Tue Oct 31 00:16:45 2017
From: jnc at mercury.lcs.mit.edu (Noel Chiappa)
Date: Mon, 30 Oct 2017 10:16:45 -0400 (EDT)
Subject: [TUHS] basic tools / Universal Unix
Message-ID: <20171030141645.6F81C18C0E7@mercury.lcs.mit.edu>

    > From: Ralph Corderoy

    > Then the real definition, ending in an execution of the empty `q'.
    > qq/4$^Ma2^[@qq

Gah. That reminds me of nothing so much as TECO (may it long Rest in Peace).

     Noel


From clemc at ccc.com  Tue Oct 31 00:40:17 2017
From: clemc at ccc.com (Clem Cole)
Date: Mon, 30 Oct 2017 10:40:17 -0400
Subject: [TUHS] basic tools / Universal Unix
In-Reply-To: <20171030141645.6F81C18C0E7@mercury.lcs.mit.edu>
References: <20171030141645.6F81C18C0E7@mercury.lcs.mit.edu>
Message-ID: <CAC20D2MTE1vmtFjtbFAg3GTfGaNEzzpsrpu6qc4f6JemuzkXMQ@mail.gmail.com>

On Mon, Oct 30, 2017 at 10:16 AM, Noel Chiappa <jnc at mercury.lcs.mit.edu>
wrote:

>     > From: Ralph Corderoy
>
>     > Then the real definition, ending in an execution of the empty `q'.
>     > qq/4$^Ma2^[@qq
>
> Gah. That reminds me of nothing so much as TECO (may it long Rest in
> Peace).
>
​Or line noise from the acoustic coupler :-)
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From krewat at kilonet.net  Tue Oct 31 01:23:18 2017
From: krewat at kilonet.net (Arthur Krewat)
Date: Mon, 30 Oct 2017 11:23:18 -0400
Subject: [TUHS] basic tools / Universal Unix
In-Reply-To: <20171030141645.6F81C18C0E7@mercury.lcs.mit.edu>
References: <20171030141645.6F81C18C0E7@mercury.lcs.mit.edu>
Message-ID: <993c493c-e455-1a37-46d6-281394c6e7a1@kilonet.net>

Aw, I loved TECO - so much so that I wrote a version for every platform 
I used after that until I got into consulting for various different 
companies that used UNIX's of various flavors.

At some point in that transition, I learned vi. Now I wouldn't do 
without it.

The only detrimental thing about TECO to me, was that it was used to 
start off EMACS. ;)



On 10/30/2017 10:16 AM, Noel Chiappa wrote:
>      > From: Ralph Corderoy
>
>      > Then the real definition, ending in an execution of the empty `q'.
>      > qq/4$^Ma2^[@qq
>
> Gah. That reminds me of nothing so much as TECO (may it long Rest in Peace).
>
>       Noel
>



From dave at horsfall.org  Tue Oct 31 06:56:05 2017
From: dave at horsfall.org (Dave Horsfall)
Date: Tue, 31 Oct 2017 07:56:05 +1100 (EST)
Subject: [TUHS] basic tools / Universal Unix
In-Reply-To: <20171030141645.6F81C18C0E7@mercury.lcs.mit.edu>
References: <20171030141645.6F81C18C0E7@mercury.lcs.mit.edu>
Message-ID: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710310754270.49141@aneurin.horsfall.org>

On Mon, 30 Oct 2017, Noel Chiappa wrote:

>    > Then the real definition, ending in an execution of the empty `q'.
>    > qq/4$^Ma2^[@qq
>
> Gah. That reminds me of nothing so much as TECO (may it long Rest in 
> Peace).

I'm glad that I'm not the only one who remembers TECO; a fun game was to 
type your name at it to see what it did.

-- 
Dave Horsfall DTM (VK2KFU)  "Those who don't understand security will suffer."


From jnc at mercury.lcs.mit.edu  Tue Oct 31 07:40:10 2017
From: jnc at mercury.lcs.mit.edu (Noel Chiappa)
Date: Mon, 30 Oct 2017 17:40:10 -0400 (EDT)
Subject: [TUHS] basic tools / Universal Unix
Message-ID: <20171030214010.E23E418C100@mercury.lcs.mit.edu>

    > From: Dave Horsfall

    > I'm glad that I'm not the only one who remembers TECO

Urp. I wish I _didn't_ remember TECO!

"TECO Madness: A moment of convenience, a lifetime of regret." - Dave Moon

(For those who didn't catch the reference, here:

  https://www.gammalyte.com/tag/reefer-madness/

you go.)

      Noel


From charles.unix.pro at gmail.com  Tue Oct 31 07:50:05 2017
From: charles.unix.pro at gmail.com (Charles Anthony)
Date: Mon, 30 Oct 2017 14:50:05 -0700
Subject: [TUHS] basic tools / Universal Unix
In-Reply-To: <20171030141645.6F81C18C0E7@mercury.lcs.mit.edu>
References: <20171030141645.6F81C18C0E7@mercury.lcs.mit.edu>
Message-ID: <CANV78LQe8A8U+WxVJhgGh8GneyXkhNQ_FELvPgxA1Epv_7LKgQ@mail.gmail.com>

On Mon, Oct 30, 2017 at 7:16 AM, Noel Chiappa <jnc at mercury.lcs.mit.edu>
wrote:

>     > From: Ralph Corderoy
>
>     > Then the real definition, ending in an execution of the empty `q'.
>     > qq/4$^Ma2^[@qq
>
> Gah. That reminds me of nothing so much as TECO (may it long Rest in
> Peace).
>
>
I've started using it again; at least until I can get vi running under
Multics.

-- Charles
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From ron at ronnatalie.com  Tue Oct 31 20:50:38 2017
From: ron at ronnatalie.com (Ronald Natalie)
Date: Tue, 31 Oct 2017 06:50:38 -0400
Subject: [TUHS] basic tools / Universal Unix
In-Reply-To: <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710310754270.49141@aneurin.horsfall.org>
References: <20171030141645.6F81C18C0E7@mercury.lcs.mit.edu>
 <alpine.BSF.2.21.1710310754270.49141@aneurin.horsfall.org>
Message-ID: <D6991441-43DF-42E2-B7CA-5A6B479AD875@ronnatalie.com>

.  make love
NOT WAR?
[4K CORE]


I’m a bizarre UNIX relic.    I never learned vi.   I went from “ed” to the various emacs variants (starting with Warren Montgomery’s EMACS, then JOVE and UNIPRESS, and later GNU).     I used INed (a commercialization of the Rand editor) but didn’t particularly like that either.    My coworkers for years would be amused when if I found the machine had no EMACS variant, I’d just use ed.    I could be startlingly fast in ed and you do learn regular expressions well if you have to do a lot of editing that way.    On a few machines where I’m confronted with VI and no ed/emacs, I just use VI in “ex” mode.






> On Oct 30, 2017, at 4:56 PM, Dave Horsfall <dave at horsfall.org> wrote:
> 
> On Mon, 30 Oct 2017, Noel Chiappa wrote:
> 
>>   > Then the real definition, ending in an execution of the empty `q'.
>>   > qq/4$^Ma2^[@qq
>> 
>> Gah. That reminds me of nothing so much as TECO (may it long Rest in Peace).
> 
> I'm glad that I'm not the only one who remembers TECO; a fun game was to type your name at it to see what it did.
> 
> -- 
> Dave Horsfall DTM (VK2KFU)  "Those who don't understand security will suffer."



From crossd at gmail.com  Mon Oct 23 02:51:55 2017
From: crossd at gmail.com (Dan Cross)
Date: Sun, 22 Oct 2017 12:51:55 -0400
Subject: [TUHS] Last officially distributed and currently available BSD
	version
In-Reply-To: <CAEoi9W5bjmB4Xw8vVEu4kDYELtuc8ciGABNNERoBtzwqnJj+ew@mail.gmail.com>
References: <f884b6a5-5c5d-e970-701d-d27c0169ef5e@gmail.com>
 <CAEoi9W4L2fwV3ukXh+7TGy8y5rwT3Rt4hhTYQxBDyMi1WJg1XQ@mail.gmail.com>
 <CAEoi9W55N8sP-Wnkrq=JCi1kuzYfLY8xp_95uhihOFV_xHKO7A@mail.gmail.com>
 <CAEoi9W7zgGWjbn3V--by+C0XvnYfMEUWj=ieF6bFeKxEgRuFJQ@mail.gmail.com>
 <CAEoi9W4B9TQj+Wfm8MXq-VW=qE5WW999HT1hNye=vaAU+YZHSw@mail.gmail.com>
 <CAEoi9W61+WciC=1+kT+vht+krhrHyWRGJfbmTtYb8h6X_SQUCQ@mail.gmail.com>
 <CAEoi9W5bjmB4Xw8vVEu4kDYELtuc8ciGABNNERoBtzwqnJj+ew@mail.gmail.com>
Message-ID: <CAEoi9W5BqLzf-6ZU=WtYzhYgGMj3RTi8hvfb_j3jmXGDsdkT6w@mail.gmail.com>

On Oct 22, 2017 1:39 AM, "Will Senn" <will.senn at gmail.com> wrote:

[...]
What is the last bootable and installable media, officially distributed by
Berkeley?

Is that image currently publicly accessible?

What is the closest version, that is currently available, that would match
the os described in "The Design and Implementation of the 4.4 BSD Operating
System"?


Probably one of the best ways to get questions about installation media
answered is to simply email Kirk McKusick. He's a really nice guy and will
probably give you an answer pretty quickly.

That said, of the three distributions you mentioned, bootable/installable
media only existed for 4.4BSD (also called the "encumbered" distribution).
-Lite and -Lite2 were "reference distributions." It didn't take *too* much
work to get -Lite working, but it wasn't something that ran out of the box
(or more properly, off of the tape). The original idea was to release
4.4BSD-encumbered to Unix source licensees, and at the same time publish
4.4BSD-Lite sans the redacted bits as an open source distribution. These
were to be the final BSD releases from UCB, but the CSRG found they had
some coin left in the coffers a few months later, so they did -Lite2 as
something of a final hurrah snapshotting some ongoing maintenance work (and
possibly some research?) before officially shutting down.

At one point, I had a copy of a bootable exabyte tape with 4.4-encumbered
installation and source images for SPARC, specifically sun4c machines, that
I had liberated from somewhere. My understanding was that the reference
hardware at Berkeley was 68030- and 68040-based HP 9000 machines, and the
SPARC bits were a contribution from Chris Torek. I got -Lite running on an
older SPARCstation 1, but it wasn't particularly reliable (the compiler
would segfault, and it panic'ed once a day or so), so we put SunOS back on
it pretty quickly.

Hope that helps.

        - Dan C.
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