From owner-freebsd-chat Sun Jan 19 01:55:26 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) id BAA24912 for chat-outgoing; Sun, 19 Jan 1997 01:55:26 -0800 (PST) Received: from csd.cs.technion.ac.il (csd.cs.technion.ac.il [132.68.32.8]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) with SMTP id BAA24895 for ; Sun, 19 Jan 1997 01:53:17 -0800 (PST) Received: from localhost (nadav@localhost) by csd.cs.technion.ac.il (8.6.11/8.6.10) with SMTP id LAA11707; Sun, 19 Jan 1997 11:44:37 +0200 X-Authentication-Warning: csd.cs.technion.ac.il: nadav owned process doing -bs Date: Sun, 19 Jan 1997 11:44:37 +0200 (IST) From: Nadav Eiron X-Sender: nadav@csd To: Andrew Perry cc: chat@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Commerical applications (was: Development and validation tools...) In-Reply-To: <32E1DD7B.2EF1@shoal.net.au> Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk One of the targets I think we should pursue (and can reasonably hope to have success in) is getting FreeBSD into the Byte Web Project. I myself got to know FreeBSD from Jordan's article in Byte about a year ago. For those of you who don't read it, the Web Project is a series of articles (all in http://www.byte.com, check it out) that describe Jon Udell's personal experience in setting up and maintaining the Byte web site. >From what I remember, he started out with an NT and a BSDI server. Later on he continued with just NT, but lately added Linux, mostly due to readers complaining about Linux (and other UNIX-style OSs) being left out of the game. I don't know how to approach him (perhaps Jordan can, as they've already published an article he wrote), but this could really be made to point out the excellent networking code and stability that FreeBSD takes pride for. Having FreeBSD mentioned in Jon Udell's "Tools watch" will surely introduce many new people to it. Nadav On Sun, 19 Jan 1997, Andrew Perry wrote: > Well lets just find another magazine and give them a few FreeBSD ISP > success stories and see if any lights switch on!!! > > I may be oversimplifying (am ofter guilty!!) but these people seem to > respond best to market pressure. > > I'll be looking for magazines now is Australia and priming brain with > suitable ideas for a reader article (all suggestions welcome!!!). > > Andrew Perry > andrew@shoal.net.au > > Arne Steinkamm wrote: > > > > > Jordan K. Hubbard writes: > > > >> maybe this should really be moved to chat ? > > > > > > > > Done > > > > [snip] From owner-freebsd-chat Sun Jan 19 02:44:44 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) id CAA26535 for chat-outgoing; Sun, 19 Jan 1997 02:44:44 -0800 (PST) Received: from hda.hda.com (ip95-max1-fitch.ziplink.net [199.232.245.95]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) with SMTP id CAA26530 for ; Sun, 19 Jan 1997 02:44:40 -0800 (PST) Received: (from dufault@localhost) by hda.hda.com (8.6.12/8.6.12) id FAA19064; Sun, 19 Jan 1997 05:38:53 -0500 From: Peter Dufault Message-Id: <199701191038.FAA19064@hda.hda.com> Subject: Cursing the sky (was: Commerical applications ...) In-Reply-To: <199701182047.NAA12461@phaeton.artisoft.com> from Terry Lambert at "Jan 18, 97 01:47:05 pm" To: terry@lambert.org (Terry Lambert) Date: Sun, 19 Jan 1997 05:38:52 -0500 (EST) Cc: chat@freebsd.org X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.4ME+ PL25 (25)] MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk > Microsoft's success arises from it being the first to be second in > any market, with an incrementally better product. > > This is, incidently, the same reason for the success of most Japanese > marketing to the US. > > Demming told the world this formula. > > Apparently only Microsoft and Japan listened... There is one main reason that MS is where it is today, and that is that until the oops-the-horse-is-out-of-the-barn-close-the-door agreement with the US Department of Justice every manufacturer of PC class computers had to include DOS and/or Windows with every computer they sold if they wanted to sell any copy of DOS and/or Windows without paying retail. MS now sits on a US$9e9 dollar cash cache and 85%+ of the computer market courtesy of a decade of anti-competitive practice, assisted by a group of ostriches laughing at PCs. Anyone who thinks that Unix couldn't have been a lot more successful at the low end wasn't working with microcomputers in the mid 80s. Lest I spend too much time crying in my beer and shaking my fist at the sky and Bill Gates, keep in mind that the sea change of the last five years came out of our corner. -- Peter Dufault (dufault@hda.com) Realtime Machine Control and Simulation HD Associates, Inc. Voice: 508 433 6936 From owner-freebsd-chat Sun Jan 19 04:09:14 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) id EAA28746 for chat-outgoing; Sun, 19 Jan 1997 04:09:14 -0800 (PST) Received: from antares.aero.org (antares.aero.org [130.221.192.46]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) with ESMTP id EAA28741 for ; Sun, 19 Jan 1997 04:09:09 -0800 (PST) Received: from anpiel.aero.org (anpiel.aero.org [130.221.196.66]) by antares.aero.org (8.8.4/8.7.3) with SMTP id EAA04108; Sun, 19 Jan 1997 04:08:26 -0800 (PST) Message-Id: <199701191208.EAA04108@antares.aero.org> To: "Jordan K. Hubbard" Cc: hosokawa@mt.cs.keio.ac.jp (HOSOKAWA Tatsumi), gjennejohn@frt.dec.com, chat@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Commerical applications (was: Development and validation tools...) In-Reply-To: Your message of "Thu, 16 Jan 1997 22:20:56 PST." <2437.853482056@time.cdrom.com> Date: Sun, 19 Jan 1997 04:08:20 -0800 From: "Mike O'Brien" Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk I've already pushed FreeBSD in my column and I'm sure I'll do it again in the coming year, like, maybe if I figure out Hasty's stuff to the point I get MBONE stuff working. :-) Mike From owner-freebsd-chat Sun Jan 19 04:23:32 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) id EAA29129 for chat-outgoing; Sun, 19 Jan 1997 04:23:32 -0800 (PST) Received: from genesis.atrad.adelaide.edu.au (genesis.atrad.adelaide.edu.au [129.127.96.120]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) with ESMTP id EAA29122 for ; Sun, 19 Jan 1997 04:23:29 -0800 (PST) Received: (from msmith@localhost) by genesis.atrad.adelaide.edu.au (8.8.2/8.7.3) id WAA24936; Sun, 19 Jan 1997 22:53:23 +1030 (CST) From: Michael Smith Message-Id: <199701191223.WAA24936@genesis.atrad.adelaide.edu.au> Subject: Re: cvs commit: src/sys/sys msgbuf.h In-Reply-To: <199701191207.EAA00658@baloon.mimi.com> from Satoshi Asami at "Jan 19, 97 04:07:51 am" To: asami@cs.berkeley.edu (Satoshi Asami) Date: Sun, 19 Jan 1997 22:53:22 +1030 (CST) Cc: chat@freebsd.org X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.4ME+ PL28 (25)] MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk Satoshi Asami stands accused of saying: > * > Modified: sys/sys msgbuf.h > * > Log: > * > Increase default msgbuf to 8k. > > Mine has been 32K (note uppercase) for two months. Prints out all 33 > disks perfectly. :) Note that the SI multiplier 'k' is lowercase. Your msgbuf is just very cool. > Satoshi -- ]] Mike Smith, Software Engineer msmith@gsoft.com.au [[ ]] Genesis Software genesis@gsoft.com.au [[ ]] High-speed data acquisition and (GSM mobile) 0411-222-496 [[ ]] realtime instrument control. (ph) +61-8-8267-3493 [[ ]] Unix hardware collector. "Where are your PEZ?" The Tick [[ From owner-freebsd-chat Sun Jan 19 11:19:15 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) id LAA14855 for chat-outgoing; Sun, 19 Jan 1997 11:19:15 -0800 (PST) Received: from obie.softweyr.ml.org ([199.104.124.49]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) with ESMTP id LAA14849 for ; Sun, 19 Jan 1997 11:19:11 -0800 (PST) Received: (from wes@localhost) by obie.softweyr.ml.org (8.7.5/8.6.12) id XAA00336; Fri, 17 Jan 1997 23:11:49 -0700 (MST) Date: Fri, 17 Jan 1997 23:11:49 -0700 (MST) Message-Id: <199701180611.XAA00336@obie.softweyr.ml.org> From: Wes Peters To: Bill Paul CC: chat@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Netscape and NIS In-Reply-To: <199701172016.PAA07959@skynet.ctr.columbia.edu> References: <199701170521.PAA17479@genesis.atrad.adelaide.edu.au> <199701172016.PAA07959@skynet.ctr.columbia.edu> Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk Bill Paul writes: > The Alamo is where General George Armstrong Custer and his troops were > slaughtered by indians. In other words, if you see a hail of arrows > heading your way, move as fast as you can in the other direction. Custer > didn't. Now he's a famous idiot. > > =========================================================================== > -Bill Paul (212) 854-6020 | System Manager, Master of Unix-Fu > Work: wpaul@ctr.columbia.edu | Center for Telecommunications Research > Home: wpaul@skynet.ctr.columbia.edu | Columbia University, New York City > =========================================================================== So much for an expensive Columbia U education. The Alamo is a large mud hut in San Antonio where 2,500 Mexicans kicked bloody hell out of a couple hundred Tennessee Volunteers who were innocently trying to wrench Texas out of Mexico. Why a bunch of seemingly intelligent Tennesseans were fighting with Mexicans over Texas is one of the great mysteries of U.S. history, but less so than the question "where were the Texans in all of this?" "Remember the Alamo" became a battle cry for Texans when they decided to fight their own war and kick the Mexican army back across the Rio Grande (spanish for slow-moving sewer) into what is now the southernmost part of the United States of NAFTA. For the life of me, I can't figger out what *any* of this might have to do with FreeBSD. (Sorry, I've been polishing up on my revisionist history, preparing for Clinton Inagural II next Monday.) -- "Where am I, and what am I doing in this handbasket?" Wes Peters Softweyr LLC http://www.xmission.com/~softweyr softweyr@xmission.com From owner-freebsd-chat Sun Jan 19 11:29:16 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) id LAA15163 for chat-outgoing; Sun, 19 Jan 1997 11:29:16 -0800 (PST) Received: from albert.gnu.ai.mit.edu (albert.gnu.ai.mit.edu [128.52.46.31]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) with SMTP id LAA15158 for ; Sun, 19 Jan 1997 11:29:13 -0800 (PST) Received: from kropotkin.gnu.ai.mit.edu by albert.gnu.ai.mit.edu (8.6.12/8.6.12GNU) with ESMTP id OAA16077; Sun, 19 Jan 1997 14:30:49 -0500 Received: by kropotkin.gnu.ai.mit.edu (8.6.12/4.0) id ; Sun, 19 Jan 1997 14:28:59 -0500 Date: Sun, 19 Jan 1997 14:28:59 -0500 Message-Id: <199701191928.OAA25598@kropotkin.gnu.ai.mit.edu> To: softweyr@xmission.com In-reply-to: <199701191837.LAA04257@obie.softweyr.ml.org> (message from Wes Peters on Sun, 19 Jan 1997 11:37:05 -0700 (MST)) Subject: Re: Commercial Applications?? From: Joel Ray Holveck Reply-to: joelh@gnu.ai.mit.edu cc: freebsd-chat@freebsd.org Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk [returned to -chat] >> If I recall correctly, Unix was never a *registered* trademark, which >> means that although AT&T tried to grab more of a share by making it a >> trademark, it has no legal force. > You recall incorrectly. Novell wanted everyone to state that "UNIX is a > registered trademark of Novell Inc. in the United States and other > countries." Currently, "UNIX is a technology trademark of X/Open > Company, Ltd." Ah, I had forgotten Novell's ploy and didn't know about X/Open. Why doesn't it fall into the category of "things that were common and in the public domain before anybody tried to trademark it"? > Do nations other than the USA have "registered" and unregistered > trademarks? I dunno, let's ask the group. -- http://www.wp.com/piquan --- Joel Ray Holveck --- joelh@gnu.ai.mit.edu All my opinions are my own, not the FSF's, my employer's, or my dog's. Fourth law of computing: Anything that can go wro .signature: segmentation violation -- core dumped From owner-freebsd-chat Sun Jan 19 12:08:10 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) id MAA16672 for chat-outgoing; Sun, 19 Jan 1997 12:08:10 -0800 (PST) Received: from rah.star-gate.com (rah.star-gate.com [204.188.121.18]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) with ESMTP id MAA16659 for ; Sun, 19 Jan 1997 12:08:07 -0800 (PST) Received: from rah.star-gate.com (localhost.star-gate.com [127.0.0.1]) by rah.star-gate.com (8.7.6/8.7.3) with ESMTP id MAA04832; Sun, 19 Jan 1997 12:05:21 -0800 (PST) Message-Id: <199701192005.MAA04832@rah.star-gate.com> X-Mailer: exmh version 1.6.9 8/22/96 To: "Mike O'Brien" cc: "Jordan K. Hubbard" , hosokawa@mt.cs.keio.ac.jp (HOSOKAWA Tatsumi), gjennejohn@frt.dec.com, chat@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: Commerical applications (was: Development and validation tools...) In-reply-to: Your message of "Sun, 19 Jan 1997 04:08:20 PST." <199701191208.EAA04108@antares.aero.org> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Date: Sun, 19 Jan 1997 12:05:21 -0800 From: Amancio Hasty Sender: owner-chat@FreeBSD.ORG X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk Hi, Just post on the multimedia mailing list and we will get you going ... I am readying a video capture driver for the Intel Smart Video Recorder III which costs around $179 --- this is fantastic news because it enables video conferencing below the $400 market or for less than $500 for audio / video conferencing. Regards, Amancio >From The Desk Of "Mike O'Brien" : > I've already pushed FreeBSD in my column and I'm sure I'll > do it again in the coming year, like, maybe if I figure out Hasty's > stuff to the point I get MBONE stuff working. :-) > > Mike From owner-freebsd-chat Sun Jan 19 13:00:33 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) id NAA18304 for chat-outgoing; Sun, 19 Jan 1997 13:00:33 -0800 (PST) Received: from phaeton.artisoft.com (phaeton.Artisoft.COM [198.17.250.211]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) with SMTP id NAA18296 for ; Sun, 19 Jan 1997 13:00:30 -0800 (PST) Received: (from terry@localhost) by phaeton.artisoft.com (8.6.11/8.6.9) id NAA14114; Sun, 19 Jan 1997 13:45:53 -0700 From: Terry Lambert Message-Id: <199701192045.NAA14114@phaeton.artisoft.com> Subject: Re: Cursing the sky (was: Commerical applications ...) To: dufault@hda.com (Peter Dufault) Date: Sun, 19 Jan 1997 13:45:53 -0700 (MST) Cc: terry@lambert.org, chat@freebsd.org In-Reply-To: <199701191038.FAA19064@hda.hda.com> from "Peter Dufault" at Jan 19, 97 05:38:52 am X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.4 PL24] MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk Well, after I quit laughing at the new subject, I finally read the message. 8-). > There is one main reason that MS is where it is today, and that is > that until the oops-the-horse-is-out-of-the-barn-close-the-door > agreement with the US Department of Justice every manufacturer of > PC class computers had to include DOS and/or Windows with every > computer they sold if they wanted to sell any copy of DOS and/or > Windows without paying retail. MS now sits on a US$9e9 dollar cash > cache and 85%+ of the computer market courtesy of a decade of > anti-competitive practice, assisted by a group of ostriches laughing > at PCs. Anyone who thinks that Unix couldn't have been a lot more > successful at the low end wasn't working with microcomputers in the > mid 80s. This makes a lot of sense, but I won't go so far as to attribute their whole success to it. Many companies are successful, yet remain one trick ponies. Microsoft has had a higher percentage of winners because of insightful management. Sometimes they are insightful because they choose to do "smart" things like engaging in anticompetitve practices (despite their long term destructiveness, you can't argue that they aren't an effect short term success strategy). Other times, they are Just Plain insightful because their horizon is further away, and anyone who can predict what's coming better than you can looks comparatively insightful. > Lest I spend too much time crying in my beer and shaking my fist > at the sky and Bill Gates, keep in mind that the sea change of the > last five years came out of our corner. Yes... I totally agree. But the question is whther or not that corner is just another one trick pony, or whether we can be insightful, too, in some of the same ways, with similar ongoing successes. Maybe we can if someone is willing to brow-beat us into doing the right things. 8-) 8-). Regards, Terry Lambert terry@lambert.org --- Any opinions in this posting are my own and not those of my present or previous employers. From owner-freebsd-chat Sun Jan 19 14:05:46 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) id OAA20921 for chat-outgoing; Sun, 19 Jan 1997 14:05:46 -0800 (PST) Received: from wakko.gil.net (keithl@wakko.gil.net [207.100.79.10]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) with ESMTP id OAA20914 for ; Sun, 19 Jan 1997 14:05:42 -0800 (PST) Received: from localhost (keithl@localhost) by wakko.gil.net (8.8.3/8.8.2) with SMTP id RAA13764 for ; Sun, 19 Jan 1997 17:07:02 -0500 Date: Sun, 19 Jan 1997 17:07:02 -0500 (EST) From: Keith Leonard To: chat@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Cursing the sky (was: Commerical applications ...) In-Reply-To: <199701192045.NAA14114@phaeton.artisoft.com> Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk Howdy, All references are about Windoze - One area that MS was very insightful (and Unix is not - at least for commercial market - average joe) is in giving the average user a usable interface at startup. The average little guy does not have a 17" supervga 2meg video ram ... yet X startx up (and all the config files) in this super lagre desktop mode. I like being able to set up anyway I want but the average user doesn't understand desktops (except the 640x480 he gets with windoze standard), Colors are blah but acceptable to the average user, Key bindings (??????), and the whatnot.... Freebsd should have installation options for a straight forward simple 'I got a 14" vga monitor with a keyboard and mouse' setup. Let the user choose X setup, developers setup, users setup without the 1x10^65 questions he has no idea or desire (at the moment) to know. They'll eventually want to know but if knowing Unix is a prerequisite (sp?) for even getting it up and running then many(vast majority) will fall by the wayside in utter frustration. This is were MS grabed the market (at least in promise) - the average user didn't care about the small stack space that would eventually limit him - all that mattered was put in a few disks, reboot and voila you are in a sort of usuable environment. The days of Unix being in the ivory tower SHOULD be over and the average joe (meaning the millions of PC users) need to be considered. Fulfil the promise and let the mechanics take care of its' self if thats what the user wants. The power of Unix will stil be there to be utilized if the person has the persistance to dig, but the useablility (is this a word?) is there if he doesn't. We wouldn't compromise the effort with this small concession only open the field to more users. There are a few Linux (sorry) installation distributions that are attempting to do just this because they know that the user wants an easy to use system that will do what he wants with minimum fuss. Plus they (the Linux organisation) are agressively persuing the commercial software companies for Linux Version and by god they are getting them. "money make the world go round" The more users, more money available, more commercial applications available. Assume the user (potential buyer) has a stock, out of the box, PC and enough brains to sign his name on the charge slip and plug in color coded cables, period! All the power of FreeBSD would still be there for the power users, but the average joe (who is not in college or working for a doctorate) would be able to experience what a real OS can do. Don't continue to make him build a 747 to learn to fly - give him a piper cub sitting on the runway with a teacher(simple book) in the seat, eventually he/she may want to learn about jets and the such, but let him experience the thrill of flight and crave more, then he will learn. Sorry for the ramblings, just tired Keith keithl@gil.net ------------------------------------------------------ Character is what you are in the dark - John Warfin ------------------------------------------------------ From owner-freebsd-chat Sun Jan 19 15:46:05 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) id PAA24932 for chat-outgoing; Sun, 19 Jan 1997 15:46:05 -0800 (PST) Received: from sax.sax.de (sax.sax.de [193.175.26.33]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) with SMTP id PAA24927 for ; Sun, 19 Jan 1997 15:46:01 -0800 (PST) Received: (from uucp@localhost) by sax.sax.de (8.6.12/8.6.12-s1) with UUCP id AAA00912; Mon, 20 Jan 1997 00:45:24 +0100 Received: (from j@localhost) by uriah.heep.sax.de (8.8.4/8.6.9) id AAA16121; Mon, 20 Jan 1997 00:43:25 +0100 (MET) Message-ID: Date: Mon, 20 Jan 1997 00:43:24 +0100 From: j@uriah.heep.sax.de (J Wunsch) To: keithl@wakko.gil.net (Keith Leonard) Cc: chat@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Cursing the sky (was: Commerical applications ...) References: <199701192045.NAA14114@phaeton.artisoft.com> X-Mailer: Mutt 0.55-PL10 Mime-Version: 1.0 X-Phone: +49-351-2012 669 X-PGP-Fingerprint: DC 47 E6 E4 FF A6 E9 8F 93 21 E0 7D F9 12 D6 4E Reply-To: joerg_wunsch@uriah.heep.sax.de (Joerg Wunsch) In-Reply-To: ; from Keith Leonard on Jan 19, 1997 17:07:02 -0500 Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk As Keith Leonard wrote: > One area that MS was very insightful (and Unix is not - at least for > commercial market - average joe) is in giving the average user a usable > interface at startup. I doubt this is the main problem. (It's merely that a lot of companies once believed they could recapitalize from the low PC market shares by selling ``UNIX'' software overpriced.) Anyway: > 2meg video ram ... yet X startx up (and all the config files) in this > super lagre desktop mode. Nah. X starts up with a cross-weave background and nothing on it. Everything else is already at the mercy of your window manager. > Freebsd should have installation options for a straight forward simple 'I > got a 14" vga monitor with a keyboard and mouse' setup. No argument. Where can i grab your all-singing all-dancing 14" monitor (ah, no, the IEEE went metric last year, finally!, so make this 35 cm) config files? :-) OTOH, we do already know (by hard experience) that the `desktop market' is dead for Unix. -- cheers, J"org joerg_wunsch@uriah.heep.sax.de -- http://www.sax.de/~joerg/ -- NIC: JW11-RIPE Never trust an operating system you don't have sources for. ;-) From owner-freebsd-chat Sun Jan 19 18:56:55 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) id SAA06954 for chat-outgoing; Sun, 19 Jan 1997 18:56:55 -0800 (PST) Received: from antares.aero.org (antares.aero.org [130.221.192.46]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) with ESMTP id SAA06946 for ; Sun, 19 Jan 1997 18:56:52 -0800 (PST) Received: from anpiel.aero.org (anpiel.aero.org [130.221.196.66]) by antares.aero.org (8.8.4/8.7.3) with SMTP id SAA10253 for ; Sun, 19 Jan 1997 18:56:19 -0800 (PST) From: "Michael O'Brien" Resent-Message-Id: <199701200256.SAA10253@antares.aero.org> Message-Id: <199701200256.SAA10253@antares.aero.org> To: Wes Peters Subject: Re: Netscape and NIS In-Reply-To: Your message of "Fri, 17 Jan 1997 22:11:49 PST." <199701180611.XAA00336@obie.softweyr.ml.org> Date: Sun, 19 Jan 1997 18:54:50 -0800 Resent-To: chat@freebsd.org Resent-Date: Sun, 19 Jan 1997 18:56:15 -0800 Resent-From: "Mike O'Brien" Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk > (Sorry, I've been polishing up on my revisionist history, preparing for > Clinton Inagural II next Monday.) Who's this Clinton dude? You'd think you'd never heard of FDR IV. Five terms and still going! At this rate he'll surpass his old man. You should be ashamed. Revisionist history indeed. Next you'll be claiming that Lincoln died in the Ford Theater attempt or something. From owner-freebsd-chat Sun Jan 19 20:01:10 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) id UAA09222 for chat-outgoing; Sun, 19 Jan 1997 20:01:10 -0800 (PST) Received: from genesis.atrad.adelaide.edu.au (genesis.atrad.adelaide.edu.au [129.127.96.120]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) with ESMTP id UAA09217 for ; Sun, 19 Jan 1997 20:01:06 -0800 (PST) Received: (from msmith@localhost) by genesis.atrad.adelaide.edu.au (8.8.2/8.7.3) id OAA28248; Mon, 20 Jan 1997 14:30:42 +1030 (CST) From: Michael Smith Message-Id: <199701200400.OAA28248@genesis.atrad.adelaide.edu.au> Subject: Re: FreeBSD into larget corp. environment? In-Reply-To: <11447.853497856@time.cdrom.com> from "Jordan K. Hubbard" at "Jan 17, 97 02:44:16 am" To: jkh@time.cdrom.com (Jordan K. Hubbard) Date: Mon, 20 Jan 1997 14:30:41 +1030 (CST) Cc: andrsn@andrsn.stanford.edu, hasty@rah.star-gate.com, msmith@atrad.adelaide.edu.au, chat@FreeBSD.ORG X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.4ME+ PL28 (25)] MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-chat@FreeBSD.ORG X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk Jordan K. Hubbard stands accused of saying: > > So you think that the customer won't insist on talking to a human > being as an initial contact? I guess I really don't have a good feel > for how customers regard email as an effective support tool these > days. I think that many customers (not necessarily all) would find email support quite acceptable, however others will insist on phone contact. The biggest problem with email support these days is that many smaller companies use it as a technique for _avoiding_ support issues. Of the dozen or so companies that I've interacted with in this fashion, I've met very widely varied results. For eg., Globetrotter (FlexLM etc.) have been very helpful, always getting back in < 24h with useful answers, despite the fact that I haven't spent any money with them, and have made it clear that I won't be for some time, if at all. At the opposite end of the scale, try Research Systems Inc., who take their cue from the FBI; "deny, deny, counter-allege". They take days or weeks to respond, and their responses are usually unhelpful, regardless of the fact that we're one of their larger Australian customers and are pushing their product into places it's never been before. I think that email support can be cost-effective and efficient, and the availabilty of a web-based form for submitting problem reports would be a big plus, but in some cases and with some clients there will _have_ to be a voice behind a phone. > If they're comfortable with the idea of just sending a message > into the void and expecting some sort of timely response back from us, > well, I guess I certainly won't argue. I'm just not entirely certain > of that latter point. That sort of comfort can be taught, and should be encouraged. > Jordan -- ]] Mike Smith, Software Engineer msmith@gsoft.com.au [[ ]] Genesis Software genesis@gsoft.com.au [[ ]] High-speed data acquisition and (GSM mobile) 0411-222-496 [[ ]] realtime instrument control. (ph) +61-8-8267-3493 [[ ]] Unix hardware collector. "Where are your PEZ?" The Tick [[ From owner-freebsd-chat Sun Jan 19 20:47:39 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) id UAA10471 for chat-outgoing; Sun, 19 Jan 1997 20:47:39 -0800 (PST) Received: from time.cdrom.com (time.cdrom.com [204.216.27.226]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) with ESMTP id UAA10466 for ; Sun, 19 Jan 1997 20:47:37 -0800 (PST) Received: from time.cdrom.com (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by time.cdrom.com (8.8.4/8.6.9) with ESMTP id UAA16823; Sun, 19 Jan 1997 20:40:24 -0800 (PST) To: Amancio Hasty cc: "Mike O'Brien" , hosokawa@mt.cs.keio.ac.jp (HOSOKAWA Tatsumi), gjennejohn@frt.dec.com, chat@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: Commerical applications (was: Development and validation tools...) In-reply-to: Your message of "Sun, 19 Jan 1997 12:05:21 PST." <199701192005.MAA04832@rah.star-gate.com> Date: Sun, 19 Jan 1997 20:40:24 -0800 Message-ID: <16820.853735224@time.cdrom.com> From: "Jordan K. Hubbard" Sender: owner-chat@FreeBSD.ORG X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk > I am readying a video capture driver for the Intel Smart Video Recorder III > which costs around $179 --- this is fantastic news because it enables > video conferencing below the $400 market or for less than $500 for > audio / video conferencing. Cool! You can bet I'll buy one. Jordan From owner-freebsd-chat Sun Jan 19 22:30:25 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) id WAA14104 for chat-outgoing; Sun, 19 Jan 1997 22:30:25 -0800 (PST) Received: from time.cdrom.com (time.cdrom.com [204.216.27.226]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) with ESMTP id WAA14087; Sun, 19 Jan 1997 22:30:19 -0800 (PST) Received: from time.cdrom.com (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by time.cdrom.com (8.8.4/8.6.9) with ESMTP id WAA17180; Sun, 19 Jan 1997 22:30:13 -0800 (PST) To: Keith Leonard cc: chat@freebsd.org, config@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Cursing the sky (was: Commerical applications ...) In-reply-to: Your message of "Sun, 19 Jan 1997 17:07:02 EST." Date: Sun, 19 Jan 1997 22:30:13 -0800 Message-ID: <17176.853741813@time.cdrom.com> From: "Jordan K. Hubbard" Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk > Freebsd should have installation options for a straight forward simple 'I > got a 14" vga monitor with a keyboard and mouse' setup. Let the user > choose X setup, developers setup, users setup without the 1x10^65 > questions he has no idea or desire (at the moment) to know. They'll > eventually want to know but if knowing Unix is a prerequisite (sp?) for > even getting it up and running then many(vast majority) will fall by the > wayside in utter frustration. Hey, you write it and I'll take it! :-) I never claimed to have the best install, or even to be the best person to write one (I'm not, really, I hate installation tools! :-). I simply did it because nobody else would or wanted to, and I hated the thought of FreeBSD being without a reasonable installation. Now, unfortunately, having done the first install, I've now got all kinds of *ideas* about how the second one should look and how to avoid the various pitfalls in the current installation's approach and yadda yadda yadda, and so I talk about them all the time and How Good It's Gonna Be When We Get There and I probably scare anyone with an idea for a "rival implementation" away. That's kind of too bad, if so, because all I and the other install hackers *really* have at this particular stage is the following motley assortment: o /usr/src/lib/libdisk for abstracting away the disk interface (which is good - it makes the installer a lot easier). o /usr/src/release/sysinstall, which is an aging pile of C that, like so many things in this category, was already obsolete before it was finished. Can you say "stop-gap technology" boys and girls? :-) o A couple of TCL packages for putting up dialogs and talking to libdisk. This was to be the nucleus of the new "setup" program to replace sysinstall but progress on that halted when we all realized that libdialog and curses really sucked for writing the "GUI" and we needed to go off and deal with that part of the problem first. I think that was about 3 or 4 months ago. :-) Maybe I'll get my act together soon and get things moving on that front again, but I'll say here and now that if someone ELSE has a brilliant shining picture in their head and the will to execute it in C, C++ and/or TCL (no PERL please - we haven't room on the boot floppy for that approach!), I'd love to talk to them. A fresh set of eyes on FreeBSD's installation and configuration framework would be interesting too. Damn, a hand-off worked so well with Satoshi and the ports collection, why can't I seem to do it again with the installation and configuration tools? :-) Jordan From owner-freebsd-chat Mon Jan 20 02:51:20 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) id CAA24310 for chat-outgoing; Mon, 20 Jan 1997 02:51:20 -0800 (PST) Received: from bunyip.cc.uq.oz.au (daemon@bunyip.cc.uq.oz.au [130.102.2.1]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) with ESMTP id CAA24305 for ; Mon, 20 Jan 1997 02:51:16 -0800 (PST) Received: (from daemon@localhost) by bunyip.cc.uq.oz.au (8.8.4/8.8.4) id UAA12211 for freebsd-chat@freebsd.org; Mon, 20 Jan 1997 20:51:10 +1000 Received: by ogre.devetir.qld.gov.au (8.7.5/DEVETIR-E0.3a) id UAA08427; Mon, 20 Jan 1997 20:51:55 +1000 (EST) Date: Mon, 20 Jan 1997 20:51:55 +1000 (EST) From: Stephen McKay Message-Id: <199701201051.UAA08427@ogre.devetir.qld.gov.au> To: freebsd-chat@freebsd.org cc: syssgm@devetir.qld.gov.au Subject: Re: Netscape and NIS X-Newsreader: NN version 6.5.0 #1 (NOV) Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk Nate Williams counter attacked: >Bill Paul rewrote history: > >> The Alamo is where General George Armstrong Custer and his troops were >> slaughtered by indians. > >*laugh* Bill, you may be a great hacker, but a historian you're not. > >The Alamo (as explained before) is/was in Texas, and is where a bunch of >folks were killed by Mexican 'invaders'. > >Custer's last stand (ie; the battle of the Little Big-Horn) happened >clear on the other end of the US, up close to where I live in Montana, >about 100 miles from Canada. This is great stuff! Everything I know about American history I learned from episodes of the Time Tunnel! Yes, they were at Pearl Harbour, too. Stephen. PS Don't ask me anything about Australian history. They never came here. From owner-freebsd-chat Mon Jan 20 03:04:00 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) id DAA24642 for chat-outgoing; Mon, 20 Jan 1997 03:04:00 -0800 (PST) Received: from genesis.atrad.adelaide.edu.au (genesis.atrad.adelaide.edu.au [129.127.96.120]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) with ESMTP id DAA24637 for ; Mon, 20 Jan 1997 03:03:57 -0800 (PST) Received: (from msmith@localhost) by genesis.atrad.adelaide.edu.au (8.8.2/8.7.3) id VAA00933; Mon, 20 Jan 1997 21:33:53 +1030 (CST) From: Michael Smith Message-Id: <199701201103.VAA00933@genesis.atrad.adelaide.edu.au> Subject: Re: Netscape and NIS In-Reply-To: <199701201051.UAA08427@ogre.devetir.qld.gov.au> from Stephen McKay at "Jan 20, 97 08:51:55 pm" To: syssgm@devetir.qld.gov.au (Stephen McKay) Date: Mon, 20 Jan 1997 21:33:51 +1030 (CST) Cc: freebsd-chat@freebsd.org, syssgm@devetir.qld.gov.au X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.4ME+ PL28 (25)] MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk Stephen McKay stands accused of saying: ... > PS Don't ask me anything about Australian history. They never came here. Australia had (has?) history? First I ever heard of it... -- ]] Mike Smith, Software Engineer msmith@gsoft.com.au [[ ]] Genesis Software genesis@gsoft.com.au [[ ]] High-speed data acquisition and (GSM mobile) 0411-222-496 [[ ]] realtime instrument control. (ph) +61-8-8267-3493 [[ ]] Unix hardware collector. "Where are your PEZ?" The Tick [[ From owner-freebsd-chat Mon Jan 20 03:43:53 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) id DAA25704 for chat-outgoing; Mon, 20 Jan 1997 03:43:53 -0800 (PST) Received: from wakko.gil.net (keithl@wakko.gil.net [207.100.79.10]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) with ESMTP id DAA25686; Mon, 20 Jan 1997 03:43:47 -0800 (PST) Received: from localhost (keithl@localhost) by wakko.gil.net (8.8.3/8.8.2) with SMTP id GAA30533; Mon, 20 Jan 1997 06:45:13 -0500 Date: Mon, 20 Jan 1997 06:45:13 -0500 (EST) From: Keith Leonard To: "Jordan K. Hubbard" cc: chat@freebsd.org, config@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Cursing the sky (was: Commerical applications ...) In-Reply-To: <17176.853741813@time.cdrom.com> Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk First: A formal appology to Jordan. My ramblings were in no way intended as jab agaist BSD installation system. The fact of the matter is I have pointed a number of other groups to Freebsds installation as a model they should implement. With its single disk boot to the automatic dependancies it a wonder to behold. My thoughts were strictly a general direction I felt this project should be looking towards (from a users point of view) in the spirit of "click your shoes together and you'll be home" I know the feeling of a frustration when you sweat blood for days and have a person not knowledgable in your craft start pickin' on it. I have no experience in the construction of installation programs and with my limited intelligence probably never will. As of now FreeBSDs installation is probably the cleanest in the 'free' world. My comments were strictly directed to the general flow of conversation about grabbing the market place. Keith keithl@wakko.gil.net ------------------------------------------------------ Character is what you are in the dark - John Warfin ------------------------------------------------------ From owner-freebsd-chat Mon Jan 20 04:53:05 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) id EAA28477 for chat-outgoing; Mon, 20 Jan 1997 04:53:05 -0800 (PST) Received: from time.cdrom.com (time.cdrom.com [204.216.27.226]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) with ESMTP id EAA28460; Mon, 20 Jan 1997 04:53:01 -0800 (PST) Received: from time.cdrom.com (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by time.cdrom.com (8.8.4/8.6.9) with ESMTP id EAA22591; Mon, 20 Jan 1997 04:52:56 -0800 (PST) To: Keith Leonard cc: chat@freebsd.org, config@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Cursing the sky (was: Commerical applications ...) In-reply-to: Your message of "Mon, 20 Jan 1997 06:45:13 EST." Date: Mon, 20 Jan 1997 04:52:56 -0800 Message-ID: <22587.853764776@time.cdrom.com> From: "Jordan K. Hubbard" Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk > A formal appology to Jordan. My ramblings were in no way intended as jab > agaist BSD installation system. The fact of the matter is I have pointed a > number of other groups to Freebsds installation as a model they should > implement. With its single disk boot to the automatic dependancies it a > wonder to behold. There's nothing to apologise for, really. I was entirely serious in my own criticism of the installation system and believe me, even though the current installation system offers a pretty good mix of features and people seem to genuinely like it, it's in bad need of a rewrite. We're supposed to be software engineers in this project, damn it, and I know we can do better! :-) Truly, the problem is not a lack of ideas or vision. The problem is lack of skilled programmer time to write all that code! :-) Jordan From owner-freebsd-chat Mon Jan 20 05:18:18 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) id FAA29708 for chat-outgoing; Mon, 20 Jan 1997 05:18:18 -0800 (PST) Received: from carlton.innotts.co.uk (root@carlton.innotts.co.uk [194.176.128.2]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) with SMTP id FAA29702 for ; Mon, 20 Jan 1997 05:18:15 -0800 (PST) Received: from [194.176.130.12] (serialA0b.innotts.co.uk [194.176.130.12]) by carlton.innotts.co.uk (8.6.12/8.6.12) with ESMTP id NAA07475 for ; Mon, 20 Jan 1997 13:19:06 GMT X-Sender: robmel@mailhost.innotts.co.uk Message-Id: In-Reply-To: References: <199701192045.NAA14114@phaeton.artisoft.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Date: Mon, 20 Jan 1997 13:05:20 +0000 To: chat@freebsd.org From: Robin Melville Subject: Re: Cursing the sky (was: Commerical applications ...) Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-MIME-Autoconverted: from quoted-printable to 8bit by freefall.freebsd.org id FAA29703 Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk At 5:07 pm -0500 19/1/97, Keith Leonard wrote: >Freebsd should have installation options for a straight forward simple 'I >got a 14" vga monitor with a keyboard and mouse' setup.... >This is were MS grabed the market... I wouldn't agree with all this. Windows/95 can be a nightmare to set up.. this isn't the issue. What has made Windows successful is a virtuous circle. The corporates all bought IBM/compatibles in the 80's --> it got to be the biggest in the market --> more software was written for it than the (better) alternatives (ie. Macs) --> people buy a) what they know, b) what their friend knows, c) what the program they want will run on --> Windows growth accelerates. On top of this, MSoft grabbed the lion share of the corporate office software market with (pretty reasonable) applications like Word and Excel. Apple has held on in niches (which have opened up wider now with the demand for multimedia content design etc). FreeBSD and Linux have really remarkably little chance of any kind of role in the workstation area, except in bits of the education market, as a development platform, and in the hackers' toy department. Even if you /could/ make it runnable out of the box on most h/w -- not much to run on it! However, FreeBSD has something which is worth thousands in the small (and even giant) corporate sector: a fantastically reliable server platform at almost zero cost. The nearest competitors (eg SCO) not only cost several thousand to get going, but don't work anything like as well. Since more & more companies from the tiniest to the hugest are networking their PCs, adding intranet for fun and instruction, and wanting to connect to the big wide world, the potential is huge. With samba and netatalk add-ins, web and mail servers etc. etc. you can meet all your back-end needs for the cost of a discarded PC with a few added bits. Maybe a wholesale shift to the Java equivalent of X-Terms will mark the end of the evil empire, but the way its going, this can only make the superb work of the FreeBSD team even more valuable. If anything will grow BSD influence it will be development of solid server-type applications... a good client-server database would be a start :-) Best regards, Robin. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Robin Melville, Addiction Information Services Nottingham Alcohol & Drug Team Tel: +44 (0)115 952 9478 Fax: +44 (0)115 952 9421 work: robmel@nadt.org.uk home: robmel@innotts.co.uk Pages: http://www.innotts.co.uk/~robmel (home page) http://www.innotts.co.uk/nadt (substance misuse pages) ---------------------------------------------------------------------- From owner-freebsd-chat Mon Jan 20 06:13:13 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) id GAA02389 for chat-outgoing; Mon, 20 Jan 1997 06:13:13 -0800 (PST) Received: from fallout.campusview.indiana.edu (fallout.campusview.indiana.edu [149.159.1.1]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) with ESMTP id GAA02384 for ; Mon, 20 Jan 1997 06:13:10 -0800 (PST) Received: from localhost (jfieber@localhost) by fallout.campusview.indiana.edu (8.8.4/8.8.4) with SMTP id JAA10442; Mon, 20 Jan 1997 09:12:09 -0500 (EST) Date: Mon, 20 Jan 1997 09:12:08 -0500 (EST) From: John Fieber To: Mark Hannon cc: kimc@w8hd.org, freebsd-chat@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: X-inside memory footprint In-Reply-To: <199701200932.UAA00257@putte.seeware.DIALix.oz.au> Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: owner-chat@FreeBSD.ORG X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk Thanks for these numbers! After working with CDE on sparc/solaris, I was pretty pessimistic, but these numbers are considerably smaller than for the sparc binaries. On Mon, 20 Jan 1997, Mark Hannon wrote: > >From my system, running netscape, dtmail, dtfile, dtterm etc... > PID USERNAME PRI NICE SIZE RES STATE TIME WCPU CPU COMMAND > 158 root 2 0 3892K 7140K select 0:14 2.25% 2.25% Xaccel That is quite a bit bigger than my X server (nearly double). What resolution and depth? Since CDE apparently requires Xaccel, this could be a concern... > 216 mark 2 0 1836K 4228K select 0:04 0.19% 0.19% dtmail > 219 mark 18 0 632K 352K pause 0:00 1.56% 0.08% tcsh > 208 mark 2 0 1476K 3240K select 0:05 0.04% 0.04% dtwm Does dtwm typically stay around 3 megabytes, or was this shortly after starting? I ask because mwm starts out about that size, but under normal use, falls to about half that (resident size, that is). > 210 mark 2 0 564K 1744K select 0:01 0.04% 0.04% dtterm That one seems about the same as xterm. > 209 mark 2 0 1664K 3964K select 0:02 0.00% 0.00% dtfile That is about the same as the freely available moxfm which I use on occasion (dtfile has a much better interface). -john From owner-freebsd-chat Mon Jan 20 08:57:02 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) id IAA11425 for chat-outgoing; Mon, 20 Jan 1997 08:57:02 -0800 (PST) Received: from dns.pinpt.com (dns.pinpt.com [205.179.195.1]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) with SMTP id IAA11420 for ; Mon, 20 Jan 1997 08:57:00 -0800 (PST) Received: from journeyman (gatemaster.pinpt.com [205.179.195.65]) by dns.pinpt.com (8.6.12/8.6.12) with SMTP id IAA11354; Mon, 20 Jan 1997 08:56:02 -0800 Date: Mon, 20 Jan 97 08:55:57 Pacific Standard Time From: "Sean J. Schluntz" Subject: Re: FreeBSD into larget corp. environment? To: Snob Art Genre Cc: chat@freebsd.org X-Mailer: Chameleon ATX 6.0, Standards Based IntraNet Solutions, NetManage Inc. X-Priority: 3 (Normal) References: Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk > > If they don't know the resolution they can bring someone else in as well. > > There are many other things you could do to stream line it all and such. > > > > So in other words, the customer sends a recursive problem-resolution > request to the first-level tech, who can then look up and send > non-recursive requests to any more advanced users who are authoritative > for that type of problem. > > Reminds me of something, I can't think what. :) PTH!!! ;) -Sean ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Sean J. Schluntz Manager, Support Services ph. 408.997.6900 x222 PinPoint Software Corporation fx. 408.323.2300 6155 Almaden Expressway, Suite 100 San Jose, CA. 95120 http://www.pinpt.com/ Local Time Sent: 01/20/97 08:55:57 ---------------------------------------------------------------------- From owner-freebsd-chat Mon Jan 20 09:07:10 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) id JAA11949 for chat-outgoing; Mon, 20 Jan 1997 09:07:10 -0800 (PST) Received: from dns.pinpt.com (dns.pinpt.com [205.179.195.1]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) with SMTP id JAA11943 for ; Mon, 20 Jan 1997 09:07:08 -0800 (PST) Received: from journeyman (gatemaster.pinpt.com [205.179.195.65]) by dns.pinpt.com (8.6.12/8.6.12) with SMTP id JAA11440; Mon, 20 Jan 1997 09:06:14 -0800 Date: Mon, 20 Jan 97 09:02:35 Pacific Standard Time From: "Sean J. Schluntz" Subject: Re: FreeBSD into larget corp. environment? To: benedict@echonyc.com, Joel Ray Holveck Cc: chat@freebsd.org, schluntz@pinpt.com X-Mailer: Chameleon ATX 6.0, Standards Based IntraNet Solutions, NetManage Inc. X-Priority: 3 (Normal) References: <199701181746.MAA21810@kropotkin.gnu.ai.mit.edu> Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk > > So in other words, the customer sends a recursive problem-resolution > > request to the first-level tech, who can then look up and send > > non-recursive requests to any more advanced users who are authoritative > > for that type of problem. > > Not not necessarily non-recursive requests. Multi-tiered support > means many tiers, not necc 2. If the first contact can't answer the > question, it will probably go to the most knowledgable person present, > then some random guru somewhere else, then to one of the heavy > wizards, or something like that. That is true, but in a small organization you don't want to aim at more than two. If the two first level techs stay on for a while you can being them up to a 2nd level and fill their positions with new 1st level, in the process raising the people in the field to 3rd level. But you need to keep in mind that with a start up you need to keep the staff as small as possible and still keep the number of customer hand offs at a minimum. > Since FreeBSD wizards aren't well-ordered, then there exists a > possible halting problem here, but that's nothing a well-balanced dose > of nonreality couldn't deal with. *g* Or just someone following up on the customer problems to make sure they are being taken care of, and if not reassigning them to another person. Like Jordan said, it's a lot of paperwork (Or data entry ;) but if you are careful you could put together a real good organization! -Sean > Fourth law of computing: > Anything that can go wro > .signature: segmentation violation -- core dumped ^ Now that I like!! ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Sean J. Schluntz Manager, Support Services ph. 408.997.6900 x222 PinPoint Software Corporation fx. 408.323.2300 6155 Almaden Expressway, Suite 100 San Jose, CA. 95120 http://www.pinpt.com/ Local Time Sent: 01/20/97 09:02:35 ---------------------------------------------------------------------- From owner-freebsd-chat Mon Jan 20 09:16:10 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) id JAA12633 for chat-outgoing; Mon, 20 Jan 1997 09:16:10 -0800 (PST) Received: from dns.pinpt.com (dns.pinpt.com [205.179.195.1]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) with SMTP id JAA12628 for ; Mon, 20 Jan 1997 09:16:07 -0800 (PST) Received: from journeyman (gatemaster.pinpt.com [205.179.195.65]) by dns.pinpt.com (8.6.12/8.6.12) with SMTP id JAA11530; Mon, 20 Jan 1997 09:15:09 -0800 Date: Mon, 20 Jan 97 09:13:31 Pacific Standard Time From: "Sean J. Schluntz" Subject: Re: FreeBSD into larget corp. environment? To: jkh@time.cdrom.com, Joel Ray Holveck Cc: andrsn@andrsn.stanford.edu, chat@freebsd.org, hasty@rah.star-gate.com, msmith@atrad.adelaide.edu.au X-Mailer: Chameleon ATX 6.0, Standards Based IntraNet Solutions, NetManage Inc. X-Priority: 3 (Normal) References: <199701181729.MAA21775@kropotkin.gnu.ai.mit.edu> Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk > It depends on the level of user. For the level of user for whom we > need to provide paid tech support, a telephone contact is vital. I > currently work as a hacker and tech support for my company (not the > FSF), and the first few minutes of most of my tech calls are spent > trying to calm down the user into a rational state of mind and > reassure them that the sky is not falling. The most common type of > tech support is called `handholding' for a reason. > > Mind you, this is based on my experience at the college help desk and > my current company, which is aimed at small non-computer-literate > businesses. Most people running FreeBSD will probably have a certain > amount of computer experience and are beyond being scared of the > computer. (I say that, then think about a lot of the new Linux > crowd... hmmm...) At my company we help a large number of different types of customers, from very computer literate to someone who still thinks the CD-ROM is a cup holder. And every group has it's people who need handholding. You will never excape it. -Sean ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Sean J. Schluntz Manager, Support Services ph. 408.997.6900 x222 PinPoint Software Corporation fx. 408.323.2300 6155 Almaden Expressway, Suite 100 San Jose, CA. 95120 http://www.pinpt.com/ Local Time Sent: 01/20/97 09:13:32 ---------------------------------------------------------------------- From owner-freebsd-chat Mon Jan 20 13:01:38 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) id NAA27299 for chat-outgoing; Mon, 20 Jan 1997 13:01:38 -0800 (PST) Received: from perki0.connect.com.au (perki0.connect.com.au [192.189.54.85]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) with ESMTP id NAA27293 for ; Mon, 20 Jan 1997 13:01:34 -0800 (PST) Received: (from uucp@localhost) by perki0.connect.com.au id IAA23309 (8.7.6h/IDA-1.6); Tue, 21 Jan 1997 08:01:25 +1100 (EST) >Received: from localhost.nemeton.com.au (localhost.nemeton.com.au [127.0.0.1]) by nemeton.com.au (8.8.4/8.8.4) with SMTP id HAA09779; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 07:36:16 +1100 (EST) Message-Id: <199701202036.HAA09779@nemeton.com.au> To: Michael Smith cc: syssgm@devetir.qld.gov.au (Stephen McKay), freebsd-chat@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Netscape and NIS In-reply-to: <199701201103.VAA00933@genesis.atrad.adelaide.edu.au> Date: Tue, 21 Jan 1997 07:36:15 +1100 From: Giles Lean Content-Type: text Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk On Mon, 20 Jan 1997 21:33:51 +1030 (CST) Michael Smith wrote: > Australia had (has?) history? First I ever heard of it... Sure we do ... 1972. :-) :-) Giles From owner-freebsd-chat Mon Jan 20 15:39:12 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) id PAA10224 for chat-outgoing; Mon, 20 Jan 1997 15:39:12 -0800 (PST) Received: from wakko.gil.net (keithl@wakko.gil.net [207.100.79.10]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) with ESMTP id PAA10218 for ; Mon, 20 Jan 1997 15:39:09 -0800 (PST) Received: from localhost (keithl@localhost) by wakko.gil.net (8.8.3/8.8.2) with SMTP id SAA14091; Mon, 20 Jan 1997 18:39:05 -0500 Date: Mon, 20 Jan 1997 18:39:05 -0500 (EST) From: Keith Leonard To: Joerg Wunsch cc: chat@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Cursing the sky (was: Commerical applications ...) In-Reply-To: Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk > > OTOH, we do already know (by hard experience) that the `desktop > market' is dead for Unix. > I kind of thought that the free Unices were all about the desktop market and recapturing the power Keith keithl@wakko.gil.net ------------------------------------------------------ Character is what you are in the dark - John Warfin ------------------------------------------------------ From owner-freebsd-chat Mon Jan 20 22:48:35 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) id WAA01927 for chat-outgoing; Mon, 20 Jan 1997 22:48:35 -0800 (PST) Received: from time.cdrom.com (time.cdrom.com [204.216.27.226]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) with ESMTP id WAA01922 for ; Mon, 20 Jan 1997 22:48:32 -0800 (PST) Received: from time.cdrom.com (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by time.cdrom.com (8.8.4/8.6.9) with ESMTP id WAA19587; Mon, 20 Jan 1997 22:46:10 -0800 (PST) To: Keith Leonard cc: Joerg Wunsch , chat@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: Cursing the sky (was: Commerical applications ...) In-reply-to: Your message of "Mon, 20 Jan 1997 18:39:05 EST." Date: Mon, 20 Jan 1997 22:46:10 -0800 Message-ID: <19583.853829170@time.cdrom.com> From: "Jordan K. Hubbard" Sender: owner-chat@FreeBSD.ORG X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk > I kind of thought that the free Unices were all about the desktop market > and recapturing the power No. UNIX on the desktop is dead, Bill winning that war while the UNIX heads were too busy fighting themselves over OpenLook vs Motif and a host of other issues (we won't even get into the actual desktop management picture, which still sucks to this day). We're a server OS now with minimal desktop functionality. Jordan From owner-freebsd-chat Tue Jan 21 00:14:21 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) id AAA06774 for chat-outgoing; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 00:14:21 -0800 (PST) Received: from who.cdrom.com (who.cdrom.com [204.216.27.3]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) with ESMTP id AAA06754; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 00:14:15 -0800 (PST) Received: from lenlen.mt.cs.keio.ac.jp (lenlen.mt.cs.keio.ac.jp [131.113.32.126]) by who.cdrom.com (8.7.5/8.6.11) with ESMTP id AAA11306 ; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 00:13:42 -0800 (PST) Received: (from hosokawa@localhost) by lenlen.mt.cs.keio.ac.jp (8.8.4/8.8.2) id PAA20592; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 15:03:00 +0900 (JST) Date: Tue, 21 Jan 1997 15:03:00 +0900 (JST) Message-Id: <199701210603.PAA20592@lenlen.mt.cs.keio.ac.jp> To: jkh@time.cdrom.com Cc: keithl@wakko.gil.net, chat@freebsd.org, config@freebsd.org, hosokawa@mt.cs.keio.ac.jp Subject: Re: Cursing the sky (was: Commerical applications ...) In-Reply-To: Your message of Sun, 19 Jan 1997 22:30:13 -0800. <17176.853741813@time.cdrom.com> From: hosokawa@mt.cs.keio.ac.jp (HOSOKAWA Tatsumi) X-Mailer: mnews [version 1.19PL2] 1996-01/26(Fri) Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk In article <17176.853741813@time.cdrom.com> jkh@time.cdrom.com writes: >> Maybe I'll get my act together soon and get things moving on that >> front again, but I'll say here and now that if someone ELSE has a >> brilliant shining picture in their head and the will to execute it in >> C, C++ and/or TCL (no PERL please - we haven't room on the boot floppy >> for that approach!), I'd love to talk to them. A fresh set of eyes on >> FreeBSD's installation and configuration framework would be >> interesting too. No perl? I like it but I admit it's too fat :-) (my second favourite is C/Tk). I started working on translating LINT config file to SGML file and implementing the translator (using sgmls with DTD file) of this meta-config file to ordinary config files. I think this enables us to make automated config file generator tools like Linux's menuconfig and xconfig smartly. I think that the same approach can be used for automatic and semi-automatic system configuration tool for network and storage management. What do you think about it? (I'm planning to port sysinstall to X11 :-). I think it's not difficult to install FreeBSD from X interface like RedHat Linux) -- HOSOKAWA, Tatsumi hosokawa@mt.cs.keio.ac.jp hosokawa@jp.FreeBSD.org From owner-freebsd-chat Tue Jan 21 00:57:06 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) id AAA08784 for chat-outgoing; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 00:57:06 -0800 (PST) Received: from who.cdrom.com (who.cdrom.com [204.216.27.3]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) with ESMTP id AAA08779 for ; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 00:57:04 -0800 (PST) Received: from melbourne.DIALix.oz.au (seeuucp@melbourne.DIALix.oz.au [192.203.228.98]) by who.cdrom.com (8.7.5/8.6.11) with ESMTP id AAA11369 for ; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 00:56:58 -0800 (PST) Received: (from seeuucp@localhost) by melbourne.DIALix.oz.au with UUCP id UAA01890; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 20:10:10 +1100 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: melbourne.DIALix.oz.au: seeuucp set sender to mark@seeware.DIALix.oz.au using -f Received: from putte.seeware.DIALix.oz.au (putte.seeware.DIALix.oz.au [10.0.0.1]) by doorway.seeware.DIALix.oz.au (8.7.5/8.7.3) with ESMTP id TAA09698; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 19:34:13 +1100 (EST) From: Mark Hannon Received: (from mark@localhost) by putte.seeware.DIALix.oz.au (8.7.5/8.7.3) id TAA00372; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 19:33:45 +1100 (EST) Date: Tue, 21 Jan 1997 19:33:45 +1100 (EST) Message-Id: <199701210833.TAA00372@putte.seeware.DIALix.oz.au> To: mark@seeware.DIALix.oz.au, jfieber@indiana.edu Subject: Re: X-inside memory footprint Cc: kimc@w8hd.org, freebsd-chat@FreeBSD.ORG Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-MD5: OEIK2AeTNp0hksycGeAAzQ== Sender: owner-chat@FreeBSD.ORG X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk > From jfieber@fallout.campusview.indiana.edu Tue Jan 21 17:30:53 1997 > Date: Mon, 20 Jan 1997 09:12:08 -0500 (EST) > From: John Fieber > To: Mark Hannon > cc: kimc@w8hd.org, freebsd-chat@FreeBSD.ORG > Subject: Re: X-inside memory footprint > In-Reply-To: <199701200932.UAA00257@putte.seeware.DIALix.oz.au> > MIME-Version: 1.0 > Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII > Content-Length: 1312 > > > > PID USERNAME PRI NICE SIZE RES STATE TIME WCPU CPU COMMAND > > 158 root 2 0 3892K 7140K select 0:14 2.25% 2.25% Xaccel > > That is quite a bit bigger than my X server (nearly double). > What resolution and depth? Since CDE apparently requires Xaccel, > this could be a concern... 16bpp, 1152x800 > > > 216 mark 2 0 1836K 4228K select 0:04 0.19% 0.19% dtmail > > 219 mark 18 0 632K 352K pause 0:00 1.56% 0.08% tcsh > > 208 mark 2 0 1476K 3240K select 0:05 0.04% 0.04% dtwm > > Does dtwm typically stay around 3 megabytes, or was this shortly > after starting? I ask because mwm starts out about that size, > but under normal use, falls to about half that (resident size, > that is). After 30minutes use still about the same /mark From owner-freebsd-chat Tue Jan 21 02:40:24 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) id CAA12864 for chat-outgoing; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 02:40:24 -0800 (PST) Received: from hda.hda.com (ip1-max1-fitch.ziplink.net [199.232.245.1]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) with SMTP id CAA12855 for ; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 02:40:19 -0800 (PST) Received: (from dufault@localhost) by hda.hda.com (8.6.12/8.6.12) id FAA22775; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 05:34:50 -0500 From: Peter Dufault Message-Id: <199701211034.FAA22775@hda.hda.com> Subject: Re: Cursing the sky (was: Commerical applications ...) In-Reply-To: <19583.853829170@time.cdrom.com> from "Jordan K. Hubbard" at "Jan 20, 97 10:46:10 pm" To: jkh@time.cdrom.com (Jordan K. Hubbard) Date: Tue, 21 Jan 1997 05:34:50 -0500 (EST) Cc: keithl@wakko.gil.net, joerg_wunsch@uriah.heep.sax.de, chat@FreeBSD.ORG X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.4ME+ PL25 (25)] MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-chat@FreeBSD.ORG X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk > > I kind of thought that the free Unices were all about the desktop market > > and recapturing the power > > No. UNIX on the desktop is dead... > ... We're a server OS now with minimal desktop functionality. (five people in a room waiting for Java...) No, wrong direction. Go under the desktop. The opportunity has traditionally come in at a lower point then the established base. Think $50.00 VAX 11/750 and where it could be applied. MS is going to aggressively battle the top end with NT while crippling the bottom end to avoid cannibalizing their product line - witness the purposefully broken server side named pipes in W95. Peter -- Peter Dufault (dufault@hda.com) Realtime Machine Control and Simulation HD Associates, Inc. Voice: 508 433 6936 From owner-freebsd-chat Tue Jan 21 03:46:15 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) id DAA14899 for chat-outgoing; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 03:46:15 -0800 (PST) Received: from time.cdrom.com (time.cdrom.com [204.216.27.226]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) with ESMTP id DAA14892 for ; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 03:46:12 -0800 (PST) Received: from time.cdrom.com (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by time.cdrom.com (8.8.4/8.6.9) with ESMTP id DAA12522; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 03:44:11 -0800 (PST) To: Peter Dufault cc: keithl@wakko.gil.net, joerg_wunsch@uriah.heep.sax.de, chat@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: Cursing the sky (was: Commerical applications ...) In-reply-to: Your message of "Tue, 21 Jan 1997 05:34:50 EST." <199701211034.FAA22775@hda.hda.com> Date: Tue, 21 Jan 1997 03:44:10 -0800 Message-ID: <12509.853847050@time.cdrom.com> From: "Jordan K. Hubbard" Sender: owner-chat@FreeBSD.ORG X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk > No, wrong direction. Go under the desktop. The opportunity has An interesting metaphor, and possibly fun if the desktop in question is occupied by an attractive blond at the time. :-) What do you suggest? Jordan From owner-freebsd-chat Tue Jan 21 04:14:01 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) id EAA15935 for chat-outgoing; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 04:14:01 -0800 (PST) Received: from time.cdrom.com (time.cdrom.com [204.216.27.226]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) with ESMTP id EAA15917; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 04:13:53 -0800 (PST) Received: from time.cdrom.com (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by time.cdrom.com (8.8.4/8.6.9) with ESMTP id EAA14446; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 04:13:25 -0800 (PST) To: hosokawa@mt.cs.keio.ac.jp (HOSOKAWA Tatsumi) cc: keithl@wakko.gil.net, chat@freebsd.org, config@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Cursing the sky (was: Commerical applications ...) In-reply-to: Your message of "Tue, 21 Jan 1997 15:03:00 +0900." <199701210603.PAA20592@lenlen.mt.cs.keio.ac.jp> Date: Tue, 21 Jan 1997 04:13:24 -0800 Message-ID: <14442.853848804@time.cdrom.com> From: "Jordan K. Hubbard" Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk > No perl? I like it but I admit it's too fat :-) (my second favourite > is C/Tk). Well, I hate to admit that BSDI went the perl route and so far they seem to really like it. They did, somehow, manage to get a kernel and a single perl interpreter onto an installation floppy but damned if I know how they did it. Perhaps they're using a specially hacked and trimmed down version of perl, something which would be pretty evil for us but is a *possibility* I suppose. :-) I guess what I'm saying is that if someone really wants to use PERL in their install solution and is willing to do the work, I'll bite the bullet and learn the damn thing (and I hate PERL! :-). However, I think that TCL would result in a lot more people on these mailing lists being happy with the final solution. It's small, it's easy to parse (wow, a regular and well-defined syntax! :-) and a version which supports dynamic loading of modules is already in our tree. To get that with PERL we'd have to import perl5 instead of perl4, and that's a political battle which I don't care to fight at this time at all. :-) > I started working on translating LINT config file to SGML file and > implementing the translator (using sgmls with DTD file) of this > meta-config file to ordinary config files. > > I think this enables us to make automated config file generator tools > like Linux's menuconfig and xconfig smartly. Hmmm. I'd be interested in hearing more about this, as would I'm sure others here. > I think that the same approach can be used for automatic and > semi-automatic system configuration tool for network and storage > management. > > What do you think about it? I think we need to hear more about the details of this approach! :-) > (I'm planning to port sysinstall to X11 :-). I think it's not > difficult to install FreeBSD from X interface like RedHat Linux) Yikes! Sysinstall is a very poor target and has gone strictly into maintainance mode (I think we still have your japanese patches to integrate, but those are still missing from the last freefall cleanup of incoming). If you want to do a CUI/GUI sysinstall, you should join us in developing the new system rather that prolonging the life of the old. :-) Jordan From owner-freebsd-chat Tue Jan 21 08:09:18 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) id IAA26981 for chat-outgoing; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 08:09:18 -0800 (PST) Received: from fallout.campusview.indiana.edu (fallout.campusview.indiana.edu [149.159.1.1]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) with ESMTP id IAA26975 for ; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 08:09:16 -0800 (PST) Received: from localhost (jfieber@localhost) by fallout.campusview.indiana.edu (8.8.4/8.8.4) with SMTP id LAA02763; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 11:09:09 -0500 (EST) Date: Tue, 21 Jan 1997 11:09:08 -0500 (EST) From: John Fieber To: Larry Lee cc: chat@freefall.freebsd.org Subject: Re: Commerical applications In-Reply-To: <199701210332.UAA09421@usr06.primenet.com> Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: owner-chat@FreeBSD.ORG X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk --->>> Moved to chat@freebsd.org <<<--- On Mon, 20 Jan 1997, Larry Lee wrote: > FreeBSD clearly outperforms W95 and WNT on the same size hardware and runs > on smaller hardware platforms. If you want to do a general comparison (which I don't believe can be done in a very meaningful way), you at *least* need to compare similar configurations, which, in this case, means adding X and CDE to FreeBSD. In this configuration, FreeBSD may still be competetive with NT, but it flat out looses to W95 in terms of hardware consumption. > The basic UNIX commands are no more difficult to learn than the basic > DOS commands and any UNIX shell is no more difficult to use than command.com > and clearly has far more power and capabilities. Hold it here. You have suddenly switched to comparing Unix with MS-DOS. Now MS-DOS runs quite nicely on an 8088 with 640K of ram, but it is NT that people are comparing to Unix, not MS-DOS. Most of the Unix shells and tools could be (and probably have been) ported to NT anyway so this argument is nearly moot. The ease of use issue is not command line versus command line, it is text interface versus graphic interface. > The UNIX install process is much more difficult than Windows and when > it's complete you still don't have a fully functional UNIX system. Yes you do, but but if you expect a fully functional Unix system to be approximately the same thing as a fully functional NT system, you are mistaken. Whether this is good, bad, or just different depends on what you use the system for. If you want FreeBSD to be more like an out-of-the-box NT system, you have to shell out the US$250 to get CDE. > UNIX costs less that Windows. Yes, if you exclude the comparable GUI component from Unix. XFree86 gets you a GUI, but only CDE offers anything remotely similar to the GUI Windows offers. > Compare the appearance and utility of Eudora to xmh, Eudora looks better. > Anything based on xaw looks awful, and the 3d version isn't much better. Compare xaw with other GUIs in existance around the time it was designed and it doesn't look that bad. Its just that nobody has bothered to update it. Think of xaw as a GUI time capsule. :) People serious about GUI design use TK or Motif. > The world has gone graphical, but Unix still clings to its text based > origins. Considering the application domains where Unix dominates, there are many good reasons to maintain a text based interface. However, that should not preclude the development of excellent GUI support. In practice it does because text based tools are generally considered essential, while their GUI counterparts are seen as a "nice feature". Guess which gets development priority? -john From owner-freebsd-chat Tue Jan 21 10:31:29 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) id KAA04102 for chat-outgoing; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 10:31:29 -0800 (PST) Received: from lenlen.mt.cs.keio.ac.jp (lenlen.mt.cs.keio.ac.jp [131.113.32.126]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) with ESMTP id KAA04095; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 10:31:14 -0800 (PST) Received: (from hosokawa@localhost) by lenlen.mt.cs.keio.ac.jp (8.8.4/8.8.2) id DAA22042; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 03:02:57 +0900 (JST) Date: Wed, 22 Jan 1997 03:02:57 +0900 (JST) Message-Id: <199701211802.DAA22042@lenlen.mt.cs.keio.ac.jp> To: jkh@time.cdrom.com Cc: keithl@wakko.gil.net, chat@freebsd.org, config@freebsd.org, hosokawa@mt.cs.keio.ac.jp Subject: Re: Cursing the sky (was: Commerical applications ...) In-Reply-To: Your message of Tue, 21 Jan 1997 04:13:24 -0800. <14442.853848804@time.cdrom.com> From: hosokawa@mt.cs.keio.ac.jp (HOSOKAWA Tatsumi) X-Mailer: mnews [version 1.19PL2] 1996-01/26(Fri) Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk In article <14442.853848804@time.cdrom.com> jkh@time.cdrom.com writes: >> > I started working on translating LINT config file to SGML file and >> > implementing the translator (using sgmls with DTD file) of this >> > meta-config file to ordinary config files. >> > >> > I think this enables us to make automated config file generator tools >> > like Linux's menuconfig and xconfig smartly. >> >> Hmmm. I'd be interested in hearing more about this, as would I'm sure >> others here. I think FreeBSD's kernel config system is far better than irritating :-) "make config" of Slackware Linux, but I think it has following problems, and introducing the formal "metaconfig" file can solve these problems. 1. Users have to learn some rules of config files. Yes, the syntax of config file is fairly simple, but the semantics is too difficult. I think if there's an interactive menu system of kernel configuration utility more smart than Linux's menuconfig and xconfig, it helps novices much. 2. Dependency and exclusiveness between options, devices, etc. are only decribed in natural language. Kernel configuration utility can't use these information. Formal description is needed. (note that following samplese are pseudo-code, I've not implemented the translater yet.) Example 1: dependency DDB Enable the kernel debugger. DDB_UNATTENDED DDB Don't drop into DDB for a panic. Intended for unattended operation wwhere you may want to drop to DDB from the console, but still want the machine to recover from a panic Example 2: exclusiveness MATH_EMULATE Support for x87 emulation GPL_MATH_EMULATE MATH_EMULATE GPL_MATH_EMULATE: Support for x87 emulation via new math emulator 3. I want to support I18N for kernel config utility, but current config system can't support these feature. For example, some hackers in Japan translated comments of 2.2-BETA and 3.0-CURRENT LINT file into Japanese, but I think such approach is not so smart. For example: # configgen LINT.metaconfig .... generates English LINT file # configgen -lang ja_JP.EUC LINT.metaconfig .... generates Japanese LINT file # configgen -lang zh_TW.big5 LINT.metaconfig .... generates Chinese LINT file 4. There's no descriptions of "flags" of each device. People have to look into the dungeon of kernel sources to find the optional flags which solves his/her problems, but sometimes (or frequently) s/he can't find anything because of s/he is unaware of the structure of kernel souces. I frequently receive personal e-mails about problems that can be solved by adding "flags" to appropreate device. I think kernel configuration utility have to support such demands. The definitions of "flags" and "options" of devices should be described in formal way. >> > (I'm planning to port sysinstall to X11 :-). I think it's not >> > difficult to install FreeBSD from X interface like RedHat Linux) >> >> Yikes! Sysinstall is a very poor target and has gone strictly into >> maintainance mode (I think we still have your japanese patches to >> integrate, but those are still missing from the last freefall cleanup >> of incoming). If you want to do a CUI/GUI sysinstall, you should join >> us in developing the new system rather that prolonging the life of >> the old. :-) Okay, I'll mail majordomo soon. P.S.: For 2.2-BETA, I totally rewrote the experimental PC-card support for sysinstall. It comes more smart compared to it of 2.1.5. New features of this boot.flp: 1. You can select scratch memroy of PC-card controller from the menu of sysinstall. 2. You can select free IRQ pool for PC-card from the menu of sysinstall. 3. You can apply PC-card patches, recompile and install the new kernel from the menu of sysinstall. 4. pccardc and pccardd are incorporated into crunched binary, and all /etc stuffs, documents about PC-card drivers, and kernel patches are stored in /stand, so you can make PC-card operational without importing any other patches and files from network or CD-ROM. (it's sometimes difficult to import these patches without making PC-card operational :-), on some laptops with fewer builtin I/O devices) The URL is "ftp://jaz.jp.FreeBSD.org/pub/FreeBSD-jp/PAO/flp/boot.flp". -- HOSOKAWA, Tatsumi hosokawa@mt.cs.keio.ac.jp hosokawa@jp.FreeBSD.org From owner-freebsd-chat Tue Jan 21 13:22:26 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) id NAA14386 for chat-outgoing; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 13:22:26 -0800 (PST) Received: from sax.sax.de (sax.sax.de [193.175.26.33]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) with SMTP id NAA14352 for ; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 13:21:58 -0800 (PST) Received: (from uucp@localhost) by sax.sax.de (8.6.12/8.6.12-s1) with UUCP id WAA17758 for chat@freebsd.org; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 22:20:32 +0100 Received: (from j@localhost) by uriah.heep.sax.de (8.8.4/8.6.9) id WAA23334; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 22:19:11 +0100 (MET) Message-ID: Date: Tue, 21 Jan 1997 22:19:11 +0100 From: j@uriah.heep.sax.de (J Wunsch) To: chat@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Cursing the sky (was: Commerical applications ...) References: <199701210603.PAA20592@lenlen.mt.cs.keio.ac.jp> <14442.853848804@time.cdrom.com> X-Mailer: Mutt 0.55-PL10 Mime-Version: 1.0 X-Phone: +49-351-2012 669 X-PGP-Fingerprint: DC 47 E6 E4 FF A6 E9 8F 93 21 E0 7D F9 12 D6 4E Reply-To: joerg_wunsch@uriah.heep.sax.de (Joerg Wunsch) In-Reply-To: <14442.853848804@time.cdrom.com>; from Jordan K. Hubbard on Jan 21, 1997 04:13:24 -0800 Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk As Jordan K. Hubbard wrote: > Well, I hate to admit that BSDI went the perl route and so far they > seem to really like it. They did, somehow, manage to get a kernel and > a single perl interpreter onto an installation floppy but damned if I > know how they did it. Perhaps they're using a specially hacked and > trimmed down version of perl, ... Not necessarily. Perl ain't that fat in the ``basic model''. > However, I think that TCL would result in a lot more people on these > mailing lists being happy with the final solution. I don't quite exactly think it's really _more_ people that it will make happy, i rather believe it's the just the other half of the people who'll be happy about it... I for one have never got the slightest feeling for it. However, i believe it's a little better suited for sysinstall due to it being designed as an extensible interpreter. (But this is assumption, i don't know very much about Tcl, but much more about Perl.) -- cheers, J"org joerg_wunsch@uriah.heep.sax.de -- http://www.sax.de/~joerg/ -- NIC: JW11-RIPE Never trust an operating system you don't have sources for. ;-) From owner-freebsd-chat Tue Jan 21 17:06:30 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) id RAA28573 for chat-outgoing; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 17:06:30 -0800 (PST) Received: from fedex.mpd.tandem.com (fedex.mpd.tandem.com [131.124.250.27]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) with ESMTP id RAA28556 for ; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 17:06:26 -0800 (PST) Received: from rolex.mpd.tandem.com (rolex.mpd.tandem.com [131.124.4.1]) by fedex.mpd.tandem.com (8.8.4/8.8.0) with ESMTP id TAA08420; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 19:05:15 -0600 (CST) Received: from papillon.lemis.de (greylan2.mpd.tandem.com [131.124.28.38]) by rolex.mpd.tandem.com (8.7.5/8.7.1) with ESMTP id TAA21551; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 19:05:46 -0600 (CST) From: Greg Lehey Received: (grog@localhost) by papillon.lemis.de (8.8.4/8.6.12) id JAA00231; Sun, 19 Jan 1997 09:31:46 -0600 (CST) Organisation: LEMIS, Schellnhausen 2, 36325 Feldatal, Germany Phone: +49-6637-919123 Fax: +49-6637-919122 Message-Id: <199701191531.JAA00231@papillon.lemis.de> Subject: Re: Uptime record? In-Reply-To: from Julian Jenkins at "Jan 17, 97 08:39:31 am" To: julianj@vast.unsw.edu.au (Julian Jenkins) Date: Sun, 19 Jan 1997 09:31:45 -0600 (CST) Cc: chat@FreeBSD.ORG (FreeBSD Chat) Reply-To: grog@lemis.de (Greg Lehey) X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.4ME+ PL28 (25)] MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-chat@FreeBSD.ORG X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk Julian Jenkins writes: > >> FreeBSD iof 1.1.5.1(RELEASE) GENERICAH#0 i386 >> >> Welcome to FreeBSD! >> >> bash$ uptime >> 3:11pm up 460 days, 9:20, 1 user, load average: 0.00, 0.00, 0.00 >> bash$ > > This should somehow be merged into the effort to convince commercial > companies that we have a good OS that is being discussed in a nother > thread. Could we put a top 10 on the web pages somewhere? Does anyone > know how this would compare with what workstaton vendors products can > achieve? I think most UNIX flavours can achieve this kind of uptime. It's more related to the environment than the OS. Note that this machine only went down because of a power cut. And, of course, it's running 1.1.5, because that was the latest available when it was last booted. Most people upgrade their systems more often than this machine has been up. What would be interesting to see would be the number of panics. I think FreeBSD would do quite well there, but unfortunately it's difficult to get concrete figures. Greg From owner-freebsd-chat Tue Jan 21 17:07:08 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) id RAA28653 for chat-outgoing; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 17:07:08 -0800 (PST) Received: from fedex.mpd.tandem.com (fedex.mpd.tandem.com [131.124.250.27]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) with ESMTP id RAA28640 for ; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 17:07:04 -0800 (PST) Received: from rolex.mpd.tandem.com (rolex.mpd.tandem.com [131.124.4.1]) by fedex.mpd.tandem.com (8.8.4/8.8.0) with ESMTP id TAA08431; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 19:05:18 -0600 (CST) Received: from papillon.lemis.de (greylan2.mpd.tandem.com [131.124.28.38]) by rolex.mpd.tandem.com (8.7.5/8.7.1) with ESMTP id TAA21557; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 19:05:50 -0600 (CST) From: Greg Lehey Received: (grog@localhost) by papillon.lemis.de (8.8.4/8.6.12) id JAA00281; Sun, 19 Jan 1997 09:58:09 -0600 (CST) Organisation: LEMIS, Schellnhausen 2, 36325 Feldatal, Germany Phone: +49-6637-919123 Fax: +49-6637-919122 Message-Id: <199701191558.JAA00281@papillon.lemis.de> Subject: Re: Netscape and NIS In-Reply-To: <199701172119.OAA05003@rocky.mt.sri.com> from Nate Williams at "Jan 17, 97 02:19:52 pm" To: nate@mt.sri.com (Nate Williams) Date: Sun, 19 Jan 1997 09:58:08 -0600 (CST) Cc: chat@FreeBSD.ORG (FreeBSD Chat) Reply-To: grog@lemis.de (Greg Lehey) X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.4ME+ PL28 (25)] MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-chat@FreeBSD.ORG X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk Nate Williams writes: > Bill Paul writes: > >> The Alamo is where General George Armstrong Custer and his troops were >> slaughtered by indians. > > *laugh* Bill, you may be a great hacker, but a historian you're not. > > The Alamo (as explained before) is/was in Texas, and is where a bunch of > folks were killed by Mexican 'invaders'. Well, I've spent a lot of time in Texas (in fact, that's where I am right now), and I've always wanted to describe my take on the Alamo, so here's some flame fodder: In the early 1830s, what we now know as Texas was part of the Mexican state of Tejas y Coahila (sp?). It was quite a way from Mexico City, but not far from the USA, and gradually English- speaking people started settling there. This apparently didn't worry the Mexican Government until they started talking about secession from the United States (of Mexico). At some point, the Mexican Government sent an army to bend them into shape, led by one General Santa Ana, which I believe is Spanish for "holy donkey". The rebels were outnumbered by some ridiculous factor (10 to 1?), and hid in a church in San Antonio (the Alamo). After a long siege, the Mexicans finally massacred everybody, including people as well-known outside the USA as Jim Bowie (a nasty piece of work, by all accounts) and Davy Crockett. The Alamo was a complete disaster for the separist Tejanos, which is presumably why their descendents are so proud of it today. They did in fact win a resounding victory a year or two later, and became independent for over 10 years before becoming a member of a different set of United States, but for some reason, nobody ever says "Remember Sam Houston". Things haven't stopped, though. Just this morning the main headline of the Austin-American Spaceman reads "Anger simmers at Republic of Texas camp". Seems that Rick McLaren, who's a furriner from Ohio, anyway, "planted a flag outside an abandoned fire station in a nearby [to Fort Davis, West Texas] trailer park. McLaren declared the area soverign soil of the so-called Republic of Texas, whose followers want the state to become an independent nation." Greg From owner-freebsd-chat Tue Jan 21 17:07:26 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) id RAA28735 for chat-outgoing; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 17:07:26 -0800 (PST) Received: from fedex.mpd.tandem.com (fedex.mpd.tandem.com [131.124.250.27]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) with ESMTP id RAA28725 for ; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 17:07:22 -0800 (PST) Received: from rolex.mpd.tandem.com (rolex.mpd.tandem.com [131.124.4.1]) by fedex.mpd.tandem.com (8.8.4/8.8.0) with ESMTP id TAA08426; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 19:05:17 -0600 (CST) Received: from papillon.lemis.de (greylan2.mpd.tandem.com [131.124.28.38]) by rolex.mpd.tandem.com (8.7.5/8.7.1) with ESMTP id TAA21554; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 19:05:48 -0600 (CST) From: Greg Lehey Received: (grog@localhost) by papillon.lemis.de (8.8.4/8.6.12) id QAA00973; Mon, 20 Jan 1997 16:02:30 -0600 (CST) Organisation: LEMIS, Schellnhausen 2, 36325 Feldatal, Germany Phone: +49-6637-919123 Fax: +49-6637-919122 Message-Id: <199701202202.QAA00973@papillon.lemis.de> Subject: Re: Commerical applications (was: Development and validation tools...) In-Reply-To: <199701190518.GAA10148@oldman.steinkamm.com> from Arne Steinkamm at "Jan 19, 97 06:18:26 am" To: arne@Steinkamm.COM (Arne Steinkamm) Date: Mon, 20 Jan 1997 16:02:29 -0600 (CST) Cc: chat@FreeBSD.ORG (FreeBSD Chat) Reply-To: grog@lemis.de (Greg Lehey) X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.4ME+ PL28 (25)] MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-chat@FreeBSD.ORG X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk Arne Steinkamm writes: > >>>> The German magazines seem to think that there are only 4 OSes: DOS, >>>> WINDOWS, NT and Linux. Whenever they talk about a non-M$ OS (although >>>> one can argue that M$ doesn't have any real OS), then it's ALWAYS Linux. >>>> Even the UNIX rags are like that. >>> >>> I think this is our fault more than anything else. As you just noted, >>> if nobody provides them with articles to publish about FreeBSD then >>> the OS world is going to look somewhat smaller to someone in the >>> publishing business. >> >> I don't have a problem with writing articles about FreeBSD. I *do* >> have a problem with iX, for whom I wrote a number of articles >> (including, to the best of my knowledge, the very first article in any >> magazine about BSD/386). I find the people stubborn, arrogant and >> stupid. I have therefore decided not to have anything to do with them >> again. > > Funny... long ago i ask exactly the same magazine about printing my paper > about the BSD Unixes... > And guess what: The answer was: No, all people are speaking about linux, there's > no need for a BSD article. > My answer: You're the press, the people speak about that, what you write... > > Then i asked someone else working in the same publishing house about this and > he said: As long as the Heise publishing house makes it's money with the > linux CDs distributed by it's daughter company e-media, there will be not > much BSD topics inside it.. I don't think that that has a bearing on it. Reducing a magazine's coverage is a bad idea for the magazine, and if FreeBSD gets more popular, Heise will just start selling FreeBSD as well. I still think that it all boils down to inflexible viewpoints (not a rarity in Germany). Greg From owner-freebsd-chat Tue Jan 21 17:42:48 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) id RAA01501 for chat-outgoing; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 17:42:48 -0800 (PST) Received: from usr03.primenet.com (lclee@usr03.primenet.com [206.165.5.103]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) with ESMTP id RAA01496 for ; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 17:42:41 -0800 (PST) Received: (from lclee@localhost) by usr03.primenet.com (8.8.3/8.8.3) id SAA27858; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 18:42:36 -0700 (MST) Date: Tue, 21 Jan 1997 18:42:36 -0700 (MST) From: Larry Lee Message-Id: <199701220142.SAA27858@usr03.primenet.com> To: jfieber@indiana.edu, lclee@primenet.com Subject: Re: Commerical applications Cc: chat@freefall.freebsd.org Sender: owner-chat@FreeBSD.ORG X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk > From jfieber@fallout.campusview.indiana.edu Tue Jan 21 09:09:14 1997 > Date: Tue, 21 Jan 1997 11:09:08 -0500 (EST) > From: John Fieber > To: Larry Lee > cc: chat@freefall.freebsd.org > Subject: Re: Commerical applications > In-Reply-To: <199701210332.UAA09421@usr06.primenet.com> > MIME-Version: 1.0 > Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII > Content-Length: 2715 > > > --->>> Moved to chat@freebsd.org <<<--- OK > > On Mon, 20 Jan 1997, Larry Lee wrote: > Please keep in mind that I'm trying to identify major reasons of why FreeBSD is not more widely accepted, specifically features and applications that would make it useful as something other than a programmers development environment. I'm NOT trying to do a detailed comparison of OS features, nor am I trying to say my OS bigger or better than your OS. My general assumption is that the FreeBSD kernel is pretty good, and no more work is required here for general acceptance. There are other areas, predominately installation and applications and general cosmetics, which which I believe should be addressed to reduce some of the entry barriers that newcomers experience. The contention is that FreedBSD needs to be more widely accepted by more people. So what kind of people are we talking about? Computer science students, professional programmers, and Unix knowledgable commercial sites with embedded applications; Or do you want to address the larger arena of desktop applications? > > FreeBSD clearly outperforms W95 and WNT on the same size hardware and runs > > on smaller hardware platforms. > > If you want to do a general comparison (which I don't believe can be > done in a very meaningful way), you at *least* need to compare > similar configurations, which, in this case, means adding X and CDE > to FreeBSD. In this configuration, FreeBSD may still be competetive > with NT, but it flat out looses to W95 in terms of hardware > consumption. I disagree, although I have nothing but personal experience to support my position. I've run FreedBSD on an 386/8M, where the company refused to even install W95, I used 3.1 instead. I've never run CDE nor do I feel that icons help someone do useful work. Judging by the 'start' menu in W95 and WNT, I would say that Microsoft agrees. I typically run Xfree86 and tvtwm and the twm menus work fine for me. > > The basic UNIX commands are no more difficult to learn than the basic > > DOS commands and any UNIX shell is no more difficult to use than command.com > > and clearly has far more power and capabilities. > > Hold it here. You have suddenly switched to comparing Unix with > MS-DOS. Now MS-DOS runs quite nicely on an 8088 with 640K of ram, > but it is NT that people are comparing to Unix, not MS-DOS. Most of > the Unix shells and tools could be (and probably have been) ported to > NT anyway so this argument is nearly moot. So we agree that UNIX shells are not difficult to use and therefore do not present a barrier to entry? > The ease of use issue > is not command line versus command line, it is text interface > versus graphic interface. I've seen a demo on TV several times in which Microsoft shows that in DOS the command COPY C:\LARRY\MESSAGE.TXT A:\JOHN\LETTER.MSG can be accomplished in Windows with just drag and drop. Of course the target file had to previously exist for the demo to work, but that's not really emphasized. I don't think we can throw away our keyboards yet. As I pointed out above frequently used program are started in .xinitrc or twm menus. I don't believe typing some commands is a barrier to new users, YMMV. > > > The UNIX install process is much more difficult than Windows and when > > it's complete you still don't have a fully functional UNIX system. > > Yes you do, but but if you expect a fully functional Unix system to > be approximately the same thing as a fully functional NT system, you > are mistaken. Windows printer setup including selection of printer type is simple. Unix is challenging. Windows serial port installation to connect to several ISP's and a BBS and accept incoming modem calls and to use it fax machine is fairly easy. To do any one of those things in Unix is challenging. Windows installation of a LAN is simple, UNIX is not too hard... These are things (printer, serial port, LAN) that people want to do, but getting everything to work is difficult or even impossible for most people. > Compare xaw with other GUIs in existance around the time it was > designed and it doesn't look that bad. Its just that nobody has > bothered to update it. Think of xaw as a GUI time capsule. :) I think we agree here as well. In 1997, if you put a xaw based app next to a Windows app, guess which one they will pick. Unix's appearance presents a barrier to user acceptance. > > The world has gone graphical, but Unix still clings to its text based > > origins. > > Considering the application domains where Unix dominates, there are > many good reasons to maintain a text based interface. However, that > should not preclude the development of excellent GUI support. In Again we agree, although I think this was my weakest point. > -john > > From owner-freebsd-chat Tue Jan 21 17:54:47 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) id RAA02225 for chat-outgoing; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 17:54:47 -0800 (PST) Received: from genesis.atrad.adelaide.edu.au (genesis.atrad.adelaide.edu.au [129.127.96.120]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.4/8.8.4) with ESMTP id RAA02205; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 17:54:39 -0800 (PST) Received: (from msmith@localhost) by genesis.atrad.adelaide.edu.au (8.8.2/8.7.3) id MAA11082; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 12:21:37 +1030 (CST) From: Michael Smith Message-Id: <199701220151.MAA11082@genesis.atrad.adelaide.edu.au> Subject: Re: Cursing the sky (was: Commerical applications ...) In-Reply-To: <199701211802.DAA22042@lenlen.mt.cs.keio.ac.jp> from HOSOKAWA Tatsumi at "Jan 22, 97 03:02:57 am" To: hosokawa@mt.cs.keio.ac.jp (HOSOKAWA Tatsumi) Date: Wed, 22 Jan 1997 12:21:34 +1030 (CST) Cc: jkh@time.cdrom.com, keithl@wakko.gil.net, chat@freebsd.org, config@freebsd.org, hosokawa@mt.cs.keio.ac.jp X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.4ME+ PL28 (25)] MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk HOSOKAWA Tatsumi stands accused of saying: > > I think FreeBSD's kernel config system is far better than irritating :-) > "make config" of Slackware Linux, but I think it has following > problems, and introducing the formal "metaconfig" file can solve these > problems. I agree entirely with this sentiment; a formal description of the kernel configuration (preferably split across multiple files) is highly desirable. > 1. Users have to learn some rules of config files. Yes, the syntax of > config file is fairly simple, but the semantics is too difficult. > I think if there's an interactive menu system of kernel > configuration utility more smart than Linux's menuconfig and > xconfig, it helps novices much. Agreed. > 2. Dependency and exclusiveness between options, devices, etc. are > only decribed in natural language. Kernel configuration utility > can't use these information. Formal description is needed. Goes without saying really 8) > (note that following samplese are pseudo-code, I've not implemented > the translater yet.) > > Example 1: dependency > > DDB > > Enable the kernel debugger. > > I really don't like that much. How about : # file : kern_options.kci option "DDB" { description "Enables the kernel debugger" manref "ddb(4)" } option "DDB_UNATTENDED" { description "Don't drop into DDB for a panic. Intended for" description "unattended operation where you may want to" description "invoke DDB from the console, but still want" description "the machine to recover from a panic" requires {option DDB} } option "MATH_EMULATE" { description "Support for systems with no math coprocessor" description "(standard version)" excludes {option GPL_MATH_EMULATE} header opt_math_emulate.h } option "GPL_MATH_EMULATE" { description "Support for systems with no math coprocessor" description "(Improved but GPL-licensed version)" excludes {option MATH_EMULATE} header opt_math_emulate.h } I realise that we're arguing for syntaxes friendly to our chosen implementation languages here; I just feel that the SGML-like syntax is a lot harder to work with. > 3. I want to support I18N for kernel config utility, but current > config system can't support these feature. For example, some > hackers in Japan translated comments of 2.2-BETA and 3.0-CURRENT > LINT file into Japanese, but I think such approach is not so smart. That's a real challenge. Short of a message catalog for every option file, I can't see how you could do that. > demands. The definitions of "flags" and "options" of devices > should be described in formal way. Definitely : # file sio_driver.kci driver "sio" { description "Serial driver for 8250/16x50 UARTs" file i386/isa/sio.c file i386/isa/sioreg.h file i386/isa/ic/ns16550.h file i386/isa/ic/esp.h manref "sio(4)" flag { mask 0x001 value 1 description "enable shared IRQ" } flag { mask 0x0002 value 1 description "disable FIFO" } flag { mask 0x0004 value 0 description "has AST/4 compatible IRQ control register" } flag { mask 0x0008 value 1 description "fast recovery from lost output interrupts" } flag { mask 0x0080 value 1 description "enable probe diagnostics" } flag { mask 0xff00 range {0 0xff} description "device number of master port" } vector siointr irq all port *8 iosize 8 } option "COM_ESP" { description "Enable support for Hayes ESP cards" requires {driver sio} associate {driver sio} } (the *8 value for 'port' would mean "multiple of 8") By using multiple files, adding/removing drivers becomes easier. Parsing this sort of configuration file is trivial with Tcl or in C, and I expect that Perl would make quick work of it as well. > HOSOKAWA, Tatsumi Note that this is all pandering to making the status-quo easier, rather than chasing some blue-sky future. Is it the right thing to do? -- ]] Mike Smith, Software Engineer msmith@gsoft.com.au [[ ]] Genesis Software genesis@gsoft.com.au [[ ]] High-speed data acquisition and (GSM mobile) 0411-222-496 [[ ]] realtime instrument control. (ph) +61-8-8267-3493 [[ ]] Unix hardware collector. "Where are your PEZ?" The Tick [[ From owner-freebsd-chat Tue Jan 21 20:01:56 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) id UAA10232 for chat-outgoing; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 20:01:56 -0800 (PST) Received: from labs.usn.blaze.net.au (labs.usn.blaze.net.au [203.17.53.30]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id UAA10217; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 20:01:44 -0800 (PST) Received: (from davidn@localhost) by labs.usn.blaze.net.au (8.8.4/8.8.4) id PAA03317; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 15:01:22 +1100 (EST) Message-ID: Date: Wed, 22 Jan 1997 15:01:22 +1100 From: davidn@unique.usn.blaze.net.au (David Nugent) To: msmith@atrad.adelaide.edu.au (Michael Smith) Cc: hosokawa@mt.cs.keio.ac.jp (HOSOKAWA Tatsumi), jkh@time.cdrom.com, keithl@wakko.gil.net, chat@freebsd.org, config@freebsd.org Subject: Kernel configuration References: <199701211802.DAA22042@lenlen.mt.cs.keio.ac.jp> <199701220151.MAA11082@genesis.atrad.adelaide.edu.au> X-Mailer: Mutt 0.56 Mime-Version: 1.0 In-Reply-To: <199701220151.MAA11082@genesis.atrad.adelaide.edu.au>; from Michael Smith on Jan 22, 1997 12:21:34 +1030 Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk Michael Smith writes: > option "GPL_MATH_EMULATE" { > description "Support for systems with no math coprocessor" > description "(Improved but GPL-licensed version)" > excludes {option MATH_EMULATE} > header opt_math_emulate.h > } > > I realise that we're arguing for syntaxes friendly to our chosen > implementation languages here; I just feel that the SGML-like syntax > is a lot harder to work with. Agreed. The above is pretty clear, less verbose and much easier on the eyes. I quite like it. :) One other thing I would add is some form of option "grouping", though, and perhaps even a way of nesting options (which might even include support for device-specific flags). That way, a metaconfig util could use this structure as the basis of creating configuration sections, rather than presenting it all on the one giant dialog or a long and arduous set of questions (like the standard Linux 'make config', which is really *awful* and vastly improved by menuconfig/xconfig which do have some structure). > > 3. I want to support I18N for kernel config utility, but current > > config system can't support these feature. For example, some > > hackers in Japan translated comments of 2.2-BETA and 3.0-CURRENT > > LINT file into Japanese, but I think such approach is not so smart. > > That's a real challenge. Short of a message catalog for every option > file, I can't see how you could do that. Perhaps the standard metaconfig file could be in English, and supplimental description files supplied for other languages. Or, following the Linux example, most if not all of the "description" text could be external, although there's always the danger that this becomes outdated because two files need to be maintained rather than just one. I guess the metaconfig tool could check that itself and issue warnings. > Note that this is all pandering to making the status-quo easier, > rather than chasing some blue-sky future. Is it the right thing > to do? The metaconfig part could remain independant of what really runs "under the bonnet". If the actual (now generated) config file format changes, then only that side of the metaconfig utility changes (ie. reading and writing it). Regardless of what happens there, I think supporting a front-end configuration system is the right way, and adding logic smarts to it, with help and adding some sort of coherent structure can only make things easier. BTW, how successful was your hunt a couple of months ago for a good text UI builder? tcl/tk is the obvious choice for an X-based metaconfig tool, but for textmode? Regards, David Nugent - Unique Computing Pty Ltd - Melbourne, Australia Voice +61-3-9791-9547 Data/BBS +61-3-9792-3507 3:632/348@fidonet davidn@freebsd.org davidn@blaze.net.au http://www.blaze.net.au/~davidn/ From owner-freebsd-chat Tue Jan 21 20:16:42 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) id UAA11020 for chat-outgoing; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 20:16:42 -0800 (PST) Received: from fallout.campusview.indiana.edu (fallout.campusview.indiana.edu [149.159.1.1]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id UAA11013 for ; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 20:16:35 -0800 (PST) Received: from localhost (jfieber@localhost) by fallout.campusview.indiana.edu (8.8.4/8.8.4) with SMTP id XAA04404; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 23:15:54 -0500 (EST) Date: Tue, 21 Jan 1997 23:15:54 -0500 (EST) From: John Fieber To: Larry Lee cc: chat@freefall.freebsd.org Subject: Re: Commerical applications In-Reply-To: <199701220142.SAA27858@usr03.primenet.com> Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: owner-chat@FreeBSD.ORG X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk On Tue, 21 Jan 1997, Larry Lee wrote: > My general assumption is that the FreeBSD kernel is pretty good, and no > more work is required here for general acceptance. There are other areas, > predominately installation and applications and general cosmetics, which > which I believe should be addressed to reduce some of the entry barriers > that newcomers experience. These are reasonable assumptions. Unfortunately the economics of FreeBSD do not support the areas of needed improvement very well. When dealing with the kernel and other "hacking" types of work, the most qualified designers and most qualified implementers are the same people. With interface design, this is rarely the case. Furthermore, while kernel hacking can be easily done by an individual working alone with email communication, good interface design is considerably more difficult, particularly when the designer and the implementer are different people. Finally, on a volunteer project, people have little motivation to work on projects they can't "own" which makes designer/implementor relationships difficult to establish. > So what kind of people are we talking about? Computer science students, > professional programmers, and Unix knowledgable commercial sites > with embedded applications; Or do you want to address the larger > arena of desktop applications? The latter is a bit unrealistic, so yes, the former. > I disagree, although I have nothing but personal experience to support > my position. I've run FreedBSD on an 386/8M, where the company refused > to even install W95, I used 3.1 instead. Without specifying a task, this is a meaningless comparison. If you say "For a web server...", I'd be in 100% agreement, but if set up FreeBSD to provide the same GUI functionality, your *only* choice is CDE which really needs considerably more than Windows 95, or about the same as Windows NT. Whether think the GUI functionality is worthwhile is a separate issue, however it *is* one of the top reasons why people choose NT over Unix so don't brush it aside so lightly. > I've never run CDE nor do I feel > that icons help someone do useful work. Judging by the 'start' menu in W95 > and WNT, I would say that Microsoft agrees. That is a pretty incredible leap of logic! If icons don't help, then would you care to explain why the Windows Explorer is the hub of the Windows 95 interface??? The "Start" menu is just one tiny part of W95, and if you take a look, you will see that (surprise) there are icons right there in the menu! Actually, this isn't alarming because HCI research has consistently shown icon + text to be more effective than text only labels, which are in turn more effective than icon only labels. > I typically run Xfree86 and > tvtwm and the twm menus work fine for me. The first and most important rule of interface design is to remove your preferences and intuition from the picture. If you have ever actually done any usability testing on anything you designed for someone else using your own intuition and preferences, you will know exactly why. :) It might surprise you, but there are many people on the planet who think and work visually much more efficiently than they do verbally. For these people grabbing two files from the desktop and dropping them on the "diff" icon requires much less mental effort than constructing the verbal command to do the same thing. Apple knows this well. Recently, Microsoft figured it out. Thankfully someone who knew this was around when Vue (the parent of CDE) was created. > So we agree that UNIX shells are not difficult to use and therefore > do not present a barrier to entry? Nope, that is not what I meant at all. Unix shells are difficult for some people to use, as is the MS-DOS shell which Windows NT has inherited. What I meant is that the differences between the Unix and NT on this front is somewhat irrelevant since the two can be so easily put on a level playing field. Creating a level GUI playing field is, at the moment, a lot harder. > As I pointed out above frequently used program are started in > .xinitrc or twm menus. I don't believe typing some commands is > a barrier to new users, YMMV. Interesting example. Let me pursue this a bit. For someone not too familiar with unix looking for ways to start things up automatically on their PC that they just installed FreeBSD on, what things might they encounter while looking for the answer? Well, how about these: /etc/rc* /usr/local/etc/rc.d/* /etc/profile /etc/csh.* /etc/inetd.conf /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/xdm/* /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/xinit/xinitrc ~/.profile ~/.login ~/.cshrc ~/.bash_profile ~/.bashrc ~/.xsession ~/.xinitrc and probably a bunch more. Should they try a "man -k start", they will be led down even more wrong paths. Okay, so, which one? Now remember, you are not too familiar with Unix.... It doesn't take much figuring to realize that the task will be simpler in Windows95 simply because the options are fewer and well documented. [With CDE, applications running when you log out are automagically restarted when you log in next. Alternatively, you can take a session "snapshot" at any time to use as your default login configuration.] -john From owner-freebsd-chat Tue Jan 21 20:38:56 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) id UAA12144 for chat-outgoing; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 20:38:56 -0800 (PST) Received: from labs.usn.blaze.net.au (labs.usn.blaze.net.au [203.17.53.30]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id UAA12137 for ; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 20:38:49 -0800 (PST) Received: from localhost (davidn@localhost) by labs.usn.blaze.net.au (8.8.4/8.8.4) with SMTP id PAA03483; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 15:37:54 +1100 (EST) Date: Wed, 22 Jan 1997 15:37:54 +1100 (EST) From: David Nugent Reply-To: davidn@blaze.net.au To: "Jordan K. Hubbard" cc: Warner Losh , Tim Vanderhoek , FreeBSD-chat Mailing List Subject: Re: Commerical applications (was: Development and validation In-Reply-To: <1162.853897495@time.cdrom.com> Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk On Tue, 21 Jan 1997, Jordan K. Hubbard wrote: >> In message n.ca> Tim Vanderhoek writes: >> : Jordan K. >> : Hubbard, much to his credit, is not the type of person likely to inspire >> : a personality cult....he lacks eccentricity. >> >> Hmmmm, how can you possibly say this about a man who lives (or lived) >> with 27 cats? :-) :-) :-) > >Uh, 15. I'm not THAT eccentric. :-) Interesting - a "cat rating". It seems that we've hit upon a means of calibrating eccentricity. Damnit, I've only got one! I feel entirely left out. :-) Regards, David Nugent - Unique Computing Pty Ltd - Melbourne, Australia Voice +61-3-9791-9547 Data/BBS +61-3-9792-3507 3:632/348@fidonet davidn@freebsd.org davidn@blaze.net.au http://www.blaze.net.au/~davidn/ From owner-freebsd-chat Tue Jan 21 20:39:41 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) id UAA12210 for chat-outgoing; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 20:39:41 -0800 (PST) Received: from time.cdrom.com (time.cdrom.com [204.216.27.226]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id UAA12205 for ; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 20:39:39 -0800 (PST) Received: from time.cdrom.com (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by time.cdrom.com (8.8.4/8.6.9) with ESMTP id UAA07100; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 20:39:26 -0800 (PST) To: grog@lemis.de (Greg Lehey) cc: nate@mt.sri.com (Nate Williams), chat@freebsd.org (FreeBSD Chat) Subject: Re: Netscape and NIS In-reply-to: Your message of "Sun, 19 Jan 1997 09:58:08 CST." <199701191558.JAA00281@papillon.lemis.de> Date: Tue, 21 Jan 1997 20:39:25 -0800 Message-ID: <7096.853907965@time.cdrom.com> From: "Jordan K. Hubbard" Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk > Well, I've spent a lot of time in Texas (in fact, that's where I am > right now), and I've always wanted to describe my take on the Alamo, > so here's some flame fodder: And for those who prefer their Alamo history in pictoral form: http://www.drtl.org/~drtl/webchro1.html :-) Jordan From owner-freebsd-chat Tue Jan 21 22:05:31 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) id WAA15970 for chat-outgoing; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 22:05:31 -0800 (PST) Received: from franc.ucdavis.edu (franc.ucdavis.edu [128.120.8.183]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id WAA15960 for ; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 22:05:28 -0800 (PST) Received: from dragon.nuxi.com by franc.ucdavis.edu (8.8.5/UCD3.8.4) id WAA10043; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 22:05:11 -0800 (PST) Received: (from obrien@localhost) by dragon.nuxi.com (8.7.6/8.7.3) id WAA00747; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 22:04:43 -0800 (PST) Message-ID: Date: Tue, 21 Jan 1997 22:04:43 -0800 From: obrien@cs.ucdavis.edu (David O'Brien) To: chat@freebsd.org Subject: cat eccentricity rating (was Commerical applications (was: Development and validation)) References: <1162.853897495@time.cdrom.com> X-Mailer: Mutt 0.58-PL15 Mime-Version: 1.0 Reply-To: deobrien@ucdavis.edu Organization: The NUXI *BSD group X-PGP-Fingerprint: B7 4D 3E E9 11 39 5F A3 90 76 5D 69 58 D9 98 7A X-Pgp-Keyid: 34F9F9D5 In-Reply-To: ; from David Nugent on Jan 22, 1997 15:37:54 +1100 Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk David Nugent writes: > >> : Jordan K. Hubbard, much to his credit, is not the type of person > >> : likely to inspire a personality cult....he lacks eccentricity. > >> > >> Hmmmm, how can you possibly say this about a man who lives (or lived) > >> with 27 cats? :-) :-) :-) > > > >Uh, 15. I'm not THAT eccentric. :-) > > Interesting - a "cat rating". It seems that we've hit upon a means of > calibrating eccentricity. > > Damnit, I've only got one! I feel entirely left out. :-) Well, you've got a live one -- there's only two stuffed ones here. :-( -- -- David (deobrien@ucdavis.edu) From owner-freebsd-chat Tue Jan 21 22:08:38 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) id WAA16212 for chat-outgoing; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 22:08:38 -0800 (PST) Received: from time.cdrom.com (time.cdrom.com [204.216.27.226]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id WAA16192; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 22:08:32 -0800 (PST) Received: from time.cdrom.com (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by time.cdrom.com (8.8.4/8.6.9) with ESMTP id WAA20542; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 22:06:15 -0800 (PST) To: davidn@unique.usn.blaze.net.au (David Nugent) cc: msmith@atrad.adelaide.edu.au (Michael Smith), hosokawa@mt.cs.keio.ac.jp (HOSOKAWA Tatsumi), keithl@wakko.gil.net, chat@freebsd.org, config@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Kernel configuration In-reply-to: Your message of "Wed, 22 Jan 1997 15:01:22 +1100." Date: Tue, 21 Jan 1997 22:06:15 -0800 Message-ID: <20538.853913175@time.cdrom.com> From: "Jordan K. Hubbard" Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk > BTW, how successful was your hunt a couple of months ago for a > good text UI builder? tcl/tk is the obvious choice for an X-based > metaconfig tool, but for textmode? It wasn't. :-( Jordan From owner-freebsd-chat Tue Jan 21 22:22:01 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) id WAA17091 for chat-outgoing; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 22:22:01 -0800 (PST) Received: from genesis.atrad.adelaide.edu.au (genesis.atrad.adelaide.edu.au [129.127.96.120]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id WAA17071; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 22:21:53 -0800 (PST) Received: (from msmith@localhost) by genesis.atrad.adelaide.edu.au (8.8.2/8.7.3) id QAA13680; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 16:50:19 +1030 (CST) From: Michael Smith Message-Id: <199701220620.QAA13680@genesis.atrad.adelaide.edu.au> Subject: Re: Kernel configuration In-Reply-To: <20538.853913175@time.cdrom.com> from "Jordan K. Hubbard" at "Jan 21, 97 10:06:15 pm" To: jkh@time.cdrom.com (Jordan K. Hubbard) Date: Wed, 22 Jan 1997 16:50:18 +1030 (CST) Cc: davidn@unique.usn.blaze.net.au, msmith@atrad.adelaide.edu.au, hosokawa@mt.cs.keio.ac.jp, keithl@wakko.gil.net, chat@freebsd.org, config@freebsd.org X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.4ME+ PL28 (25)] MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk Jordan K. Hubbard stands accused of saying: > > BTW, how successful was your hunt a couple of months ago for a > > good text UI builder? tcl/tk is the obvious choice for an X-based > > metaconfig tool, but for textmode? > > It wasn't. :-( That's not entirely fair to Jan, but in reality, there appears to be absolutely zip available. > Jordan -- ]] Mike Smith, Software Engineer msmith@gsoft.com.au [[ ]] Genesis Software genesis@gsoft.com.au [[ ]] High-speed data acquisition and (GSM mobile) 0411-222-496 [[ ]] realtime instrument control. (ph) +61-8-8267-3493 [[ ]] Unix hardware collector. "Where are your PEZ?" The Tick [[ From owner-freebsd-chat Tue Jan 21 22:23:31 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) id WAA17222 for chat-outgoing; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 22:23:31 -0800 (PST) Received: from genesis.atrad.adelaide.edu.au (genesis.atrad.adelaide.edu.au [129.127.96.120]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id WAA17212 for ; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 22:23:27 -0800 (PST) Received: (from msmith@localhost) by genesis.atrad.adelaide.edu.au (8.8.2/8.7.3) id QAA13724; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 16:53:07 +1030 (CST) From: Michael Smith Message-Id: <199701220623.QAA13724@genesis.atrad.adelaide.edu.au> Subject: Re: Commerical applications (was: Development and validation In-Reply-To: from David Nugent at "Jan 22, 97 03:37:54 pm" To: davidn@blaze.net.au Date: Wed, 22 Jan 1997 16:53:06 +1030 (CST) Cc: chat@freebsd.org X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.4ME+ PL28 (25)] MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk David Nugent stands accused of saying: > >> > >> Hmmmm, how can you possibly say this about a man who lives (or lived) > >> with 27 cats? :-) :-) :-) > > > >Uh, 15. I'm not THAT eccentric. :-) > > Interesting - a "cat rating". It seems that we've hit upon a > means of calibrating eccentricity. > > Damnit, I've only got one! I feel entirely left out. :-) Can I compete by proxy? There's a 'cathouse' just down the street; at last cull they took 50 cats (leaving about half a dozen, who are busy repopulating...) ('cathouse' : house occupied by lonely old individual with no interest in desexing their furry friends.) > David Nugent - Unique Computing Pty Ltd - Melbourne, Australia -- ]] Mike Smith, Software Engineer msmith@gsoft.com.au [[ ]] Genesis Software genesis@gsoft.com.au [[ ]] High-speed data acquisition and (GSM mobile) 0411-222-496 [[ ]] realtime instrument control. (ph) +61-8-8267-3493 [[ ]] Unix hardware collector. "Where are your PEZ?" The Tick [[ From owner-freebsd-chat Tue Jan 21 22:54:56 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) id WAA18927 for chat-outgoing; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 22:54:56 -0800 (PST) Received: from genesis.atrad.adelaide.edu.au (genesis.atrad.adelaide.edu.au [129.127.96.120]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id WAA18910; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 22:54:52 -0800 (PST) Received: (from msmith@localhost) by genesis.atrad.adelaide.edu.au (8.8.2/8.7.3) id RAA14007; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 17:23:25 +1030 (CST) From: Michael Smith Message-Id: <199701220653.RAA14007@genesis.atrad.adelaide.edu.au> Subject: Re: Kernel configuration In-Reply-To: from David Nugent at "Jan 22, 97 03:01:22 pm" To: davidn@unique.usn.blaze.net.au (David Nugent) Date: Wed, 22 Jan 1997 17:23:24 +1030 (CST) Cc: msmith@atrad.adelaide.edu.au, hosokawa@mt.cs.keio.ac.jp, jkh@time.cdrom.com, keithl@wakko.gil.net, chat@freebsd.org, config@freebsd.org X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.4ME+ PL28 (25)] MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk David Nugent stands accused of saying: > Michael Smith writes: > > option "GPL_MATH_EMULATE" { > > description "Support for systems with no math coprocessor" > > description "(Improved but GPL-licensed version)" > > excludes {option MATH_EMULATE} > > header opt_math_emulate.h > > } > > > > I realise that we're arguing for syntaxes friendly to our chosen > > implementation languages here; I just feel that the SGML-like syntax > > is a lot harder to work with. > > Agreed. The above is pretty clear, less verbose and much easier on > the eyes. I quite like it. :) Thankyou 8) I've been using that style of syntax in our current software for about 18 months now (in case you were wondering whether I'm just making this up as I go along 8), and it's proven to be very useful. Just digressing on the Tcl side for a moment, you define : proc option {name attr} { global Options; lappend Options(list) $name; while {$attr != ""} { set token [lvarpop attr]; switch -- $token { description { lappend Options($name:description) [lvarpop attr]; } ... and then you can test for a description somewhere else : if {[info exists Options($name:description)]} { ... } > One other thing I would add is some form of option "grouping", though, You could group based on the file the options are defined in, or you could add a 'group' attribute, perhaps even with a heirachial syntax if you thought it was worth it. > and perhaps even a way of nesting options (which might even include > support for device-specific flags). Note the 'sio' example, which specifically implies (sic) this; the 'requires {device sio}' means that the option makes no sense without the 'sio' device configured (and thus would ideally not be visible at all). Likewise you could nest options using the 'requires' attribute. > Perhaps the standard metaconfig file could be in English, and > supplimental description files supplied for other languages. That actually sounds fairly reasonable. In situations where only english text was available, the tool could fall back on that as a default. (eg. I distribute a new driver with a .ki file but not a .kim (message translation) file) > David Nugent - Unique Computing Pty Ltd - Melbourne, Australia -- ]] Mike Smith, Software Engineer msmith@gsoft.com.au [[ ]] Genesis Software genesis@gsoft.com.au [[ ]] High-speed data acquisition and (GSM mobile) 0411-222-496 [[ ]] realtime instrument control. (ph) +61-8-8267-3493 [[ ]] Unix hardware collector. "Where are your PEZ?" The Tick [[ From owner-freebsd-chat Tue Jan 21 23:02:18 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) id XAA19401 for chat-outgoing; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 23:02:18 -0800 (PST) Received: from time.cdrom.com (time.cdrom.com [204.216.27.226]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id XAA19378; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 23:02:14 -0800 (PST) Received: from time.cdrom.com (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by time.cdrom.com (8.8.4/8.6.9) with ESMTP id WAA10636; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 22:58:10 -0800 (PST) To: Michael Smith cc: davidn@unique.usn.blaze.net.au, hosokawa@mt.cs.keio.ac.jp, keithl@wakko.gil.net, chat@freebsd.org, config@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Kernel configuration In-reply-to: Your message of "Wed, 22 Jan 1997 16:50:18 +1030." <199701220620.QAA13680@genesis.atrad.adelaide.edu.au> Date: Tue, 21 Jan 1997 22:58:10 -0800 Message-ID: <10627.853916290@time.cdrom.com> From: "Jordan K. Hubbard" Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk > > It wasn't. :-( > > That's not entirely fair to Jan, but in reality, there appears to be > absolutely zip available. I can only measure our success at finding something by the presence or absence of that something, sorry. :-) Jordan From owner-freebsd-chat Tue Jan 21 23:32:57 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) id XAA20671 for chat-outgoing; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 23:32:57 -0800 (PST) Received: from genesis.atrad.adelaide.edu.au (genesis.atrad.adelaide.edu.au [129.127.96.120]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id XAA20654; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 23:32:53 -0800 (PST) Received: (from msmith@localhost) by genesis.atrad.adelaide.edu.au (8.8.2/8.7.3) id SAA14304; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 18:02:03 +1030 (CST) From: Michael Smith Message-Id: <199701220732.SAA14304@genesis.atrad.adelaide.edu.au> Subject: Re: Kernel configuration In-Reply-To: <199701220653.RAA14007@genesis.atrad.adelaide.edu.au> from Michael Smith at "Jan 22, 97 05:23:24 pm" To: msmith@atrad.adelaide.edu.au (Michael Smith) Date: Wed, 22 Jan 1997 18:02:02 +1030 (CST) Cc: davidn@unique.usn.blaze.net.au, msmith@atrad.adelaide.edu.au, hosokawa@mt.cs.keio.ac.jp, jkh@time.cdrom.com, keithl@wakko.gil.net, chat@freebsd.org, config@freebsd.org X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.4ME+ PL28 (25)] MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk Michael Smith stands accused of saying: > > > > Agreed. The above is pretty clear, less verbose and much easier on > > the eyes. I quite like it. :) > > Thankyou 8) I've been using that style of syntax in our current software > for about 18 months now (in case you were wondering whether I'm just > making this up as I go along 8), and it's proven to be very useful. I should also perhaps have observed that the software I'm talking about here is a client-server configuration utility, with the client deriving all of the metaconfiguration data from the server at session startup, and generating the UI on the fly based on this data. So I guess you could say I've been down this road before, but at the same time to date I've been walking it alone, and new perspectives are proving very enlightening. 8) -- ]] Mike Smith, Software Engineer msmith@gsoft.com.au [[ ]] Genesis Software genesis@gsoft.com.au [[ ]] High-speed data acquisition and (GSM mobile) 0411-222-496 [[ ]] realtime instrument control. (ph) +61-8-8267-3493 [[ ]] Unix hardware collector. "Where are your PEZ?" The Tick [[ From owner-freebsd-chat Wed Jan 22 03:42:47 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) id DAA29503 for chat-outgoing; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 03:42:47 -0800 (PST) Received: from wakko.gil.net (keithl@wakko.gil.net [207.100.79.10]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id DAA29498 for ; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 03:42:45 -0800 (PST) Received: from localhost (keithl@localhost) by wakko.gil.net (8.8.3/8.8.2) with SMTP id GAA31637; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 06:44:48 -0500 Date: Wed, 22 Jan 1997 06:44:48 -0500 (EST) From: Keith Leonard To: Wes Peters cc: chat@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Cursing the sky (was: Commerical applications ...) In-Reply-To: <199701220526.WAA00319@obie.softweyr.ml.org> Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk Sorry, I despise Win95 so much that I don't even consider it in my ramblings. Almost all my refereces are to win 3.0 and 3.1. I've installed over 150 systems with 3.1 (standalone machines) and it is quite simple once you understand it (which the average person is capable of - especially with all the books available). Hell, I just set up a 70 year old retired guy and his wife with 3.1 and all I have to do is say (over the phone) just click here, then here and type this. TRY THIS WITH X! Inside of one week he is producing letters setting up databases and connecting to the web. If I handed him a FreeBSD (or any other free Unix) CD he shoot his machine inside of that week and go off to Tahiti to sun on the beach. No Software is easy to a newbie - it's just that Billy boy promises shit and at least delivers half a sack. On Tue, 21 Jan 1997, Wes Peters wrote: > You must be. After spending two nights trying to get Win$%&(@#95 to > recognize a PCI ethernet controller that FreeBSD probes with no > problems, I'm ready to take the disk out and hit it with a hammer. Or > better yet, just over that pile of BullBits(tm) with FreeBSD. Microsoft > has, in this as in all things, made a lot of promises they do not live > up to. Plug and play my bloody ass! Keith keithl@wakko.gil.net ------------------------------------------------------ Character is what you are in the dark - John Warfin ------------------------------------------------------ From owner-freebsd-chat Wed Jan 22 04:58:43 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) id EAA03242 for chat-outgoing; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 04:58:43 -0800 (PST) Received: from time.cdrom.com (time.cdrom.com [204.216.27.226]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id EAA03219; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 04:58:36 -0800 (PST) Received: from time.cdrom.com (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by time.cdrom.com (8.8.4/8.6.9) with ESMTP id EAA22825; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 04:57:34 -0800 (PST) To: Michael Smith cc: davidn@unique.usn.blaze.net.au, hosokawa@mt.cs.keio.ac.jp, keithl@wakko.gil.net, chat@freebsd.org, config@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Kernel configuration In-reply-to: Your message of "Wed, 22 Jan 1997 18:02:02 +1030." <199701220732.SAA14304@genesis.atrad.adelaide.edu.au> Date: Wed, 22 Jan 1997 04:57:34 -0800 Message-ID: <22821.853937854@time.cdrom.com> From: "Jordan K. Hubbard" Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk > I should also perhaps have observed that the software I'm talking > about here is a client-server configuration utility, with the client > deriving all of the metaconfiguration data from the server at session > startup, and generating the UI on the fly based on this data. > > So I guess you could say I've been down this road before, but at the > same time to date I've been walking it alone, and new perspectives > are proving very enlightening. 8) Actually, where's your code for this lately? I was just thinking about this the other day and wanted to play with the concept a little. :-) Jordan From owner-freebsd-chat Wed Jan 22 07:30:16 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) id HAA09107 for chat-outgoing; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 07:30:16 -0800 (PST) Received: from tyger.inna.net (root@tyger.inna.net [206.151.66.1]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id HAA09088; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 07:30:12 -0800 (PST) Received: from dolphin.inna.net (jamie@dolphin.inna.net [206.151.66.2]) by tyger.inna.net (8.8.3/8.7.3) with SMTP id KAA10225; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 10:42:17 -0500 (EST) Date: Wed, 22 Jan 1997 10:30:07 -0500 (EST) From: Jamie Bowden To: HOSOKAWA Tatsumi cc: jkh@time.cdrom.com, keithl@wakko.gil.net, chat@freebsd.org, config@freebsd.org, hosokawa@mt.cs.keio.ac.jp Subject: Re: Cursing the sky (was: Commerical applications ...) In-Reply-To: <199701210603.PAA20592@lenlen.mt.cs.keio.ac.jp> Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk Please don't remove the ability to edit the config file by hand. I personally hate linux's kernel config tool. I don't know how many would second that, but I am sure there are quite a few. On Tue, 21 Jan 1997, HOSOKAWA Tatsumi wrote: > In article <17176.853741813@time.cdrom.com> > jkh@time.cdrom.com writes: > > >> Maybe I'll get my act together soon and get things moving on that > >> front again, but I'll say here and now that if someone ELSE has a > >> brilliant shining picture in their head and the will to execute it in > >> C, C++ and/or TCL (no PERL please - we haven't room on the boot floppy > >> for that approach!), I'd love to talk to them. A fresh set of eyes on > >> FreeBSD's installation and configuration framework would be > >> interesting too. > > No perl? I like it but I admit it's too fat :-) (my second favourite > is C/Tk). > > I started working on translating LINT config file to SGML file and > implementing the translator (using sgmls with DTD file) of this > meta-config file to ordinary config files. > > I think this enables us to make automated config file generator tools > like Linux's menuconfig and xconfig smartly. > > I think that the same approach can be used for automatic and > semi-automatic system configuration tool for network and storage > management. > > What do you think about it? > > (I'm planning to port sysinstall to X11 :-). I think it's not > difficult to install FreeBSD from X interface like RedHat Linux) > > -- > HOSOKAWA, Tatsumi > hosokawa@mt.cs.keio.ac.jp > hosokawa@jp.FreeBSD.org > Jamie Bowden Network Administrator, TBI Ltd. From owner-freebsd-chat Wed Jan 22 07:35:18 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) id HAA09357 for chat-outgoing; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 07:35:18 -0800 (PST) Received: from frig.mt.cs.keio.ac.jp (frig.mt.cs.keio.ac.jp [131.113.32.7]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) with SMTP id HAA09349; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 07:35:15 -0800 (PST) Received: (from hosokawa@localhost) by frig.mt.cs.keio.ac.jp (8.6.12+2.4W/3.4Wbeta3) id AAA06428; Thu, 23 Jan 1997 00:32:04 +0900 Date: Thu, 23 Jan 1997 00:32:04 +0900 Message-Id: <199701221532.AAA06428@frig.mt.cs.keio.ac.jp> To: jamie@inna.net Cc: jkh@time.cdrom.com, keithl@wakko.gil.net, chat@freebsd.org, config@freebsd.org, hosokawa@mt.cs.keio.ac.jp Subject: Re: Cursing the sky (was: Commerical applications ...) In-Reply-To: Your message of Wed, 22 Jan 1997 10:30:07 -0500 (EST). From: hosokawa@mt.cs.keio.ac.jp (HOSOKAWA Tatsumi) X-Mailer: mnews [version 1.18PL3] 1994-08/01(Mon) Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk In article jamie@inna.net writes: >> Please don't remove the ability to edit the config file by hand. Of course. >> I >> personally hate linux's kernel config tool. Me too :-). hosokawa From owner-freebsd-chat Wed Jan 22 08:49:10 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) id IAA12420 for chat-outgoing; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 08:49:10 -0800 (PST) Received: from toth.ferginc.com (toth.ferginc.com [205.139.23.69]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id IAA12403; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 08:49:03 -0800 (PST) Received: from toth.hq.ferg.com by toth.ferginc.com (You/Wish) with SMTP id LAA07909; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 11:48:02 -0500 (EST) Posted-Date: Wed, 22 Jan 1997 11:48:02 -0500 (EST) Date: Wed, 22 Jan 1997 11:48:02 -0500 (EST) From: Branson Matheson X-Sender: branson@toth.hq.ferg.com Reply-To: branson.matheson@ferginc.com To: Jamie Bowden cc: HOSOKAWA Tatsumi , jkh@time.cdrom.com, keithl@wakko.gil.net, chat@freebsd.org, config@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Cursing the sky (was: Commerical applications ...) In-Reply-To: Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk On Wed, 22 Jan 1997, Jamie Bowden wrote: > Please don't remove the ability to edit the config file by hand. I > personally hate linux's kernel config tool. I don't know how many would > second that, but I am sure there are quite a few. You can add a Hearty Second from this person too! -branson ============================================================================= Branson Matheson | Ferguson Enterprises | If you're falling off a System Administrator | W: (804) 874-7795 | mountian, you might as well Unix, Perl, WWW | branson@ferginc.com | attempt to fly. -Delenn From owner-freebsd-chat Wed Jan 22 09:49:34 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) id JAA16541 for chat-outgoing; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 09:49:34 -0800 (PST) Received: from usr07.primenet.com (lclee@usr07.primenet.com [206.165.5.107]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id JAA16522 for ; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 09:49:24 -0800 (PST) Received: (from lclee@localhost) by usr07.primenet.com (8.8.3/8.8.3) id KAA15464; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 10:49:18 -0700 (MST) Date: Wed, 22 Jan 1997 10:49:18 -0700 (MST) From: Larry Lee Message-Id: <199701221749.KAA15464@usr07.primenet.com> To: jfieber@indiana.edu, lclee@primenet.com Subject: Re: Commerical applications Cc: chat@freefall.freebsd.org Sender: owner-chat@FreeBSD.ORG X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk > From jfieber@fallout.campusview.indiana.edu Tue Jan 21 21:16:18 1997 > > On Tue, 21 Jan 1997, Larry Lee wrote: > > > My general assumption is that the FreeBSD kernel is pretty good, and no > > more work is required here for general acceptance. There are other areas, > > predominately installation and applications and general cosmetics, which > > which I believe should be addressed to reduce some of the entry barriers > > that newcomers experience. > > These are reasonable assumptions. Unfortunately the economics of > FreeBSD do not support the areas of needed improvement very well. > When dealing with the kernel and other "hacking" types of work, the > most qualified designers and most qualified implementers are the same > people. > > With interface design, this is rarely the case. Furthermore, while > kernel hacking can be easily done by an individual working alone with > email communication, good interface design is considerably more > difficult, particularly when the designer and the implementer are > different people. Finally, on a volunteer project, people have > little motivation to work on projects they can't "own" which > makes designer/implementor relationships difficult to establish. As I understood it, the fundamental complaint is: FreeBSD is a great OS, but it isn't getting the general acceptance that it deserves. I think there are specific reasons (deficiencies in FreeBSD) that are responsible. Someone else might disagree with my assessment and present their own ideas, but at least we would both by trying to change things for the better. But as I read the previous paragraphs you seem to feel that it can't be done. Everyone is a primadonna with no interest in working towards a common goal. It's easy to find reasons for why something can't be done, but it doesn't accomplish anything. > > So what kind of people are we talking about? Computer science students, > > professional programmers, and Unix knowledgable commercial sites > > with embedded applications; Or do you want to address the larger > > arena of desktop applications? > > The latter is a bit unrealistic, so yes, the former. The people you want to appeal to are already knowledgable in the internals of a computer, its operating system, and development environments. So tell me why aren't these people flocking to FreeBSD? Where are they going? What's there that isn't here? I actually thought/hoped that it would be more beneficial to use FreedBSD for something. So I was voting for the latter. 1% of all the PC's in the world is a lot more than 50% of all unix programmers, and that translates to a lot more users. I know I made up the percentages but I hope you see the point. As far as the rest of you comments go, I think we have some fundamental differences as to what is needed and whether it's even possible. Let me summarize and respond without quoting. I do think that most people use their computers as communication and organization devices, and what is needed in the basic offering are applications such as word processors, internet access, fax machines, as well as installation procedure to make this stuff work. I don't think FreeBSD needs to be a windows clone to be accepted. Specifically, I don't agree that icons, point/click, and drag/drop are _requirements_ to doing useful work. Although I will go see what I can find about CDE. I do agree that FreeBSD needs some serious help with respect to installation and configuration. Larry From owner-freebsd-chat Wed Jan 22 11:06:02 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) id LAA20442 for chat-outgoing; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 11:06:02 -0800 (PST) Received: from time.cdrom.com (time.cdrom.com [204.216.27.226]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id LAA20437 for ; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 11:05:59 -0800 (PST) Received: from time.cdrom.com (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by time.cdrom.com (8.8.4/8.6.9) with ESMTP id LAA24782; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 11:05:43 -0800 (PST) To: Larry Lee cc: jfieber@indiana.edu, chat@freefall.freebsd.org Subject: Re: Commerical applications In-reply-to: Your message of "Wed, 22 Jan 1997 10:49:18 MST." <199701221749.KAA15464@usr07.primenet.com> Date: Wed, 22 Jan 1997 11:05:42 -0800 Message-ID: <24779.853959942@time.cdrom.com> From: "Jordan K. Hubbard" Sender: owner-chat@FreeBSD.ORG X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk > I do agree that FreeBSD needs some serious help with respect to > installation and configuration. And I need some serious help in providing that full picture. Are you willing to help write some of the code? Rough design docs we have coming out our ears, but programmers capable of executing them not so much. Jordan From owner-freebsd-chat Wed Jan 22 11:19:03 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) id LAA21172 for chat-outgoing; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 11:19:03 -0800 (PST) Received: from fallout.campusview.indiana.edu (fallout.campusview.indiana.edu [149.159.1.1]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id LAA21160 for ; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 11:19:01 -0800 (PST) Received: from localhost (jfieber@localhost) by fallout.campusview.indiana.edu (8.8.4/8.8.4) with SMTP id OAA06786; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 14:16:41 -0500 (EST) Date: Wed, 22 Jan 1997 14:16:41 -0500 (EST) From: John Fieber To: "Jordan K. Hubbard" cc: Larry Lee , chat@freefall.freebsd.org Subject: Re: Commerical applications In-Reply-To: <24779.853959942@time.cdrom.com> Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: owner-chat@FreeBSD.ORG X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk On Wed, 22 Jan 1997, Jordan K. Hubbard wrote: > > I do agree that FreeBSD needs some serious help with respect to > > installation and configuration. > > And I need some serious help in providing that full picture. Are you > willing to help write some of the code? Rough design docs we have > coming out our ears, but programmers capable of executing them not so > much. Which was one of my points. :) The best interface designers are often lousy programmers, if programmers at all, thus a designer/programmer team is required. The FreeBSD development model does not *appear* to support such teams very well; everybody wants to "own" their project and the designer/programmer arrangement can so easily turn into a master/slave arrangement.... I would like to be proven wrong though. :) -john From owner-freebsd-chat Wed Jan 22 11:29:40 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) id LAA21797 for chat-outgoing; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 11:29:40 -0800 (PST) Received: from fallout.campusview.indiana.edu (fallout.campusview.indiana.edu [149.159.1.1]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id LAA21680 for ; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 11:27:43 -0800 (PST) Received: from localhost (jfieber@localhost) by fallout.campusview.indiana.edu (8.8.4/8.8.4) with SMTP id OAA06798; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 14:26:51 -0500 (EST) Date: Wed, 22 Jan 1997 14:26:51 -0500 (EST) From: John Fieber Reply-To: John Fieber To: Larry Lee cc: chat@freefall.freebsd.org Subject: Re: Commerical applications In-Reply-To: <199701221749.KAA15464@usr07.primenet.com> Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: owner-chat@FreeBSD.ORG X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk On Wed, 22 Jan 1997, Larry Lee wrote: > I do think that most people use their computers as communication > and organization devices, and what is needed in the basic offering > are applications such as word processors, internet access, fax machines, > as well as installation procedure to make this stuff work. > > I don't think FreeBSD needs to be a windows clone to be accepted. > Specifically, I don't agree that icons, point/click, and drag/drop > are _requirements_ to doing useful work. Although I will go see what > I can find about CDE. Well, sure. A keyboard isn't a _requirement_ doing useful work. There are many people, probably some right here on this list, that have done lots of useful work using punched cards. :) You seem to be saying that FreeBSD needs the functionality and ease of use of windows to attract people who might otherwise use Windows. Then you turn around and say that you don't think that the GUI model Windows provides is necessary to accomplish that. To be blunt, you are dead wrong and have completely missed the fundamental change that interface design took when the GUI was developed at Xerox and later marketed by Apple. For better or worse, computer interfaces are not intuitive; they are idiomatic. People invest time in learning the idiom and what the GUI offers is consistent use of idioms with visual affordances from application to application. The most widely accepted interface model today is the windows/icon/mouse interface and if you want people to use your system, you adhere to that model, or you demonstrate that your model is superior. The average Joe has long ago rejected the traditional Unix command model, so what do you propose? The other thing to note is that the Mac and Windows applications are successful because they (usually) fit into a well defined application framework that permits smooth interoperation. Much of this framework is directly visible only to the developers, but the users reap the benefits. What a lot of Unix developers seem to miss is that the advantages of using the same idiom consistently across applications almost always outweighs the advantages of providing a new idiom that may even be slightly more efficient for a given task. The latter only becomes worthwhile if the advantage is very large and the learning time can be recouped over extensive use. Another issues is that just like some ties just don't go with some shirts, not all interface idioms are compatible; when designing a new idiom, it must blend well with the existing framework. X, with its motley collection of home-brew toolkits just doesn't cut it in this respect. This application framework is a necessary prerequisite for the emergence of quality applications that work well enough together to provide a critical mass to attract more applications and users. Unfortunately, X by itself provides **no** such framework. Xt adds a thin layer (thick, actually, but that is a technical issues), but not nearly enough. Motif adds a fair amount on top of that, including standardizing things like window management, and drag and drop, and a more usable clipboard model. CDE is the only thing to date that offers the sort of GUI application framework that Windows and Mac offer. Tk appears to be the runner up but operates at about the same level as Motif. Java has some interesting potential but still needs work. Since Motif and CDE are not free, there has been a well unified opposition to it among many developers. Unfortunately, that unification evaporates instantly when presented with the task of providing an alternative. :( If you are at all familiar with the Amiga, it had a similar framework problem. Prior to version 2.0 of the operating system, basic mechanisms for writing GUI software were in place, but no application framework. GUI applications, outside of games, basically sucked. When 2.0 came out, it came with a style guide and a toolkit which made following that style guide the path of least resistance. Unfortunately, it was too late as would-be developers of productivity applications had long ago dismissed the platform. As a final note, I don't think anybody would argue that Microsoft has been successful by releasing technically elegant, or even stable products. Their interface design isn't that great either. What Microsoft offers is an assurance of continual improvement. Windows95 isn't great, but it is a hell of a lot better than Windows 1.0. Microsoft is persistent and although it may take them a number of tries to get something right, they usually will get it right eventually. In the Unix/X context, if we want the sort of applications you are talking about, we need a robust, modern application framework. The most comprehensive one is CDE. It is not free, there are many rough edges, it is incredibly bloated, some think it is ugly, but with a unified effort, these liabilities can all be minimized (even price), and some eliminated. The commercial Unix world is just now recognizing this as being essential in their defense against the persistence of Microsoft and NT. -john From owner-freebsd-chat Wed Jan 22 11:55:40 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) id LAA23174 for chat-outgoing; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 11:55:40 -0800 (PST) Received: from time.cdrom.com (time.cdrom.com [204.216.27.226]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id LAA23166 for ; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 11:55:36 -0800 (PST) Received: from time.cdrom.com (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by time.cdrom.com (8.8.4/8.6.9) with ESMTP id LAA25090; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 11:53:55 -0800 (PST) To: John Fieber cc: Larry Lee , chat@freefall.freebsd.org, config@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Commerical applications In-reply-to: Your message of "Wed, 22 Jan 1997 14:16:41 EST." Date: Wed, 22 Jan 1997 11:53:55 -0800 Message-ID: <25086.853962835@time.cdrom.com> From: "Jordan K. Hubbard" Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk > The best interface designers are often lousy programmers, if > programmers at all, thus a designer/programmer team is required. > The FreeBSD development model does not *appear* to support such > teams very well; everybody wants to "own" their project and the > designer/programmer arrangement can so easily turn into a > master/slave arrangement.... Well, I like to think of myself as a fairly good interface designer (and please don't take sysinstall as an indication of said skills since that was a quick hack using UI tools equivalent to stone knives and bearskins :-) and a reasonable programmer, but I don't mind being involved in either role. I simply gravitate towards design because I've seen and done more than my share of both good and bad interfaces, and I think I have a reasonable idea of how to do it right now. However, we still suffer from a bad case of "tools gap", where there is really no reasonable framework for allowing the UI people to easily practice their craft. Since we can't count on an X server being present (either due to configuration hassles, non-support for a given card or other hardware issues), we need to have support for some kind of CUI paradigm which also doesn't lock us into CUI forever and make us look crude to those people who do have access to X displays and tools. We've talked plenty about various sorts of universal forms translators or HTML based approaches, but the fact remains that there are simply too few bodies willing or able to provide these tools. I also don't think that design is really the issue here since I'm pretty sure that we all basically know what we need and Windows, for better or for worse, has already shown us much of the way. We need a hardware configuration tool for configuring, creating and installing kernels. We need a user configuration tool for adding, deleting and otherwise managing user accounts and groups. We need a login configuration tool for setting desktop preferences, login defaults, quotas, etc. We need a network configuration tool for managing interfaces, DNS, routing, IP aliases, etc. We need a network services tool for turning services like telnet, rlogin, ssh, etc on and off and configuring their individual settings. We need a printer setup and queue management tool. I could go on, and these are just the work of about 2 minutes thought - if I really put my mind to it, I could probably list another 3 or 4 major categories in which we have no configuration coverage at all. :-) And tying all of this together, we need a hypertext help system (Hi John! :) which enables the user to actually find out how to drive all this crap. That's kind of why I like the idea of an HTML based tools, even with all the limitations of HTML - it lets you integrate the whole concept together at a level previously unheard of, basically. Also, every time this subject comes up, about 2 or 3 people pipe up unnecessarily saying "Argh!! Please don't remove the ascii configuration files, please please!" Relax, folks. Never in my wildest dreams have I ever conceived of adding such ease-of-use services on top at the expense of the mechanisms below, and I don't think that anyone else here has either. One of the big strengths of UNIX is that you can really get down into its guts and tweak it when you have to, rather than simply being left high and dry as you are with Windows ("No button for that, sorry!"). Nobody's talking about giving that up, simply automating the configuration process for those who wish it and putting a pretty face on the whole thing. However, there's just a lot of work there, plain and simple. We don't even have the tools for writing all those nice looking configuration screens yet, and we need to get that situation taken care of before any progress will ever be made in this area. Jordan From owner-freebsd-chat Wed Jan 22 12:29:53 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) id MAA25403 for chat-outgoing; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 12:29:53 -0800 (PST) Received: from rover.village.org (rover.village.org [204.144.255.49]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) with SMTP id MAA25390 for ; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 12:29:50 -0800 (PST) Received: from rover.village.org [127.0.0.1] by rover.village.org with esmtp (Exim 0.56 #1) id E0vn9HM-00027s-00; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 13:28:16 -0700 To: "Jordan K. Hubbard" Subject: Re: Commerical applications Cc: John Fieber , Larry Lee , chat@freefall.freebsd.org, config@FreeBSD.ORG In-reply-to: Your message of "Wed, 22 Jan 1997 11:53:55 PST." <25086.853962835@time.cdrom.com> References: <25086.853962835@time.cdrom.com> Date: Wed, 22 Jan 1997 13:28:16 -0700 From: Warner Losh Message-Id: Sender: owner-chat@FreeBSD.ORG X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk In message <25086.853962835@time.cdrom.com> "Jordan K. Hubbard" writes: : However, we still suffer from a bad case of "tools gap", where there : is really no reasonable framework for allowing the UI people to easily : practice their craft. Since we can't count on an X server being : present (either due to configuration hassles, non-support for a given : card or other hardware issues), The SVGA or VGA drivers will run on almost all hardware. Maybe not optimally, or at 1600x1200, but the X server can be made to run in that small a footprint. : I also don't think that design is really the issue here since I'm : pretty sure that we all basically know what we need and Windows, for : better or for worse, has already shown us much of the way. We need a : hardware configuration tool for configuring, creating and installing : kernels. We need a user configuration tool for adding, deleting and : otherwise managing user accounts and groups. We need a login : configuration tool for setting desktop preferences, login defaults, : quotas, etc. We need a network configuration tool for managing : interfaces, DNS, routing, IP aliases, etc. We need a network services : tool for turning services like telnet, rlogin, ssh, etc on and off and : configuring their individual settings. We need a printer setup and : queue management tool. I could go on, and these are just the work of : about 2 minutes thought - if I really put my mind to it, I could : probably list another 3 or 4 major categories in which we have no : configuration coverage at all. :-) All you need is a framework for describing what needs to be changed. The actual GUI from that point is fairly easy to do... : However, there's just a lot of work there, plain and simple. We don't : even have the tools for writing all those nice looking configuration : screens yet, and we need to get that situation taken care of before : any progress will ever be made in this area. That's true. Having done this stuff before, you really want to have a good set of meta data so that you can drive EVERYTHING in your build/configuration/etc world by that meta data. How you drive it isn't too interesting, since you can easily write something that groks X and another something that groks curses. Generally it is hard to write something that gorks both. Hacking out custom interfaces for each screen you want will likely doom this project to failure, or at least taking a really really long time. I just wish I had more time to devote to all of this. Sounds like a lot of fun. Warner From owner-freebsd-chat Wed Jan 22 12:46:51 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) id MAA26345 for chat-outgoing; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 12:46:51 -0800 (PST) Received: from time.cdrom.com (time.cdrom.com [204.216.27.226]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id MAA26336 for ; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 12:46:48 -0800 (PST) Received: from time.cdrom.com (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by time.cdrom.com (8.8.4/8.6.9) with ESMTP id MAA25365; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 12:42:32 -0800 (PST) To: Warner Losh cc: John Fieber , Larry Lee , chat@freefall.freebsd.org, config@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: Commerical applications In-reply-to: Your message of "Wed, 22 Jan 1997 13:28:16 MST." Date: Wed, 22 Jan 1997 12:42:31 -0800 Message-ID: <25361.853965751@time.cdrom.com> From: "Jordan K. Hubbard" Sender: owner-chat@FreeBSD.ORG X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk > : practice their craft. Since we can't count on an X server being > : present (either due to configuration hassles, non-support for a given > : card or other hardware issues), > > The SVGA or VGA drivers will run on almost all hardware. Maybe not > optimally, or at 1600x1200, but the X server can be made to run in > that small a footprint. You're forgetting serial consoles and machines with monochrome adaptors so funky that I doubt any reasonable X would run on them (don't laugh, I think freefall has one of these cards in it - it's a server machine with no need of a good gfx card). This is not to say that you have to bend over backwards to support such machines, simply that some alternative needs to be supplied if we're talking about something as critical as installation and basic configuration being drawn under the umbrella of this new system. > Having done this stuff before, you really want to have a good set of > meta data so that you can drive EVERYTHING in your > build/configuration/etc world by that meta data. How you drive it > isn't too interesting, since you can easily write something that groks > X and another something that groks curses. Generally it is hard to > write something that gorks both. Oh, I agree. That's made almost mandatory by the widely divergent nature of the underlying configuration files anyway. If I make a DNS auto-configurator, for example, you can bet that I don't want to put the code for groking named's configuration files into the configuration tool itself - that would be nightmarish. Rather, I write a single CLI based tool which implements an argument set from hell for frobbing DNS. Then everything else fronts for that tool and insulates the users from its devilish argument syntax. Even there, there's a fair bit of work just to be done in defining a CLI tool for every type of service you want an abstract interface for, but now that I think of it, perhaps that's not a bad place to start at all. We could put aside our GUI selection problems for the time being and just pile in on writing little `pw'-like tools for all the stuff we want to bring into the first version of the system. Once critical mass has been achieved there, I suspect that the front-end folks would start coming out of the woodwork and, in the short term, I could write some libdialog based stuff to handle our immediate proof-of-concept needs. What do people think? If this idea sounds promising, we could move on to the next step by making a list of all the configurators (I like that name :) we need to write and try to come up with some consistent standards for argument naming (e.g. all configurators accept ``--help'' for describing themselves, ``--fake'' to only pretend to do whatever it is they do, etc.). I'd be happy to help here. Jordan P.S. Is it time for us to move this over solely to config? I'm not sure if this is -chat material anymore. From owner-freebsd-chat Wed Jan 22 13:19:33 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) id NAA28081 for chat-outgoing; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 13:19:33 -0800 (PST) Received: from tyger.inna.net (root@tyger.inna.net [206.151.66.1]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id NAA28076 for ; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 13:19:31 -0800 (PST) Received: from dolphin.inna.net (jamie@dolphin.inna.net [206.151.66.2]) by tyger.inna.net (8.8.3/8.7.3) with SMTP id QAA27624; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 16:31:53 -0500 (EST) Date: Wed, 22 Jan 1997 16:19:42 -0500 (EST) From: Jamie Bowden To: Keith Leonard cc: Wes Peters , chat@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Cursing the sky (was: Commerical applications ...) In-Reply-To: Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk Uh, my wife has no idea how to use unix. Whe she logs in, X comes up, and all she has to do is click a mouse button to connect to the net. She starts netscape, pine, etc. from a mouse button. I also have buttons to disconnect and shutdown as necessary. On Wed, 22 Jan 1997, Keith Leonard wrote: > Sorry, > > I despise Win95 so much that I don't even consider it in my ramblings. > Almost all my refereces are to win 3.0 and 3.1. I've installed over 150 > systems with 3.1 (standalone machines) and it is quite simple once you > understand it (which the average person is capable of - especially with > all the books available). Hell, I just set up a 70 year old retired guy > and his wife with 3.1 and all I have to do is say (over the phone) just > click here, then here and type this. TRY THIS WITH X! > > Inside of one week he is producing letters setting up databases and > connecting to the web. If I handed him a FreeBSD (or any other free Unix) > CD he shoot his machine inside of that week and go off to Tahiti to sun on > the beach. > > No Software is easy to a newbie - it's just that Billy boy promises shit > and at least delivers half a sack. > > > On Tue, 21 Jan 1997, Wes Peters wrote: > > You must be. After spending two nights trying to get Win$%&(@#95 to > > recognize a PCI ethernet controller that FreeBSD probes with no > > problems, I'm ready to take the disk out and hit it with a hammer. Or > > better yet, just over that pile of BullBits(tm) with FreeBSD. Microsoft > > has, in this as in all things, made a lot of promises they do not live > > up to. Plug and play my bloody ass! > > Keith > keithl@wakko.gil.net > ------------------------------------------------------ > Character is what you are in the dark - John Warfin > ------------------------------------------------------ > > Jamie Bowden Network Administrator, TBI Ltd. From owner-freebsd-chat Wed Jan 22 13:59:51 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) id NAA00348 for chat-outgoing; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 13:59:51 -0800 (PST) Received: from dns.pinpt.com (dns.pinpt.com [205.179.195.1]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) with SMTP id NAA00341 for ; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 13:59:49 -0800 (PST) Received: from journeyman (gatemaster.pinpt.com [205.179.195.65]) by dns.pinpt.com (8.6.12/8.6.12) with SMTP id NAA26151; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 13:58:42 -0800 Date: Wed, 22 Jan 97 13:57:17 Pacific Standard Time From: "Sean J. Schluntz" Subject: Re: Commerical applications To: Warner Losh Cc: chat@freefall.freebsd.org, config@freebsd.org X-Mailer: Chameleon ATX 6.0, Standards Based IntraNet Solutions, NetManage Inc. X-Priority: 3 (Normal) References: Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk > In message <25086.853962835@time.cdrom.com> "Jordan K. Hubbard" writes: > : However, we still suffer from a bad case of "tools gap", where there > : is really no reasonable framework for allowing the UI people to easily > : practice their craft. Since we can't count on an X server being > : present (either due to configuration hassles, non-support for a given > : card or other hardware issues), > > The SVGA or VGA drivers will run on almost all hardware. Maybe not > optimally, or at 1600x1200, but the X server can be made to run in > that small a footprint. "on almost all hardware". It won't work on my Firewall or on my mailserver. Neither have a monitor that can handle anything but text or CGA (Maybe). -Sean ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Sean J. Schluntz Manager, Support Services ph. 408.997.6900 x222 PinPoint Software Corporation fx. 408.323.2300 6155 Almaden Expressway, Suite 100 San Jose, CA. 95120 http://www.pinpt.com/ Local Time Sent: 01/22/97 13:57:17 ---------------------------------------------------------------------- From owner-freebsd-chat Wed Jan 22 14:16:48 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) id OAA01206 for chat-outgoing; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 14:16:48 -0800 (PST) Received: from rover.village.org (rover.village.org [204.144.255.49]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) with SMTP id OAA01200 for ; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 14:16:43 -0800 (PST) Received: from rover.village.org [127.0.0.1] by rover.village.org with esmtp (Exim 0.56 #1) id E0vnAxf-0002LV-00; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 15:16:03 -0700 To: "Sean J. Schluntz" Subject: Re: Commerical applications Cc: chat@freefall.freebsd.org, config@freebsd.org In-reply-to: Your message of "Wed, 22 Jan 1997 13:57:17 EST." References: Date: Wed, 22 Jan 1997 15:16:02 -0700 From: Warner Losh Message-Id: Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk In message "Sean J. Schluntz" writes: : "on almost all hardware". It won't work on my Firewall or on my mailserver. : Neither have a monitor that can handle anything but text or CGA (Maybe). X will run in client mode on those. :-) However, they are good candiates for the curses version that would be needed as well. Like I said, I just wanted to point out that X isn't that hard to run on most hardware... While your hardware doesn't work, it isn't anywhere near the most common config. Warner From owner-freebsd-chat Wed Jan 22 16:10:46 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) id QAA09553 for chat-outgoing; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 16:10:46 -0800 (PST) Received: from albert.gnu.ai.mit.edu (albert.gnu.ai.mit.edu [128.52.46.31]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) with SMTP id QAA09511; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 16:10:34 -0800 (PST) Received: from kropotkin.gnu.ai.mit.edu by albert.gnu.ai.mit.edu (8.6.12/8.6.12GNU) with ESMTP id TAA16147; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 19:11:25 -0500 Received: by kropotkin.gnu.ai.mit.edu (8.6.12/4.0) id ; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 19:09:33 -0500 Date: Wed, 22 Jan 1997 19:09:33 -0500 Message-Id: <199701230009.TAA18836@kropotkin.gnu.ai.mit.edu> To: jkh@time.cdrom.com CC: hosokawa@mt.cs.keio.ac.jp, keithl@wakko.gil.net, chat@freebsd.org, config@freebsd.org In-reply-to: <14442.853848804@time.cdrom.com> (jkh@time.cdrom.com) Subject: Re: Cursing the sky (was: Commerical applications ...) From: Joel Ray Holveck Reply-to: joelh@gnu.ai.mit.edu Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk >> No perl? I like it but I admit it's too fat :-) (my second favourite >> is C/Tk). > Well, I hate to admit that BSDI went the perl route and so far they > seem to really like it. They did, somehow, manage to get a kernel and > a single perl interpreter onto an installation floppy but damned if I > know how they did it. Perhaps they're using a specially hacked and > trimmed down version of perl, something which would be pretty evil > for us but is a *possibility* I suppose. :-) Although this is an HP9000 running an unknown version of perl: kropotkin$ ls -al perl -rwxrwxr-x 1 joelh staff 630784 Jan 22 19:04 perl kropotkin$ gzexe perl perl: 64.5% kropotkin$ ls -al perl -rwxrwxr-x 1 joelh staff 223980 Jan 22 19:05 perl > version which supports dynamic loading of modules is already in our > tree. To get that with PERL we'd have to import perl5 instead of > perl4, and that's a political battle which I don't care to fight at > this time at all. :-) Sorry, not with you. What are the issues? -- http://www.wp.com/piquan --- Joel Ray Holveck --- joelh@gnu.ai.mit.edu All my opinions are my own, not the FSF's, my employer's, or my dog's. Fourth law of computing: Anything that can go wro .signature: segmentation violation -- core dumped From owner-freebsd-chat Wed Jan 22 16:15:16 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) id QAA09997 for chat-outgoing; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 16:15:16 -0800 (PST) Received: from wakko.gil.net (keithl@wakko.gil.net [207.100.79.10]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id QAA09986 for ; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 16:15:12 -0800 (PST) Received: from localhost (keithl@localhost) by wakko.gil.net (8.8.3/8.8.2) with SMTP id TAA15164; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 19:17:21 -0500 Date: Wed, 22 Jan 1997 19:17:20 -0500 (EST) From: Keith Leonard To: Jamie Bowden cc: Wes Peters , chat@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Cursing the sky (was: Commerical applications ...) In-Reply-To: Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk Howdy Jamie, Did you give the BSD cd to you wife and she created the buttons and install all the software?? NO. Which is my point. If you could give your wife the CD and with a simple book at her side SHE could install it and then use with a little reading it would be more widely used. As it is now YOU had to set it up (bet you didn't start using Unix yesterday). This is what I've been talking about. With Windoze (3.0, 3.1) when you install a program it puts icons on your desktop and you double click. With Unix , you not only have to guess what the programs executiable is really named you have to have a full working knowledge of were in the setup file for your window manager to put it, how to create the button, what size screen to make it , how to specify its geometry (Netscape uses a '.' Mosaic a *, xterm uses characters, Mosaic uses pixals....) yadda, yadda, yadda. This is my point! What you say below is what is needed to popularize BSD etc, not with the rocket jockeys but with the average joe in the street. An installation routine that will install the basics and be setup to run. Craftwork linux uses 2 questions to configure X, and neither is more complicated than is asked by Windoze (3.1 or 3.0) - shock-suprise it actually works. On Wed, 22 Jan 1997, Jamie Bowden wrote: > Uh, my wife has no idea how to use unix. Whe she logs in, X comes up, > and all she has to do is click a mouse button to connect to the net. She > starts netscape, pine, etc. from a mouse button. I also have buttons to > disconnect and shutdown as necessary. > From owner-freebsd-chat Wed Jan 22 16:43:11 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) id QAA13302 for chat-outgoing; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 16:43:11 -0800 (PST) Received: from stanton-1-1.quick.net (soil@stanton-1-6.quick.net [207.212.170.106]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id QAA13289 for ; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 16:43:03 -0800 (PST) Received: from localhost (soil@localhost) by stanton-1-1.quick.net (8.8.5/8.8.5) with SMTP id QAA00558 for ; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 16:42:31 -0800 (PST) X-Authentication-Warning: stanton-1-1.quick.net: soil owned process doing -bs Date: Wed, 22 Jan 1997 16:42:31 -0800 (PST) From: Josh Gilliam To: freebsd-chat@freebsd.org Subject: *BSD comparision (fwd) Message-ID: X-IRC: soil X-Operating-System: FreeBSD 2.1.6.1-RELEASE i386 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk Thought the www page may be of interest; ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Message-Id: <199701220856.JAA22629@knight.cons.org> Date: Wed, 22 Jan 1997 09:56:57 +0100 (MET) From: Martin Cracauer To: misc@openbsd.org Sender: owner-misc@openbsd.org Subject: *BSD comparision Dear OpenBSD folks, I though it might be a good idea to remind you that I have a NetBSD/FreeBSD comparision with a few OpenBSD comments in it. I includes kind of a position statement from an OpenBSD user, that may be outdated, it is from the very beginning of OpenBSD. I welcome any comments you might have and I'm happy to adjust my text as needed. I'm sorry I can't take care of that myself, but I currently don't have an OpenBSD system running and don't feel qualified. The page is at http://www.cons.org/cracauer/bsd-net-vs-free.html Happy Hacking Martin -- %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% Martin Cracauer http://www.cons.org/cracauer cracauer@wavehh.hanse.de (batched, preferred for large mails) Tel.: (daytime) +4940 41478712 Fax.: (daytime) +4940 41478715 Tel.: (private) +4940 5221829 Fax.: (private) +4940 5228536 Paper: (private) Waldstrasse 200, 22846 Norderstedt, Germany From owner-freebsd-chat Wed Jan 22 17:51:44 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) id RAA18918 for chat-outgoing; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 17:51:44 -0800 (PST) Received: from tyger.inna.net (root@tyger.inna.net [206.151.66.1]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id RAA18913 for ; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 17:51:37 -0800 (PST) Received: from tyger.inna.net (jamie@tyger.inna.net [206.151.66.1]) by tyger.inna.net (8.8.3/8.7.3) with SMTP id VAA12691; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 21:04:00 -0500 (EST) Date: Wed, 22 Jan 1997 21:04:00 -0500 (EST) From: Jamie Bowden To: Keith Leonard cc: Wes Peters , chat@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Cursing the sky (was: Commerical applications ...) In-Reply-To: Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk Anyone who wants my .ctwmrc is free to have it. I give it freely. I give all my .files freely. I like the fact that I can pick a window manager, totally customize my environment, etc. Yes, I have been a UNIX user/admin for a while. It's complex, but real usable systems tend to be. I don't consider win95 a real usable environment. I have fairly standard hardware, and it's not reliable. OS/2 is rock stable, but no apps for it. FreeBSD is the os of choice. I made it easy for my wife, but I didn't have to. She can use win95 or os/2 anytime she wants. She uses X to access the net almost exclusively. I spent much time customizing that box. Time that couldn't be spent making win95 as stable or freindly (to me), simply because the tools don't exist. Jamie Bowden Network Administrator, TBI Ltd. On Wed, 22 Jan 1997, Keith Leonard wrote: > Howdy Jamie, > > Did you give the BSD cd to you wife and she created the buttons and > install all the software?? NO. Which is my point. If you could give your > wife the CD and with a simple book at her side SHE could install it and > then use with a little reading it would be more widely used. As it is now > YOU had to set it up (bet you didn't start using Unix yesterday). This is > what I've been talking about. > > With Windoze (3.0, 3.1) when you install a program it puts icons on your > desktop and you double click. With Unix , you not only have to guess what > the programs executiable is really named you have to have a full working > knowledge of were in the setup file for your window manager to put it, how > to create the button, what size screen to make it , how to specify its > geometry (Netscape uses a '.' Mosaic a *, xterm uses characters, Mosaic > uses pixals....) yadda, yadda, yadda. > > > This is my point! > > What you say below is what is needed to popularize BSD etc, not with the > rocket jockeys but with the average joe in the street. An installation > routine that will install the basics and be setup to run. Craftwork linux > uses 2 questions to configure X, and neither is more complicated than is > asked by Windoze (3.1 or 3.0) - shock-suprise it actually works. > > On Wed, > 22 Jan 1997, Jamie Bowden wrote: > > > Uh, my wife has no idea how to use unix. Whe she logs in, X comes up, > > and all she has to do is click a mouse button to connect to the net. She > > starts netscape, pine, etc. from a mouse button. I also have buttons to > > disconnect and shutdown as necessary. > > > > From owner-freebsd-chat Wed Jan 22 18:02:23 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) id SAA19660 for chat-outgoing; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 18:02:23 -0800 (PST) Received: from root.com (implode.root.com [198.145.90.17]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id SAA19637 for ; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 18:02:16 -0800 (PST) Received: from localhost (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by root.com (8.7.6/8.6.5) with SMTP id RAA18651; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 17:57:54 -0800 (PST) Message-Id: <199701230157.RAA18651@root.com> X-Authentication-Warning: implode.root.com: Host localhost [127.0.0.1] didn't use HELO protocol To: Terry Lambert cc: gdr@wcs.uq.edu.au, freebsd-chat@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: Terry In-reply-to: Your message of "Wed, 22 Jan 1997 17:16:03 MST." <199701230016.RAA22558@phaeton.artisoft.com> From: David Greenman Reply-To: dg@root.com Date: Wed, 22 Jan 1997 17:57:54 -0800 Sender: owner-chat@FreeBSD.ORG X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk >> > What's wrong with arranged marriages? >> >> How about (usually) the female having to be totally subservient to the male? > >That's a side effect of the society in which arranged marriages have >typically arisin, historically. > >It's not an attribute of arranged marriages themselves. In general, >neither person in an arranged marriage has a choice (or the person >who didn't have the choice would have the choice, by secondary effect, >to make themselves chronically undesirable... in the limit if one of >them has a choice, both have a choice). All of this is getting FAR away from the charter of the freebsd-hackers mailing list and should not be posted to it. If this thread needs to continue, it should be moved to the freebsd-chat mailing list. -DG David Greenman Core-team/Principal Architect, The FreeBSD Project From owner-freebsd-chat Wed Jan 22 21:56:39 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) id VAA29186 for chat-outgoing; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 21:56:39 -0800 (PST) Received: from time.cdrom.com (time.cdrom.com [204.216.27.226]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id VAA29181 for ; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 21:56:37 -0800 (PST) Received: from time.cdrom.com (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by time.cdrom.com (8.8.4/8.6.9) with ESMTP id VAA02017; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 21:56:25 -0800 (PST) To: Josh Gilliam cc: freebsd-chat@freebsd.org Subject: Re: *BSD comparision (fwd) In-reply-to: Your message of "Wed, 22 Jan 1997 16:42:31 PST." Date: Wed, 22 Jan 1997 21:56:25 -0800 Message-ID: <2013.853998985@time.cdrom.com> From: "Jordan K. Hubbard" Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk > Thought the www page may be of interest; With due deference to Martin, I've never cared for this comparison very much. It's too haphazard in its coverage, does not compare the relative merits of each OS in a structured fashion (leaping instead from disassociated topic to disassociated topic to the general confusion of the reader) and it's far too biased towards the perspective of a research guy with specific interests which probably overlap with less than 1% of the existing *BSD user base. Unfortunately, there are few other people willing to sit down and craft such comparisons so it's all that's available right now. If we could get someone disconnected from either camp to do an out-of-box evaluation of the systems, using both for several months with an entirely fresh perspective and writing up their general experiences with using the systems, that would indeed be valuable. Jordan > > ---------- Forwarded message ---------- > Message-Id: <199701220856.JAA22629@knight.cons.org> > Date: Wed, 22 Jan 1997 09:56:57 +0100 (MET) > From: Martin Cracauer > To: misc@openbsd.org > Sender: owner-misc@openbsd.org > Subject: *BSD comparision > > Dear OpenBSD folks, > > I though it might be a good idea to remind you that I have a > NetBSD/FreeBSD comparision with a few OpenBSD comments in it. > > I includes kind of a position statement from an OpenBSD user, that may > be outdated, it is from the very beginning of OpenBSD. > > I welcome any comments you might have and I'm happy to adjust my text > as needed. I'm sorry I can't take care of that myself, but I currently > don't have an OpenBSD system running and don't feel qualified. > > The page is at > http://www.cons.org/cracauer/bsd-net-vs-free.html > > Happy Hacking > Martin > -- > %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% > Martin Cracauer http://www.cons.org/cracauer > cracauer@wavehh.hanse.de (batched, preferred for large mails) > Tel.: (daytime) +4940 41478712 Fax.: (daytime) +4940 41478715 > Tel.: (private) +4940 5221829 Fax.: (private) +4940 5228536 > Paper: (private) Waldstrasse 200, 22846 Norderstedt, Germany > From owner-freebsd-chat Wed Jan 22 22:39:13 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) id WAA01580 for chat-outgoing; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 22:39:13 -0800 (PST) Received: from grackle.grondar.za (QkbHekozGs7HeCzK3YIWDWWJ0E+NBv2u@grackle.grondar.za [196.7.18.131]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id WAA01573 for ; Wed, 22 Jan 1997 22:39:03 -0800 (PST) Received: from grackle.grondar.za (crXVPZMLXabGZ0fegU96ls6tA2tFEWjN@localhost [127.0.0.1]) by grackle.grondar.za (8.8.4/8.8.4) with ESMTP id IAA02328 for ; Thu, 23 Jan 1997 08:38:51 +0200 (SAT) Message-Id: <199701230638.IAA02328@grackle.grondar.za> To: chat@freebsd.org Subject: Spam from owlsnest.com X-Face: "=q0"STs_81w9y4&#}>]hpQ-VBL.1^,QB{9u[05?&^k1*y#*OpIkS7b?V0Rs8qg]`Z}LBTa JT}q{S+z%%SR{~1@;Ybho~Ck.)PC/#3$lceQZ`O Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk Hi Anyone else getting SPAM/UCE from these owlsnest.com idiots? Looks like they are farming our lists for addresses. M -- Mark Murray PGP key fingerprint = 80 36 6E 40 83 D6 8A 36 This .sig is umop ap!sdn. BC 06 EA 0E 7A F2 CE CE From owner-freebsd-chat Thu Jan 23 04:39:06 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) id EAA17281 for chat-outgoing; Thu, 23 Jan 1997 04:39:06 -0800 (PST) Received: from haldjas.folklore.ee (Haldjas.folklore.ee [193.40.6.121]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id EAA17258 for ; Thu, 23 Jan 1997 04:38:05 -0800 (PST) Received: from localhost (narvi@localhost) by haldjas.folklore.ee (8.8.4/8.8.4) with SMTP id OAA16264; Thu, 23 Jan 1997 14:37:09 +0200 (EET) Date: Thu, 23 Jan 1997 14:37:08 +0200 (EET) From: Narvi To: Keith Leonard cc: Jamie Bowden , Wes Peters , chat@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Cursing the sky (was: Commerical applications ...) In-Reply-To: Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk On Wed, 22 Jan 1997, Keith Leonard wrote: > Howdy Jamie, > > Did you give the BSD cd to you wife and she created the buttons and > install all the software?? NO. Which is my point. If you could give your > wife the CD and with a simple book at her side SHE could install it and > then use with a little reading it would be more widely used. As it is now > YOU had to set it up (bet you didn't start using Unix yesterday). This is > what I've been talking about. > > With Windoze (3.0, 3.1) when you install a program it puts icons on your > desktop and you double click. With Unix , you not only have to guess what > the programs executiable is really named you have to have a full working > knowledge of were in the setup file for your window manager to put it, how > to create the button, what size screen to make it , how to specify its > geometry (Netscape uses a '.' Mosaic a *, xterm uses characters, Mosaic > uses pixals....) yadda, yadda, yadda. > Well, perhaps we could talk jamie into submitting his mouse button settings (for a window manager) and include them on the CD adding a checkbox to the XFree86 install screen: X - install supercool easy FreeBSD access with xxxx (was it ctwm?) Witch would, of course: 1) Install the apropriate window manager 2) Set it as default (so that user doesn't get twm instead of it when starting up X) 3) Install all the programs any of the functions uses And suddenly, we are at least slightly aproaching user-friendliness with X. Of course, others could also offer their mouse/keyboard/etc. settings they consider useful. Sander > > This is my point! > > What you say below is what is needed to popularize BSD etc, not with the > rocket jockeys but with the average joe in the street. An installation > routine that will install the basics and be setup to run. Craftwork linux > uses 2 questions to configure X, and neither is more complicated than is > asked by Windoze (3.1 or 3.0) - shock-suprise it actually works. > > On Wed, > 22 Jan 1997, Jamie Bowden wrote: > > > Uh, my wife has no idea how to use unix. Whe she logs in, X comes up, > > and all she has to do is click a mouse button to connect to the net. She > > starts netscape, pine, etc. from a mouse button. I also have buttons to > > disconnect and shutdown as necessary. > > > > From owner-freebsd-chat Thu Jan 23 06:32:21 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) id GAA21495 for chat-outgoing; Thu, 23 Jan 1997 06:32:21 -0800 (PST) Received: from ki1.chemie.fu-berlin.de (ki1.Chemie.FU-Berlin.DE [160.45.24.21]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) with SMTP id GAA21489 for ; Thu, 23 Jan 1997 06:32:10 -0800 (PST) Received: by ki1.chemie.fu-berlin.de (Smail3.1.28.1) from mail.hanse.de (193.174.9.9) with smtp id ; Thu, 23 Jan 97 15:31 MET Received: from wavehh.UUCP by mail.hanse.de with UUCP for freebsd-chat@freebsd.org id ; Thu, 23 Jan 97 15:31 MET Received: by wavehh.hanse.de (4.1/SMI-4.1) id AA26901; Thu, 23 Jan 97 15:02:27 +0100 Date: Thu, 23 Jan 97 15:02:27 +0100 From: cracauer@wavehh.hanse.de (Martin Cracauer) Message-Id: <9701231402.AA26901@wavehh.hanse.de> To: freebsd-chat@freebsd.org Cc: jkh@time.cdrom.COM Subject: Re: *BSD comparision (fwd) Newsgroups: hanse-ml.freebsd.chat References: <2013.853998985@time.cdrom.com> Reply-To: cracauer@wavehh.hanse.de Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk Jordan wrote: >someone else wrote: >> Thought the www page may be of interest; >With due deference to Martin, I've never cared for this comparison >very much. It's too haphazard in its coverage, does not compare the >relative merits of each OS in a structured fashion (leaping instead >from disassociated topic to disassociated topic to the general >confusion of the reader) and it's far too biased towards the >perspective of a research guy with specific interests which probably >overlap with less than 1% of the existing *BSD user base. No offence taken, that's in fact what I think my document is (maybe I should label it as such a bit more). I think the problem is that people who cared enough for their OS to try several over a long period are very likely to have a strong interest of some sort. Strong interests of any sort are likely to fall within the 1%. I just cleaned the document up, BTW, removing some glibberisch (and leave it unstructured :-). >Unfortunately, there are few other people willing to sit down and >craft such comparisons so it's all that's available right now. If we >could get someone disconnected from either camp to do an out-of-box >evaluation of the systems, using both for several months with an >entirely fresh perspective and writing up their general experiences >with using the systems, that would indeed be valuable. That's quite impossible, I'm afraid. I.e. starting from scratch will mean to take installation into account and NetBSD will clearly loose against FreeBSD and a Linux/*BSD comparision will probably be more hardware-dependend than anything else. The desktop user market is not important enough for Unix clones, working towards setting up a nice GUI-oriented system from scratch with few experience doesn't cover much more than a few % of the user base also. After all, people like most on this list can bring up a system no matter how bad the provided installation tools are. The differences most important for people like us are those that arise when using the system for specialized work of some sort, each taking 1% of the existing base. It's the number of hours or days one has to sit down to work around something that's in the way. Maybe the right thing is to label pages like mine as "how I came to choose my OS(es)" and link a larger number of such Web pages, ideally on the same server and under some kind of common look. A collection of such documents would probably be more useful than just to support new users in choosing a Unix clone. By reading such descriptions, people looking for a Unix clone might get a better idea what experienced people actually do on their Unix clones and they get triggered to ask themself how limited their old OS might be in supporting the same work. We should show that Unix these days is not to offer the same workflow as Windows with more stability and for less money. We have some very advanced tools that fit the typical Unix work style, CVS/RCS, m4, some Emacs-tools, find | xargs grep, TCP/IP services etcetcetc. It's important to tell people about these tools and what our workstyle is. As always in marketing, it's not easy to transport a message people don't want to spend the reading time for. But I can tell from the email feedback to my page that people reading it *are* open to read about such things. Reading the client log for my *BSD comparision, I see that about half of all people use MS-Windows to access a die-hard-specialized comparision of FreeBSD and NetBSD. That are 200 people every month who actually use a toy OS and are interestedt in reading about Unix workstyle. I doubt most of these are in the business of deciding between the two BSD systems, but all of them are open to be told about Unix and the way we do things. A collection of pages with descriptions in the line "how I came to choose my OS" can turn our apparent disadvantage of having several Unix and free Unix systems into an advance. Seeing how different needs lead people to choose different OSes and Unix system will give users an impuls to rething their own needs for computing tools and whether learning something new might be worth the effort. I'm busy right now and this message is already too long, but should you think in the same way, I welcome your descriptions to be put besides mine. Martin P.S. Of course *my* workstyle is rather (cons 'foo 'bar) than `grep | foo | bar` :-) -- %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% Martin_Cracauer@wavehh.hanse.de http://cracauer.cons.org Fax.: +4940 5228536 "As far as I'm concerned, if something is so complicated that you can't ex- plain it in 10 seconds, then it's probably not worth knowing anyway"- Calvin From owner-freebsd-chat Thu Jan 23 07:12:19 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) id HAA23105 for chat-outgoing; Thu, 23 Jan 1997 07:12:19 -0800 (PST) Received: from time.cdrom.com (time.cdrom.com [204.216.27.226]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id HAA23100 for ; Thu, 23 Jan 1997 07:12:16 -0800 (PST) Received: from time.cdrom.com (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by time.cdrom.com (8.8.4/8.6.9) with ESMTP id HAA05226; Thu, 23 Jan 1997 07:12:08 -0800 (PST) To: cracauer@wavehh.hanse.de cc: freebsd-chat@freebsd.org Subject: Re: *BSD comparision (fwd) In-reply-to: Your message of "Thu, 23 Jan 1997 15:02:27 +0100." <9701231402.AA26901@wavehh.hanse.de> Date: Thu, 23 Jan 1997 07:12:08 -0800 Message-ID: <5222.854032328@time.cdrom.com> From: "Jordan K. Hubbard" Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk > That's quite impossible, I'm afraid. I.e. starting from scratch will > mean to take installation into account and NetBSD will clearly loose > against FreeBSD and a Linux/*BSD comparision will probably be more Sorry Martin, but you can't structure the evaluation so that weak spots are deliberately avoided or it's not much of an evaluation then. :-) The installation and general "pain factor" count for something and I don't care if you're Joe Newbie or Seymore Cray. Nobody likes having to do more work than necessary. You don't make the installation and configuration part of your evaluation the entire judgement criteria, of course, but it counts for something and you have to factor it in when you present your overall bad/good ratings chart at the end. Most importantly, such a review needs to be done by someone who's diligent and patient enough to poke into every corner, merciless enough to be unforgiving of any clear shortcoming or defect, intelligent enough to know a serious problem from a minor one and, most importantly, thoroughly disassociated with any of the OSes being compared. Biased reviews I can read all day, and it's only the unbiased ones which have any real value to me since I know I'm getting a truly untainted and clear-headed appraisal of the product. There are a lot of writers at UNIX Review and related mags who could do such an unbiased review (the ones you generally see writing articles about Solaris or AIX), hopefully of reasonable quality and for a large audience, but the magazines obviously don't see it as worth their while yet since such "test lab" reviews have yet to appear. Jordan From owner-freebsd-chat Thu Jan 23 09:00:55 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) id JAA29284 for chat-outgoing; Thu, 23 Jan 1997 09:00:55 -0800 (PST) Received: from phaeton.artisoft.com (phaeton.Artisoft.COM [198.17.250.211]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) with SMTP id JAA29278 for ; Thu, 23 Jan 1997 09:00:53 -0800 (PST) Received: (from terry@localhost) by phaeton.artisoft.com (8.6.11/8.6.9) id JAA23905; Thu, 23 Jan 1997 09:45:15 -0700 From: Terry Lambert Message-Id: <199701231645.JAA23905@phaeton.artisoft.com> Subject: Re: Terry: a bystanders view... To: brian@awfulhak.demon.co.uk (Brian Somers) Date: Thu, 23 Jan 1997 09:45:14 -0700 (MST) Cc: chat@freebsd.org, terry@lambert.org In-Reply-To: <199701230118.BAA18919@awfulhak.demon.co.uk> from "Brian Somers" at Jan 23, 97 01:18:21 am X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.4 PL24] MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk > > > > "Sovereign power comes from a mandate from the people, > > not because some watery tart lobbs a scimitar at you". > > -- Dennis, who's not an old lady or an old man... > > You must have rewound about 10 times to get that quote ! Nope. I'm just "that wierd". Terry Lambert terry@lambert.org --- Any opinions in this posting are my own and not those of my present or previous employers. From owner-freebsd-chat Thu Jan 23 10:16:21 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) id KAA02805 for chat-outgoing; Thu, 23 Jan 1997 10:16:21 -0800 (PST) Received: (from jmb@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) id KAA02797; Thu, 23 Jan 1997 10:16:03 -0800 (PST) From: "Jonathan M. Bresler" Message-Id: <199701231816.KAA02797@freefall.freebsd.org> Subject: Re: Commerical applications (was: Development and validation To: imp@village.org (Warner Losh) Date: Thu, 23 Jan 1997 10:16:03 -0800 (PST) Cc: , chat@freebsd.org In-Reply-To: from "Warner Losh" at Jan 22, 97 12:15:40 pm X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.4 PL24] Content-Type: text Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk Warner Losh wrote: > > In message "Brian N. Handy" writes: > : Well, my favorite quote so far is the one regarding the bottle of > : Benzedrine and the plastic Jesus hanging from the rear view, on a > : spiritual journey to SLC. :-) > : > : Shopping the goodwill stores for MY plastic Jesus, > > I read this initially as "Jesus Mallory" and wondered why you wanted a > plastic Jesus :-) no.. its jesus monroy jr. From owner-freebsd-chat Thu Jan 23 10:18:39 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) id KAA02892 for chat-outgoing; Thu, 23 Jan 1997 10:18:39 -0800 (PST) Received: from rover.village.org (rover.village.org [204.144.255.49]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) with SMTP id KAA02886 for ; Thu, 23 Jan 1997 10:18:36 -0800 (PST) Received: from rover.village.org [127.0.0.1] by rover.village.org with esmtp (Exim 0.56 #1) id E0vnTjD-0003TL-00; Thu, 23 Jan 1997 11:18:23 -0700 To: "Jonathan M. Bresler" Subject: Re: Commerical applications (was: Development and validation Cc: chuckr@Glue.umd.edu, chat@freebsd.org In-reply-to: Your message of "Thu, 23 Jan 1997 10:16:03 PST." <199701231816.KAA02797@freefall.freebsd.org> References: <199701231816.KAA02797@freefall.freebsd.org> Date: Thu, 23 Jan 1997 11:18:23 -0700 From: Warner Losh Message-Id: Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk In message <199701231816.KAA02797@freefall.freebsd.org> "Jonathan M. Bresler" writes: : no.. its jesus monroy jr. Well, it has been so long since the Farring incident that I had forgotten. Warner From owner-freebsd-chat Thu Jan 23 12:16:57 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) id MAA09430 for chat-outgoing; Thu, 23 Jan 1997 12:16:57 -0800 (PST) Received: from phaeton.artisoft.com (phaeton.Artisoft.COM [198.17.250.211]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) with SMTP id MAA09421 for ; Thu, 23 Jan 1997 12:16:54 -0800 (PST) Received: (from terry@localhost) by phaeton.artisoft.com (8.6.11/8.6.9) id MAA24225; Thu, 23 Jan 1997 12:54:09 -0700 From: Terry Lambert Message-Id: <199701231954.MAA24225@phaeton.artisoft.com> Subject: Re: Terry: a bystanders view... To: wilko@yedi.iaf.nl (Wilko Bulte) Date: Thu, 23 Jan 1997 12:54:08 -0700 (MST) Cc: terry@lambert.org, chat@freebsd.org In-Reply-To: <199701231832.TAA00761@yedi.iaf.nl> from "Wilko Bulte" at Jan 23, 97 07:32:47 pm X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.4 PL24] MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk > Didn't some revolutionary (the name escapes me) say something to the > effect of: "..When a king misuses his power, it is the duty of the > people to overthrow him...?" ;-) Yes. Jefferson. Rosseau also said someting along the lines of "Failure to effectively wield power is an abuse of power" (please excuse my poor translation from French). Regards, Terry Lambert terry@lambert.org --- Any opinions in this posting are my own and not those of my present or previous employers. From owner-freebsd-chat Thu Jan 23 14:41:36 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) id OAA16870 for chat-outgoing; Thu, 23 Jan 1997 14:41:36 -0800 (PST) Received: from labs.usn.blaze.net.au (labs.usn.blaze.net.au [203.17.53.30]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id OAA16861 for ; Thu, 23 Jan 1997 14:41:30 -0800 (PST) Received: (from davidn@localhost) by labs.usn.blaze.net.au (8.8.4/8.8.4) id JAA18769; Fri, 24 Jan 1997 09:40:01 +1100 (EST) Message-ID: Date: Fri, 24 Jan 1997 09:40:00 +1100 From: davidn@unique.usn.blaze.net.au (David Nugent) To: terry@lambert.org (Terry Lambert) Cc: chat@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Terry: a bystanders view... References: <199701230118.BAA18919@awfulhak.demon.co.uk> <199701231645.JAA23905@phaeton.artisoft.com> X-Mailer: Mutt 0.56 Mime-Version: 1.0 In-Reply-To: <199701231645.JAA23905@phaeton.artisoft.com>; from Terry Lambert on Jan 23, 1997 09:45:14 -0700 Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk Terry Lambert writes: > > You must have rewound about 10 times to get that quote ! > Nope. I'm just "that wierd". Hmmm. Do you own many cats? David Nugent - Unique Computing Pty Ltd - Melbourne, Australia Voice +61-3-9791-9547 Data/BBS +61-3-9792-3507 3:632/348@fidonet davidn@freebsd.org davidn@blaze.net.au http://www.blaze.net.au/~davidn/ From owner-freebsd-chat Thu Jan 23 15:54:24 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) id PAA20712 for chat-outgoing; Thu, 23 Jan 1997 15:54:24 -0800 (PST) Received: from gadget.nla.gov.au (cmakin@gadget.nla.gov.au [203.4.201.52]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id PAA20617 for ; Thu, 23 Jan 1997 15:54:12 -0800 (PST) Received: from localhost (cmakin@localhost) by gadget.nla.gov.au (8.8.4/8.8.4) with SMTP id KAA26102 for ; Fri, 24 Jan 1997 10:53:33 +1100 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: gadget.nla.gov.au: cmakin owned process doing -bs Date: Fri, 24 Jan 1997 10:53:32 +1100 (EST) From: Carl Makin To: chat@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Terry: a bystanders view... In-Reply-To: <199701231645.JAA23905@phaeton.artisoft.com> Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk Terry Lambert wrote: > "Sovereign power comes from a mandate from the people, > not because some watery tart lobbs a scimitar at you". > -- Dennis, who's not an old lady or an old man... I thought the quote was; "Sovereign power comes from a mandate from the masses not from some farcical aquatic ceremony" Carl. -- Carl Makin (VK1KCM) C.Makin@nla.gov.au 'Work +61 6 262 1576' "Speaking for myself only!" 'If you want to make your spouse pay attention to what you say... Talk in your sleep!' From owner-freebsd-chat Thu Jan 23 18:16:04 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) id SAA00537 for chat-outgoing; Thu, 23 Jan 1997 18:16:04 -0800 (PST) Received: from tyger.inna.net (root@tyger.inna.net [206.151.66.1]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id SAA00473; Thu, 23 Jan 1997 18:15:53 -0800 (PST) Received: from tyger.inna.net (jamie@tyger.inna.net [206.151.66.1]) by tyger.inna.net (8.8.3/8.7.3) with SMTP id VAA28274; Thu, 23 Jan 1997 21:28:25 -0500 (EST) Date: Thu, 23 Jan 1997 21:28:25 -0500 (EST) From: Jamie Bowden To: chat@freebsd.org cc: hackers@freebsd.org Subject: newbie type environment Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk I have had several requests for the environment I setup for my wife, so on ftp.inna.net:/pub/jamie/ is a file called newbie.tgz. You will need to get that, put the zap perl script in /usr/local/bin, and compile and install runas. All of these are in the .tgz file. You will need to make sure your kernel is pppd capable, cause I can't stand user ppp. You will need to touch /etc/ppp/options as root, or make it an empty file if it already exists (I do everything on the command line). You will need to place the three ppp.* files (in their own .tgz file) in /root, and chmod the ppp.connect 0700, the ppp.dial 0700, and the ppp.pap (I assume all ISP's are pap'ing these days) 0600. You will need to edit ppp.dial and ppp.pap with appropriate phone # and login/password (respectively). You could substitute sudo for runas, if you could turn off the annoying 'gimme your passwd to do anything' feature. Runas is an easy compile. Read the instructions, edit the Makefile before you do your final build, and make sure you check the line for INSTALL, and replace it with a valid install command. It does this to insure you know it's install suid root, and so you aren't doing something you are unaware of. You might also want to change the base install dir from /usr/local/runas to /usr/local. You will need to be root to make or edit all runas files ( they untar as root.staff owned). I realise it could be easier, but I don't precompile runas do the fact that I wouldn't accept a precompiled suid root binary, and won't give someone else one either. It shouldn't take anyone on any of these lists more than half an hour to install this little package. runas supports acl's as well for a sudo like environment so you don't have to give a totally clueless person full root access. Jamie Bowden Network Administrator, TBI Ltd. From owner-freebsd-chat Thu Jan 23 19:20:40 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) id TAA03793 for chat-outgoing; Thu, 23 Jan 1997 19:20:40 -0800 (PST) Received: from bunyip.cc.uq.oz.au (daemon@bunyip.cc.uq.oz.au [130.102.2.1]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id TAA03788 for ; Thu, 23 Jan 1997 19:20:34 -0800 (PST) Received: (from daemon@localhost) by bunyip.cc.uq.oz.au (8.8.4/8.8.4) id NAA20568 for freebsd-chat@freebsd.org; Fri, 24 Jan 1997 13:20:23 +1000 Received: from troll.devetir.qld.gov.au by ogre.devetir.qld.gov.au (8.7.5/DEVETIR-E0.3a) with ESMTP id NAA25608; Fri, 24 Jan 1997 13:19:10 +1000 (EST) Received: (from syssgm@localhost) by troll.devetir.qld.gov.au (8.8.5/8.8.5) id NAA04138; Fri, 24 Jan 1997 13:17:19 +1000 (EST) Date: Fri, 24 Jan 1997 13:17:19 +1000 (EST) Message-Id: <199701240317.NAA04138@troll.devetir.qld.gov.au> From: Stephen McKay To: freebsd-chat@freebsd.org cc: syssgm@devetir.qld.gov.au Subject: Re: Terry: a bystanders view... Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk Carl Makin wrote: >Terry Lambert wrote: > >> "Sovereign power comes from a mandate from the people, >> not because some watery tart lobbs a scimitar at you". >> -- Dennis, who's not an old lady or an old man... > >I thought the quote was; > > "Sovereign power comes from a mandate from the masses > not from some farcical aquatic ceremony" >From memory, I think it went something like: "Strange women lying in ponds distributing swords is no basis for a system of government. Supreme executive power derives from a mandate from the masses, not from some farcical aquatic ceremony. You can't expect to wield supreme executive power because some watery tart threw a sword at you. I mean, if I went around saying I was an Emperor just because some moistened bint had lobbed a scimitar at me, they'd put me away." If this turns out to be correct, I will be submitting myself for mandatory memory purge, down at the local psychiatric centre. Stephen "Help! Help! I'm being repressed!" McKay From owner-freebsd-chat Fri Jan 24 02:26:09 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) id CAA19929 for chat-outgoing; Fri, 24 Jan 1997 02:26:09 -0800 (PST) Received: from time.cdrom.com (time.cdrom.com [204.216.27.226]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id CAA19903; Fri, 24 Jan 1997 02:26:03 -0800 (PST) Received: from time.cdrom.com (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by time.cdrom.com (8.8.4/8.6.9) with ESMTP id CAA18315; Fri, 24 Jan 1997 02:25:30 -0800 (PST) To: Michael Smith cc: hosokawa@mt.cs.keio.ac.jp (HOSOKAWA Tatsumi), keithl@wakko.gil.net, chat@freebsd.org, config@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Cursing the sky (was: Commerical applications ...) In-reply-to: Your message of "Wed, 22 Jan 1997 12:21:34 +1030." <199701220151.MAA11082@genesis.atrad.adelaide.edu.au> Date: Fri, 24 Jan 1997 02:25:30 -0800 Message-ID: <18310.854101530@time.cdrom.com> From: "Jordan K. Hubbard" Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk > I really don't like that much. How about : > > # file : kern_options.kci > > option "DDB" { > description "Enables the kernel debugger" > manref "ddb(4)" > } > [ Other examples elided ] I like it! Who's gonna write the yacc specification! :-) Jordan From owner-freebsd-chat Fri Jan 24 08:31:01 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) id IAA05820 for chat-outgoing; Fri, 24 Jan 1997 08:31:01 -0800 (PST) Received: from phaeton.artisoft.com (phaeton.Artisoft.COM [198.17.250.211]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) with SMTP id IAA05815 for ; Fri, 24 Jan 1997 08:30:58 -0800 (PST) Received: (from terry@localhost) by phaeton.artisoft.com (8.6.11/8.6.9) id JAA27192; Fri, 24 Jan 1997 09:14:21 -0700 From: Terry Lambert Message-Id: <199701241614.JAA27192@phaeton.artisoft.com> Subject: Re: Terry: a bystanders view... To: davidn@unique.usn.blaze.net.au (David Nugent) Date: Fri, 24 Jan 1997 09:14:21 -0700 (MST) Cc: terry@lambert.org, chat@freebsd.org In-Reply-To: from "David Nugent" at Jan 24, 97 09:40:00 am X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.4 PL24] MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk > > > You must have rewound about 10 times to get that quote ! > > Nope. I'm just "that wierd". > > Hmmm. Do you own many cats? "Whack! Meow! Whack! Meow! Whack! Meow! Whack! ... Whack! ... Whack!" Not any more. Terry Lambert terry@lambert.org --- Any opinions in this posting are my own and not those of my present or previous employers. From owner-freebsd-chat Fri Jan 24 09:20:25 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) id JAA07988 for chat-outgoing; Fri, 24 Jan 1997 09:20:25 -0800 (PST) Received: from time.cdrom.com (time.cdrom.com [204.216.27.226]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id JAA07983 for ; Fri, 24 Jan 1997 09:20:22 -0800 (PST) Received: from time.cdrom.com (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by time.cdrom.com (8.8.4/8.6.9) with ESMTP id JAA06140; Fri, 24 Jan 1997 09:18:47 -0800 (PST) To: Terry Lambert cc: davidn@unique.usn.blaze.net.au (David Nugent), chat@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Terry: a bystanders view... In-reply-to: Your message of "Fri, 24 Jan 1997 09:14:21 MST." <199701241614.JAA27192@phaeton.artisoft.com> Date: Fri, 24 Jan 1997 09:18:47 -0800 Message-ID: <6136.854126327@time.cdrom.com> From: "Jordan K. Hubbard" Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk > > Hmmm. Do you own many cats? > > "Whack! Meow! Whack! Meow! Whack! Meow! Whack! ... Whack! ... Whack!" > > Not any more. I showed this to my cats. They were not amused. They furthermore suggested that were you to come here, where they have you outnumbered 15-to-1, the scenario might go more like: "Whack! Meow! [14 others, in concert: "Meow?! Meow!!!"] Terry: "Aieeeeeieeeie!!!" (lawnmower sounds and what sounds disturbingly like gobbets of human flesh hitting the walls at high velocity)." Hardened Medical examiner: "My god! *choke*" [runs for toilet, sounds of retching]." Moral: You may be the bigger animal, but when facing these kind of numbers the right thing to say is "Nice kitty!" :-) Jordan From owner-freebsd-chat Fri Jan 24 09:42:32 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) id JAA09153 for chat-outgoing; Fri, 24 Jan 1997 09:42:32 -0800 (PST) Received: from grackle.grondar.za (WUBivHX+U4j0rB+MZE/SZO/bWtWkjPGI@grackle.grondar.za [196.7.18.131]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id JAA09148 for ; Fri, 24 Jan 1997 09:42:21 -0800 (PST) Received: from grackle.grondar.za (Cz4GvMjPoptRkrHumgEyYasehNdbeiL7@localhost [127.0.0.1]) by grackle.grondar.za (8.8.4/8.8.4) with ESMTP id TAA07693; Fri, 24 Jan 1997 19:38:11 +0200 (SAT) Message-Id: <199701241738.TAA07693@grackle.grondar.za> X-Mailer: exmh version 2.0beta 12/23/96 To: "Jordan K. Hubbard" cc: Terry Lambert , davidn@unique.usn.blaze.net.au (David Nugent), chat@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Terry: a bystanders view... Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Date: Fri, 24 Jan 1997 19:37:50 +0200 From: Mark Murray Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk Q: What does a 400 lb cat eat? A: Anything he damn wants. Got a problem with that? Hubbard" wrote: > > > Hmmm. Do you own many cats? > > > > "Whack! Meow! Whack! Meow! Whack! Meow! Whack! ... Whack! ... Whack!" > > > > Not any more. > > I showed this to my cats. They were not amused. They furthermore suggested > that were you to come here, where they have you outnumbered 15-to-1, the > scenario might go more like: > > "Whack! Meow! [14 others, in concert: "Meow?! Meow!!!"] > Terry: "Aieeeeeieeeie!!!" (lawnmower sounds and what sounds disturbingly > like gobbets of human flesh hitting the walls at high velocity)." > > Hardened Medical examiner: "My god! *choke*" [runs for toilet, sounds > of retching]." > > Moral: You may be the bigger animal, but when facing these kind of > numbers the right thing to say is "Nice kitty!" :-) > > Jordan -- Mark Murray PGP key fingerprint = 80 36 6E 40 83 D6 8A 36 This .sig is umop ap!sdn. BC 06 EA 0E 7A F2 CE CE From owner-freebsd-chat Fri Jan 24 09:49:25 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) id JAA09323 for chat-outgoing; Fri, 24 Jan 1997 09:49:25 -0800 (PST) Received: from phaeton.artisoft.com (phaeton.Artisoft.COM [198.17.250.211]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) with SMTP id JAA09318 for ; Fri, 24 Jan 1997 09:49:23 -0800 (PST) Received: (from terry@localhost) by phaeton.artisoft.com (8.6.11/8.6.9) id KAA27403; Fri, 24 Jan 1997 10:32:18 -0700 From: Terry Lambert Message-Id: <199701241732.KAA27403@phaeton.artisoft.com> Subject: Re: Terry: a bystanders view... To: jkh@time.cdrom.com (Jordan K. Hubbard) Date: Fri, 24 Jan 1997 10:32:18 -0700 (MST) Cc: terry@lambert.org, davidn@unique.usn.blaze.net.au, chat@freebsd.org In-Reply-To: <6136.854126327@time.cdrom.com> from "Jordan K. Hubbard" at Jan 24, 97 09:18:47 am X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.4 PL24] MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk > Moral: You may be the bigger animal, but when facing these kind of > numbers the right thing to say is "Nice kitty!" :-) Heh. But kitties are amennable to parallel soultion, or to gated tasking (through a kitty-door) because each kitty is topoligically equivalent. So you could: Open gate <-----. | | v | Obtain cat | | | v | Close gate | | | v | "Process" cat | <- subroutine detailed in original posting | | v | More cats? Y----' N | v done I call this approach KATS-switching... 8-). OR Whack! Whack! Whack! Whack! Whack! ... Whack! Meow! Meow! Meow! Meow! Meow! ... Meow! Whack! Whack! Whack! Whack! Whack! ... Whack! Meow! Meow! Meow! Meow! Meow! ... Meow! Whack! Whack! Whack! Whack! Whack! ... Whack! Meow! Meow! Meow! Meow! Meow! ... Meow! Whack! Whack! Whack! Whack! Whack! ... Whack! ... ... ... ... ... ... Whack! Whack! Whack! Whack! Whack! ... Whack! ... ... ... ... ... ... Whack! Whack! Whack! Whack! Whack! ... Whack! I call this approach PURRallel PURRcessing... 8-). The second, of course, depends on how many midieval old women you can effectivel say "Nee!" to at the same time. Regards, Terry Lambert terry@lambert.org --- Any opinions in this posting are my own and not those of my present or previous employers. From owner-freebsd-chat Fri Jan 24 09:55:51 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) id JAA09494 for chat-outgoing; Fri, 24 Jan 1997 09:55:51 -0800 (PST) Received: from time.cdrom.com (time.cdrom.com [204.216.27.226]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id JAA09489 for ; Fri, 24 Jan 1997 09:55:49 -0800 (PST) Received: from time.cdrom.com (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by time.cdrom.com (8.8.4/8.6.9) with ESMTP id JAA06795; Fri, 24 Jan 1997 09:54:48 -0800 (PST) To: Terry Lambert cc: davidn@unique.usn.blaze.net.au, chat@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Terry: a bystanders view... In-reply-to: Your message of "Fri, 24 Jan 1997 10:32:18 MST." <199701241732.KAA27403@phaeton.artisoft.com> Date: Fri, 24 Jan 1997 09:54:47 -0800 Message-ID: <6789.854128487@time.cdrom.com> From: "Jordan K. Hubbard" Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk > I call this approach PURRallel PURRcessing... 8-). OK, I give. Someone has to put an end to the bloodshed. :-) Jordan From owner-freebsd-chat Fri Jan 24 10:17:09 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) id KAA10659 for chat-outgoing; Fri, 24 Jan 1997 10:17:09 -0800 (PST) Received: from dns.pinpt.com (dns.pinpt.com [205.179.195.1]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) with SMTP id KAA10653 for ; Fri, 24 Jan 1997 10:17:06 -0800 (PST) Received: from journeyman (gatemaster.pinpt.com [205.179.195.65]) by dns.pinpt.com (8.6.12/8.6.12) with SMTP id KAA03352; Fri, 24 Jan 1997 10:16:06 -0800 Date: Fri, 24 Jan 97 10:15:30 Pacific Standard Time From: "Sean J. Schluntz" Subject: Re: Terry: a bystanders view... To: freebsd-chat@freebsd.org, Stephen McKay Cc: syssgm@devetir.qld.gov.au X-Mailer: Chameleon ATX 6.0, Standards Based IntraNet Solutions, NetManage Inc. X-Priority: 3 (Normal) References: <199701240317.NAA04138@troll.devetir.qld.gov.au> Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk > >> "Sovereign power comes from a mandate from the people, > >> not because some watery tart lobbs a scimitar at you". > >> -- Dennis, who's not an old lady or an old man... > > > >I thought the quote was; > > > > "Sovereign power comes from a mandate from the masses > > not from some farcical aquatic ceremony" > > From memory, I think it went something like: > > "Strange women lying in ponds distributing swords is no basis for a > system of government. Supreme executive power derives from a mandate > from the masses, not from some farcical aquatic ceremony. You can't > expect to wield supreme executive power because some watery tart threw > a sword at you. I mean, if I went around saying I was an Emperor just > because some moistened bint had lobbed a scimitar at me, they'd put > me away." > > If this turns out to be correct, I will be submitting myself for mandatory > memory purge, down at the local psychiatric centre. Yep, you got it right. Good old Monty Python Movies!! -Sean ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Sean J. Schluntz Manager, Support Services ph. 408.997.6900 x222 PinPoint Software Corporation fx. 408.323.2300 6155 Almaden Expressway, Suite 100 San Jose, CA. 95120 http://www.pinpt.com/ Local Time Sent: 01/24/97 10:15:30 ---------------------------------------------------------------------- From owner-freebsd-chat Fri Jan 24 17:01:03 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) id RAA06162 for chat-outgoing; Fri, 24 Jan 1997 17:01:03 -0800 (PST) Received: from po1.glue.umd.edu (root@po1.glue.umd.edu [129.2.128.44]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id RAA06155 for ; Fri, 24 Jan 1997 17:00:58 -0800 (PST) Received: from gilligan.eng.umd.edu (gilligan.eng.umd.edu [129.2.103.21]) by po1.glue.umd.edu (8.8.5/8.7.3) with ESMTP id UAA04013 for ; Fri, 24 Jan 1997 20:00:20 -0500 (EST) Received: from localhost (chuckr@localhost) by gilligan.eng.umd.edu (8.8.5/8.7.3) with SMTP id UAA31004 for ; Fri, 24 Jan 1997 20:00:19 -0500 (EST) X-Authentication-Warning: gilligan.eng.umd.edu: chuckr owned process doing -bs Date: Fri, 24 Jan 1997 20:00:19 -0500 (EST) From: Chuck Robey X-Sender: chuckr@gilligan.eng.umd.edu To: FreeBSD-chat@FreeBSD.org Subject: privacy Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: owner-chat@FreeBSD.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk I found an html-ized version of a paper on computer privacy, that's chock full of great references (in a full bibliography), so I thought I'd post the url here: http://www.cs.berkeley.edu/~daw/privacy-compcon97-www/privacy-html.html It's worth checking just for the bibliography, even if the paper itself weren't interesting (I enjoyed it tho). ----------------------------+----------------------------------------------- Chuck Robey | Interests include any kind of voice or data chuckr@eng.umd.edu | communications topic, C programming, and Unix. 9120 Edmonston Ct #302 | Greenbelt, MD 20770 | I run Journey2 and picnic, both FreeBSD (301) 220-2114 | version 3.0 current -- and great FUN! ----------------------------+----------------------------------------------- From owner-freebsd-chat Fri Jan 24 18:06:45 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) id SAA10419 for chat-outgoing; Fri, 24 Jan 1997 18:06:45 -0800 (PST) Received: from fallout.campusview.indiana.edu (fallout.campusview.indiana.edu [149.159.1.1]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id SAA10401 for ; Fri, 24 Jan 1997 18:06:32 -0800 (PST) Received: from localhost (jfieber@localhost) by fallout.campusview.indiana.edu (8.8.4/8.8.4) with SMTP id VAA01179; Fri, 24 Jan 1997 21:05:31 -0500 (EST) Date: Fri, 24 Jan 1997 21:05:31 -0500 (EST) From: John Fieber To: Warner Losh cc: "Sean J. Schluntz" , chat@freefall.freebsd.org, config@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Commerical applications In-Reply-To: Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk On Wed, 22 Jan 1997, Warner Losh wrote: > Like I said, I just wanted to point out that X isn't that hard to run > on most hardware... While your hardware doesn't work, it isn't > anywhere near the most common config. For new tools, it strikes me that the only one that *really* needs a decent text mode interface is the installation because everybody has to use it. For anything else, those who prefer vi are most certainly welcome to continue using it as they have since the beginning of time. -john From owner-freebsd-chat Sat Jan 25 08:51:19 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) id IAA08046 for chat-outgoing; Sat, 25 Jan 1997 08:51:19 -0800 (PST) Received: from sax.sax.de (sax.sax.de [193.175.26.33]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) with SMTP id IAA08041 for ; Sat, 25 Jan 1997 08:51:16 -0800 (PST) Received: (from uucp@localhost) by sax.sax.de (8.6.12/8.6.12-s1) with UUCP id RAA00179; Sat, 25 Jan 1997 17:51:14 +0100 Received: (from j@localhost) by uriah.heep.sax.de (8.8.4/8.6.9) id RAA27277; Sat, 25 Jan 1997 17:45:34 +0100 (MET) Message-ID: Date: Sat, 25 Jan 1997 17:45:31 +0100 From: j@uriah.heep.sax.de (J Wunsch) To: chat@freebsd.org Cc: msmith@atrad.adelaide.edu.au (Michael Smith) Subject: Re: Cursing the sky (was: Commerical applications ...) References: <199701220151.MAA11082@genesis.atrad.adelaide.edu.au> <18310.854101530@time.cdrom.com> X-Mailer: Mutt 0.55-PL10 Mime-Version: 1.0 X-Phone: +49-351-2012 669 X-PGP-Fingerprint: DC 47 E6 E4 FF A6 E9 8F 93 21 E0 7D F9 12 D6 4E Reply-To: joerg_wunsch@uriah.heep.sax.de (Joerg Wunsch) In-Reply-To: <18310.854101530@time.cdrom.com>; from Jordan K. Hubbard on Jan 24, 1997 02:25:30 -0800 Sender: owner-chat@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk As Jordan K. Hubbard wrote: > > I really don't like that much. How about : > > > > # file : kern_options.kci > > > > option "DDB" { > > description "Enables the kernel debugger" > > manref "ddb(4)" > > } > > [ Other examples elided ] > > I like it! Who's gonna write the yacc specification! :-) Writing the yacc specs for this is simple, and probably the fun part from the entire task. :) The ``remainder'' will be a little more work... -- cheers, J"org joerg_wunsch@uriah.heep.sax.de -- http://www.sax.de/~joerg/ -- NIC: JW11-RIPE Never trust an operating system you don't have sources for. ;-)