*BSD News Article 18957


Return to BSD News archive

Path: sserve!newshost.anu.edu.au!munnari.oz.au!news.Hawaii.Edu!ames!haven.umd.edu!uunet!spcvxb!terry
From: terry@spcvxb.spc.edu (Terry Kennedy, Operations Mgr.)
Newsgroups: comp.os.386bsd.misc
Subject: Re: BSD/386 Commercial Product
Message-ID: <1993Jul28.025606.6655@spcvxb.spc.edu>
Date: 28 Jul 93 02:56:06 EDT
References: <1778.2C53F9EF@mechanic.fidonet.org> <23136o$aa6@pdq.coe.montana.edu> <1993Jul27.053721.6646@spcvxb.spc.edu> <1993Jul28.035328.2892@fcom.cc.utah.edu>
Organization: St. Peter's College, US
Lines: 70

In article <1993Jul28.035328.2892@fcom.cc.utah.edu>, terry@cs.weber.edu (A Wizard of Earth C) writes:
> Not many CSRG drivers out there (or any BSD4.4 Lite, for that matter).  Not
> to complain, but if you want to be where the drivers are, you need a kernel
> that can run Linux or 386BSD/NetBSD/FreeBSD drivers.

  I believe those have already diverged (or not converged, in the case of
Linux). At least that's what I've read in the 386bsd newsgroups from some of
the responsible folks.

  I haven't yet seen any drivers that I'd need/want that aren't already in
BSD/386. Perhaps that just proves that BSD/386 is an excellent fit for my
needs. Anybody have any examples? I've already seen the "anything but Adap-
tec" request. What I haven't seen is a clear "winner" of what the next SCSI
controller supported should be.
 
> LKM is "Loadable Kernel Modules".. it allows you to load/unload device
> drivers, file systems, system calls, execution classes, streams modules,
> and misc modules (basically, anything you can wedge a hack into in the
> kernel address space) without taking the system down.  And modules loaded
> take kernel memory, and are not affected by initial kernel size.

  I'm sure this is very interesting, particularly in a development environ-
ment. What benefits would these give me in an application development (or
deployment) environment?

> For instance, say I bought a printer and wanted to get it running.  I could
> install the interruptless printer driver without taking my machine down.

  But I have already configured my kernel with lp support, even though I don't
have a parallel printer on it (though I might in the future).

  Please don't misunderstand - I'm perfectly willing to be convinced. I just
don't "get it" from the examples you cite. Currently, if I were developing a
new filesystem, I'd do it on a test machine (probably accompanied by frequent
crashes 8-) and when I had something solid (or at least Jello-like) I'd plop
it into a "light duty" production system.

> An execution class is basically a program loader.  For instance, using code
> I can't give out, I can run ISC 386 and SCO Xenix binaries on my machine
> (if I'd spent another week, the Xenix stuff would be distributable) as long
> as they are statically linked.

  This is certainly interesting. What percentage of these binaries are static-
ally linked? (Out of curiousity - I really don't know the answer)

> I wouldn't either; but I wouldn't call it a research OS either, and that's
> the primary motivator for the *BSD efforts.  BSD/386 is an applications
> platform.

  No disagreement there.

>>  I'd be quite surprised if any of these things make it out in an official
>>"free" release first.
> 
> Suprise.  Xenix Compatability and shared libs.  Maybe not SPARC, but then
> again maybe (we'll see).  In any case, Amiga and several ther ports exist
> in Beta (Macintosh?), and others are planned or starting coding.

  Will that be in 386bsd 0.2, or NetBSD 1.0, or...? Note that I meant a com-
plete official "free" release, suitable for installing from scratch, not as
a patchkit or similar...

> Don't underestimate free.

  I don't. However, don't dismiss BSD/386 just because it's commercial. [This
is directed at the general audience, not anybody in particular, by the way]

	Terry Kennedy		Operations Manager, Academic Computing
	terry@spcvxa.bitnet	St. Peter's College, Jersey City, NJ USA
	terry@spcvxa.spc.edu	+1 201 915 9381