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Newsgroups: comp.unix.bsd Path: sserve!newshost.anu.edu.au!harbinger.cc.monash.edu.au!bunyip.cc.uq.oz.au!munnari.oz.au!news.Hawaii.Edu!ames!pacbell.com!ihnp4.ucsd.edu!usc!cs.utexas.edu!howland.reston.ans.net!europa.eng.gtefsd.com!newsxfer.itd.umich.edu!zip.eecs.umich.edu!umn.edu!newsdist.tc.umn.edu!uum1!newsserver!rhealey From: rhealey@sirius.aggregate.com (Rob Healey) Subject: Re: 4.4-lite? Sender: usenet@newsserver.aggregate.com (Usenet News Administrative Account) Message-ID: <Csxxqo.DsM@newsserver.aggregate.com> Date: Thu, 14 Jul 1994 17:25:35 GMT References: <2vgvc7$3tg@spruce.cic.net> <301rrc$cmv@masala.cc.uh.edu> Nntp-Posting-Host: sirius.aggregate.com Organization: Aggregate Computing, Inc. Minneapolis,MN Lines: 52 In article <301rrc$cmv@masala.cc.uh.edu>, Woody Jin <wjin@moocow.cs.uh.edu> wrote: >I was always curious why they want to run BSD on a McIntosh, or Amiga. >If I can have a graphic environment (X11) with BSD on Mac or Amiga, >it may be OK. > Because Mac, Sun3 and Amiga owners want to run BSD UNIX that's why... X runs just fine on Amiga and Sun3, the non-server executables should run OK on the Mac as well as all 3 systems use the exact same binary format, i.e. all m68k NetBSD ports have interchangeable executables. Only hardware specific code, like an X server or device drivers, differ. >If I want the unix on McIntosh, I should be able to run unix on >top of Mac OS, run X11 window, communicate between Mac and Unix >system using graphic environment. Then this would be great. > But a native running UNIX is faster than running on top of MacOS. >I just can't think of the situation like : running BSD on McIntosh in >tty mode and saying "This is great !!!". >(This could have been really great ten years ago) > I imagine they are working on an X server. >Even though it is better to run on more platforms, I would hate if >FreeBSD core team creates the above kind of comedy, wasting their time >and efforts (I do not mean that they should totally stop thinking of it. >FreeBSD should be designed as portable as possible). > Since NetBSD has already beaten FreeBSD to SPARC, m68k, MIPS and I think VAX I would say that the FreeBSD core would probably make better use of their time by concentrating on the x86 OS they know inside and out. The non-x86 architecture people have pretty much made their choice and thrown their lot in with NetBSD, I doubt they are going to throw 6+ months of hard work out the window and start over with FreeBSD as that makes no sense. I find it odd that people don't see the obvious, i.e. the REASON NetBSD is not releasing like FreeBSD is because it is supporting 6+ different architectures with different endianness and such. Doing this obviously takes more time, involves coordinating more people and is tricker to get all arch's to release at the same time. The BENIFIT is that having that many arch's banging away on the same code let's you find ALOT more portability and endianness problems and I think results in more robust code over the long run as you start seeing the BIG portability picture in all the subsystems that make up an OS. -Rob