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From: vjs@calcite.rhyolite.com (Vernon Schryver)
Subject: Re: Whats wrong with Linux networking ???
Message-ID: <CuBzq9.BMx@calcite.rhyolite.com>
Organization: Rhyolite Software
Date: Wed, 10 Aug 1994 18:08:32 GMT
References: <RSANDERS.94Aug9003813@hrothgar.mindspring.com> <CuA6w1.5tF@calcite.rhyolite.com> <32acqn$ghb@ra.nrl.navy.mil>
Lines: 75
In article <32acqn$ghb@ra.nrl.navy.mil> cmetz@sundance.itd.nrl.navy.mil (Craig Metz) writes:
>In article <CuA6w1.5tF@calcite.rhyolite.com>,
>Vernon Schryver <vjs@calcite.rhyolite.com> wrote:
>>Changing the U.Guelph NFS code to use whatever Linux uses for networking
>>cannot be a fraction as much work as writing a new NFS implementation
>>unless the Linux networking is worse than anyone has so far claimed.
>
> Are you volunteering?
> Have you ever actually looked at the code?
Have I looked at Linux? no.
Have I looked at the U.Guelph NFS code? yes.
Have I looked at other NFS code? yes. For example, I worked on the first port
of NFS to SVR3 as a Lachman employee in Bob Lyon's group at Sun.
Are the U.Guelph, old but internal Sun source, and various Sun reference
releases the only NFS code I've looked at? no.
Have I ever put 4.*BSD network code into a non-BSD system? yes.
More than once? yes.
Did I do those things for free? no, except for looking at the U.Guelph code.
Do I think such things require much invention or creativity? no, not much.
Do I want to do such things again, even if paid? probably not.
Do I think that my spare, recreational kernel hacking time would be well
spent putting the U.Guelph NFS code into Linux using the renowned
Linux networking code? no.
Is it my professional judgement having looked at and ported NFS source
that porting the U.Guelph NFS source to any system with reasonable
UDP/IP networking would be a tiny job compared to writing a new NFS
clone for scratch for that system, even if the target system is not
like UNIX and/or not written in C? yes.
Have you made Linux sound like something I should run in addition to
the NetBSD, BSDI, and System V I run on my PC's, or the major UNIX
worstation vendor's system I'm paid to hack? no.
Given that the last several articles in this thread have been confined
to comp.os.386bsd.questions and comp.os.386bsd.misc, do I think
you've made any converts? no.
>>There was an excuse for inception of Linux. Big-bad-nasty-mean-USL/AT&T
>>is obviously a sufficent reason for most of the kernel. Who says
>>otherwise?
>
> Well, Linus. But he's not important, right?
What? He says that USL/AT&T nastiness an <<insufficient>> reason
for the core of Linux?
>>It
>>makes just much sense as refusing to have an open() system call. Of
>>course a non-BSD kernel has different internal mechanisms, but one
>>expects a good clone (i.e. something strictly and unabigiously better
>>than the original) to have compatibility glue.
>
> Maybe (gasp!) Linux isn't a clone...
That's nonsense. Of course Linux is a clone. "Clone" does not mean
"recompile", it means "write from scratch something with the same external
interfaces." Linux is supposed to have the same form, fit and function
of UNIX(tm). That makes it a UNIX(tm) clone. The concensus seems to
be that it is a better clone than Coherent. Of course, you can invent
a new meaning for the word "clone", but that won't help you communicate.
This inclination to label the student exercises or bad-NIH parts of
Linux (e.g. Linux networking and NFS) as other than they are is not
sane. Things are what they are. Calling one's student excercises Great
Works or declaring that one's clone of a mildly popular operating system
is something more original is not an indication of a good adjustment to
reality. Student work is very valuable, not because its direct utility
but because of what it has taught the student. Clones can be good,
breaking noxious license restrictions or improving on the original.
(e.g the IBM-PC BIOS clones did both.) Nevertheless, they are what they
are.
Vernon Schryver vjs@rhyolite.com