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Xref: sserve comp.unix.aix:48585 comp.unix.bsd:15514 comp.unix.pc-clone.32bit:7676 comp.unix.solaris:28014 comp.unix.unixware:14970 Path: sserve!newshost.anu.edu.au!harbinger.cc.monash.edu.au!bunyip.cc.uq.oz.au!munnari.oz.au!spool.mu.edu!howland.reston.ans.net!swrinde!sgiblab!sgigate.sgi.com!fido.asd.sgi.com!slovax!lm From: lm@slovax.engr.sgi.com (Larry McVoy) Newsgroups: comp.unix.aix,comp.unix.bsd,comp.unix.pc-clone.32bit,comp.unix.solaris,comp.unix.unixware Subject: Re: Unix for PC Followup-To: comp.unix.aix,comp.unix.bsd,comp.unix.pc-clone.32bit,comp.unix.solaris,comp.unix.unixware Date: 9 Dec 1994 22:24:06 GMT Organization: Silicon Graphics Inc., Mountain View, CA Lines: 57 Distribution: inet Message-ID: <3cale6$6ep@fido.asd.sgi.com> References: <199411210319.TAA18133@nic.cerf.net> <D0I7Fq.C1p@news.cern.ch> <3c7qli$glm@pdq.coe.montana.edu> <3c81c7$h1o@fido.asd.sgi.com> <3c8aqi$l4i@pdq.coe.montana.edu> Reply-To: lm@slovax.engr.sgi.com NNTP-Posting-Host: slovax.engr.sgi.com X-Newsreader: TIN [version 1.2 PL2] I wrote: : >I hate to burst your bubble, but I worked at Sun in the systems group for : >a few years (and then in the server group). They had *no* regression : >test other than the binaries that shipped with the OS. Since 5.x, : >they use the POSIX test suites but those (were) are pathetic and : >certainly don't cover everything. Nate Williams (nate@bsd.coe.montana.edu) wrote: : Then somebody should take the manager of that group out and shoot him. : Either that or his manager for giving unreasonable deadlines that can't : be met with decent testing. Until you've actually implemented a Unix regression test, don't be so naive. If it was just a matter of a dumbass manager, do you think they wouldn't have figured that out by now? Real testing is hard, hard, hard. Let me know when you have a solution. : If microsoft does one thing right it's test it's software. Granted, it : still never seems to find the bugs that the average user find the first : time around, but they do indeed spend alot of their resources trying to : break their own products. Reread that paragraph and tell me the content? I'm supposed to (a) believe that Microsoft does good testing but (b) accept that they can't find the bugs that the average user encounters? And that is good testing? Maybe the problem here is your definition of testing, I fail to see what it is. : >The commercial OS release mechanism is pretty similar to Linux. You send : >out some alpha junk to a few sites and see what the reaction is. The closer : >you get to beta the less you allow in. After beta only show stoppers get : >in. : That might be the way SUN does things, but I know of a couple other OS : vendors that don't do things that way. :) Name them. : >Stability is important but there is little in the way of testing done to : >insure stability. SMCC might be fixing that, I understand they have/had : >Solaris 2.4 months before they shipped it. :-) : Stability can be tested by putting real world applications on your : hardware. The way FreeBSD tests it's software is by sticking it on : wcarchive.cdrom.com. Having 250-350 ftp's is one way of seeing how : the system reacts under load. :) That tests 250-350 ftps. So what? Is that it? That's great if I want to be doing a bunch of ftps. How about a bunch of ftps and a make? Or a untar with a make? Or X and an untar and SLIP but no ftps? Oh, did I mention that all the interesting bugs are ones that only show up under some weirdball combo of unrelated things? -- --- Larry McVoy (415) 390-1804 lm@sgi.com