Return to BSD News archive
Path: euryale.cc.adfa.oz.au!newshost.anu.edu.au!harbinger.cc.monash.edu.au!news.rmit.EDU.AU!news.unimelb.EDU.AU!munnari.OZ.AU!news.uwa.edu.au!classic.iinet.com.au!swing.iinet.net.au!news.uoregon.edu!psgrain!newsfeed.internetmci.com!chi-news.cic.net!usc!cs.utexas.edu!not-for-mail From: sfkaplan@cs.utexas.edu (Scott Frederick Kaplan) Newsgroups: comp.unix.bsd.netbsd.misc Subject: Re: MachTen vs NetBSD/Mac68k Date: 8 Dec 1995 00:50:35 -0600 Organization: CS Dept, University of Texas at Austin Lines: 58 Message-ID: <4a8n7r$bkd@chirp.cs.utexas.edu> References: <slrn4cfcp2.da1.aiyar@biocserver.BIOC.CWRU.Edu> NNTP-Posting-Host: chirp.cs.utexas.edu Ashok Aiyar (aiyar@biocserver.BIOC.CWRU.Edu) wrote: : a) I just came across something called Professional MachTen from : Tenon Intersystems. Would this better suit my needs? Does : anyone have a number/e-mail address for Tenon Intersystems? : Is MachTen related to NetBSD/Mac68k? The two are not related, other than being variants of BSD. The number, if I remember correctly, is 1-800-6-MACH-10. My apologies if my memory stinks. As to whether MachTen would be better for your needs, that's a tough one--MachTen is stable, comes with a nice set of libraries, and things seem to compile quite easily on it. On the other hand, you lose a bit of usable RAM and performance because MachTen has to go through the MacOS for many services (most importantly I/O). : b) Will either NetBSD/mac68K-1.1 or MachTen(or A/UX) allow me : to run the combination of GN + freeWAIS? I have a number of : Perl CGI scripts that I had written for the Linux box and I : would like to be able to reuse those as well. I think all three would be capable of compiling and running what you're looking for, with a varying amount of fiddling. While A/UX is very cool, it's not supported anymore, and I think the other two would be better choices. Personally, I tried out MachTen. I have used my IIci for years, and had some Mac applications (WordPerfect, Quicken) which were nice and I hated the idea of not having them easily available. Also, a fully supported UNIX seemed like a great idea to me. However, I found that the dependance on file I/O and MacOS device drivers made the system less stable and less responsive. It also meant that over 1 meg of non-swappable code took up space in RAM, which was a big problem with only 8 megs available. On the other hand, all devices worked without any special additions-- if the MacOS driver worked, then MachTen could use it. I could use Mac applications. The X implementation was very complete. The support staff seemed excellent. But for my use, it wasn't the thing to do. I needed some performance and a more stable system, and NetBSD seems to do a good job of that. But then, NetBSD/mac68k is black and white display only, only some ethernet cards are supported, and most "oddball" devices are not likely to be supported unless you do it yourself. Not a knock on the NetBSD/mac68k people, mind you! It just that it requires more work when the MacOS is purged and you have to start from scratch. I don't know if I gave any useful information, but hopefully I have. You should also note that Tenon does have a 30-day money back policy, so it might be worth a test drive for you. They seem very much to want to produce an excellent product, and are improving MachTen all the time. In fact, for the future, MachTen with Copland may be quite a nice system on a PowerMac--but we'll see. Scott Kaplan sfkaplan@cs.utexas.edu http://www.cs.utexas.edu/users/sfkaplan PGP public key by finger or WWW