Linux
Dennis Wong
However, I don't have "rawwrite.exe" program to put the image
back on the floppy.
Could anyone tell me where can I find rawrite.exe ?
Thanks
Dennis
Dennis Wong den...@ersys.edmonton.ab.ca
Edmonton Remote Systems: Serving Northern Alberta since 1982
Jerry Bolton
Norton Utilities, you can use the explore disk option, choose
the file as an item, and write item to disk using absolute
sector writes. I used side 0 head 0 sector 1 and my boot
image and root image work fine.
Jerry
Timothy Murphy
and can give an opinion on its merits
vis-a-vis 386-Minix?
While I could be convinced on this,
it seems to me pretty unlikely on the face of it
that anyone could really write a reliable operating system
from scratch in a short time.
After all, it took Tanenbaum years to write Minix,
and he worked night and day without stop,
and had a team working under him too.
One only has to look at the sources
to see the sheer intellectual work involved
in such an enterprise.
--
Timothy Murphy
e-mail: t...@maths.tcd.ie
tel: +353-1-2842366
s-mail: School of Mathematics, Trinity College, Dublin 2, Ireland
Linus Benedict Torvalds
In article <1992Jan13....@maths.tcd.ie> t...@maths.tcd.ie (Timothy Murphy) writes:
>Is any independent person actually running Linux,
>and can give an opinion on its merits
>vis-a-vis 386-Minix?
Ok, somebody else should answer this, I can only say that the latest
count on the activists-list is 196. Some of them are actually using
linux. Many are just interested, and aren't actually going to use it,
but there are quite a few that have started making changes and sending
in patches: About half the new things in 0.12 have been implemented by
others (job control, ptys, select, and virtual consoles are mostly tthe
work of others, although I have hcaked them heavily)
>While I could be convinced on this,
>it seems to me pretty unlikely on the face of it
>that anyone could really write a reliable operating system
>from scratch in a short time.
>
>After all, it took Tanenbaum years to write Minix,
>and he worked night and day without stop,
[ editors note: he probably slept alternate sundays so that he could
start afresh for next fortnights hacking. ast, can you confirm :-? ]
>and had a team working under him too.
>One only has to look at the sources
>to see the sheer intellectual work involved
>in such an enterprise.
Are you writing this seriously? There are a lot of smileys missing. The
reason unix has been so successful is that it's actually a very clean
and simple operating system. I would seriously doubt anybody will
implement VMS in a year (or 5, and even after that I wouldn't want to
actually use it :-)
On the off chance that this was a real post, and not just a joke then:
yes, linux is a viable alternative to minix-386. Minix has a bigger
base, and "the book", which are definitive advantages, but if a person
knows unix a bit, then linux is entirely possible to use. There are
bugs, and "reliable" might be too strong a word for linux still, but
most things are easier to do under linux than under minix. Porting is
much easier (I remember porting bash-1.05 to minix: it wasn't just "make
and go".)
Linus
Dave Cottingham
>While I could be convinced on this,
>it seems to me pretty unlikely on the face of it
>that anyone could really write a reliable operating system
>from scratch in a short time.
And what's even more remarkable, he apparently managed it without
using CVS! 8-0
Just for amusement, here are some stats from the contents of linux-0.11.tar:
Lines of C 8578
Lines of header 2741
Lines of assembler 1347
Total 12666
For comparison, according to Pike et al. "Plan 9 from Bell Labs" (which
I happen to have on my desk) the Plan 9 operating system contains
about 15400 lines of code in all.
Hope someone finds this relevant.
- Dave Cottingham
d...@cobi.gsfc.nasa.gov
Robert W. Brewer
(Dennis Wong) says:
>
>Could anyone tell me where can I find rawrite.exe ?
I think you can find rawrite on ftp.cs.vu.nl in the minix/demo directory, and p
robably also in the mirror of this site at plains.nodak.edu.
Pietro Caselli
>In article <1992Jan13....@maths.tcd.ie> t...@maths.tcd.ie (Timothy Murphy) writes:
>>Is any independent person actually running Linux,
>>and can give an opinion on its merits
>>vis-a-vis 386-Minix?
Well, I'm using Linux as my reference system. It still lacks some
usefule things like an init or a login or ... well It lacks a lot of
things but ... it's reliable, speedy and it's a SYSV
I'v been in trouble with minix porting nn, and nn still doesn't work
well, with linux I needed no Abracadabra, it works and thats is what
I wanted.
Minix is better as readability ( Hu .. does it writes so ? ) but
as realabilty there are billions of miles of distance ( and Linux is
till an alfa !!! ).
>Ok, somebody else should answer this, I can only say that the latest
>count on the activists-list is 196. Some of them are actually using
>linux. Many are just interested, and aren't actually going to use it,
>but there are quite a few that have started making changes and sending
>in patches: About half the new things in 0.12 have been implemented by
>others (job control, ptys, select, and virtual consoles are mostly tthe
>work of others, although I have hcaked them heavily)
And there are people working on ports of several PD pkgs you'll hardly
see on minix. I ported tcsh, ( I'm testing it and I'm waiting for Linux
0.12 in order to have job-control and release it on the net )
>On the off chance that this was a real post, and not just a joke then:
>yes, linux is a viable alternative to minix-386. Minix has a bigger
>base, and "the book", which are definitive advantages, but if a person
>knows unix a bit, then linux is entirely possible to use. There are
>bugs, and "reliable" might be too strong a word for linux still, but
>most things are easier to do under linux than under minix. Porting is
>much easier (I remember porting bash-1.05 to minix: it wasn't just "make
>and go".)
I agree, Minix is the best "educational" system I've ever seen, It's clear
and (quite) easy to understand, but it's slow and up-to-date, Linux is
more cryptic to understand ( At least for me, I've never been famialiar
with Gas sintax and I think I'll never be ) but is the best way toward
a free Unix system.
Ciao.
Pietro.
Ari Lemmke
: it seems to me pretty unlikely on the face of it
: that anyone could really write a reliable operating system
: from scratch in a short time.
: After all, it took Tanenbaum years to write Minix,
: and he worked night and day without stop,
: and had a team working under him too.
You must be joking. This article is for fun ????
Teasing us?
: One only has to look at the sources
: to see the sheer intellectual work involved
: in such an enterprise.
I've used Minix for teaching (2 years). Minix is definitely
too big ... too much trouble with diskettes.
The Minix book is quite good, but [no comments].
I don't say 'Linux is perfect' .. there are many things
what I would like to do otherwise, but Minix is not
perfect either. Never tried to create a new FS to Minix ?
[no comments].
: Timothy Murphy
arl // Writing better OSes with less code
Thomas J. Trebisky
: While I could be convinced on this,
: it seems to me pretty unlikely on the face of it
: that anyone could really write a reliable operating system
: from scratch in a short time.
: After all, it took Tanenbaum years to write Minix,
: and he worked night and day without stop,
: and had a team working under him too.
: One only has to look at the sources
: to see the sheer intellectual work involved
: in such an enterprise.
I will apologize in advance, I cannot let this pass without commenting.
This is the kind of thinking I call the "only the experts can do it" syndrome.
It is the most evil and insidious poison towards any sort of creative activity.
I imagine the Wright Brothers, Henry Ford, Alexander Graham Bell, and countless
others had to turn a deaf ear toward this sort of silly thinking.
For long years (even centuries), the bulk of the religious world believed
that only the clergy could read and understand scripture, the common man
could not (and should not) read it for himself.
What about unix itself? I may not have all the facts straight, but the first
version was essentially the work of two people over a span of maybe a year,
perhaps less.
I believe that any person who attempts any kind of serious, new, and creative
venture will have to war against this kind of thinking, first in their own
mind, and then as they face criticism from others.
(As an aside, I have finally learned that I don't need to let the "experts"
work on my car -- I can turn bolts, set timing, even do substantial repairs
as well or better than the experts (if nothing else I am more motivated to
do a quality job) -- but for years I did not believe this and cringed in fear
before the mighty automobile).
As far as minix, I don't know the history of it's creation, but I respect
Tanenbaum's work. One comment I would like to make, some criticism toward
minix has been made, based on how message passing is used so heavily in its
design. I am willing to accept and put up with this as a stepping stone to
distributed systems -- in a multiprocessor system, the messages might be
moving between machines. And didn't Tanenbaum go on to work on Amoeba? I would
guess the choice to use message passing was looking ahead to such systems.
--
Tom Trebisky ttre...@as.arizona.edu
Richard Betel
>For long years (even centuries), the bulk of the religious world believed
>that only the clergy could read and understand scripture, the common man
>could not (and should not) read it for himself.
>
they trying to keep control, by controlling the common man's
understanding of his on religion?
(followup to alt.religion or mail, please)
>What about unix itself? I may not have all the facts straight, but the first
>version was essentially the work of two people over a span of maybe a year,
>perhaps less.
They had already spent a long time working on multics. Unix was a
stripped down version. Also, they USED unix for a long time. What was
unix capable of doing when they first wrote it? I doubt that what they
had done in ONE year is even comparable to minix. The unix we know was
several versions later.
>
>I believe that any person who attempts any kind of serious, new, and creative
>venture will have to war against this kind of thinking, first in their own
>mind, and then as they face criticism from others.
>
I'm sorry, but I really don't think you have to try to martyr
yourself (or your operating system of choice) under the circumstances.
MINIX has its uses, and its niche. So does linux. That is good enough
to justify either of them.
>(As an aside, I have finally learned that I don't need to let the "experts"
>work on my car -- I can turn bolts, set timing, even do substantial repairs
>as well or better than the experts (if nothing else I am more motivated to
>do a quality job) -- but for years I did not believe this and cringed in fear
>before the mighty automobile).
>
>As far as minix, I don't know the history of it's creation, but I respect
>Tanenbaum's work. One comment I would like to make, some criticism toward
>minix has been made, based on how message passing is used so heavily in its
>design. I am willing to accept and put up with this as a stepping stone to
>distributed systems -- in a multiprocessor system, the messages might be
>moving between machines. And didn't Tanenbaum go on to work on Amoeba? I would
>guess the choice to use message passing was looking ahead to such systems.
I am no expert, but as far as I understand it, message passing
is just a method of IPC. Minix is an operating system where individual
tasks are fairly clearly divided among dedicated processes. When they
need to, they communicate through messages. It can be slow, but it has
advantages: Modular design (I have heard of several networked file
systems for minix. I gathered that most people felt the mods were
fairly trivial.) Easy to understand. Linux, I gather, (and most unixes) are
monolithic in design. They have a single huge chunk of code. The IPC
mechanism here is shared memory. On the other hand, unless well
designed, monolithic systems tend to be large, and sometimes wastefull
(I once read that AT&T had trouble when they first tried to make an
RFS because MAJOR pieces of the FS were duplicated all over to make
the system more efficient.)
Summary:
- Linux works.
- Minix works.
- message passing is a feature, not a flaw.
Actually, I wonder why we should be arguing like this. Linux
has much to gain from minix experiences, and perhaps linux will spurr
some new devellopments in minix, just to stay competitive.
Furthermore, it would be really nice to hear how linux does what it
does, not just what. I mean, BSD does all the things linux does, but
the lastime I looked, BSD was a major victim of kernel bloat. What
about linux?
Dennis Wong
It seems to work fine but I'm having problem importing xxxx.Z files
because the installation file only give example using tar files.
Could anyone tell me how to transfer xxxx.Z files to the hard disk.
Is uemacs.Z workable ?
Timothy Murphy
(in reply to a remark of mine):
> You must be joking. This article is for fun ????
> Teasing us?
...
> I've used Minix for teaching (2 years). Minix is definitely
> too big ... too much trouble with diskettes.
I'm baffled by this.
You're comparing Minix with Linux.
So you must have a 386.
Why don't you run 386-Minix?
With shoelace there is no reason to use diskettes at all.
Theodore Y. Ts'o
supplementary groups, and a dynamic kernel memory allocator in the
Linux kernel, so I should admit my biases up front. The reason why
decided to work on Linux instead of Minix was the cost; being able to
just FTP the source code and not having to pay $150 was a big win.
Also, at least for me, it seemed much easier to add new features to
Linux than Minix, just looking source code from both systems. Perhaps
I had to modify a few more modules in Linux than in Minix, but (1)
that's what context diffs are for, and (2) Linux was much easier for
me to understand.
>While I could be convinced on this,
>it seems to me pretty unlikely on the face of it
>that anyone could really write a reliable operating system
>from scratch in a short time.
>After all, it took Tanenbaum years to write Minix,
>and he worked night and day without stop,
There are a couple of responses to this. First of all, it's much
easier to write a new operating system when you have an old OS to
use as a bootstrap. For example, there was quite a while when Linux
did not yet have a fsck program, but since it was (and still) uses a
Minix filesystem, people who owned Minix could use Minix's fsck.
Also, Linus didn't need to write the utility programs. Almost all of
the utility programs and compilers and such used the GNU Free Software
Foundation programs. This certainly cut a lot of time away from the
development of Linux. This also had the advantage that when Linus had
the choice of modifying the GNU utility program's source code or
modifying the operating system/include files to make it compile, he
chose to modify the kernel. As a result, POSIX is very nearly
completely POSIX compliant. So most of the GNU programs and other
public domain Unix programs compile with almost no modifications.
Finally, up to a limit, a non-message passing kernel is simply easier
to write and modify and understand. As Linux gets bigger, if we
don't become *very* careful with the abstraction boundaries inside the
kernel, it could become a big mess, like (say) the BSD kernel. But at
the moment, it's small and compact, and relatively clean --- and its
current size, the fact that Linux "monolithic" is an advantage over
Minix's "modular, message passing" approach.
The true test, though, will be after we add BSD networking and
sockets. (And yes, there are people within the Linux community who
are interested in doing this.) If we can keep Linux to be
(relatively) compact and clean and easy to understand even after we've
added all of these new features, I think we will have succeeded, and
we will be able to justify saying that "yes, you can write a Real
Operating System without using message passing."
>I remember reading a(may be several) posting that mentions that
>curently available version of Linux (is it .11) does not have
>init/login. Then am I correct in presuming that I will always be root
>in Linux. Does this mean that I cannot change my uid and change my
>previlege level (or is it just that you don't have login/su to do
>it.). As you can see, I am confused by the real meaning of the phrase
>"init/login not available".
Actually, someone just made a bare-bones version of init/login to the
Linux FTP servers. What that comment meant was that while the
setuid() and getuid() and setreuid() calls were implemented in the
Linux kernel, there weren't any application programs that actually
used them. When you booted Linux, it dumped you into a root shell on
the console (essentially, "single-user mode"). But people who wrote
quick hacks like "main(){setuid(15806);execl("/bin/sh","/bin/sh",0);}"
would be able to run at a different (non-root) privilege level.
As far as privelege levels are concerned, Linux is probably more
advanced than Minix, since Linux 0.12 has BSD/POSIX supplementary
group sets, which allow a user operate in several different groups at
the same time.
-----------------------------------------------------------------
>I have just got a copy of Linux-0.11 and I have a couple of questions....
Questions about Linux should go to the Linux-A...@niksula.hut.fi
mailing list. Send mail to Linux-Activ...@niksula.hut.fi to
be placed on the mailing list.
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
Theodore Ts'o bloom-beacon!mit-athena!tytso
3 Ames St., Cambridge, MA 02139 ty...@athena.mit.edu
Everybody's playing the game, but nobody's rules are the same!
Ari Lemmke
In article <1992Jan15.1...@maths.tcd.ie> t...@maths.tcd.ie (Timothy Murphy) writes:
In <ARL.92Ja...@zen.hut.fi> a...@cs.hut.fi (Ari Lemmke) writes
(in reply to a remark of mine):
> too big ... too much trouble with diskettes.
> I'm baffled by this.
> You're comparing Minix with Linux.
No, I try to avoid compairing.
> So you must have a 386.
Couple, and some 286s and 88s too
> Why don't you run 386-Minix?
Sometimes. Not actually much.
> With shoelace there is no reason to use diskettes at all.
You don't get it .. I was taking about teaching that
means you have to copy those disks (1.3d it was 10
diskettes in our kit) to your students, so they could
make the project at home. Our Comp Sci Lab and PCs?
No, we have only work stations (local joke) ;-) ...
> Timothy Murphy
arl
Kevin J. Duling
of the articles I read in this newsgroup are about Linux. I don't
have Linux and I don't want it -- it won't run on my machine, so I
have no interest in it. I thought that this was a Minix newsgroup.
Why don't you make the effort and create comp.os.linux?
That sounds quite a bit more harsh than I inteneded, but that's my
suggestion, anyway.
--
-=*=-=*=-=*=-=*=-=*=-=*=-=*=-=*=-=*=-=*=-=*=-=*=-=*=-=*=-=*=-=*=-=*=-=*=-=*=-
Kevin J. Duling UNIX kdu...@nmsu.edu
New Mexico State University VM/CMS opr...@nmsuvm1.nmsu.edu
Computer Center/Small Systems VMS CC4...@helen.nmsu.edu
-=*=-=*=-=*=-=*=-=*=-=*=-=*=-=*=-=*=-=*=-=*=-=*=-=*=-=*=-=*=-=*=-=*=-=*=-=*=-
David Feustel
to bash it intelligently. :-)
--
David Feustel N9MYI, 1930 Curdes Ave, Fort Wayne, IN 46805. (219)482-9631
feu...@netcom.com
Dylan Smith
>Furthermore, it would be really nice to hear how linux does what it
>does, not just what. I mean, BSD does all the things linux does, but
>the lastime I looked, BSD was a major victim of kernel bloat. What
>about linux?
As far as I can see Linux hasn't got a massive kernel, wether it's larger than
Minix or not I can't say. What I will say though is if Linux allows me to
throw out MS-DOS as my primary operating system I am very happy for it to do
so. I can't afford to fork out for Minix, so for me linux has some very
definite advantages. (Perhaps a new news group Linux should be set up?
There seems to be an awful lot of linux talk here!)
--
Email : JANET d_s...@brispoly.csd | Everywhere else d_s...@csd.brispoly.ac.uk
FidoNet Address 2:252/204 | Data (v22/v22bis) phone 0491 875104
Ralph Merwin
>In article <1992Jan14....@watserv1.waterloo.edu> hbe...@watserv1.waterloo.edu (Richard Betel) writes:
>
>>Furthermore, it would be really nice to hear how linux does what it
>>does, not just what. I mean, BSD does all the things linux does, but
>>the lastime I looked, BSD was a major victim of kernel bloat. What
>>about linux?
>
>As far as I can see Linux hasn't got a massive kernel, wether it's larger than
>Minix or not I can't say. What I will say though is if Linux allows me to
>throw out MS-DOS as my primary operating system I am very happy for it to do
>so. I can't afford to fork out for Minix, so for me linux has some very
>definite advantages. (Perhaps a new news group Linux should be set up?
>There seems to be an awful lot of linux talk here!)
All linux postings should now be directed to alt.os.linux (just recently
created). Work is in progress to setup comp.os.linux.
The first couple of articles in alt.os.linux provide a nice introduction.
Ralph
--
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Ralph Merwin ra...@swmerc.rain.com (503) 642-0256
Dennis Wong
I'm happy with Linux and would like to port more utilities.
However, I'm having problem with using GCC under Linux.
First of all, I'm not sure if I have everything--there is no
header files.
I don't seem to find any installtion doc file.
When I tried to compile the Hello world program, Linux responded
with " can't execute cpp.exe ".
Do I have to change all the gcc-xx to just xx ?
What directory should gcc reside ?
Are there any header files ?
Satish CHITTAMURU
> I really don't wish to flame, but it's starting to annoy me that 50%
> of the articles I read in this newsgroup are about Linux. I don't
> have Linux and I don't want it -- it won't run on my machine, so I
> have no interest in it. I thought that this was a Minix newsgroup.
> Why don't you make the effort and create comp.os.linux?
I agree, but for the opposite reason. I am only interested in Linux (I was
interested in Minix, but since Linux came along I have lost interest). So
I suggest that comp.os.linux be formed (Yeah! I know. Yet another!). Since
I am not quite familiar with proposals and voting etc. could someone make
the proposal and the CFD for this (that is, if other too feel it is
worthwhile to start a new group). The volume of messages seem to justify
it.
--
Satish K. Chittamuru sat...@microsoft.com
Microsoft Corporation Redmond, WA
=====
Veni! Vidi! Visa! (I came! I saw! I purchased!). -- Julius, Sieze Her!
Brendan Kehoe
So I suggest that comp.os.linux be formed (Yeah! I know. Yet
another!). Since I am not quite familiar with proposals and voting
etc. could someone make the proposal and the CFD for this (that is,
if other too feel it is worthwhile to start a new group). The
volume of messages seem to justify it.
alt.os.linux has been created; the traffic probably can't be used as a
gauge on the potential traffic in a comp.os.linux group until the
initial "Burst" of popularity dies down. In a couple of months,
maybe.
--
Brendan Kehoe, Sun Network Manager bre...@cs.widener.edu
Widener University Chester, PA
``Ya know Quaker Oats make you feel good twice?'' Hmm.