ES/2 development underway for an open source OS/2

[Rick C. Hodgin]

Over the decades, there have been several efforts at work to create
a full open source OS/2 alternative. These projects have been in
various stages of completion and accomplishment, and they all attempt
to recreate the entire OS/2 operating environment, including support
for 16-bit code.

I'm announcing today the continuation of an effort I began toward OS/2
last year, but is a continuation of an effort I began in the 90s and
into the 00s, which is my purpose to create a near OS/2 clone from the
ground up, similar to what Linux did for UNIX.

I will ultimately be dropping 16-bit support, and will create a
hybrid 32-bit / 64-bit kernel to run on x86, and eventually to port
to ARM as well.

The new product is called ES/2 and will replicate the entire visible
API seen by applications programs. It will be a microkernel,
comprised of many close-knit mainboard drivers, with each such driver
being able to be hot-swapped out while running. This will allow for
bug fixes, and (during development) to move from version to version
as development continues and subsequent recompiles are made in real-
time.

My goals are to have others come on board and help with this effort
once I get my kernel up and running again under my own set of tools.

-----
I would like to ask all of you who are interested in writing a
modern kernel, and creating a modern OS that will ultimately step
up and compete directly with Windows, Linux, Mac OS, and mobile
OSes in use and ability, such that we, as a large community of
developers, begin porting applications to this product, and giving
the world an alternative to the existing choices, one that is based
on what is in my opinion the best operating system ever written.

My current kernel boots today and can access BOIS hardware, video,
and block devices, but the drivers are well out of date. I'm going
to complete my toolset and get my kernel compiling and running
under my own tools, and then continue development with the kernel
and its drivers.

If all goes well, I'll be ready early 2018. We will then be ready
to begin replacing OS/2 apps with our own ES/2 apps one by one, and
adding drivers, and moving forward.

-----
If you are interested in helping, please come join the project.
Thank you for considering this project as a part of your life.

Thank you,
Rick C. Hodgin

[Peter Cheung]

Rick C. Hodgin於 2017年6月6日星期二 UTC+8上午12時01分43秒寫道：

what is ES/2 website?

[Rick C. Hodgin]

On Monday, June 5, 2017 at 2:39:05 PM UTC-4, Peter Cheung wrote:
> what is ES/2 website?

Here is a generic page I started last year:
http://www.libsf.org/es2/

The kernel code is here:
http://www.libsf.org:8990/projects/LIB/repos/libsf/browse/exodus/source

And here's a video demonstrating the kernel debugger:
http://www.visual-freepro.org/videos/2014_02_13__exodus_debi_debugger.ogv

The kernel was originally developed between 1996 and 2004, with most
development occurring between 1998 and 2002.

[Rick C. Hodgin]

I would like to request help. For any of you willing to participate,
please post here or send me email.

Thank you, and God bless,
Rick C. Hodgin

[Peter Cheung]

Rick C. Hodgin於 2017年6月6日星期二 UTC+8下午11時20分54秒寫道：

Thanks for sending me link. I am busy on https://github.com/mcheung63/Netbeans-R

[Bernhard Schornak]

Rick C. Hodgin wrote:


> I would like to request help. For any of you willing to participate,
> please post here or send me email.

Good intention, but almost impossible to realise. I'm interested,
but have no experience with OS programming. Nevertheless, I could
support your project with several native OS/2 programs.

First problem was to create a boot manager capable to handle some
modern standards like UEFI BIOS, GPT (partially 'sharing' sectors
with the old boot manager), SATA, support for the last generation
of grapic adapters, and so on. Might be more work than a handfull
of programmers ever could achieve. Otherwise, IBM still continued
to develop OS/2 themselves rather than to pass this burden to two
unknown software companies (Mensys and Arca).


May Aton's warming beams touch you

Bernhard Schornak

[Rick C. Hodgin]

I hold the effort up before Jesus Christ and wait for Him to
move. I am not seeking to create just another OS, but to give
this world a purposeful effort unto God, to hold Him out front
of the effort, to look up and say, "Lord, here we are. Bless our
offering unto You."

He is worthy of us taking back efforts given over to money and
proprietary interests, and focusing on Him as the root of our
effort. I want to serve the Lord in these areas of interest to
me, and to encourage others in their areas of interests.

Together, by looking up to Jesus AND THEN walking, we can change
the world. That is my goal. And God will send people of like-
minded interests to help.

> May Aton's warming beams touch you

What?

> Bernhard Schornak

Thank you,
Rick C. Hodginn

[Rick C. Hodgin]

On Tuesday, August 29, 2017 at 6:55:07 AM UTC-4, Rick C. Hodgin wrote:
> > Rick C. Hodgin wrote:
> > > I would like to request help. For any of you willing to participate,
> > > please post here or send me email.
>

> I hold the effort up before Jesus Christ and wait for Him to
> move. I am not seeking to create just another OS, but to give
> this world a purposeful effort unto God, to hold Him out front
> of the effort, to look up and say, "Lord, here we are. Bless our
> offering unto You."
>
> He is worthy of us taking back efforts given over to money and
> proprietary interests, and focusing on Him as the root of our
> effort. I want to serve the Lord in these areas of interest to
> me, and to encourage others in their areas of interests.
>
> Together, by looking up to Jesus AND THEN walking, we can change
> the world. That is my goal. And God will send people of like-
> minded interests to help.

I would like to expand upon this a little bit:

We already have efforts which provide us with functional operating
systems. We have proprietary models, and open source models, but
I have not found one that is run by people who are looking up to
Jesus Christ first, and then moving forward. The proprietary
models are seeking some sort of caged control or money interests,
and the open source models I've seen are run by people who are
very much non-Christians, who have no problems using profanity
and berating other people publicly, and even vulgarly and without
any check on their negativity.

In addition, we find in the FSF and GNU the root man, Richard
Stallman, who hold absolutely heinous views on things that should
be wholly shunned.

-----
What I want to do is create a pure effort, a new source that is
from the ground up an offering to the Lord based on the best of
what we've learned in all areas. I want it to be a protractive
effort involving scores of developers, one that will take us a
few years to get booting, and a few more years to have a version
1.0 release, but one that is comprehensive and has as its goals
the ultimate total replacement of every proprietary and open
source effort that's out there.

We read in the Old Testament about Aaron's Staff, how it became
a snake and ate up the other snakes:

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Exodus%207%3A8-13

I want this full hardware and software stack to do the same. I
want our great God to empower us in moving forward to create and
produce something that will be a beacon, a flagship project that
will serve as a model to all other such projects in all other
industries, that we are going to serve the Lord with our passion
in these things we do. We will no longer serve selfish interests,
but will serve Him and His interests, and His interests are in all
of the people He's placed us around, in helping every last one of
them be empowered by the diverse and distributed abilities He's
doled out to each of us, knowing that collectively we have all
from Him that we need.

-----
This is a whole new mindset to have as the base of a project, and
I am not content to move forward with a half-hearted attempt in
its production. It will be moving forward rightly from day one,
with prayer over our efforts, with lives seeking unto Him in full
repentance, in an active pursuit of holiness, knowing in our hearts
and spirits why it is we are doing what we are doing.

It's not trivial. It's not casual. It is a conscious, concerted
effort given over by our labor hours in this world unto the Lord
knowing that He will bless our endeavors, for He has stated that
very thing, that we are to serve Him, looking up to Him, that He
might bless us as we then demonstrate by our self-constraint, our
choices put into motion by the guiding influence of His own Holy
Spirit at work in our lives, that we are then worthy to be entrusted
by such a blessing, that we will not squander it for personal gain
and trivial matters.

My goal is to serve the Lord, and these are my interests in this
world. I desire to create the full hardware and software stack I
have stated, and I desire to do it with my eyes open unto Him. I
want Him to be honored by my work, and for all people world-wide
to see that movement of love and devotion in my unto Him as witness,
a testimony to the love I now possess because He reached into my
hard heart of wickedness and saved me. And even since being saved,
and despite Rick trying again and again to run the other way, yet
has His Hand of Salvation reached into my life and brought me back
to where I should be.

I want my life to be a testimony unto Him, and the things I spend
my time on being an offering back to Him, remembering always that
which He saved me from: my own wretched self, in my own wretched sin.

I owe the Lord everything, and it is from that realization that I
desire to move. And I know with His blessing, not only will I move,
but this project will soar like nothing this world's ever seen
before. It won't be by me, but it will be by men and women like me
who consciously look up to the Lord and say collectively, "Here am
I," as we move forward for Him in this world.

I pray this makes sense to all of you. And I await the day you come
on board to help on this project. The people of this world are
waiting for your contribution, and the Lord is waiting for such a
level of personal devotion from you to Him. He is waiting to bless
your efforts beyond your wildest dreams, as you lift Him high in
your life, pointing others also to Him so that they too might be
saved, and also serve Him in this world to create something worthy,
worthwhile, and right, true, and holy, as its root is an effort of
love and devotion unto the One who is the true foundation of all
that is right, true, proper, holy, and enduring in this world.

May God receive all the glory for this project, and may men and
women from all over this world, and in all disciplines, receive
their own inner call, answer it, and go forth to serve Him in
whatever their interests may be.

In God's sight, we've come together.
We've come together to help each other.
Let's grow this project up ... together!
In service and Love to The Lord, forever!

In faith, hope, and love, but the greatest of these is love,
Rick C. Hodgin

[Bernhard Schornak]

Sorry, but...

a) ...I thought you were looking for people who want to create a 64
bit version of OS/2...

b) ...I 'worship' the Sun as life-giving entity. This is the oldest
belief of human beings and exists much, much longer than the two
and one half millennia since your God was invented. The Sun as a
celestial body can be seen or felt by *any* form of life. No one
has to believe it is there - a simple look proves its existence.

c) ...you should know Aton better than me, since he was the *model*
for that Jewish copy called Yahwe, who then was heavily modified
for the Roman invention called 'Christianity', which finally was
modified to the entity 'Allah' worshipped by Muslims (I disclaim
to analyse Joseph Smith's SciFi 'upgrade' of Christianity called
'Mormonism' or other modifications with even lesser importance).

Therefore: Nope, I am not interested in Christian brainwashing, nor
will I support such a thing in any way - my stuff can be downloaded
and modified for free, as long as it is not used to gain commercial
profit: http://ft4fp.blogspot.de/p/ft4fp-license.html

I think it's hopeless to argue with brainwashed people (that's what
your cult actually did with you), so I save our readers all further
replies to your religiuos monologues. It's so sad, how brainwashing
turned a once intelligent and respected person into a caricature.

May Aton's warming beams touch you

Bernhard Schornak


Post scriptum: I still respect you as a human being, but - doing so
doesn't mean I have to respect the ideology you were
brainwashed with, as well...

[Rick C. Hodgin]

I am, but that component is part of a larger project.

> b) ...I 'worship' the Sun as life-giving entity. This is the oldest
>    belief of human beings and exists much, much longer than the two
>    and one half millennia since your God was invented. The Sun as a
>    celestial body can be seen or felt by *any* form of life. No one
>    has to believe it is there - a simple look proves its existence.

Popular consensus does not make something true. The truth bears
witness to itself.

> c) ...you should know Aton better than me, since he was the *model*
>    for that Jewish copy called Yahwe, who then was heavily modified
>    for the Roman invention called 'Christianity', which finally was
>    modified to the entity 'Allah' worshipped by Muslims (I disclaim
>    to analyse Joseph Smith's SciFi 'upgrade' of Christianity called
>    'Mormonism' or other modifications with even lesser importance).

Jesus Christ is God Almighty and predates time:

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=John+1&version=KJV
1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and
the Word was God.
2 The same was in the beginning with God.
3 All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing
made that was made.
4 In him was life; and the life was the light of men.
5 And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness
comprehended it not.

Verse 5 is why people today are able to be fooled. They do not have
the facilities to receive God's light, for it is spirit, and therefore
they conclude it is falseness, and the things which have come after,
which are lies, which are constructed atop those things they can "see"
with their natural faculties, those must be the truth.

The truth is we are more than this natural existence. Jesus shows us
the way to be restored to our full nature, and to have eternal life.

> Therefore: Nope, I am not interested in Christian brainwashing, nor
> will I support such a thing in any way - my stuff can be downloaded
> and modified for free, as long as it is not used to gain commercial
> profit: http://ft4fp.blogspot.de/p/ft4fp-license.html

I am not interested in Christian brainwashing either. I am interested
in the truth.

All I can do it teach you the truth, Bernhard. I can't make you
believe it.

> I think it's hopeless to argue with brainwashed people (that's what
> your cult actually did with you), so I save our readers all further
> replies to your religiuos monologues. It's so sad, how brainwashing
> turned a once intelligent and respected person into a caricature.

It is hopeless to argue with brainwashed people. That's why you must
not argue with them. But by teaching people the truth, it is then the
teaching which stands.

-----
Christianity is the truth, Bernhard. It sounds like you've encountered
a lot of religious people in your life, and I'm sorry for that. The
true nature of Christianity is a rebirth into the spirit as Jesus
forgives our sin. It is not religion. It is a real change that only
He can make from within. In fact, only He can even draw people to Him
so that the change can be in someone's life (John 6:44), but He does
this for all people who will seek the truth. It's why there's always
hope for us ... until we leave this world because then our fate is
forever cast in stone.

[Rick C. Hodgin]

I am migrating my developer environment to a full OS/2 environment.
It will be developed in a fully OS/2 developer environment on native
hardware from this point forward, with a second native hardware machine
used for testing the code.

My goals are to use the OS/2 developer environment to get my kernel
working, and then to write all of my tools in my own kernel to continue
development in my own OS.

----
Again, I would like to invite you to come and help out on this project.
It's to be an offering of the skills God first gave us, to return them
back to Him directly, and not for money, not for fame, not for personal
glory, but because we have these interests, and we recognize all of our
abilities come from Him.

Consider: If someone gave you $10 million to build a company and some
large campus, you would begin work and invite that person to be a part
of all of your project, opening ceremonies, you'd give speeches which
include parts like, "Without so-and-so, we wouldn't be here today."
You would name a building after that person, or the whole campus even.
There would be plaques commemorating that individual, with their picture
here and there all around. The "About us..." documentation within the
company would include references to that individual's generosity. And
so on.

All I'm trying to do here with these projects of mine is give God His
proper place in my life. He made the Earth, Sun, air, trees, animals,
plants, everything, including me and you. It is desirous, and proper,
to give Him all that He is rightly due with our lives.

ES/2 is to be a ground-up open-source OS/2-like operating system. The
compilers I'm writing are ground-up open-source creations using some
familiar languages as a starting point (assembly, C, Java, Julia, and
others), but then extending them forward. And the same holds true for
apps that will be developed which are similar to other apps.

All of these are ground-up, sanctified, purposeful efforts given over
to Him acknowledging His rightful place in our lives.

Please ... look up to God. Look within your heart. And come and be
a part of this project. Let His gifts to you shine outwardly to others
in this endeavor, so that you can receive from Him the reward of your
efforts given over to Him here in this world.

--
Rick C. Hodgin

[vlrz...@gmail.com]

понеділок, 5 червня 2017 р. 19:01:43 UTC+3 користувач Rick C. Hodgin написав:

all this religious comedy aside, I wanted to say, you've chosen a wrong target for your effort. in my opinion. It's outdated and not developing. NT is much better. Or better think out your own design. There is no points to clone an OS which hasn't been used for a while. IBM screwed it a long time ago, no use, no applications for it, what for one would need to clone that? 16 bit? for 386? despite imb fanboys always blame MS, this was IBM that screwed it. Funny, but this OS that is so praised by MS haters, really has begun at MS. As Gordon Letwin pointed out back then in 95. And he predicted that IBM will get it into trash. Dave Cutler made even better OS/2 after that "break", it's NT. Really interesting design, worth recreating by OS enthusiasts, because of many reasons. Not just attractiveness of the design. But also, cloning it, you have a chance to get all those tons of existing applications. At least in theory. Personally I am preparing myself for this exact work - making an NT clone. For mips and arm first. By making a UEFI for a mips SBC. Good luck, though.

[Rick C. Hodgin]

On Thursday, November 2, 2017 at 9:29:35 PM UTC-4, vlrz...@gmail.com wrote:
> all this religious comedy aside, I wanted to say, you've chosen a wrong target for your effort. in my opinion. It's outdated and not developing. NT is much better. Or better think out your own design. There is no points to clone an OS which hasn't been used for a while. IBM screwed it a long time ago, no use, no applications for it, what for one would need to clone that? 16 bit? for 386? despite imb fanboys always blame MS, this was IBM that screwed it. Funny, but this OS that is so praised by MS haters, really has begun at MS. As Gordon Letwin pointed out back then in 95. And he predicted that IBM will get it into trash. Dave Cutler made even better OS/2 after that "break", it's NT. Really interesting design, worth recreating by OS enthusiasts, because of many reasons. Not just attractiveness of the design. But also, cloning it, you have a chance to get all those tons of existing applications. At least in theory. Personally I am preparing myself for this exact work - making an NT clone. For mips and arm first. By making a UEFI for a mips SBC. Good luck, though.

ES/2 will not support 16-bit code. It will initially target a 32-bit
386 mode, but will be largely abstracted through a C layer, and extended
to 64-bits.

I will extend support of the base OS/2 Win32 API to include a very wide
range of features found in modern Windows OSes. It will not be binary
compatible, and I will not support everything, but I do intent do support
enough of the base Windows API to allow recompilation of a wide range of
Windows apps with minor refactoring, including the standard GDI. And,
since it's an open source effort, people will be able to add additional
support for the modules they need as needed. Over time it will become
more comprehensive.

The OS is a window or portal into functionality, Valerij. It's a
superstructure, a visible framework giving logical construction to a
wide range of abilities and facilities that are necessary to operate
and coordinate tasks internally. Any exposed API can be built atop
that base kernel offering, one which mimics the abilities of other
OSes. You do not have to design for a particular architecture or OS
target to then have those abilities also exposed to the developer.

With the speed of modern computers, it seems unnecessary to target a
a particular design because there is a wide software base supporting
it. With the proper API exposure, existing apps compiling on other
OSes can be ported. It just takes adding that support.

I have chosen OS/2 because it is a phenomenal operating system, it is
out of patents, and it introduced features that modern OSes in 2017
still do not possess.

Here you can see a video of some features of OS/2 2.1 back in 1993.
Later versions like OS/2 Warp 4 had built-in speech recognition in
1996:

Begins at 38:45 -- OS/2 Windows NT "shootout"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-DAojx2Hgec&t=38m45s

And there is still an active OS/2 community, including a new version
of OS/2 released earlier this year, called ArcaOS:

http://www.os2world.com/forum/index.php
https://www.arcanoae.com

--
Rick C. Hodgin

[Peter Cheung]

do not reply to evil rick, i am spamming back his family by exactly his holy shit posts

[Rick C. Hodgin]

On Friday, November 3, 2017 at 12:41:40 AM UTC-4, Peter Cheung wrote:
> do not reply to evil rick, i am spamming back his family by exactly his holy .. posts

The One you mock (Jesus) is the One willing to forgive you and
give you eternal life in Heaven, Peter. He is your greatest advocate.

--
Rick C. Hodgin

[Bernhard Schornak]

vlrz...@gmail.com wrote:


> in my opinion. It's outdated and not developing. NT is much better. Or better think out your own
> design. There is no points to clone an OS which hasn't been used for a while. IBM screwed it a
> long time ago, no use, no applications for it, what for one would need to clone that? 16 bit? for
> 386? despite imb fanboys always blame MS, this was IBM that screwed it. Funny, but this OS that
> is so praised by MS haters, really has begun at MS. As Gordon Letwin pointed out back then in 95.
> And he predicted that IBM will get it into trash. Dave Cutler made even better OS/2 after that
> "break", it's NT. Really interesting design, worth recreating by OS enthusiasts, because of many
> reasons. Not just attractiveness of the design. But also, cloning it, you have a chance to get
> all those tons of existing applications. At least in theory. Personally I am preparing myself for
> this exact work - making an NT clone. For mips and arm first. By making a UEFI for a mips SBC.
> Good luck, though.

Actually, Windows is a downgraded child of OS/2. Microsoft took the
idea behind OS/2, but couldn't steal Ed Iacobucci's superior design
(the entirely object oriented Workplace Shell, extended attributes,
et cetera). MS had an advantage, because DOS + Windows were bundled
with *each* sold PC, so they could gain a lot of installed systems,
while OS/2 had to be purchased separately. The price for MS systems
was a hidden part of the price you paid for your entire PC, and you
could not get a PC *without* the bundled DOS/Windows package. Those
bundling contracts existed 'til the late nineties, before they were
forbidden in most countries.

From a technical point of view, OS/2 still was superior to windows,
if IBM had managed to keep it working with recent hardware. Instead
of keeping OS/2 and upgrading it to a 64 bit multicore OS, IBM gave
it away, and the amateurs (eCS) who got it killed this great OS.

BTW: In 1995 (the year 'Windows 95' should have been released), IBM
managed to sell more than a million WARP 3 copies in Germany, which
was a PITA for MS, because they could not launch Windows 95 duly.

I agree OS/2 is a dead OS, but, nevertheless, it was classes better
than Windows (or, just for the record, Linux). IMHO, OS development
is a very complex task for many programmers working together, so no
lonesome programmer probably is able to develop a completely new OS
design from scratch. You can take an existing OS and modify it, but
it's impossible to keep up with hardware development while creating
a new one (think of the rapid cycle hardware standards are outdated
and replaced by new ones, e.g. IDE => SATA, COM => USB, etc.).


Greetings from Augsburg

Bernhard Schornak

[vlrz...@gmail.com]

субота, 4 листопада 2017 р. 00:51:01 UTC+2 користувач Bernhard Schornak написав:

OS/2 was born inside of MS, they stole nothing. That initial OS was developed by DOS and Xenix teams inside MS. That's why never mind how "superior" its design for someone seems to be, it was stemmed at MS. This little detail is running away of attention of OS/2 lovers MS haters.
The design of OS/2 is superior to DOS and Windows 3.1 and maybe Windows 9x. But no way it's superior to the NT's line.
Gordon Letwin told that IBM didn't want that API for the OS was under control of MS, they wanted to own it. So they dictated that MS abandoned Windows and its API for OS/2. Of course that would be insane since Windows got very popular. So, MS bird flipped to IBM and instead they introduced Win32 into NT. That is the main OS and its environment for the world up to date. "If IBM could". That's the point, if they could, they'd made it, but they couldn't. No one hindered them to keep develop OS/2 with the owned by them API, making it "superior", so that, it would attract people. If they could. But no, all they could was spreading this anti-MS hatred, a plain jealousness for the success. All these fairy tales about Windows success just because of it came pre-installed, are just ridiculous. That huge monster as IBM couldn't make their OS "preinstalled" and a much smaller company as MS could? Then again, wins that who doesn't suck.

[Rick C. Hodgin]

It is. OS/2 continued the philosophy begun at Microsoft, while Microsoft
took the path of compromise to achieve money-goals.

I used to be angry with Microsoft across the board. I began work on my
own kernel in the Windows 95 era for the express purpose of wanting to
put an end to that evil company who required that every PC sold pay them
money for their OS regardless of what OS was installed on the machine.

Microsoft was an evil money-seeking company, and they have been found
guilty on numerous continents of anti-competitive practices, fined
record amounts on more than one occasion, and have been broken up in
many ways under the force of law, such as disconnecting the tight and
comprehensive integration of Internet Explorer that was originally
intended as a means of stamping out competition. We don't have Word
Perfect today because of last minute changes made to the interanl
Win32 model which prevented Word Perfect from working properly, and
so on.

But, as I've gotten older, I began to realize there are two distinct
forces at work at Microsoft. There is the technical end, and then
there is the political / corporate end.

On the technical side we have the team who brought us the core OS,
which is a very solid, stable, and comprehensive design. They've
also brought us the Visual Studio suite and related developer tools,
all of which are not only excellent, but are the best in the world
in my personal opinion.

But that technical prowess has had a force applied to it by the
political / corporate side, and it is within that force end that I
take exception to Microsoft.

> Gordon Letwin told that IBM didn't want that API for the OS was under control of MS, they wanted to own it. So they dictated that MS abandoned Windows and its API for OS/2. Of course that would be insane since Windows got very popular. So, MS bird flipped to IBM and instead they introduced Win32 into NT. That is the main OS and its environment for the world up to date. "If IBM could". That's the point, if they could, they'd made it, but they couldn't. No one hindered them to keep develop OS/2 with the owned by them API, making it "superior", so that, it would attract people. If they could. But no, all they could was spreading this anti-MS hatred, a plain jealousness for the success. All these fairy tales about Windows success just because of it came pre-installed, are just ridiculous. That huge monster as IBM couldn't make their OS "preinstalled" and a much smaller company as MS could? Then again, wins that who doesn't suck.

I would like for the developers at Microsoft to leave Microsoft and
come and help me complete ES/2, to continue the work they began back
then, and the work many of them would like to do today.

OS/2 is a superior operating system. It is superior because it was done
right. It wasn't compromised on or sacrificed in part for money goals,
or time-sensitive needs for money goals. It was an extension of DOS, a
DOS that was better than DOS, and it allowed for a future path into that
which would become the Presentation Manager / GDI world.

I've begun doing Presentation Manager development now and it's easier
than the GDI is. It's less complex, more straight-forward, simpler,
and it provides most capability that's needed. In fact, I've been quite
surprised as it's rather elegant.

-----
I will never say a negative thing about the Microsoft core developers
working on the kernel, base driver models, or the compiler and IDE tools
we see in Visual Studio. In fact, I'll go on record stating that the
modern Windows server kernels, and the recently released Visual Studio
2017, are the best I've ever seen. They incorporate essentially all
aspects of design I want to see in my core kernel and developer platform.

However, I will not use them because of the political / corporate push
within Microsoft to use those excellent core tools for evil purposes.

Win8 and Win10 are draconian. Visual Studio 2012 and later are also
draconian. They are totally intrusive spyware products designed to
remove all degree of anonymity or autonomy from development, placing
a Microsoft eye in every machine, into every developer's mind, able
to examine abilities, stamina, creativity, and more.

It is to be completely shunned in all possible regards.

ES/2 will continue OS/2's legacy of doing it right. I do not intend
to include a lot of legacy baggage that has no place in a 2017 and
later kernel or OS app suite, but I do intend to continue the base
and core kernel design, and I intend to create a much simpler driver
model atop that kernel allowing for rapid development of hardware
support by more average developers. In fact, I'd like to create a
type of scanner to read through other OS kernel source codes and
extract the necessary ports and protocols used for communicating
with the hardware, to then allow them to be included in ES/2 driver
sources, written from scratch in the ES/2 model, but using the cues
visible in the published design of those other systems.

And, I intend to honor God and acknowledge Jesus Christ with all of
these efforts, and not ever pervert them over to money-seeking goals.

We are men and women in this world, created by God, given to a choice
to follow Him, or the enemy. And as for me and my house, we will
serve the Lord. I will give Him the honor, praise, and glory in all
of my endeavors, and I will never compromise on design or vision to
meet some secondary need. What He has placed upon my heart is what
I will run with, and I will always say it is not me, but it is Him
living inside of my heart which is bringing me forward.

-----
I long for the days the OS/2 kernel developers from IBM and their sub-
contractors, come forward to help me with ES/2. I long for the days
that some millionaires spawned from Microsoft's vast money-seeking
success come forward and make the same choice, seeking to honor God
with their skills and assets, and help make ES/2 become a reality by
using their labor time for the development of this product.

And I want the same for the compilers and developer tools, and also
the app suites, and also the hardware re-design we'll create so that
we aren't even using AMD or Intel or ARM chips any more, but we are
creating our own, also not given over to money needs, but are then
explicitly given over to honoring God and being done correctly as
best we're able ... and explicitly because of who He is and what He
has first given us.

As men and women in this world with a choice, I am going to lift all
that I possess up before Him in these areas. And I will encourage
everyone else to do the same: to not compromise, to not take short-
cuts for money or other reasons, but to do it right, do it fully, do
it purposefully, do it remembering the people you're doing it for and
to help make their lives better, and so on.

It is a proper goal. God is worthy of everything we can give back to
Him. He is worthy of us honoring Him with all of the fruits of all
of our lives. And it is something the people of this world need to
see. They need to see men and women looking up to God because of who
He is, and then doing in this world with the fullness of the full range
of abilities and opportunities He's given them, so that they see men
and women not doing things for money goals, not sacrificing values or
principles, but maintaining their integrity because their focus is
upon Christ, upon the One in whom there is no compromise, no fault, no
charge of un-merit, but they are all casting everything upon the One
who is called Faithful and True, who is exactly that.

Jesus is worthy. And that is a teaching this world needs to hear. He
is our leader. He is our guide. He is the One from whom we must take
our cues. He is all things to each of us, and He will be acknowledged
in my life and my projects in that regard.

It is the natural way of things, and it is my hope that others will also
come into this knowledge, and will, from within their own bosom, make a
choice as I have done, to honor Him with their lives, in whatever place
and station they are in. If they are hardware designers, then design
hardware rightly for God. If they are software designers, then design
software rightly for God. If they are home construction workers, then
do that rightly for God. If they are bakers, then do that rightly for
God, and so on.

Across the board, across the professions, across the world, men and
women looking up to Jesus Christ, receiving Him into their heart, and
then making choices to honor Him with all they possess within themselves.

As I say, it is the natural way of things for those who seek the truth.
It's not about religion. Or about man's mistakes. Or about wrong
things. It is about Jesus Christ, and it is about doing what's right
in all cases for all people stemming from a full reliance upon God to
provide all things necessary to move forward.

Not by our strength, but by His strength living inside us.

--
Rick C. Hodgin

[Peter Cheung]

do not reply to evil rick, he wants to behave as a normal person now, and then, he will just spam the group. everybody remember this.

[Bernhard Schornak]

vlrz...@gmail.com replied:

> OS/2 was born inside of MS, they stole nothing. That initial OS was developed by DOS and Xenix
> teams inside MS. That's why never mind how "superior" its design for someone seems to be, it was
> stemmed at MS. This little detail is running away of attention of OS/2 lovers MS haters.
> The design of OS/2 is superior to DOS and Windows 3.1 and maybe Windows 9x. But no way it's
> superior to the NT's line.
>
> Gordon Letwin told that IBM didn't want that API for the OS was under control of MS, they wanted
> to own it. So they dictated that MS abandoned Windows and its API for OS/2. Of course that would
> be insane since Windows got very popular. So, MS bird flipped to IBM and instead they introduced
> Win32 into NT. That is the main OS and its environment for the world up to date. "If IBM could".
> That's the point, if they could, they'd made it, but they couldn't. No one hindered them to keep
> develop OS/2 with the owned by them API, making it "superior", so that, it would attract people.
> If they could. But no, all they could was spreading this anti-MS hatred, a plain jealousness for
> the success. All these fairy tales about Windows success just because of it came pre-installed,
> are just ridiculous. That huge monster as IBM couldn't make their OS "preinstalled" and a much
> smaller company as MS could? Then again, wins that who doesn't suck.

It is okay if you are a Microsoft fanatic, but please stay with
the facts:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._Microsoft_Corp.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_litigation

What you tell is Letwin's & Microsoft's point of view, which is
at least biased (as a long time OS/2 programmer, i've read many
contrary versions from reliable sources).

I'm an autistic person, so I can't be fanatic - I always choose
the stuff which I think is technically or physically the best I
can get. If you compare both APIs, the Windows API is a chaotic
collection of functions someone needed urgently for one special
purpose, while OS/2's API was logically structured and straight
forward. I've written assembler code for both operating systems
and can back up what I wrote with detailed examples.

By the way: It was nice, if you quote me properly. I didn't say
"If IBM could" anywhere and I never hated Windows (at least not
for being Windows, but because I could not do the same things I
could do while running OS/2). Actually, OS/2 and Windows always
coexisted peacefully on my machines - Windows still is the best
OS for gaming, while OS/2 was the best OS for serious work like
programming, office stuff and internet access (because OS/2 was
more secure due to its low installation base). Meanwhile, I had
to switch to Windows, because it was impossible to get OS/2 run
on recent hardware (with Bulldozer it did not boot any longer),
but I still miss my WPS and the superior usability of OS/2.

[Rick C. Hodgin]

On Sunday, November 5, 2017 at 6:12:02 AM UTC-5, Bernhard Schornak wrote:
> ...Meanwhile, I had

> to switch to Windows, because it was impossible to get OS/2 run
> on recent hardware (with Bulldozer it did not boot any longer),
> but I still miss my WPS and the superior usability of OS/2.

Bernhard, have you tried ArcaOS? It's a licensed, patched, original
OS/2 kernel with new drivers and support for more modern hardware.
It includes YUM, and has many modern software packages including GCC,
git, and many others out of the box.

--
Rick C. Hodgin

[Bernhard Schornak]

I've visited their homepage, but I'm not willing to purchase
another $99 OS/2 copy to get it working. Moreover, they want
money for up to date drivers, which is a reason to stay away
from rather than to purchase ArcaOS. Except the 17 Euro paid
for my Windows 7 Professional, I do not have to pay anything
else. Drivers are generally free, because hardware companies
want to sell their stuff, and most programs - except games -
alternatively come as Open Source software, which often is a
better choice than the commercial archetype. During the eCS-
era, you could get all required drivers from Hobbes for free
(e.g. DANIS506), but that was then. Nowadays, commercialised
software isn't what users expect - drivers should come along
with hardware, but *never* be charged separately.

[Rick C. Hodgin]

I purchased ArcaOS for $99. The driver license was several
months, and I haven't needed new drivers since then.

I also disagree with their money model, but it is what we
have to have modern OS/2. I'm using it to write this message,
and ArcaOS is very stable.

Each ArcaOS install is stamped to the individual it's for. I
have been able to install it to a VirtualBox VDI, and two
native machines. Only one of them as active presently.

It's a good alternative to Linux, Windows, and Mac OS. It is
fully GUI, recognizes more modern hardware and standards, and
is being actively maintained by Arca Noae.

While not ideal ... it's a good effort.

--
Rick C. Hodgin

[Peter Cheung]

Rick C. Hodgin於 2017年11月6日星期一 UTC+8上午6時06分41秒寫道：

Do not reply to evil Rick C. Hodgin, he spams the group. He is trying to make people think he is normal, but in fact, he is mad, never listen to people, keep spamming this group over 2 years. Keep posting his holy shit posts.

[john]

> In article <otmrm1$4pq$1...@dont-email.me>, scho...@web.de says...
>

There'sa lot of plain wrong "history" here but here's a litmus test
you might consider instructive: (I did this on Warp myself when I got
the eval copy many years ago)

OS/2
Install the OS clean.
Then install some applications.
Then install voice recognition.

Be suprised at how many applications are now voice enabled.

Do the same on windows.
Be suprised at how low tech it is.

It isn't accidental that high end financial institutions insist on OS2.

Now move 30 years on - windows is the same software with a few extra
drivers and a whole lot more bugs and end user "manipulation"

I dont know about OS2 today but I do know how bad windows is and I
will never install another version past windows-7 on any machine.

People that install windows-10 just make me giggle.

--

john

=========================
http://johntech.co.uk
=========================

[Bernhard Schornak]

Peter Cheung wrote:


> Do not reply to evil Rick C. Hodgin, he spams the group. He is trying to make people think he is
> normal, but in fact, he is mad, never listen to people, keep spamming this group over 2 years.
> Keep posting his holy shit posts.

As long as postings are on topic, there's no reason to *not*
reply. Don't take your personal feud with Rick too serious -
it isn't worth to waste your life with hatred.

[Bernhard Schornak]

It is just eight years too late. Meanwhile, I ported my programming
stuff to 64 bit Windows 7, which is stable as a rock. I upgraded my
machine with a AMD Ryzen 7 1800X processor on a X370 mainboard this
weekend, and had a lot of problems to get Windows 7 running on this
machine (starting with meanwhile missing legacy support, so there's
no more mouse or keyboard because there are only USB 3.x connectors
on the backside of recent boards). I'm quite sure that even a brand
new driver package included in ArcaOS - my last OS/2 was eCS R1.2 -
would run on this machine 'out of the box'.

Because Windows 10 is a mess (ugly 1980-ies 2-D retro design paired
with built-in spy- and malware technology), two alternatives remain
for sane people - Linux and MacOS. The latter is bound to expensive
hardware, so there is only Linux (the most freaky OS of all) left.

[Bernhard Schornak]

john wrote:


> People that install windows-10 just make me giggle.

They have 'nothing to hide' and are satisfied to pay for
machines controlled by Microsoft... ;)

(My neighbour had serious problems to use his PC after a
new build, because Windows decided to download gigabytes
of new spyware and kept the entire system busy for about
four hours...)

[Rick C. Hodgin]

On Monday, November 6, 2017 at 2:52:29 PM UTC-5, Bernhard Schornak wrote:
> [ArcaOS] is just eight years too late...

Come on board and help me complete ES/2.

I'm working on getting a remote kernel debugger setup right now. I
have an OS/2 dev machine, and an ES/2 test machine. I make changes
to the kernel and drivers, update them, and either restart ES/2 or
simply restart the driver, and go.

My plans are:

(1) Get kernel debugger using COM1 for base kernel boot+debug.
(2) Develop ethernet driver, and switch to that from COM1.
(3) Develop everything else.

--
Rick C. Hodgin

[Melzzzzz]

On 2017-11-06, Bernhard Schornak <scho...@web.de> wrote:
>
> It is just eight years too late. Meanwhile, I ported my programming
> stuff to 64 bit Windows 7, which is stable as a rock. I upgraded my
> machine with a AMD Ryzen 7 1800X processor on a X370 mainboard this
> weekend, and had a lot of problems to get Windows 7 running on this
> machine (starting with meanwhile missing legacy support, so there's
> no more mouse or keyboard because there are only USB 3.x connectors
> on the backside of recent boards). I'm quite sure that even a brand
> new driver package included in ArcaOS - my last OS/2 was eCS R1.2 -
> would run on this machine 'out of the box'.
>
> Because Windows 10 is a mess (ugly 1980-ies 2-D retro design paired
> with built-in spy- and malware technology), two alternatives remain
> for sane people - Linux and MacOS. The latter is bound to expensive
> hardware, so there is only Linux (the most freaky OS of all) left.

Heh, you can hack Linux as much as you want to suit your needs ;)
I used Windows XP to develop for Linux and moved to Linux when Vista
came around. Regarding AMD, now it is their time ;)
On Ryzen you can execute 4 SSE instructions in single clock,
while Intel can only two ;)

--
press any key to continue or any other to quit...

[Scott Lurndal]

Bernhard Schornak <scho...@web.de> writes:

>
>Because Windows 10 is a mess (ugly 1980-ies 2-D retro design paired
>with built-in spy- and malware technology), two alternatives remain
>for sane people - Linux and MacOS. The latter is bound to expensive
>hardware, so there is only Linux (the most freaky OS of all) left.

If something that basically pre-dates[*] OS/2 by a decade or more is
freaky; I'll take it over OS/2 or Windows anyday.

[*] Unix.

[Bernhard Schornak]

Do you really use a COM port? I've written a program reading
sensors communicating via COM, but it's more than one decade
ago:

https://github.com/BernhardSchornak/st-open/blob/master/AVDL.7z

Maybe it provides something you might be able to use. Should
run (native OS/2), but will complain about missing sensors.

I'm not sure how this might help to create a 64 bit version,
though. IMHO, a better solution was to contact Ben to create
a working USB (2.x + 3.x) driver to start with. Recent MoBos
don't provide legacy PS/2 connectors any longer, so all OSes
are *forced* to work with USB, only, which is beneficial for
code simplification, anyway.

[Bernhard Schornak]

A question of personal taste. Unix is an OS for professional
system administrators who were taught how to use it. Mundane
PC users grew up with DOS (or modern operationg systems with
GUI), controlled via a command line with less, but very easy
to learn commands.

While Unix still is a professional OS, Linux was an OS for a
minority from its beginning. It gained some users throughout
the passed two decades, but still is an OS for a small elite
(some call them 'nerds'). Its installation base of something
around one percent tells more than words - if it was an easy
to use OS, more people had installed it with Microsofts turn
to force-install their spyware on user PCs...

[Bernhard Schornak]

Melzzzzz wrote:


> Heh, you can hack Linux as much as you want to suit your needs ;)

I know. But it might take two lifetimes to remove the phobic
security restrictions and the unwanted multiuser bloat. I am
used to use my computer without asking for the permission to
use it - I'm the owner, not the property of my PC, so I want
to get access without logins or security checks when I think
I want to alter system settings.

> I used Windows XP to develop for Linux and moved to Linux when Vista
> came around.

I use Windows 7 - a rock solid OS. I had XP before that, but
skipped Vista.

> Regarding AMD, now it is their time ;)
> On Ryzen you can execute 4 SSE instructions in single clock,
> while Intel can only two ;)

It's a great machine. Using my own benchmark, Ryzen 1800X is
twice as fast as my previous FX-8350, while it consumes less
power (about 40 Watt per hour).

[Melzzzzz]

On 2017-11-06, Bernhard Schornak <scho...@web.de> wrote:

I have installed it for my parents, they used it no problem.
Also on my nephew computer and brother in law ;)
They don't know nothing about command line ;)

[James Harris]

Which distribution did you install for them?


--
James Harris

[Melzzzzz]

One Ubuntu that was in 2013, rest Manjaro.

[Scott Lurndal]

Melzzzzz <Melz...@zzzzz.com> writes:
>On 2017-11-06, Bernhard Schornak <scho...@web.de> wrote:
>> Scott Lurndal wrote:
>>
>>
>>> Bernhard Schornak <scho...@web.de> writes:
>>>
>>>>
>>>> Because Windows 10 is a mess (ugly 1980-ies 2-D retro design paired
>>>> with built-in spy- and malware technology), two alternatives remain
>>>> for sane people - Linux and MacOS. The latter is bound to expensive
>>>> hardware, so there is only Linux (the most freaky OS of all) left.
>>>
>>> If something that basically pre-dates[*] OS/2 by a decade or more is
>>> freaky; I'll take it over OS/2 or Windows anyday.
>>>
>>> [*] Unix.
>>
>>
>> A question of personal taste. Unix is an OS for professional
>> system administrators who were taught how to use it. Mundane

Unix is an OS for professional programmers.

>> PC users grew up with DOS (or modern operationg systems with
>> GUI), controlled via a command line with less, but very easy
>> to learn commands.
>>
>> While Unix still is a professional OS, Linux was an OS for a
>> minority from its beginning. It gained some users throughout
>> the passed two decades, but still is an OS for a small elite
>> (some call them 'nerds'). Its installation base of something
>> around one percent tells more than words - if it was an easy
>> to use OS, more people had installed it with Microsofts turn
>> to force-install their spyware on user PCs...
>
>I have installed it for my parents, they used it no problem.
>Also on my nephew computer and brother in law ;)
>They don't know nothing about command line ;)

Yup. My 78 year old father and my sister are both happy
Ubuntu users. Everything just works.

[Rick C. Hodgin]

On Tuesday, November 7, 2017 at 8:18:49 AM UTC-5, Scott Lurndal wrote:
> >> A question of personal taste. Unix is an OS for professional
> >> system administrators who were taught how to use it. Mundane
>
> Unix is an OS for professional programmers.

You will not find a finer development environment than Microsoft's
Visual Studio 2017. It is the most comprehensive set of tools I've
ever seen.

> Yup. My 78 year old father and my sister are both happy
> Ubuntu users. Everything just works.

You are about 20 years younger than I thought you were, Scott.
Interesting.

I wrote an article in 2007 for TGdaily.com called "How to leave
Redmond, WA in 24 hours." It was a tutorial on how to make the
switch from a Windows-knowledge base to a Linux-knowledge base,
and specifically using Ubuntu 7.04 at the time.

It took about 24 hours to learn the various commands to do real
work back then. But over the years, Ubuntu has gotten much more
friendly and easy to use. And with the wide range of normal,
everyday user apps ... very few people need a command line any
longer.

As for Unix ... I've never found it advantageous. It is at the
command line, with complex things to do work. It removes a large
portion of our innate visual abilities, and requires a certain
type of mind to use. It's never been something I could appreciate,
though I know many people have found great success in Unix.

I've also had difficulty over the years working in real Unix.
The only place I did was at university, and it was all command
line stuff. And Linux is not quite Unix, so they are different
enough to be different.

-----
I'd like to ask you to come and help me develop ES/2, Scott. You
have great skills and experience. You would be an asset on the
technical side.

--
Rick C. Hodgin

[James Harris]

I find Unix distributions are awesome for software development and are
usable in ways that Windows simply is not. But the thing I don't like
about any I've seen is the GUI is not as easily controllable -
especially from the keyboard - as is the one on Windows. I guess that
most people who use Ubuntu and similar end up using the mouse a lot.


--
James Harris

[Scott Lurndal]

Ubuntu, in particular, works well without a mouse. Once one becomes
familiar with the keyboard shortcuts.

I think it's mainly about what you're used to.

[Rick C. Hodgin]

On Tuesday, November 7, 2017 at 9:15:44 AM UTC-5, James Harris wrote:
> I find Unix distributions are awesome for software development and are
> usable in ways that Windows simply is not.

I'm willing to learn and grow. If you or somebody can give me the
steps to setup a Unix machine, or go ahead and set one up that's
in a VirtualBox .VDI so I can download it, I'll be happy to look at
it.

I have looked wide for an excellent developer environment. I have
tried Solaris, Windows, Linux, OS/2, and various other tools. I
have never found a better developer environment than Visual Studio.

But my search continues, because I hate Microsoft and am migrating
away from every tool they have for all personal development. I've
stopped using their products in all regards for all personal use,
and will continue doing so in moving forward. There is a political
component of Microsoft that is moving in evil ways, and I want no
part of it.

So ... if there is a better developer platform around, I will be
happy to investigate it.

--
Rick C. Hodgin

[Bernhard Schornak]

Melzzzzz wrote:


> [Linux]

>
> I have installed it for my parents, they used it no problem.
> Also on my nephew computer and brother in law ;)
> They don't know nothing about command line ;)

Probably depends on the way you work with a computer. I deny
to 'log in' to any machine in my possession. I own objects -
they don't own me. I understand to enter a PIN to connect to
a network, e.g. smartphone or ISP, because networks interact
with other machines and you have to prove you are authorised
to use the requested service. This is not the case on my PC.
As the name suggests, it is my personal computer, so I don't
have to prove I'm authorised to use it - I'm the owner, it's
my possession, I want do with it whatever I want to do with-
out being asked for a 'permission'.

This is the reason why I dislike Windows several times a day
and why I do not use Linux. I'm not a nerd who tries to hide
secret data from myself because the CIA, NSA or whoever else
might capture and torture me to steal my secrets. Logins and
security queries are necessary in environments, where touchy
data are handled and stored by a large staff, but not inside
my private rooms. Fullstop!

[Rick C. Hodgin]

On Monday, November 6, 2017 at 6:35:09 PM UTC-5, Bernhard Schornak wrote:
> Rick C. Hodgin wrote:
> > On Monday, November 6, 2017 at 2:52:29 PM UTC-5, Bernhard Schornak wrote:
> >> [ArcaOS] is just eight years too late...
> >
> > Come on board and help me complete ES/2.
> >
> > I'm working on getting a remote kernel debugger setup right now. I
> > have an OS/2 dev machine, and an ES/2 test machine. I make changes
> > to the kernel and drivers, update them, and either restart ES/2 or
> > simply restart the driver, and go.
> >
> > My plans are:
> >
> > (1) Get kernel debugger using COM1 for base kernel boot+debug.
> > (2) Develop ethernet driver, and switch to that from COM1.
> > (3) Develop everything else.
>
> Do you really use a COM port?

For this early stage of kernel debugging, yes. It is a very easy way
to send data back-and-forth using only BIOS interrupts.

However, I continue to have development time and plans are in flux as
I move forward. I've decided last night to use IBM PC DOS 7 instead
of OS/2 for development (see below).

> I'm not sure how this might help to create a 64 bit version,
> though. IMHO, a better solution was to contact Ben to create
> a working USB (2.x + 3.x) driver to start with. Recent MoBos
> don't provide legacy PS/2 connectors any longer, so all OSes
> are *forced* to work with USB, only, which is beneficial for
> code simplification, anyway.

I have puchased Ben's book. I intend to write a full USB stack at
some point, but it won't be first.

My goals are to have my kernel developed, working on the x86-64
hardware rightly, in all modes (as today it is only a 32-bit kernel),
and then to extend those base abilities forward to all of the needs
of the OS/2 API model.

I'm looking to create a brand new, from scratch redesign, from the
kernel up. I'm not using other kernels as a reference. I'm using
the AMD, Intel, and VIA tech manuals on processor and chipset
architectures. I'm using my mind to figure out how things should
be designed.

I'm going this long route, doing it the hard way, because I want it
to be a wholly sanctified offering unto God, where I am using the
gifts and skills He's given me, to create something that is not like
other things in the world which are not given over to God.

God must have first place in our lives, and I seek to do that with
this offering of creativity borne of the abilities, skills, and many
opportunities He's first given me.

Make sense?

-----
Thank you for the driver info. I made the decision last night to
move development to IBM PC DOS 7, and use VESA BIOS Extensions (VBE)
to provide a DOS-based graphics environment. I'll use BIGREAL mode
on FS: and GS: to access memory beyond the base 1 MB, but most of
my host machine tools should be small as they are just monitors.

I'll also use that medium to create my network stack in DOS so I can
have well-developed and debug development tools to analyze things.

Once I get that done, I will relegate COM port usage to a backup
when no network connection is available.

--
Rick C. Hodgin

[James Harris]

On 07/11/2017 14:20, Scott Lurndal wrote:
> James Harris <james.h...@gmail.com> writes:

...

>> I find Unix distributions are awesome for software development and are
>> usable in ways that Windows simply is not. But the thing I don't like
>> about any I've seen is the GUI is not as easily controllable -
>> especially from the keyboard - as is the one on Windows. I guess that
>> most people who use Ubuntu and similar end up using the mouse a lot.
>>
>
> Ubuntu, in particular, works well without a mouse. Once one becomes
> familiar with the keyboard shortcuts.

Which of the Ubuntu GUIs do you have in mind?

>
> I think it's mainly about what you're used to.

--
James Harris

[Scott Lurndal]

Personally, I use twm + xterm on all distributions (RHEL, Fedora, SL).

But I've used Ubuntu's unity GUI in the past.

https://help.ubuntu.com/stable/ubuntu-help/mouse-mousekeys.html

Hold the super key (windows key) for 5 seconds to get the startup
shortcuts screen.

https://help.ubuntu.com/stable/ubuntu-help/shell-keyboard-shortcuts.html

[Rick C. Hodgin]

On Tuesday, November 7, 2017 at 11:01:37 AM UTC-5, Scott Lurndal wrote:
> But I've used Ubuntu's unity GUI in the past.
> https://help.ubuntu.com/stable/ubuntu-help/mouse-mousekeys.html
>
> Hold the super key (windows key) for 5 seconds to get the startup
> shortcuts screen.
>
> https://help.ubuntu.com/stable/ubuntu-help/shell-keyboard-shortcuts.html

5 seconds?

You could also do what I did, buy an IBM keyboard with an integrated
trackpoint mouse:

http://www.dansdata.com/images/clicky/blackboard1024.jpg

You can find them on eBay every now and again:

https://www.ebay.com/itm/Rare-IBM-Model-M13-black-keyboard-with-TrackPoint-II-/152070785033

I paid $200 each for my keyboards new back in the early 2000s. I
own two. They both worked until earlier this year a monitor fell
on one of them and the trackpoint stopped working. The keyboard
still works. I haven't tried to fix it yet. But, in my personal
estimation, these keyboards are worth their weight in gold.

They also have much less expensive new keyboards. I have one like
the 2nd link. They're like laptop keyboards. They work, but I
wouldn't want to use it all day long. Having the trackpoint and
the mouse pad is nice. It allows scrolling:

www.amazon.com/Lenovo-ThinkPad-Compact-Keyboard-TrackPoint/dp/B00F3U4TQS
https://www.amazon.com/IBM-UltraNav-Travel-Keyboard-89P8500/dp/B000COV3KA

By using a keyboard like this, even your mouse movements are on the
keyboard.

--
Rick C. Hodgin

[vlrz...@gmail.com]

неділя, 5 листопада 2017 р. 13:12:02 UTC+2 користувач Bernhard Schornak написав:
>
> It is okay if you are a Microsoft fanatic, but please stay with
> the facts:
>
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._Microsoft_Corp.
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_litigation
>
> What you tell is Letwin's & Microsoft's point of view, which is
> at least biased (as a long time OS/2 programmer, i've read many
> contrary versions from reliable sources).
>
> I'm an autistic person, so I can't be fanatic - I always choose
> the stuff which I think is technically or physically the best I
> can get. If you compare both APIs, the Windows API is a chaotic
> collection of functions someone needed urgently for one special
> purpose, while OS/2's API was logically structured and straight
> forward. I've written assembler code for both operating systems
> and can back up what I wrote with detailed examples.
>
> By the way: It was nice, if you quote me properly. I didn't say
> "If IBM could" anywhere and I never hated Windows (at least not
> for being Windows, but because I could not do the same things I
> could do while running OS/2). Actually, OS/2 and Windows always
> coexisted peacefully on my machines - Windows still is the best
> OS for gaming, while OS/2 was the best OS for serious work like
> programming, office stuff and internet access (because OS/2 was
> more secure due to its low installation base). Meanwhile, I had

> to switch to Windows, because it was impossible to get OS/2 run
> on recent hardware (with Bulldozer it did not boot any longer),
> but I still miss my WPS and the superior usability of OS/2.
>
>

> Greetings from Augsburg
>
> Bernhard Schornak

Bernhard, facts and wikipedia are antagonists when it comes to things even closely related to MS. I am not a MS fanatic, I like NT, it's not fanatism. Gordon Letwin was there and he knows what he says, he was some kind of a lead at that project, don't remember the precise name for his position, and unfortunately cannot find the article, it's from around 1995, lying somewhere in the Internet. If he tells things like "that OS was begun at MS, of course it wasn't called OS/2 then ..." He sais this not working at MS anymore, and in the article where he predicts IBM is going to destroy OS/2. So why would he lie?
MS had MS DOS as a temporary solution and was working on fully featured OS, after they discarded Xenix, then the OS started that gave the birth for OS/2. Dave Cutler and his team were hired 1988 and the team was established to start NT. It was called OS/2 NT first.
Doesn't matter how you call WinAPI, it's the Winner interface. It won and is the most used programming interface ever created. And OS/2 API is in the oblivion. there is no fortuity with these things, wins the best. I mean, yes, you and I are biased, but just look at the facts, not wikipedia facts, at the real ones. I wasn't planning a holy war Windows vs OS/2, I really was wondered why to apply such a huge effort in making an OS, with such an outdated OS as OS/2? If your project will have luck to succeed, wouldn't it be nice to provide for it a way to survive? In form of adopting popular, currently used APIs? Like WinAPI and POSIX of course. so that your enthusiastic OS has a chance to be usable really. That was the point.

[Bernhard Schornak]

> Bernhard, facts and wikipedia are antagonists when it comes to things even closely related to MS.

If it is about OS/2, Letwin isn't a protagonist, either.

Both links report in detail how Microsoft managed to become the
largest software company of the world. They don't mention OS/2,
it's just about bundling, which was judged as illegal 'business
model' by many courts and high courts around the globe.

> I am not a MS fanatic, I like NT, it's not fanatism. Gordon Letwin was there and he knows what he
> says, he was some kind of a lead at that project, don't remember the precise name for his
> position, and unfortunately cannot find the article, it's from around 1995, lying somewhere in
> the Internet. If he tells things like "that OS was begun at MS, of course it wasn't called OS/2
> then ..." He sais this not working at MS anymore, and in the article where he predicts IBM is
> going to destroy OS/2. So why would he lie?

Because he was a clerk of Microsoft at that time. You Know: Who
pays your wage dictates what you say.

> MS had MS DOS as a temporary solution and was working on fully featured OS, after they discarded
> Xenix, then the OS started that gave the birth for OS/2. Dave Cutler and his team were hired 1988
> and the team was established to start NT. It was called OS/2 NT first.

MS-DOS was developed by Tim Paterson in 1980. He called it QDOS
(Quick & Dirty Operating System). Microsoft purchased a license
in 1980 and gave IBM a license with a slightly modified version
1981. MS-DOS *never* was a temporary solution, but the first OS
partially(!) developed by MS. Xenix was licensed from AT&T, but
it was a flop for MS, because it required a hard disk drive and
256 kB of RAM - both too expensive for the price segment of the
first PC generation. They played around with Xenix for a while,
but finally gave it up when they started to develop OS/2, while
IBM developed their own license (also from AT&T) as 'PC-Xenix'.

Windows 1.0 was released 20th November 1985, while OS/2 1.0 was
released 4th December 1987. Even if both dates didn't speak for
themselves, a short look at the APIs was sufficient to see, how
much different both operating systems are. Windows NT, starting
with version 3.1 ('cause it was released after Windows 3.0) was
released Juli 1993 - exactly two years after the split wit IBM.

What you did not get until now is the fact, that OS/2 never was
an end user OS for gaming and multimedia stuff. It always was a
professional OS, which still runs in insurances and banks world
wide, because it outperforms any Windows if security matters.

I see no point to continue this 'discussion', because you start
to repeat yourself - regardless of how many facts speak against
the one 'argument' (regarding Letwin) you present in an endless
loop.

BTW: NT = New Testimony, NT OS/2 (as it was called by MS) = New
Testimony 2?

[vlrz...@gmail.com]

середа, 8 листопада 2017 р. 08:50:53 UTC+2 користувач Bernhard Schornak написав:

>
> If it is about OS/2, Letwin isn't a protagonist, either.
>

I didn't state that, what I stated was the OS/2 was started at MS. IBM joined later.

> Both links report in detail how Microsoft managed to become the
> largest software company of the world. They don't mention OS/2,
> it's just about bundling, which was judged as illegal 'business
> model' by many courts and high courts around the globe.
>

If you wanna believe that MS gained what they gained only because of "bundling" or how you call that, OK. This changes nothing. But you wouldn't argue that IBM made OS/2 move rapidly into the archive of history?

>
> Because he was a clerk of Microsoft at that time. You Know: Who
> pays your wage dictates what you say.
>

Clerk? This is one of the 10 founders. And btw, he wrote OS/2 HPFS!
And you missed: I said he was not working at MS in 95 when he wrote that article. That was not a bragging like "that was us who wrote OS/2", just a notice. And he said DOS was a temorariry solution for "IBM to be happy".

>
> BTW: NT = New Testimony, NT OS/2 (as it was called by MS) = New
> Testimony 2?

WNT == VMS++, since VMS was the previous famous creature from Dave Cutler.
MS created OS/2, and MS discarded its API since it turned out WinAPI is better.
OS/2, NT were aimed at workstations, but it turned out it is better to bring there WinAPI from "gaming" Windows and use NT kernel for everything - servers, workstations, home users.
IBM didn't want including WinAPI into OS/2, not because of a silly "serious"/"non-serious OS" criterion, it's your fantasy, they did so for the only reason - Windows was owned by MS completely, they could not control it. They wanted to control everything related to PC. And failed with everything by the way.
It's easy to understand both sides. But after the split they both were free to do what they can. And they did. And you know, DOS still is used somewhere too, like in those paying machines, don't know how it's called properly. But that's a ridiculous comparison. You compare to hunders of millions installations for literally every imaginable use case, starting from home gaming machine up to some nuclear power plant computers.

There is no "serious" use and "non-serious meadia/gaming" use. In terms of OS/API complexity and abilty, media and gaming require decent underlying subsystems/APIs/middleware. That's why such a mediocre OS as linux sucks badly at these things.

[jb]

Le 07/11/2017 à 02:59, Melzzzzz a écrit :
> On 2017-11-06, Bernhard Schornak <scho...@web.de> wrote:
>> Scott Lurndal wrote:

>> [ . . . ]

>>
>> While Unix still is a professional OS, Linux was an OS for a
>> minority from its beginning. It gained some users throughout
>> the passed two decades, but still is an OS for a small elite
>> (some call them 'nerds'). Its installation base of something
>> around one percent tells more than words - if it was an easy
>> to use OS, more people had installed it with Microsofts turn
>> to force-install their spyware on user PCs...
>
> I have installed it for my parents, they used it no problem.
> Also on my nephew computer and brother in law ;)
> They don't know nothing about command line ;)
>
>

Windows is on most "grand public" puters because they have no choice. It
is bundled with each PC. Forbid bundling windows or any other OS, give
people an open, genuine choice then most will stay with MS, but Linux
and other alternative OSes (BSD flavored for example) will gain momentum.

My father's (73 yo) PC runs Linux Mint. No trouble. Hadn't have I told
him his puter was running Linux, he would have thought it was a new
version of his older system, except it runs a bit faster, uses less
memory and disk space.
For him, no need for command line. He wants email, he wants the web, he
wants to read his documents whatever format they are in, he wants to
make business cards, print photos and this is it.

The average PC user (I don't include gamers here), wants just this : use
their PC for what they have to do, and Linux fully fits in . "What else ?"
Now, for graphics, music and video I dunno. Maybe windows apps are
better, maybe not, but I'm no graphist and no musician (except for my
basses) so have no opinion.

Above was about "average" users.

Now, about servers. Server world is very different.
Command line interfaces are way more efficient than any rodent based
interfaces. I have only worked for 25 years, but I have had this
experience again and again.
CLIs have a tougher learning curve, but I haven't heard about any
sysadmin who does not want to learn. New knowledge are the fuel and the
bonus for a sysadmin. Command line expects a lot of abstraction, guis
more eye/hands coordination. Sysadmin work needs abstraction, although a
good doodle will help.
With Gui based admin, reach the mouse, move the pointer, click, click ,
reach the keyboard and enter a parameter or two, reach the mouse and
click once more, a cli or two have already been issued.

Now, back to OS/2 and its descendence...

I haven't used OS/2 since 1994, OS/2 Warp, for oracle things (this was
the time of oracle 7.* IIRC and its Case tools). Never used if for
office applications, never for servers either, since we used SVR4 Unix.
Guess what ? Command line, scripting, supervision, automation.

Any open source OS/2 sibbling ? I haven't seen any. I went into Linux
circa 1996. My personal puter was a bit short on processing power, but
on professional machines it was already great, but this was Linux
childhood. Office like applications were not that common either, and
compatibility just about random, if any.

Being open source is what OS/2 and its sibblings lack today for the
average PC user. I know IBM is not a non profit organization, but had
they open sourced it, then it would still be a visible thing. Now, only
banks and maybe insurance use it.

" ES/2 development underway for an open source OS/2 ".
Yes, please, just do it, but will it gain momentum on desktop computers
and laptops, and servers ? You'd better be at least as efficient as
Linux teams are, and they are "only 1%" on the desktop market.

I really hope you will succeed with ES/2. It would be a great achievment
for you but let me state this : I will not invest time and effort into
it. Not that you don't deserve to succeed, but I can't see a short term
(ie less than 10 years) success. Maybe I'm wrong.

Until then, my hobby osdev is sufficient for me. Fun, entertaining, full
of teachings. Nothing more. Everyone its own path.

jb

[Rick C. Hodgin]

On Sunday, November 12, 2017 at 6:59:41 AM UTC-5, jb wrote:
> " ES/2 development underway for an open source OS/2 ".
> Yes, please, just do it, but will it gain momentum on desktop computers
> and laptops, and servers ? You'd better be at least as efficient as
> Linux teams are, and they are "only 1%" on the desktop market.
>
> I really hope you will succeed with ES/2. It would be a great achievment
> for you but let me state this : I will not invest time and effort into
> it. Not that you don't deserve to succeed, but I can't see a short term
> (ie less than 10 years) success. Maybe I'm wrong.

I appreciate and respect your position. The offer remains open
if you are interested later.

> Until then, my hobby osdev is sufficient for me. Fun, entertaining, full
> of teachings. Nothing more. Everyone its own path.

I am doing it not for marketshare, but because I have interests in
this area, OS/2 is a good design, and most importantly, I want to
create a computer system given over to God in faith, so that it is
a holy, sanctified tool to use, not one littered with for-profit
motives, or personal vulgarity, obscenity, or heinousness as is
found in Linux and GNU, nor overt sin as in Apple.

I am on this Earth. I have no choice but to be here. My past is
as everyone's, riddled with sin. Even now I still strive against
sin's draws and pulls daily. Sometimes I fail despite conscious
efforts.
But, I don't desire to fail. And I do desire to stand up in this
world, and look up to Heaven, look up to Jesus Christ, and say, "For
You, my Lord. Because of who You are," and then to give Him my best.

It is a conscious choice. It is why I move.

I want a better world for us (man). Jesus Christ is the only way.

--
Rick C. Hodgin

[Bernhard Schornak]

jb wrote:


> Windows is on most "grand public" puters because they have no choice. It is bundled with each PC.
> Forbid bundling windows or any other OS, give people an open, genuine choice then most will stay
> with MS, but Linux and other alternative OSes (BSD flavored for example) will gain momentum.

As long as you can get Windows 7 for less than 20 Euro, no
user will switch to Linux without beeing forced (e. g.: by
Microsofts upgrade and update policies) - Linux still is a
mess for Windows (or OS/2) users.

> My father's (73 yo) PC runs Linux Mint. No trouble. Hadn't have I told him his puter was running
> Linux, he would have thought it was a new version of his older system, except it runs a bit faster,
> uses less memory and disk space.
> For him, no need for command line. He wants email, he wants the web, he wants to read his documents
> whatever format they are in, he wants to make business cards, print photos and this is it.
>
> The average PC user (I don't include gamers here), wants just this : use their PC for what they have
> to do, and Linux fully fits in . "What else ?"
> Now, for graphics, music and video I dunno. Maybe windows apps are better, maybe not, but I'm no
> graphist and no musician (except for my basses) so have no opinion.

Linux surely is okay for users who do not really use their
computers. As long as you use those folders forced on you,
e.g. "my documents", "downloads", and tons of other crappy
stuff created on your boot partition by "modern" operating
systems, you never will encounter any problems. If you are
used to have more than a single harddisk (I have >12 TB on
4 HDDs and 2 SSDs) with your own hierarchy, Linux isn't as
easy to use as Windows (leave alone OS/2), because it will
force you to obey its insane "access rules", while Windows
allows you to act as "administrator" permanently, granting
at least a little bit of freedom, even if you still cannot
remove crap like the never used folder "my documents". (My
documents are stored at those places they belong to).

> Above was about "average" users.
>
> Now, about servers. Server world is very different.
> Command line interfaces are way more efficient than any rodent based interfaces. I have only worked
> for 25 years, but I have had this experience again and again.
> CLIs have a tougher learning curve, but I haven't heard about any sysadmin who does not want to
> learn. New knowledge are the fuel and the bonus for a sysadmin. Command line expects a lot of
> abstraction, guis more eye/hands coordination. Sysadmin work needs abstraction, although a good
> doodle will help.
> With Gui based admin, reach the mouse, move the pointer, click, click , reach the keyboard and enter
> a parameter or two, reach the mouse and click once more, a cli or two have already been issued.

You forgot one (very important) kind of users: Application
programmers. Even if you prefer to work on a command line,
most (like 99.9 percent or so) users prefer to communicate
with their computer via GUI. While it is straight forwards
to write GUI based applications for Windows, MacOS or OS/2
with their straight forwards GUI support, Linux *does not*
provide a standard GUI interface with common controls like
entryfields, spinbuttons or notebooks (okay - Windows does
not have notebooks, either). If you want to write apps for
Linux, you have to provide as many *different* versions as
there are graphical interfaces (KDE, Gnome plus at least 6
more major environments). To reach all Linux users (except
command line lovers, of course...), you have to provide at
least eight different versions of one and the same program
just to run your app on all possible machines.

Kind of overkill, isn't it?

> Now, back to OS/2 and its descendence...
>
> I haven't used OS/2 since 1994, OS/2 Warp, for oracle things (this was the time of oracle 7.* IIRC
> and its Case tools). Never used if for office applications, never for servers either, since we used
> SVR4 Unix. Guess what ? Command line, scripting, supervision, automation.
>
> Any open source OS/2 sibbling ? I haven't seen any. I went into Linux circa 1996. My personal puter
> was a bit short on processing power, but on professional machines it was already great, but this was
> Linux childhood. Office like applications were not that common either, and compatibility just about
> random, if any.
>
> Being open source is what OS/2 and its sibblings lack today for the average PC user. I know IBM is
> not a non profit organization, but had they open sourced it, then it would still be a visible thing.
> Now, only banks and maybe insurance use it.
>
> " ES/2 development underway for an open source OS/2 ".
> Yes, please, just do it, but will it gain momentum on desktop computers and laptops, and servers ?
> You'd better be at least as efficient as Linux teams are, and they are "only 1%" on the desktop market.
>
> I really hope you will succeed with ES/2. It would be a great achievment for you but let me state
> this : I will not invest time and effort into it. Not that you don't deserve to succeed, but I can't
> see a short term (ie less than 10 years) success. Maybe I'm wrong.
>
> Until then, my hobby osdev is sufficient for me. Fun, entertaining, full of teachings. Nothing more.
> Everyone its own path.

OS/2 is dead since IBM gave up to maintain it (which was a
question of rentability - no one spends more money than is
coming out). There still are attempts to resurrect it, but
they are doomed, because they try to reanimate obsolescent
technologies rather than to keep the good ideas, and start
from scratch, again.

As long as there's no attempt to unify Linux with a single
straight forward GUI, it doesn't make sense to switch from
Windows if you are an application programmer. Linux has so
many system programmers - why can't they pull on one rope,
but create more ropes than sane users can count on a daily
base?

One serious question: Is there any Linux out there without
forcing me to play the role of a user, without accounts (I
am the only person using my machine!), access restrictions
(this machine is my property) and logins (as I told - this
machine neither belongs to MS nor a Linux guru)? I'm still
waiting for such an OS since OS/2 denied to work on recent
machines...


Have a nice Sunday!

Bernhard Schornak

[jb]

>As long as you can get Windows 7 for less than 20 Euro, no
>user will switch to Linux without beeing forced (e. g.: by
>Microsofts upgrade and update policies) - Linux still is a
>mess for Windows (or OS/2) users.

Say you're an average driver. You drive an automatic gear car. Yes, it's
great, it shifts gears for you. You may have ESP, and you surely have
ABS. Great.
Now for a single journey you have to use an "old fashioned" car, with
manual gear shifting. Will you say it is a mess ?
Sure no. You have to learn or relearn to shift gears, but this is it.

Linux for the average user is no miore mess or complicated. You just
have to know where things are. You can't expect your car controls be at
the same place on a bike, can you. Both are good means to go from point
A to point B.
Linux and windows are food means to youse your PC.
The difference ? With Linux you have more control. Don't like your Gnome
? install KDE. The package manager will ask some password and install
what you want.

>Linux surely is okay for users who do not really use their
>computers.

Opening documents is not using one's computer ? Then what is using a
computer ?

> As long as you use those folders forced on you,
>e.g. "my documents", "downloads", and tons of other crappy
>stuff created on your boot partition by "modern" operating
>systems, you never will encounter any problems.

Most "modern" linux GUIs (KDE, Gnome, etc) provide these folders.

>If you are
>used to have more than a single harddisk (I have >12 TB on
>4 HDDs and 2 SSDs) with your own hierarchy, Linux isn't as
>easy to use as Windows (leave alone OS/2), because it will
>force you to obey its insane "access rules", while Windows
>allows you to act as "administrator" permanently, granting
>at least a little bit of freedom, even if you still cannot
>remove crap like the never used folder "my documents". (My
>documents are stored at those places they belong to).

Managing disks and access control are two things. Using multiple disks
is easy in Linux. Have the system mount them (USB disks and such are
even easier), make links (unix way for windows shortcuts) and organise
your stuff. No more C: D: E: and such drives. I can't see any
difficulties here. Neither do my father and my brothers, and computer
stuff are not their speciality.

Access rules are meant to prevent misbehaved applications to write into
system files or folders, and to help, or prevent other users to access
your files. Different means, same goal, CLI is optional since the
desktop provides gui stuff for that.

>You forgot one (very important) kind of users: Application
>programmers. Even if you prefer to work on a command line,
>most (like 99.9 percent or so) users prefer to communicate
>with their computer via GUI. While it is straight forwards
>to write GUI based applications for Windows, MacOS or OS/2
>with their straight forwards GUI support, Linux *does not*
>provide a standard GUI interface with common controls like
>entryfields, spinbuttons or notebooks (okay - Windows does
>not have notebooks, either). If you want to write apps for
>Linux, you have to provide as many *different* versions as
>there are graphical interfaces (KDE, Gnome plus at least 6
>more major environments). To reach all Linux users (except
>command line lovers, of course...), you have to provide at
>least eight different versions of one and the same program
>just to run your app on all possible machines.

You are right : I forgot application programmers.

Good programming tools and libraries provide sufficient means to build
your app for any desktop environment. This is something to set up in
your IDE, but it exists.

>Kind of overkill, isn't it?

Yes, maybe, but things are improving. Looking for better ways to develop
applications is part of the job of the dev team leader.

Now, most apps are provided for many Desktop environments. It is surely
a lot of work, but not impossible. And if I install an app for KDE and
my DE is Gnome then the package manager will install the needed
libraries, and the application will work out "of the box".

>OS/2 is dead since IBM gave up to maintain it (which was a
>question of rentability - no one spends more money than is
>coming out). There still are attempts to resurrect it, but
>they are doomed, because they try to reanimate obsolescent
>technologies rather than to keep the good ideas, and start
>from scratch, again.

+1

>As long as there's no attempt to unify Linux with a single
>straight forward GUI, it doesn't make sense to switch from
>Windows if you are an application programmer.

It makes sense if there are positive side effects. Take POS
applications. Many franchises have switched their POS systems from
Windows to Linux. A POS has to be sturdy, software-wise and those
companies have acknowledged that their POS puters are more sturdy and
stable then their windows based POSs.

>Linux has so
>many system programmers - why can't they pull on one rope,
>but create more ropes than sane users can count on a daily
>base?

System programming is not application programming. For sure a corporate
app designer (this is an app designer decision) has to choose. Gnome,
KDE, whatever they choose with their end user/customer/etc. The choice
made, all the tools are in his hand.
For average user app development you may have to provide you app for any
DE, ok, but there are many apps intended to run only with this or that
DE. The libraries dependecy handled by the package manager will make if
work almost anywhere. We are not in 1998 anymore !

>One serious question: Is there any Linux out there without
>forcing me to play the role of a user, without accounts (I
>am the only person using my machine!), access restrictions
>(this machine is my property) and logins (as I told - this
>machine neither belongs to MS nor a Linux guru)? I'm still
>waiting for such an OS since OS/2 denied to work on recent
>machines...

Most distribs will propose you to auto login. One single user. Dot bar.
And don't forget that access restrictions are made to prevent misbehaved
apps to trash the system folders. They do not prevent you to use and
fully own your puter.
This is not an PITA at all. If I'm not an admin account then I can't
write to system folder, and I can't install apps. Do I want to install
apps, then the package manager will ask for a password. How unacceptable
is this ? If this is too much, then add your user to the admin group.
Then with autologin you will have an all opened machine just the way DOS
was.

[jb]

I may not participate to discussions here before december. Nanowrimo
takes most of my time in November. My novel universe is at stake. Yet
another form of creation and development :-P

[Bernhard Schornak]

jb wrote:


>>As long as you can get Windows 7 for less than 20 Euro, no
>>user will switch to Linux without beeing forced (e. g.: by
>>Microsofts upgrade and update policies) - Linux still is a
>>mess for Windows (or OS/2) users.
>
> Say you're an average driver. You drive an automatic gear car. Yes, it's great, it shifts gears for
> you. You may have ESP, and you surely have ABS. Great.
> Now for a single journey you have to use an "old fashioned" car, with manual gear shifting. Will you
> say it is a mess ?
> Sure no. You have to learn or relearn to shift gears, but this is it.
>
> Linux for the average user is no miore mess or complicated. You just have to know where things are.
> You can't expect your car controls be at the same place on a bike, can you. Both are good means to
> go from point A to point B.
> Linux and windows are food means to youse your PC.
> The difference ? With Linux you have more control. Don't like your Gnome ? install KDE. The package
> manager will ask some password and install what you want.

Actually, I'm a truck driver, so I'm used to switch 5 groups
of gears (slow/fast with low/high transmission and reverse).

a better picture was a car with self made transmission where
the order of slow and fast gears is missing (e.g.: 5th, 2nd,
reverse, 3rd, 4th, 1st and 6th) which is installed in one of
100 cars. To get a perfect picture: None of these cars has a
door and the way to enter them only depends on the owner who
built it.

Sorry to say, but this is how I see Linux.

>>Linux surely is okay for users who do not really use their
>>computers.
>
> Opening documents is not using one's computer ? Then what is using a computer ?

Opening an document at a place where the OS put it in is not
what I call 'using'.

>> As long as you use those folders forced on you,
>>e.g. "my documents", "downloads", and tons of other crappy
>>stuff created on your boot partition by "modern" operating
>>systems, you never will encounter any problems.
>
> Most "modern" linux GUIs (KDE, Gnome, etc) provide these folders.

Does 'having' similar MS inventions make 'em better? For the
record: Personal data on the system drive is lost forever if
the system drive dies. Which is more likely than a defective
second, third, nth drive. Therefore: Storing private data on
system drives *is* a mess - regardless of the OS doing that.

>>If you are
>>used to have more than a single harddisk (I have >12 TB on
>>4 HDDs and 2 SSDs) with your own hierarchy, Linux isn't as
>>easy to use as Windows (leave alone OS/2), because it will
>>force you to obey its insane "access rules", while Windows
>>allows you to act as "administrator" permanently, granting
>>at least a little bit of freedom, even if you still cannot
>>remove crap like the never used folder "my documents". (My
>>documents are stored at those places they belong to).
>
> Managing disks and access control are two things. Using multiple disks is easy in Linux. Have the
> system mount them (USB disks and such are even easier), make links (unix way for windows shortcuts)
> and organise your stuff. No more C: D: E: and such drives. I can't see any difficulties here.
> Neither do my father and my brothers, and computer stuff are not their speciality.
>
> Access rules are meant to prevent misbehaved applications to write into system files or folders, and
> to help, or prevent other users to access your files. Different means, same goal, CLI is optional
> since the desktop provides gui stuff for that.

Obviously, our points of view differ enormously. For me, the
OS has to provide maximum freedom for the machine owner - if
the owner installs programs accessing files belonging to an-
other program, these file still belong to the machine owner,
so there's no excuse to disallow this action. If I never use
"favorites", "documents" and other crap populating my system
drive, there is no reason to 'prevent' me from deleting this
superfluous pollution of my drive. I pay for it, I tell what
is stored on it or not. It's okay to protect *system files*,
but it never is okay to tell computer owners 'Oh, sorry, you
are not allowed to use your property like you want 'cause we
(force-)install on your machine what we want!' - which is an
absolutely Microsoft'ish behaviour I never accept for a free
OS...

>>You forgot one (very important) kind of users: Application
>>programmers. Even if you prefer to work on a command line,
>>most (like 99.9 percent or so) users prefer to communicate
>>with their computer via GUI. While it is straight forwards
>>to write GUI based applications for Windows, MacOS or OS/2
>>with their straight forwards GUI support, Linux *does not*
>>provide a standard GUI interface with common controls like
>>entryfields, spinbuttons or notebooks (okay - Windows does
>>not have notebooks, either). If you want to write apps for
>>Linux, you have to provide as many *different* versions as
>>there are graphical interfaces (KDE, Gnome plus at least 6
>>more major environments). To reach all Linux users (except
>>command line lovers, of course...), you have to provide at
>>least eight different versions of one and the same program
>>just to run your app on all possible machines.
>
> You are right : I forgot application programmers.
>
> Good programming tools and libraries provide sufficient means to build your app for any desktop
> environment. This is something to set up in your IDE, but it exists.
>
>>Kind of overkill, isn't it?
>
> Yes, maybe, but things are improving. Looking for better ways to develop applications is part of the
> job of the dev team leader.
>
> Now, most apps are provided for many Desktop environments. It is surely a lot of work, but not
> impossible. And if I install an app for KDE and my DE is Gnome then the package manager will install
> the needed libraries, and the application will work out "of the box".

Sorry, but I am the guy who writes such libraries, and there
is no way to convince me of operating systems where I had to
provide multiple concurrent versions of my libraries. Which,
ironically, provide unified functions as long as the base OS
provides comparable API functions.

>>OS/2 is dead since IBM gave up to maintain it (which was a
>>question of rentability - no one spends more money than is
>>coming out). There still are attempts to resurrect it, but
>>they are doomed, because they try to reanimate obsolescent
>>technologies rather than to keep the good ideas, and start
>>from scratch, again.
>
> +1
>
>>As long as there's no attempt to unify Linux with a single
>>straight forward GUI, it doesn't make sense to switch from
>>Windows if you are an application programmer.
>
> It makes sense if there are positive side effects. Take POS applications. Many franchises have
> switched their POS systems from Windows to Linux. A POS has to be sturdy, software-wise and those
> companies have acknowledged that their POS puters are more sturdy and stable then their windows
> based POSs.

There is not even one 'positive' side effect - I was playing
around with Linux since the late 1990'ies, and I never found
a distribution which was easy to use like OS/2 or Windows. I
see no reason to switch to an OS which definitely is a down-
grade in terms of usability and personal freedom over user's
property.

Windows is restrictive in few cases, but Linux is the mother
of restriction. Good for large companies, but really bad for
average users who do not need a fully blown security network
woven on their single user, one 'account' PCs.

>>Linux has so
>>many system programmers - why can't they pull on one rope,
>>but create more ropes than sane users can count on a daily
>>base?
>
> System programming is not application programming. For sure a corporate app designer (this is an app
> designer decision) has to choose. Gnome, KDE, whatever they choose with their end user/customer/etc.
> The choice made, all the tools are in his hand.
> For average user app development you may have to provide you app for any DE, ok, but there are many
> apps intended to run only with this or that DE. The libraries dependecy handled by the package
> manager will make if work almost anywhere. We are not in 1998 anymore !

My libraries are written in assembler, not in C or any other
bloated HLL. You deliver one argument following the next not
to switch to Linux. Probably the opposite of what you had in
mind...

>>One serious question: Is there any Linux out there without
>>forcing me to play the role of a user, without accounts (I
>>am the only person using my machine!), access restrictions
>>(this machine is my property) and logins (as I told - this
>>machine neither belongs to MS nor a Linux guru)? I'm still
>>waiting for such an OS since OS/2 denied to work on recent
>>machines...
>
> Most distribs will propose you to auto login. One single user. Dot bar.
> And don't forget that access restrictions are made to prevent misbehaved apps to trash the system
> folders. They do not prevent you to use and fully own your puter.
> This is not an PITA at all. If I'm not an admin account then I can't write to system folder, and I
> can't install apps. Do I want to install apps, then the package manager will ask for a password. How
> unacceptable is this ? If this is too much, then add your user to the admin group. Then with
> autologin you will have an all opened machine just the way DOS was.

Well - I started to check new Linux distributions every five
years since the late 1990'ies. I will give it a try in 2019,
again, but I am sure I still will not switch, because I will
not throw away my programming stuff within the next decade.

[Bernhard Schornak]

jb wrote:


> I may not participate to discussions here before december. Nanowrimo takes most of my time in
> November. My novel universe is at stake. Yet another form of creation and development :-P

I can wait... ;)


Bernhard

[Melzzzzz]

Hm, are you sure?
~ >>> df -h
Filesystem Size Used Avail Use% Mounted on
dev 16G 0 16G 0% /dev
run 16G 9.8M 16G 1% /run
/dev/sda1 220G 59G 160G 27% /
tmpfs 16G 73M 16G 1% /dev/shm
tmpfs 16G 0 16G 0% /sys/fs/cgroup
tmpfs 16G 60K 16G 1% /tmp
/dev/sdb1 1.8T 1.5T 333G 82% /home
bmaxa_data/Steam 509G 189G 320G 38% /home/bmaxa/Steam
bmaxa_data/clang 321G 1.2G 320G 1% /home/bmaxa/clang
bmaxa_data/gcc-trunk 322G 1.5G 320G 1% /home/bmaxa/gcc-trunk
bmaxa_data/ghc 322G 1.4G 320G 1% /home/bmaxa/ghc
bmaxa_data/go 321G 301M 320G 1% /home/bmaxa/go
bmaxa_data/projects 343G 23G 320G 7% /home/bmaxa/projects
bmaxa_data/rust 320G 87M 320G 1% /home/bmaxa/rust
bmaxa_data 365G 45G 320G 13% /home/bmaxa/zfs/bmaxa_data
bmaxa_data/public 320G 22M 320G 1% /public
bmaxa_data/boinc 321G 203M 320G 1% /var/lib/boinc
bmaxa_data/mysql 321G 284M 320G 1% /var/lib/mysql
bmaxa_data/postgres 321G 679M 320G 1% /var/lib/postgres
bmaxa_cache 20G 774M 19G 4% /home/bmaxa/.cache
tmpfs 3.2G 60K 3.2G 1% /run/user/1000
/dev/sdd1 466G 312G 154G 67% /run/media/bmaxa/Natasa
bmaxa_backup 1.8T 1.3T 530G 71% /home/bmaxa/zfs/bmaxa_backup

This simply is not true. Qt and GTK+ applications works all the same
accross every desktop. You just pick Qt or GTK+ and go for it.
(Or you can use OpenGL interface anyway like Steam does)

> Have a nice Sunday!
>
> Bernhard Schornak

Nice Sunday from me, as well!!!

[Bernhard Schornak]

Melzzzzz wrote:


> On 2017-11-12, Bernhard Schornak <scho...@web.de> wrote:
>>
>> Linux surely is okay for users who do not really use their
>> computers. As long as you use those folders forced on you,
>> e.g. "my documents", "downloads", and tons of other crappy
>> stuff created on your boot partition by "modern" operating
>> systems, you never will encounter any problems. If you are
>> used to have more than a single harddisk (I have >12 TB on
>> 4 HDDs and 2 SSDs) with your own hierarchy, Linux isn't as
>> easy to use as Windows (leave alone OS/2), because it will
>> force you to obey its insane "access rules", while Windows
>> allows you to act as "administrator" permanently, granting
>> at least a little bit of freedom, even if you still cannot
>> remove crap like the never used folder "my documents". (My
>> documents are stored at those places they belong to).
>
> Hm, are you sure?

Yes. I was talking about

C:\Benutzer\ich\Documents
C:\Benutzer\ich\Eigene Bilder
C:\Benutzer\ich\Eigene Dateien
C:\Benutzer\ich\Eigene Musik
C:\Benutzer\ich\Eigene Videos
C:\Benutzer\ich\Favoriten
C:\Benutzer\ich\Gespeicherte Spiele
C:\Benutzer\ich\Kontakte
C:\Benutzer\ich\Links

and their duplicates in

C:\Benutzer\Administrators\*
C:\Benutzer\All Users\*
C:\Benutzer\Default\*

None of these folders ever was used nor will any of them ever
be used by me.

Sorry, but what should that be? My drives are organised as

SSD 1 0.10 GB Windows boot partition
C: 119.19 GB reserved for Windows 7
119.19 GB reserved for second OS

HD 1 D: 488.28 GB downloaded software (9 main folders)
I: 1,374.73 GB pictures (1 main folder)

SSD 2 F: 119.24 GB games (1 main folder)

HD 2 E: 488.28 GB backup of D:
J: 1,374.73 GB backup of I:

HD 3 G: 244.14 GB programming stuff (5 main folders)
K: 976.56 GB knowledge base (16 main folders)
L: 2,505.19 GB GB backup of N:

HD 4 H: 244.14 GB backup of G:
M: 976.56 GB backup of K: + Windows safety backup
N: 2,505.19 GB recorded TV stuff (3 main folders)

BD1 S: Baldur's Gate CD (for verification)
BD2 T: reserved for burning CDs, DVDs and BluRay disks

SSD1 will become SSD 2 when I get a new M.2 SSD at the end of
this month (the current SSD 2 will be removed).

>> You forgot one (very important) kind of users: Application
>> programmers. Even if you prefer to work on a command line,
>> most (like 99.9 percent or so) users prefer to communicate
>> with their computer via GUI. While it is straight forwards
>> to write GUI based applications for Windows, MacOS or OS/2
>> with their straight forwards GUI support, Linux *does not*
>> provide a standard GUI interface with common controls like
>> entryfields, spinbuttons or notebooks (okay - Windows does
>> not have notebooks, either). If you want to write apps for
>> Linux, you have to provide as many *different* versions as
>> there are graphical interfaces (KDE, Gnome plus at least 6
>> more major environments). To reach all Linux users (except
>> command line lovers, of course...), you have to provide at
>> least eight different versions of one and the same program
>> just to run your app on all possible machines.
>>
>> Kind of overkill, isn't it?
>
> This simply is not true. Qt and GTK+ applications works all the same
> accross every desktop. You just pick Qt or GTK+ and go for it.
> (Or you can use OpenGL interface anyway like Steam does)

Which still were three different approaches to study and port
my assembler libraries to. No way to convince me!

And: If Qt, GTK+ and OpenGL are 'all the same', why were they
named differently, and why were they not coded by one and the
same 'Linux GUI' team?

[Melzzzzz]

Similar, but not depicted with letter, rather with mountpoint to
directory. tmpfs is ram disk.
name/data_set is partition into zfs pool and name is zfs pool
which can be anything (drive,raid or just plain file).

>
>
>>> You forgot one (very important) kind of users: Application
>>> programmers. Even if you prefer to work on a command line,
>>> most (like 99.9 percent or so) users prefer to communicate
>>> with their computer via GUI. While it is straight forwards
>>> to write GUI based applications for Windows, MacOS or OS/2
>>> with their straight forwards GUI support, Linux *does not*
>>> provide a standard GUI interface with common controls like
>>> entryfields, spinbuttons or notebooks (okay - Windows does
>>> not have notebooks, either). If you want to write apps for
>>> Linux, you have to provide as many *different* versions as
>>> there are graphical interfaces (KDE, Gnome plus at least 6
>>> more major environments). To reach all Linux users (except
>>> command line lovers, of course...), you have to provide at
>>> least eight different versions of one and the same program
>>> just to run your app on all possible machines.
>>>
>>> Kind of overkill, isn't it?
>>
>> This simply is not true. Qt and GTK+ applications works all the same
>> accross every desktop. You just pick Qt or GTK+ and go for it.
>> (Or you can use OpenGL interface anyway like Steam does)
>
>
> Which still were three different approaches to study and port
> my assembler libraries to. No way to convince me!

Well, you don't need three different approaches. Pick just one.

>
> And: If Qt, GTK+ and OpenGL are 'all the same', why were they
> named differently, and why were they not coded by one and the
> same 'Linux GUI' team?

Linux does not have single team working on GUI. Actually, you can
easilly run Linux headless because of that.

>
>
> Greetings from Augsburg
>
> Bernhard Schornak

Greets!

--
eress any key to continue or any other to quit...

[Bernhard Schornak]

Mountpoint like Mount Everest summit or more like something
fixed with screws or bolts? (The concept of partitioning is
as old as devices with sufficient capacity to split them up
into handy parts. Treating all devices connected to a PC as
one 'superdevice' is counterproductive.)

>>>> You forgot one (very important) kind of users: Application
>>>> programmers. Even if you prefer to work on a command line,
>>>> most (like 99.9 percent or so) users prefer to communicate
>>>> with their computer via GUI. While it is straight forwards
>>>> to write GUI based applications for Windows, MacOS or OS/2
>>>> with their straight forwards GUI support, Linux *does not*
>>>> provide a standard GUI interface with common controls like
>>>> entryfields, spinbuttons or notebooks (okay - Windows does
>>>> not have notebooks, either). If you want to write apps for
>>>> Linux, you have to provide as many *different* versions as
>>>> there are graphical interfaces (KDE, Gnome plus at least 6
>>>> more major environments). To reach all Linux users (except
>>>> command line lovers, of course...), you have to provide at
>>>> least eight different versions of one and the same program
>>>> just to run your app on all possible machines.
>>>>
>>>> Kind of overkill, isn't it?
>>>
>>> This simply is not true. Qt and GTK+ applications works all the same
>>> accross every desktop. You just pick Qt or GTK+ and go for it.
>>> (Or you can use OpenGL interface anyway like Steam does)
>>
>>
>> Which still were three different approaches to study and port
>> my assembler libraries to. No way to convince me!
>
> Well, you don't need three different approaches. Pick just one.

Nope. You did not address the true problem at all: There is
no unique GUI for Linux! Which keeps it where it always was
and still is: An OS from rival nerd parties for other nerds
who blindly follow the competing 'leader' of their choice.

>> And: If Qt, GTK+ and OpenGL are 'all the same', why were they
>> named differently, and why were they not coded by one and the
>> same 'Linux GUI' team?
>
> Linux does not have single team working on GUI. Actually, you can
> easilly run Linux headless because of that.

This is one more reason to stay away from Linux: It's an OS
written by nerds for nerds - why should anyone except nerds
install an OS with six rival 'GUI's following ten different
approaches influenced by twenty different philosophies?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZPUk1yNVeEI

And this is no problem of pre-installed OS'es. I bet people
will pay for a Windows DVD on machines with a pre-installed
Linux, because Linux is not an end user OS - only nerds and
administrators of supercomputers and server farms are happy
with it. The average workaholic from next door *never* will
install an OS asking for a 'permission' for many things you
can do without being bothered with password requests on all
other platforms.

[Melzzzzz]

How would you move ~/.cache directory to SSD shile keeping ~/
at hdd? How would you move Steam directory to compressed file
without needing to do anything ?

That is why Windows is full of malware. Heck, MS figured that out and
introduced same thing in their OS.
BTW, I'll take anytime more desktops/toolkits then single one.
And yes, it is much easier to install Linux these days then Windows 7...

>
>
> Greetings from Augsburg
>
> Bernhard Schornak

--
press any key to continue or any other to quit...

[Bernhard Schornak]

Drag and drop with right mouse button, choose "copy to" in the
popup menu or type

copy DRIVE1:\PATH1\mystuff DRIVE2:\PATH2\mystuff

in a DOS box if you deny to use a mouse.

What is a Steam directory - something like Windows 'favorites'
or just a normal folder inside a normal folder hierarchy?

No answer?

>>>> And: If Qt, GTK+ and OpenGL are 'all the same', why were they
>>>> named differently, and why were they not coded by one and the
>>>> same 'Linux GUI' team?
>>>
>>> Linux does not have single team working on GUI. Actually, you can
>>> easilly run Linux headless because of that.
>>
>>
>> This is one more reason to stay away from Linux: It's an OS
>> written by nerds for nerds - why should anyone except nerds
>> install an OS with six rival 'GUI's following ten different
>> approaches influenced by twenty different philosophies?
>>
>> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZPUk1yNVeEI
>>
>> And this is no problem of pre-installed OS'es. I bet people
>> will pay for a Windows DVD on machines with a pre-installed
>> Linux, because Linux is not an end user OS - only nerds and
>> administrators of supercomputers and server farms are happy
>> with it. The average workaholic from next door *never* will
>> install an OS asking for a 'permission' for many things you
>> can do without being bothered with password requests on all
>> other platforms.
>
> That is why Windows is full of malware.

Windows is full of malware because it has an installation base
of about 93 percent

https://www.netmarketshare.com/operating-system-market-share.aspx?qprid=10&qpcustomd=0

worldwide. No sane hacker would write virusses for an OS which
is installed on less than three machines out of 100, while his
virus can infect 93 out of 100 machines because they share the
same code base.

As many Linux 'gurus' pointed out, Linux will suffer from mal-
ware with growing installation base. The higher the prevalance
rate, the higher the risk of getting infected. Infection risks
grow with the overall rate of *unexperienced* users, mo matter
which OS and no matter how much people believe in its security
(breaking security obstacles built into an OS is just a matter
of the criminal energy you're willing to invest).

> Heck, MS figured that out and
> introduced same thing in their OS.

Any OS is secure as long as you don't allow your machine to do
things 'for you', e.g. preventing you from deleting stuff, but
opening executables without asking you if it was allowed to do
so. This *built-in* behaviour of 'modern' operating systems is
the reason why so many virusses win the race against the user.
Deleting a system file can be undone with a short repair run -
catching a virus can be lethal for both, OS *and* your data if
you let dictate the programmers of the OS where they prefer to
store user data.

> BTW, I'll take anytime more desktops/toolkits then single one.
> And yes, it is much easier to install Linux these days then Windows 7...

You know this is a lie. A new Windows install is done in about
twenty minutes on recent machines with M.2 installation drive.
As long as you do not need to alter your standard installation
path (e. g. you need to split your installation drive into two
or more partitions), you don't have to enter anything else and
can go through the entire install with a few clicks. You don't
even have to enter passwords and you can switch logging in off
completely when the system rebooted the very first time.

When I recall it correctly, installing Linux always began with
the mess that I could not choose Windows' boot manager as boot
manager, but had to choose between LILO and GRUB - both a real
PITA, because both urgently want to overwrite MBR boot entries
with their own crappy data, which required using an MBR repair
tool after *each* Linux install. Not to speak of the remaining
(never ending) questionaire where you want to put what and how
large your 'cache file' should be.

To be honest: Even if I managed to keep cool up to this point,
I always got the creeps because a 'cache file' for 16 or 32 GB
of RAM is so far below stone age technology I lose countenance
whenever I see such a thing.

I think I should save your day and stop here... ;)

[Melzzzzz]

Nope will not work ;)
All Steam programs should work without change ;)

>
> What is a Steam directory - something like Windows 'favorites'
> or just a normal folder inside a normal folder hierarchy?

Normal directory.

Same old bogus argument...

Ok. I found your arguments bogus.

>
>
> Greetings from Augsburg
>
> Bernhard Schornak

[Bernhard Schornak]

Works on any machine with any Windows installed between 1996 and
today. Maybe your Wine installation is corrupted?

> All Steam programs should work without change ;)
>
>> What is a Steam directory - something like Windows 'favorites'
>> or just a normal folder inside a normal folder hierarchy?
>
> Normal directory.

Fine. On the other hand, I ask myself why one might want to move
a normal directory to a compressed file if everything works well
as it should.

For the sake of completeness - to compress a folder select it in
the right pane and right click on it. Select "7-Zip", choose one
of the options from the pop-up menu to create an archive.

Still no answer?

Blah blah blah. Or, in other words: This is no argument at all -
come up with facts if you have anything to say.

That is: You haven't found even a little piece of dirt you could
pollute my water supply with. Or, in other words: You agree with
what I wrote... ;)

(About ten years ago I had to write a rescue program for my OS/2
installation, because GRUB felt the urgent need to overwrite all
sectors reserved for OS/2 Boot Manager. Since then, I'm a little
bit over-cautious if someone tries to make me believe "it's much
easier to install Linux these days then Windows 7". Sorry, but I
*have* installed Ubuntu this year and *know* this is not true at
all. And yes: I wiped Ubuntu after I had to repair the destroyed
MBR with my Windows install DVD.)

[Melzzzzz]

You seem do not understand what I am doing... I move directory to
diffent drive while not changing anything in programs.

>
>
>> All Steam programs should work without change ;)
>>
>>> What is a Steam directory - something like Windows 'favorites'
>>> or just a normal folder inside a normal folder hierarchy?
>>
>> Normal directory.
>
>
> Fine. On the other hand, I ask myself why one might want to move
> a normal directory to a compressed file if everything works well
> as it should.
>
> For the sake of completeness - to compress a folder select it in
> the right pane and right click on it. Select "7-Zip", choose one
> of the options from the pop-up menu to create an archive.

You can't mount that ;)

Answer to what? GUI is not part of OS rather userland application?
Who stops anyone to write one more?

Fact is that Linux does not have malware as much as Windows and this is
surely not because of small userbase...

You see when one installs Windows it destroys MBR as well, Linux will
not boot. When you install Linux you have at least option to boot
Windows. So this argument does not stands.

>
>
> Greetings from Augsburg
>
> Bernhard Schornak

Greets!

[Bernhard Schornak]

Yep. That's exactly what copying files does. If you wanted to re-
move them from the source drive, you've to move (first copy, then
delete) them.

>>> All Steam programs should work without change ;)
>>>
>>>> What is a Steam directory - something like Windows 'favorites'
>>>> or just a normal folder inside a normal folder hierarchy?
>>>
>>> Normal directory.
>>
>>
>> Fine. On the other hand, I ask myself why one might want to move
>> a normal directory to a compressed file if everything works well
>> as it should.
>>
>> For the sake of completeness - to compress a folder select it in
>> the right pane and right click on it. Select "7-Zip", choose one
>> of the options from the pop-up menu to create an archive.
>
> You can't mount that ;)

No such thing on Windows. Drives inside the case are available as
long as the BIOS was able to detect them. Thumb drives are usable
after the USB driver checked the file system and stored its para-
meters. No need to look for a screwdriver in any case!

Wrong. Except Unix (developed as command line OS in 1969) and its
derivates (BSD, NexTSTEP/MacOS, Solaris, Minix, Linux...), modern
operating systems developed after 1990 come along with a *unique*
graphical frontend. Even MacOS - the first OS with a GUI - always
had just one graphical frontend (maybe with different optical de-
sign, but with consistent functionality for decades).

> Who stops anyone to write one more?

The user - Linux exists for more than 26 years now, but still has
an installation base of less than 3 percent. If it was as good as
you think it is, it meanwhile should have beaten Windows XP?

Come back to reality: PC sales are going down, Linux got stuck at
a 3 percent margin and MS still couldn't convince Windows 7 users
to switch to Windows 10 (46.46 vs. 29.26 percent in 10/2017). Who
needs an OS with dozens of *competing* graphical user interfaces?
If you counted each GUI and distribution separate, Linux wouldn't
be mentioned in statistics, at all.

Don't spread urban legends - stay with the facts:

https://www.linux.com/learn/myth-busting-linux-immune-viruses
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linux_malware
https://news.sophos.com/en-us/2015/03/26/dont-believe-these-four-myths-about-linux-security/

Sorry, but that's not true. I installed Windows many times and it
*never* touched my OS/2 Boot Manager sectors - only Linux managed
to wipe them during a test install.

What Windows really does (if you do not install its boot manager)
is to set the Windows partition as *active* partition on the boot
drive (which is the usual behaviour during system installations).
If you choose the proper way and install the Bootmanager, you can
start Linux or any other OS with it. (After doing that, you still
can make LILO or GRUB your Boot Manager, again).

Please learn the difference between 'setting the active flag of a
drive' and 'overwriting entire sectors holding data'!

[Melzzzzz]

You still doesn't understand advantage of mounting ;)

>
>
>>>> All Steam programs should work without change ;)
>>>>
>>>>> What is a Steam directory - something like Windows 'favorites'
>>>>> or just a normal folder inside a normal folder hierarchy?
>>>>
>>>> Normal directory.
>>>
>>>
>>> Fine. On the other hand, I ask myself why one might want to move
>>> a normal directory to a compressed file if everything works well
>>> as it should.
>>>
>>> For the sake of completeness - to compress a folder select it in
>>> the right pane and right click on it. Select "7-Zip", choose one
>>> of the options from the pop-up menu to create an archive.
>>
>> You can't mount that ;)
>
>
> No such thing on Windows. Drives inside the case are available as
> long as the BIOS was able to detect them. Thumb drives are usable
> after the USB driver checked the file system and stored its para-
> meters. No need to look for a screwdriver in any case!

Hm, I rememember I mounted drive to directory on XP without problem.
This was for music sharing program that didn't have option to pick
different drives for sharing directories. Did they removed that feature?

Well, Linux is different. This is no argument at all.

>
>
>> Who stops anyone to write one more?
>
>
> The user - Linux exists for more than 26 years now, but still has
> an installation base of less than 3 percent. If it was as good as
> you think it is, it meanwhile should have beaten Windows XP?
>
> Come back to reality: PC sales are going down, Linux got stuck at
> a 3 percent margin and MS still couldn't convince Windows 7 users
> to switch to Windows 10 (46.46 vs. 29.26 percent in 10/2017). Who
> needs an OS with dozens of *competing* graphical user interfaces?
> If you counted each GUI and distribution separate, Linux wouldn't
> be mentioned in statistics, at all.

Percent doesn't matter, Linux got 1% boost since May ;)

I have yet to see malware on my Linux install. I picked it up easilly
when I used Windows...

What Linux, what are those sectors, what installer?
Depending on distro you don't have to install bootloader at all.

>
> What Windows really does (if you do not install its boot manager)
> is to set the Windows partition as *active* partition on the boot
> drive (which is the usual behaviour during system installations).
> If you choose the proper way and install the Bootmanager, you can
> start Linux or any other OS with it. (After doing that, you still
> can make LILO or GRUB your Boot Manager, again).

How? I have yet to see Windows not overwriting Linux ;)
If you want dual boot you always install Windows first, then Linux,
that is.
I don't know your OS/2 sectors, to talk about that...

>
> Please learn the difference between 'setting the active flag of a
> drive' and 'overwriting entire sectors holding data'!

That is what Windows does, yes. In case of EFI it just overwrites
boot file on EFI partition.

>
>
> Greetings from Augsburg
>
> Bernhard Schornak

Greets !
PS this is more interresting then plain religious preaching ;)

[Bernhard Schornak]

I do, but I only mount drives when I want to increase the capacity
of my local storage. The case is inside a separate part of a rack,
and I have to remove and re-connect about 20 cables to get inside.
If you prefer to remove or exchange your drives on a daily base, I
might ask myself how long your connectors and screws may withstand
permanent physical stress, but it is your free will, and I have no
right to tell you not to carry your mass storage with you wherever
you go.

If you don't mount your drives, they might be damaged by their own
vibration. Moreover, unmounted drives will increase the noise pro-
duced by a PC enormously. Don't be stingy with a few screws - your
hardware will live *much* longer if you fix your drives inside the
case!

>>>>> All Steam programs should work without change ;)
>>>>>
>>>>>> What is a Steam directory - something like Windows 'favorites'
>>>>>> or just a normal folder inside a normal folder hierarchy?
>>>>>
>>>>> Normal directory.
>>>>
>>>> Fine. On the other hand, I ask myself why one might want to move
>>>> a normal directory to a compressed file if everything works well
>>>> as it should.
>>>>
>>>> For the sake of completeness - to compress a folder select it in
>>>> the right pane and right click on it. Select "7-Zip", choose one
>>>> of the options from the pop-up menu to create an archive.
>>>
>>> You can't mount that ;)
>>
>> No such thing on Windows. Drives inside the case are available as
>> long as the BIOS was able to detect them. Thumb drives are usable
>> after the USB driver checked the file system and stored its para-
>> meters. No need to look for a screwdriver in any case!
> Hm, I rememember I mounted drive to directory on XP without problem.
> This was for music sharing program that didn't have option to pick
> different drives for sharing directories. Did they removed that feature?

Why should I know which features were removed from programs you've
installed on your machine? Ask Google to learn more about software
you're using... ;)

You still didn't tell us why you want to move your steam directory
to a compressed archive?


>>> [...]

>>> Answer to what? GUI is not part of OS rather userland application?
>>
>>
>> Wrong. Except Unix (developed as command line OS in 1969) and its
>> derivates (BSD, NexTSTEP/MacOS, Solaris, Minix, Linux...), modern
>> operating systems developed after 1990 come along with a *unique*
>> graphical frontend. Even MacOS - the first OS with a GUI - always
>> had just one graphical frontend (maybe with different optical de-
>> sign, but with consistent functionality for decades).
>
> Well, Linux is different. This is no argument at all.

There is a difference between 'different' and 'fragmented' - Linux
is 'fragmented' into dozens of distributions, each provides dozens
of GUIs. Melt them together, and the result might be 'different'.

>>> Who stops anyone to write one more?
>>
>> The user - Linux exists for more than 26 years now, but still has
>> an installation base of less than 3 percent. If it was as good as
>> you think it is, it meanwhile should have beaten Windows XP?
>>
>> Come back to reality: PC sales are going down, Linux got stuck at
>> a 3 percent margin and MS still couldn't convince Windows 7 users
>> to switch to Windows 10 (46.46 vs. 29.26 percent in 10/2017). Who
>> needs an OS with dozens of *competing* graphical user interfaces?
>> If you counted each GUI and distribution separate, Linux wouldn't
>> be mentioned in statistics, at all.
>
> Percent doesn't matter, Linux got 1% boost since May ;)

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/81/Operatingsystem_market_share.svg

Really? It's a continuous up an down - a single month isn't really
significant for an overall trend.

And, honestly: This is no argument for dozens of concurrent GUIs -
I bet, Linux had a much higher installation base with a consistent
(unique) GUI.


>>> [...]

>>> Fact is that Linux does not have malware as much as Windows and this is
>>> surely not because of small userbase...
>>
>>
>> Don't spread urban legends - stay with the facts:
>>
>> https://www.linux.com/learn/myth-busting-linux-immune-viruses
>> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linux_malware
>> https://news.sophos.com/en-us/2015/03/26/dont-believe-these-four-myths-about-linux-security/
>
> I have yet to see malware on my Linux install. I picked it up easilly
> when I used Windows...

Oh boy... I run Linux, OS/2 and Windows since 1993 (and tried some
other OS'es, throughout the time), but I never 'caught' one single
virus on my machines. Might be because the *very first thing* I do
after a new install is to switch off all automated program starts.
Nothing starts on my machines as long as I have not double-clicked
its icon or launched it via command line. Same applies to browsers
- as long as you disabled automated updates/upgrades and automatic
starts of executables there's no way to 'catch' a virus. Same with
e-mail clients - as long as you read mails as plain text and don't
allow automated running of scripts, there is no way to infect your
machine. I never installed anti virus software on my machines, but
never 'caught' a virus, either. It's just a question of reasonable
behaviour and a balanced sense of responsibility.

And - last, but not least - if your Linux machine was not infected
until now does not prove that no Linux virusses exist. (You cannot
prove god exists, but you cannot prove he does not exist, either -
it's more or less a question of reason versus beliefs.)

Do you know everything you did ten years ago? I don't...

>> What Windows really does (if you do not install its boot manager)
>> is to set the Windows partition as *active* partition on the boot
>> drive (which is the usual behaviour during system installations).
>> If you choose the proper way and install the Bootmanager, you can
>> start Linux or any other OS with it. (After doing that, you still
>> can make LILO or GRUB your Boot Manager, again).
>
> How? I have yet to see Windows not overwriting Linux ;)
> If you want dual boot you always install Windows first, then Linux,
> that is.
> I don't know your OS/2 sectors, to talk about that...

Always the last sectors on the first cylinder, head zero (LBA 0x3E
downwards).

>> Please learn the difference between 'setting the active flag of a
>> drive' and 'overwriting entire sectors holding data'!
>
> That is what Windows does, yes. In case of EFI it just overwrites
> boot file on EFI partition.

I have UEFI MoBos since 2008, but never saw that happen.

> PS this is more interresting then plain religious preaching ;)

Well, it is kind of religious preaching on your side of the chain.
For me, there is no perfect OS. The best choice was OS/2 for a few
years, followed by Windows 7 until now. (Nonetheless, I am looking
for a better OS, because I do not like Microsoft's latest attempts
to force-update user systems to the most effective spyware MS ever
developed. Unfortunately, Linux does not meet my visions of a good
OS, because it takes my freedom to use my machine like I *can* use
it while running Windows.)