The future of Plan9?

[Digby Tarvin digbyt@acm.org]

Steve's comments:
>
>> [Plan 9's] main failing,
>> in my opinion, is its inability to interact with other operating
>> systems conveniently.
>
>I don't think the other operating system is a problem, because
>most users aren't concerned with it. They just use it for kicking
>off their main applications. The interchange of data is the important
>thing.
>
I should have said that this was the biggest problem for me. I don't
know how others are using it. When I kick off my main applications,
I need to be able to interact with them. Having found hp(1), this is
now just a problem for graphical apps. And it is still a problem
accessing and running plan 9 apps from an external non-plan9 system.

>
>> At least the
>> wealth of quality free software available on the net makes developing
>> alternate operating systems less of a daunting task than it used to
>> be - only the core has to be build, and a quite usable suite of
>> applications can be readily ported by a user community.
>
>Huh? If I understand you, you're saying that one can bash out a
>new kernel, and then chuck all the standard freebie tools on top
>of it. Ok, so this is handy for researchers into OS development,
>but apart from that, what does it give you that you haven't
>already got? [Bzzzt! Warning: heading off-topic]
>
That is mostly what I had in mind. I used to tinker with
operating systems when I was at University, and the thing
that always seemed to be the obstacle to making a usable system
was the thought of having to write all the compilers, editors
and utilities from scratch. I had access to Unix sources, but nothing
that could be redistributed.  Now at least it is only a porting
effort. But it only gets you the level of funtionality of plan 9,
certainly not what you need to compete with M$ in commercial
applications :-/


Regards,
DigbyT
-- 
Digby R. S. Tarvin                                              digbyt@acm.org
http://www.users.dircon.co.uk/~cthulhu/