From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Message-Id: <200104100818.JAA07235@localhost.localdomain> To: 9fans@cse.psu.edu Subject: Re: [9fans] micro vs monolithic kernels In-Reply-To: Your message of "Mon, 09 Apr 2001 19:28:32 CDT." Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii From: Steve Kilbane Date: Tue, 10 Apr 2001 09:18:49 +0100 Topicbox-Message-UUID: 7e299fe6-eac9-11e9-9e20-41e7f4b1d025 > It's damn hard to 'use' a system if it isn't 'installed'. True. But in general, a system is installed by a single individual over a handful of hours, and then used by from one to thousands of individuals, over periods that may last for years. Plan 9 isn't impossible to install, and evidently many people have reached the end of the installation process, and are using it. Therefore, evidently, it's worth paying attention to this ratio. From your other posts, it sounds like you're working on solving the installation problems, though. Very nice, but it would have been nicer still if you could have just said so, without attacking. The Bell folks are always open and forthcoming about where their efforts fall short, be it because of lack of resources, or lack of vision. > Talk about specious distinctions. About as specious as writing code that's coherent enough to be read by someone else, or as putting coder/decoder complexities into the coder so that the decoder just needs to stream. "Done once" versus "done lots" is a pretty damn important difference. When resources are limited, choices have to be made about where one puts the effort. Indulge my curiosity, for a moment: if you'd being doing it, Jim, which part of Plan 9 would you have dropped (i.e. not designed or implemented) so that the time could be spent on the installation process? steve