From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Date: Fri, 26 May 2006 01:48:22 -0700 Message-Id: <200605260148.22511.corey_s@qwest.net> From: "Corey" To: 9fans@cse.psu.edu Subject: Re: [9fans] this is not an advocacy question User-Agent: KMail/1.9.1 References: In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Disposition: inline Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Topicbox-Message-UUID: 550e8a42-ead1-11e9-9d60-3106f5b1d025 On Friday 26 May 2006 00:16, geoff@collyer.net wrote: > Inferno and Plan 9 kernels are similar, having common > ancestry. > So Inferno and Plan 9 kernels are both forks from a common source? How far have the two divurged? Do/can they share device drivers? ( Also, are there any design white-papers/documents that explain or discuss the kernel implementations/concepts? ( similar to what is available for the, say, L4 kernels ) ) > Both systems use essentially 9P2000 as their > network filesystem protocol. > Is it accurate to say that "Styx" is a conformant implementation of 9fs2000 that is written in Limbo rather than C? ( similar to v9fs under linux? ) > If you want to write in Limbo, you have to run Inferno, but you can > run Inferno on (l)unix, Windows or Plan 9. If you want to write > applications in C, you can't use Inferno. > Aside from the considerable portability provided by Inferno via the Dis virtual-machine, are there any other obvious/compelling reasons for choosing to develop in Limbo? After doing quite a bit of reading, I get the general notion that the primary functional difference between plan9 and inferno consists in a choice/requirement of portability vs. language.( ie Inferno/Limbo vs. Plan9/C ) I'm wondering whether Inferno's current requirement of a new/"obscure" language (limbo) as its sole development platform hindered wider usage. i.e., I'm curious as to how many deployments resulted in Plan 9 over Inferno specifically due to language ( C vs Limbo ) considerations/requirements/preference. The point of all this, is that - aside from sheer interest in the nuances of these two operating environments - I've hit a point in my own independent evaluations of Plan 9 and Inferno, that I'm unable to decide where best to focus my future learning/experimentation - Plan 9 or Inferno. Since I lack any practical experience under either OS -- it's not a matter of "install them both and see which you like better", such as the case would be with, say, two Linux distributions -- I'm hoping to get some further info from an experienced/knowledgable forum. Thanks for your time!