Re: [9fans] Consumers? We the eeevil empire are the consumers!

Re: [9fans] Consumers? We the eeevil empire are the consumers!

[john]

>
> My point is that it's easier to fight the static Apple hardware, with
> it's absent hardware doc, than to fight the dynamic Intel/AMD
> hardware, with its/their also missing doc. At least the obsolete Apple
> gear is a non-moving target, so we stand a chance ... The x86 stuff
> changes on an hourly basis, and cannot be kept up with :-(

Come on, folks, PPC Apple was around for how many years, and the
only port effort I know of was a university project that I'm pretty
sure never got anything released. Why do we not want to do anything
until obsolescence is guaranteed? I think I'll start a Zaurus port,
that platform has been dead long enough now. If you want to work on
a port, do sparc64, since you can still buy those machines.


John

Re: [9fans] Consumers? We the eeevil empire are the consumers!

[eekee57]

On Feb 24, 7:47 pm, j...@csplan9.rit.edu wrote:
> Come on, folks, PPC Apple was around for how many years, and the
> only port effort I know of was a university project that I'm pretty
> sure never got anything released. Why do we not want to do anything
> until obsolescence is guaranteed? I think I'll start a Zaurus port,
> that platform has been dead long enough now. If you want to work on
> a port, do sparc64, since you can still buy those machines.

I'd be very interested in a Zaurus port, although in my case it would
be the SL-C3200 that I would be cheifly interested in. I have been
porting a desktop linux distro to it but keep running into trouble,
particulaly with the complexities of gcc and other bloated stuff. I
guess porting a Linux distro to a machine designed for Linux is on a
different level to porting an operating system, but if I can help with
anything I'd like to.

[Irrelevant Moderator's Note:

 You can run OpenBSD on these machines:

 http://www.openbsd.org/zaurus.html ]

Re: [9fans] Consumers? We the eeevil empire are the consumers!

[John Waters]

I always thought that rio would look spectacular on an Apollo DN3500...


On 4/23/08, eekee57@fastmail.fm <eekee57@fastmail.fm> wrote:
> On Feb 24, 7:47 pm, j...@csplan9.rit.edu wrote:
> > Come on, folks, PPC Apple was around for how many years, and the
> > only port effort I know of was a university project that I'm pretty
> > sure never got anything released. Why do we not want to do anything
> > until obsolescence is guaranteed? I think I'll start a Zaurus port,
> > that platform has been dead long enough now. If you want to work on
> > a port, do sparc64, since you can still buy those machines.
>
> I'd be very interested in a Zaurus port, although in my case it would
> be the SL-C3200 that I would be cheifly interested in. I have been
> porting a desktop linux distro to it but keep running into trouble,
> particulaly with the complexities of gcc and other bloated stuff. I
> guess porting a Linux distro to a machine designed for Linux is on a
> different level to porting an operating system, but if I can help with
> anything I'd like to.
>
> [Irrelevant Moderator's Note:
>
>  You can run OpenBSD on these machines:
>
>  http://www.openbsd.org/zaurus.html ]
>
>

Re: [9fans] Consumers? We the eeevil empire are the consumers!

[Dave Eckhardt]

> There is a lot of PPC-based Apple gear coming on the used equipment
> market.  Considering the tight control Apple placed on the hardware,
> porting the MD kernel bits has many fewer moving targets.

The bad news is that there is still a *lot* of Apple-specific hardware
which would need to be dealt with.  The PPC Macs used fairly common
graphics hardware, but the same cannot be said of disk controllers,
interrupt controllers, etc.

The reading-lamp style iMac, for example, would require support for
a "Uninorth" memory controller and PCI bridge, a "Pangea" I/O hub, a
"Keylargo" ATA controller, and so on.  Suspend/resume is vastly
different from the PC world (for better or worse).

Dave Eckhardt

Re: [9fans] Consumers? We the eeevil empire are the consumers!

[lucio]

> Thank you, I'll cherish that.  It's not from "The Little Prince", is it?
>
> ++L

Oops.  I got half way to making this a private message, then slipped
up :-(

++L

Re: [9fans] Consumers? We the eeevil empire are the consumers!

[lucio]

> "Perfection is achieved, not when there is nothing more to add,
> but when there is nothing left to take away."
>         -Antoine de Saint-Exupery

Thank you, I'll cherish that.  It's not from "The Little Prince", is it?

++L

Re: [9fans] Consumers? We the eeevil empire are the consumers!

[david jeannot]

>  I think the philosophy (who said it first?) that something isn't
>  finished as long as there are features that can be removed

"Perfection is achieved, not when there is nothing more to add,
but when there is nothing left to take away."
        -Antoine de Saint-Exupery

Re: [9fans] Consumers? We the eeevil empire are the consumers!

[lucio]

> My point is that it's easier to fight the static Apple hardware, with
> it's absent hardware doc, than to fight the dynamic Intel/AMD
> hardware, with its/their also missing doc. At least the obsolete Apple
> gear is a non-moving target, so we stand a chance ... The x86 stuff
> changes on an hourly basis, and cannot be kept up with :-(

We violently agree on this point.  There may be less agreement as to
how to port Plan 9 to such hardware: there seems to be a drift towards
virtualisation which of course eliminates any efficiencies (yes, I
know I'm exaggerating) contributed by Plan 9.

I think the philosophy (who said it first?) that something isn't
finished as long as there are features that can be removed - which
very clearly applies to Plan 9 - is being replaced by a culture where
Plan 9 is needed to squeeze the last teraflop out of the fastest
ultracomputing platform available at any time.  I'm not sure that even
a middle ground is possible, while it is a matter of faith that the
first philosophy will eventually triumph over the opposing culture.

Some, of course, do not see the conflict here at all.

++L

PS: You did suggest originally that there was a similarity between the
lack of documentation for Apple hardware and that for the Intel
platform.  I am pleased that you corrected that impression, the two
are different for exactly the reason you suggested.

Re: [9fans] Consumers? We the eeevil empire are the consumers!

[Lyndon Nerenberg]

On 2008-Feb-23, at 22:16 , lucio@proxima.alt.za wrote:

> That ought to be good news and I am pleased to hear it.  I presume,
> but I have no experience, that there is already a growing performance
> gap?

Sure. The Apple hardware is leaping behind the latest and greatest of
the Intel/AMD world.

And Plan 9 doesn't need to be there, either.

I have a 1.x G4 GHz Mac Mini that can't realistically keep up with
Leopard (server). But it will make a kick ass Plan 9 CPU server.

My point is that it's easier to fight the static Apple hardware, with
it's absent hardware doc, than to fight the dynamic Intel/AMD
hardware, with its/their also missing doc. At least the obsolete Apple
gear is a non-moving target, so we stand a chance ... The x86 stuff
changes on an hourly basis, and cannot be kept up with :-(

Re: [9fans] Consumers? We the eeevil empire are the consumers!

[lucio]

> There is a lot of PPC-based Apple gear coming on the used equipment
> market. Considering the tight control Apple placed on the hardware,
> porting the MD kernel bits has many fewer moving targets. And the lack
> of hardware documentation sucks equally between the two platforms.

That ought to be good news and I am pleased to hear it.  I presume,
but I have no experience, that there is already a growing performance
gap?  Yet you'd think something like Plan 9 would bridge that gap by
making more efficient use of the hardware (less cpu-devouring
eye-candy) and therefore would attract at least some developers.

The ways of this grave new world are so very mysterious...

++L

[9fans] Consumers? We the eeevil empire are the consumers!

[Lyndon Nerenberg]

On 2008-Feb-23, at 21:41 , lucio@proxima.alt.za wrote:

> Caveat emptor.  I thought we lived in a world that aimed to please the
> consumer...

There is a lot of PPC-based Apple gear coming on the used equipment
market. Considering the tight control Apple placed on the hardware,
porting the MD kernel bits has many fewer moving targets. And the lack
of hardware documentation sucks equally between the two platforms.