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Cc: "9fans@9fans.net" <9fans@9fans.net>
From: David Leimbach <leimy2k@gmail.com>
Date: Wed, 18 May 2011 07:23:00 -0700
To: Fans of the OS Plan 9 from Bell Labs <9fans@9fans.net>
Subject: Re: [9fans] crazy idea - drawterm in javascript?
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Sent from my iPhone

On May 18, 2011, at 5:24 AM, blstuart@bellsouth.net wrote:

>> On 05/18/2011 05:12 AM, Jacob Todd wrote:
>>> Writing/porting web stuff to plan 9 will be hard. Writing something that=

>>> accesses plan 9 from the web will be less hard.
>>=20
>> "The KISS (Keep It Simple, Stupid) acronym has been popular in business=20=

>> for decades, but its message has never been more important and, or=20
>> useful for many." -- Rob Tannen
>>=20
>> "When simplifying, is's critical to target the right features for=20
>> excision, based on the customers' actual needs" -- Rob Tannen
>=20
> I'm confused.  Why are we using business ideas to constrain what
> we are doing with a research system?  It seems to me that what
> we work on (outside what puts food on the table) should be driven
> primarily by what we find intellectually stimulating.  I personally
> get no stimulation over the idea of porting an existing web browser.
> However, the idea of an emulator in a highly portable environment
> was interesting enough that I looked around some and found a
> PDP-11 emulator running 6th Edition (also in js).  I couldn't help
> but think about extending Bellard's work to include a drawable
> device and a network interface and then building a Plan 9 terminal
> for it, or running native Inferno on it, or using the same ideas to
> build a Dis VM in js, or...  It's true that utility can be a meaningful
> motivator for what questions we look at, but if all you care about
> is utility, it's hard to beat an android tablet.  Like most of us, I
> worry about what customers want in my day job.  But what
> customers want is boring to the point of suicide.  To borrow from
> the bard; "There is more in the computing universe than is dreamt
> of in the PC/Web philosophy."  Plan 9 and Inferno are the best
> places I've found to glimpse that hidden beauty.
>=20
> BLS
>=20
>=20

I don't think there's any real constraints.  Bottom line is the code is ther=
e and it's pretty nice.  You can do what you want.  If you seek outside appr=
oval to chase an idea, you've already failed the most important person in th=
e equation - yourself.

Who cares what anyone else thinks?

Or as Homer Simpson said, "I'm sure Einstein turned himself all kinds of col=
ors before he invented the light bulb".=