Re: [9fans] crazy idea - drawterm in javascript?

[blstuart@bellsouth.net]

> 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.
>
> "The KISS (Keep It Simple, Stupid) acronym has been popular in business
> for decades, but its message has never been more important and, or
> useful for many." -- Rob Tannen
>
> "When simplifying, is's critical to target the right features for
> excision, based on the customers' actual needs" -- Rob Tannen

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.

BLS