From mboxrd@z Thu Jan  1 00:00:00 1970
Message-Id: <929738E4-394A-4868-9544-E1D0F0F8C159@orthanc.ca>
From: Lyndon Nerenberg <lyndon@orthanc.ca>
To: Fans of the OS Plan 9 from Bell Labs <9fans@9fans.net>
In-Reply-To: <48714039.7000704@coraid.com>
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Date: Tue,  8 Jul 2008 17:30:39 -0700
References: <893336fd0a9673f20c7468d7f6339554@quanstro.net>
	<48714039.7000704@coraid.com>
Subject: Re: [9fans] a question of file and the history of
	magic^H^H^H^H^HUNIX
Topicbox-Message-UUID: e05afd86-ead3-11e9-9d60-3106f5b1d025

On 2008-Jul-6, at 14:59 , Brantley Coile wrote:

> I remember the day I first saw a file magic file.  I welcomed it
> because for the first time I didn't have access to the source code.
> Those were the days when you had to have $45k to get the source.

Closer to $100K for most people. I had great fun writing nroff (yup,
*n*roff) output device tables as binary blobs to interface with the
non-source UNIXen of the day. And the Convergent Technologies X.25
binary code was a wonder to configure/tune as an end user :-P

Remember kids: UNIX source code (BSD, really) wasn't free until 1994
(give or take a bit). You haven't lived until you've resolved device
driver configuration and ordering problems when trying to link a
binary version of SunOS 2 or 3 (no, not Solaris :-).  Or even better,
an NBI VME 68K box pretending it's a UNIBUS VAX.

Is alt.folklore.computers still alive? 99% of the list traffic
[cs]hould be redirected there.

-- (creaky/grumpy olde) lyndon