[9fans] what heavy negativity!

[9fans] what heavy negativity!

[Mayuresh Kathe]

man, i experienced such heavy negativity towards my efforts to build a
linux kernel based plan9port vehicle that i am sure considering
abandoning the effort.

the idea was to have a 64-bit linux kernel with the advantages of
plan9port (small and elegantly designed+developed tools).

no, really, there was too much negativity.

sorry that i bothered you all.

~mayuresh

Re: [9fans] what heavy negativity!

[Tyga]

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Hi Mayuresh !

Can't help offering the quote:

*First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then
you win. *
*Mahatma Gandhi*

I have read with considerable bemusement the many responses to your
proposal.  Granted that it does look like a huge challenge.  Knowledgeable
people can see many problems with what you are contemplating.  But you have
to remember that you might learn a great deal if you attempt your idea and
sometimes good things come from attempting grand challenges. Just think
what would have happened if Columbus had given up when his proposal was
first rejected.

May I suggest that you overlook the emotional negativity and look at the
technical specifics of why many others see your proposal as foolhardy.
Then having given due consideration to the technical issues and your
resources (both time and knowledge) you would be in a far better position
to make an informed decision.

IMHO Plan9 offers a great deal of potential but is hamstrung by the lack of
resources to advance device drivers and accommodate the evolution of
hardware since the times it was designed.  To many people the visual
aspects of the user interface are unappealing and yet to others that is
exactly what appeals to them.  So it is impossible to please all the people
all the time.  I for one, would very much like to see the Plan9
architecture and thus concepts become available within more mainstream
environments.





On Fri, 5 Oct 2018 at 15:11, Mayuresh Kathe <mayuresh@kathe.in> wrote:

> man, i experienced such heavy negativity towards my efforts to build a
> linux kernel based plan9port vehicle that i am sure considering
> abandoning the effort.
>
> the idea was to have a 64-bit linux kernel with the advantages of
> plan9port (small and elegantly designed+developed tools).
>
> no, really, there was too much negativity.
>
> sorry that i bothered you all.
>
> ~mayuresh
>
>
>

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Re: [9fans] what heavy negativity!

[hiro]

it's sad that technical disagreements have to lead to such hysteria :(

Re: [9fans] what heavy negativity!

[Steven Stallion]

Hi Mayuresh,

Please don't be discouraged. The Plan 9 community is small and has its
fair share of trolls.

If you feel strongly about this effort then by all means move forward!
In the past, I've found that a prototype/proof of concept can speak
far more than any email I could write ahead of time. Give this a shot
- test our your ideas, and if you're pleased with the result share it!
This is a great opportunity to learn more about plan9port, it's
relationship with Linux and more importantly what a minimal system
could look like.

Regards,
Steve
On Fri, Oct 5, 2018 at 12:11 AM Mayuresh Kathe <mayuresh@kathe.in> wrote:
>
> man, i experienced such heavy negativity towards my efforts to build a
> linux kernel based plan9port vehicle that i am sure considering
> abandoning the effort.
>
> the idea was to have a 64-bit linux kernel with the advantages of
> plan9port (small and elegantly designed+developed tools).
>
> no, really, there was too much negativity.
>
> sorry that i bothered you all.
>
> ~mayuresh
>
>

Re: [9fans] what heavy negativity!

[Kurt H Maier]

On Fri, Oct 05, 2018 at 10:39:36AM +0530, Mayuresh Kathe wrote:
>
> sorry that i bothered you all.
>

apology accepted, try to do better next time

khm

Re: [9fans] what heavy negativity!

[Devon H. O'Dell]

You're being a real jerk, Kurt. I don't really care what your
rationale is; it's simply unnecessary.

Flame away,

--dho

Op vr 5 okt. 2018 om 08:00 schreef Kurt H Maier <khm@sciops.net>:
>
> On Fri, Oct 05, 2018 at 10:39:36AM +0530, Mayuresh Kathe wrote:
> >
> > sorry that i bothered you all.
> >
>
> apology accepted, try to do better next time
>
> khm
>
>

Re: [9fans] what heavy negativity!

[Brian L. Stuart]

Fri, Oct 5, 2018 at 12:11 AM Mayuresh Kathe <mayuresh@kathe.in> wrote:
> man, i experienced such heavy negativity towards my efforts to build ...
>
> the idea was to have a 64-bit linux kernel with the advantages of
> plan9port (small and elegantly designed+developed tools).

Mayuresh,
To echo what others have said, don't let the negativity
itself affect your work.  Consider only the technical points
that have been raised.  To the extent that you evaluate
them and consider them relevant to your objectives, factor
them into your work.

It really doesn't matter if anyone else ever cares about
or uses your work.  If you learn from it, get intellectual
satisfaction from it, and it's useful to you, then it's worth
doing.  If others can benefit too, great, but lack of interest
on the part of others is not a good reason for lack of
initiative on your part.  As far as I can tell, I'm the only
one using a file system I developed.  Sure, in some ways
I would like if everyone thought it was as great as I do,
but just because they don't doesn't stop me from benefitting
from it.

As for the specifics of your project, I personally don't think
I'd be all that interested in the results.  As much as I like
the elegance and simplicty of the implementation of the
Plan 9 user-land, much of the beauty of the system comes
from the simplicity and elegance of the kernel.  So if I
were using the Plan 9 user-land on top of the LInux kernel,
I wouldn't feel the same sense of beauty, intellectual satisfaction,
and connection to the original developers as I do running
the same user-land on the Plan 9 kernel.  But just because
I wouldn't be interested is no reason to stop your research.
Just be sure to study the similar efforts that have come
before and that have been mentioned here.  What did
they accomplish?  Did they go wrong somewhere?  Can
you get to that goal avoiding those mistakes?  If nothing
else, the whole experience will almost certainly give you
a greater appreciation for the Plan 9 kernel.

Just a couple of thoughts from an old-timer who misses
the days of working on PDP-11s.

BLS

Re: [9fans] what heavy negativity!

[Digby R.S. Tarvin]

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ooh, there's an idea for new project...

I also have a soft spot for the old PDP11 architecture and aesthetics, and
like the idea of an emulator sitting behind an 11/70 front panel, but I
havn't been able to decide what software to run on it...

Unix ran quite nicely on an 11/70 back in the late 70s, but I doubt you
would squeeze much more than the boot loader of a modern bloated system
onto one.... And a Unix image from that era would probably be a little
limited. (I don't really have enough history with RT11/RSTS to want to use
them).

So the question is... is plan9 still lean and mean enough to fit onto a
machine with a 64K address space? Doing a port would certainly provide
plenty of opportunity to tinker with the lights and switches on front
panel, and if it the port was initially limited to being a CPU server,
there would be no need to worry about displays and mass storage.... just
the compiler back end and low level kernel support.

Has anyone already looked at that? I expect it would be a fun, educational
and nostalgic exercise, but of course not of much practical use...

Regards,
DigbyT

On Sat, 6 Oct 2018 at 00:23, Brian L. Stuart <blstuart@bellsouth.net> wrote:

> Fri, Oct 5, 2018 at 12:11 AM Mayuresh Kathe <mayuresh@kathe.in> wrote:
> > man, i experienced such heavy negativity towards my efforts to build ...
> >
> > the idea was to have a 64-bit linux kernel with the advantages of
> > plan9port (small and elegantly designed+developed tools).
>
> Mayuresh,
> To echo what others have said, don't let the negativity
> itself affect your work.  Consider only the technical points
> that have been raised.  To the extent that you evaluate
> them and consider them relevant to your objectives, factor
> them into your work.
>
> It really doesn't matter if anyone else ever cares about
> or uses your work.  If you learn from it, get intellectual
> satisfaction from it, and it's useful to you, then it's worth
> doing.  If others can benefit too, great, but lack of interest
> on the part of others is not a good reason for lack of
> initiative on your part.  As far as I can tell, I'm the only
> one using a file system I developed.  Sure, in some ways
> I would like if everyone thought it was as great as I do,
> but just because they don't doesn't stop me from benefitting
> from it.
>
> As for the specifics of your project, I personally don't think
> I'd be all that interested in the results.  As much as I like
> the elegance and simplicty of the implementation of the
> Plan 9 user-land, much of the beauty of the system comes
> from the simplicity and elegance of the kernel.  So if I
> were using the Plan 9 user-land on top of the LInux kernel,
> I wouldn't feel the same sense of beauty, intellectual satisfaction,
> and connection to the original developers as I do running
> the same user-land on the Plan 9 kernel.  But just because
> I wouldn't be interested is no reason to stop your research.
> Just be sure to study the similar efforts that have come
> before and that have been mentioned here.  What did
> they accomplish?  Did they go wrong somewhere?  Can
> you get to that goal avoiding those mistakes?  If nothing
> else, the whole experience will almost certainly give you
> a greater appreciation for the Plan 9 kernel.
>
> Just a couple of thoughts from an old-timer who misses
> the days of working on PDP-11s.
>
> BLS
>
>

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Re: [9fans] what heavy negativity!

[Lucio De Re]

Let's take a step back here, and stop treating jerks like Kurt (or me,
for that matter) the way they treat the ideas they perceive to be
hare-brained.

It's weird that with all the time in the world to "think before
posting", knee-jerk reactions still find their way to a mailing list
like this one that is capable of extremely high quality discussion.

The psychology is clearly complex, mixing territoriality with
competence with defensiveness with mere human frailties, I would not
even like anyone to start investigating that: who knows what it may
reveal?

What I see, though, is that part of the quality displayed here depends
on the like of Hiro and Kurt (and others, I'm not picking on the two
of them) to set a high bar, while others are willing to offer what may
even be misplaced empathy and thus also encourage a certain type of
contribution that may seem weak at best.

No one has a monopoly of "what's good for Plan9...", although if I was
the King here, I'd whip everyone into blending divergent "distros" -
for that despicable moniker describes precisely what they are - into a
modular system where each divergence is carefully documented so that
even newbies can slot into their base system exactly what they
perceive as being valuable.

So, in the interest of not discouraging hare-brained ideas that may
benefit us all, while ensuring that the spirit of Plan 9 is not
diluted by the lure of Linux and associates, let's give everyone some
space and help those that feel offended or victimised to understand
that the rules of  the game, here, at least, include considerable
pain.

Happy coding, everyone!

Lucio.

Re: [9fans] what heavy negativity!

[hiro]

clearly the more certain people think the more text gets created.

> Let's take a step back here

feel free, it will save everybody's time.

Re: [9fans] what heavy negativity!

[Richard Miller]

> So the question is... is plan9 still lean and mean enough to fit onto a
> machine with a 64K address space?

Lean in concepts and algorithms doesn't necessarily imply lean in
resource usage -- sometimes the opposite.  I don't have access to
1st edition source, but the 2nd edition C compiler used a simplified
malloc() which grew the address space in 500000 byte hunks, and a
free() which was even simpler:

	void
	free(void *p)
	{
		USED(p);
	}

It seems that already in 1995, virtual memory was assumed to be
not particularly constrained.