Re: [9fans] alright, this should be interesting

[Dave Lukes <davel@anvil.com>]

Tim,
You are missing the point of what I said:

>> Kernels are also important in the sense that they set the tone for
>> everything above them:

In other words, if you have a crufty kernel, you'll have a smelly  
compiler,
and vice-versa.

>> kencc wouldn't have happened on linux, for example.

i.e. if you have just implemented the 15th optional parameter to
the  
asynciowithorwithoutsignalandoptionalscattergatherfromthe19thaddresszone 
() system call,
which supplies a bitmask of signal numbers and the days of the week on  
which to send them in the event of there being a 'c' in the month name,
then adding the  
__asm____stuff___3_registers_and_a_status_mask_up_your_nose() inline to  
gcc to make it run 10 times faster
seems like a ReallyGoodIdea(tm).

> The "personality" can be completely isolated from the kernel.

Yes, but you've still gotta struggle through six piles of elephant  
excrement to get there,
by which time your brain is soup, and you're muttering about how to  
implement a 15th way to map
all the odd-numbered framebuffers into someone else's address space.

> It is possible to provide the complete plan9 API above windows
> or linux or any other reasonable kernel.  It wouldn't be efficient,
> and you may have to bend over backwards in a few places if using
> some APIs (ie. see cygwin's implementation of fork and select
> using only the win32 api), but it is possible.  So in this sense,
> I'm not sure I agree with you.

Well, we're talking oranges and (Posix-compliant) apples, so it's hard  
to agree:
you're talking about implementations, I'm talking about philosophical  
approaches to problem solving.

Cheers,
	DaveL.