[9fans] Plan 9 and PR

[9fans] Plan 9 and PR

[Herbert B. Hancock]

I wonder if Plan 9 is getting the exposure it deserves?  I met with some people from IBM last week about a grid project and they weren't aware of the capabilites of Plan 9 for grid solutions.  I'm setting up a grid between departments but unfortunately need to use Linux and the Globus Toolkit because of the applications. I have nothing against Linux or Globus but it seems to me that Plan 9 is ideal for such a project. I need to have some applications on the grid which I can't do with Plan 9.  I'll even have to disguise Linux as Windows so the users won't think it's not too unfamiliar.

On a better note, we published an article in Library Hi Tech vol. 21 no. 4, pp. 471-476 on Plan 9.  At least we've introduced it to some librarians.

Brian

Brian Hancock
Humanities Librarian
Rutgers University

Re: [9fans] Plan 9 and PR

[ron minnich]

we're trying to get the 9grid ready for general use but it is hard to get
these things going -- I wish it were further along so you could point
people to it.

But yes, Plan 9 has the one thing that the other Grids lack -- an
operating system that makes sense for Grids.

ron

Re: [9fans] Plan 9 and PR

[Jim Choate]

Hi Herbert,


On Sun, 8 Feb 2004, Herbert B. Hancock wrote:

> I wonder if Plan 9 is getting the exposure it deserves?  I met with some people from IBM last week about a grid project and they weren't aware of the capabilites of Plan 9 for grid solutions.  I'm setting up a grid between departments but unfortunately need to use Linux and the Globus Toolkit because of the applications. I have nothing against Linux or Globus but it seems to me that Plan 9 is ideal for such a project. I need to have some applications on the grid which I can't do with Plan 9.  I'll even have to disguise Linux as Windows so the users won't think it's not too unfamiliar.
>
> On a better note, we published an article in Library Hi Tech vol. 21 no. 4, pp. 471-476 on Plan 9.  At least we've introduced it to some librarians.

No, it isn't. And this community is part of the problem. A major example
is the 'discussion' over P9 being brain dead for single user -single
machine- applications. They just don't get that the power of P9 is in
-transcending- this model. That is the true power of P9. The seperation of
where the output goes and where the work gets done at. It's a pity.

Using P9 as a single user single machine solution is like using a Porche
to open soup cans by running over them. It works but what a waste. I
personaly believe their reticence about admitting their mistaken approach
is that they don't want to admit they make a mistake. Typical.

I've got a 'in' with the upcoming COMMON (ie IBM user group) meeting here
in San Antonio. Among other things I hope to do a short presentation on
P9 as well as talk on a panel regarding grid solutions. The week following
that I'll be at the San Antonio College/SATLUG conference doing a similar
presentation. I've also contacted First Lego League with regard to the
"Blind and Haptic Computing SIG" we've created. The idea is to use Lego
Mindstorms to allow blind developers to build and analyse robots. Among
other things I hope to have get some info on their page about
Styx-in-a-Box.

When I worked at the LTC here in Austin I tried to talk to lower and
middle management about it but they really don't think 'grid' computing is
an answer. The general consensus I got was that it was smoke and mirrors.
It was also pretty interesting to work for a company making Open Source
software but prohibiting their employees from doing -any- outside work
even if it was for Open Source.

In the past I was asked on this list why I didn't program, IBM prohibited
it and I hate laywers. So, I quite in August of last summer and I've been
pursuing it since. Still trying to make it break even but we're getting
closer and closer. You people ain't seen shit, yet. One of Hangar 18's
goals is to put out a "Plan 9 bis" at some point. The idea will be to make
it as easy for users to -use- as possible instead of making it targeted at
'developers'.

I can say, that if -anyone- wants to do presentations or demonstrations on
P9 at any of these events I'll do my best to support your efforts. The
only caveat is that you've got to provide your own $$$.

ps I'll also be providing tech support for the upcoming Texas Gaming
   Festival (www.txgf.com) next weekend. One of the things I hope I have
   time for is setting up a couple of P9 boxes to use for accessing
   techinal resources on the net. My hope is people will ask "What is
   that?". Several of the larger game related hardware manufacturers will
   be there. If I have time I hope to burn some CD's and give them away.

 -- --

Open Forge, LLC  24/365 Onsite Support for PCs, Networks, & Game Consoles
512-695-4126 (Austin, Tx.)  help@open-forge.com  irc.open-forge.com

Hangar 18  Open Source Distributed Computing Using Plan 9 & Linux
512-451-7087  http://open-forge.org/hangar18  irc.open-forge.org

James Choate  512-451-7087  ravage@ssz.com  jchoate@open-forge.com

Re: [9fans] Plan 9 and PR

[boyd, rounin]

> No, it isn't. And this community is part of the problem. A major example
> is the 'discussion' over P9 being brain dead for single user -single
> machine- applications.

fuck, i must have missed a meeting.

Re: [9fans] Plan 9 and PR

[Kenji Okamoto]

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Hi Ron,

Can I join your grid project from our firewalled Plan 9 system,
where I have one Plan 9 cpu server exposed to internet
(peridotite.cias.osakafu-u.ac.jp(157.16.101.70).   We have
firewall by our University which prevent us to login to our
machine from outside, which however does not filt HTTP etc.

Kenji

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From: ron minnich <rminnich@lanl.gov>
To: 9fans@cse.psu.edu
Subject: Re: [9fans] Plan 9 and PR
Date: Sun, 8 Feb 2004 09:36:25 -0700 (MST)
Message-ID: <Pine.LNX.4.44.0402080935260.13641-100000@maxroach.lanl.gov>

we're trying to get the 9grid ready for general use but it is hard to get
these things going -- I wish it were further along so you could point
people to it.

But yes, Plan 9 has the one thing that the other Grids lack -- an
operating system that makes sense for Grids.

ron

Re: [9fans] Plan 9 and PR

[Kenji Okamoto]

> Hi Ron,

This was a personal mail, sorry every one.

Kenji

Re: [9fans] Plan 9 and PR

[Fco.J.Ballesteros]

> we're trying to get the 9grid ready for general use but it is hard to get
> these things going

What's the reason(s) you'd point out that in your opinnion make it hard
to do so?

Re: [9fans] Plan 9 and PR

[Michael Jeffrey]

"Herbert B. Hancock" <bhancock@rutgers.edu> wrote in message
news:5e14e61cf2.61cf25e14e@rutgers.edu...
> On a better note, we published an article in Library Hi Tech vol. 21 no.
4, pp. 471-476 on Plan 9.  At least we've introduced it to some librarians.

History has shown that librarians should never be underestimated: from
their recent success in getting 'Stupid White Men' published all the way
back to Casanova - and beyond.

Re: [9fans] Plan 9 and PR

[Dave Lukes]

Hear hear!

Never underestimate the power of the word:
remember that Unix's first "serious" application was [nt]roff.

	Dave.

On Mon, 2004-02-09 at 10:40, Michael Jeffrey wrote:
> "Herbert B. Hancock" <bhancock@rutgers.edu> wrote in message
> news:5e14e61cf2.61cf25e14e@rutgers.edu...
> > On a better note, we published an article in Library Hi Tech vol. 21 no.
> 4, pp. 471-476 on Plan 9.  At least we've introduced it to some librarians.
>
> History has shown that librarians should never be underestimated: from
> their recent success in getting 'Stupid White Men' published all the way
> back to Casanova - and beyond.
--
Dave Lukes
System Administrator
Anvil Software Ltd.

Re: [9fans] Plan 9 and PR

[boyd, rounin]

> Hear hear!

order in the house!!

> Never underestimate the power of the word:
> remember that Unix's first "serious" application was [nt]roff.

for writing patents iirc.

Re: [9fans] Plan 9 and PR

[Dave Lukes]

> order in the house!!
<aside>There's a great track on the late Warren Zevon's last album
called "Disorder in the House":-).</aside>

> for writing patents iirc.

Yeah, something about needing line numbering:
basically, it did the job, and someone realised that it did,
and used it.

My point was that if we can come up
with a "killer app" that can put a grin on a librarian's face,
then we have a winner.

"Clever" users:  mathematicians, librarians, museum curators ...
(yes, I am being intellectually snobbish: so sue me)
who are dedicated to getting their job done
have always been the most enthusiastic adopters of
useful-but-not-necessarily-mainstream-or-pretty-or-popular
technology.
Mostly I suspect that this is because they are smart enough
to ignore the hype and realise that it (whatever "it" is)
can get the job done.

Also, having an outside perspective means that they tend to lack
the inbuilt bigotries about technology that so-called
IT professionals suffer from
("No-one ever got fired for buying "IBM/Microsoft/Linux ...")
so they'll use whatever works.

I remember teaching regexps to a math prof. about 20 years ago,
so he could update the equation numbering in his papers.

Did he like it?  No.
(The regexps were OK, but He whined that the shell syntax ought
 to have been:
	file < command > file
for elegance and symmetry:-).

Did he understand it and use it because it got the job done?  Yes.

Just a thought:-),

	Dave.

P.S. have you hugged your librarian today?

On Mon, 2004-02-09 at 12:15, boyd, rounin wrote:
> > Never underestimate the power of the word:
> > remember that Unix's first "serious" application was [nt]roff.

Re: [9fans] Plan 9 and PR

[boyd, rounin]

> My point was that if we can come up
> with a "killer app" that can put a grin on a librarian's face,
> then we have a winner.

like the PARC Alto etc ...

Re: [9fans] Plan 9 and PR

[Dave Lukes]

Well, I was thinking more of
"What would librarians want in the 21st. century?"

My guess would be some funky text search type stuff.

I've always thought that plan9 would make a bonza platform
for serious data mining.

OTOH, we'd need serious interfaces to <spit>ODBC</spit>,
and suchlike if we were to do it properly:=(.

Cheers,
	Dave.

On Mon, 2004-02-09 at 12:52, boyd, rounin wrote:
> > My point was that if we can come up
> > with a "killer app" that can put a grin on a librarian's face,
> > then we have a winner.
>
> like the PARC Alto etc ...
--
Dave Lukes
System Administrator
Anvil Software Ltd.

Re: [9fans] Plan 9 and PR

[ron minnich]

On Mon, 9 Feb 2004, Fco.J.Ballesteros wrote:

> > we're trying to get the 9grid ready for general use but it is hard to get
> > these things going
>
> What's the reason(s) you'd point out that in your opinnion make it hard
> to do so?


using Plan 9 for anything loses mind share ("What? Not Globus? Not Linux?
You must be wrong!"). We're trying to resolve in a nice way the issues of
authentication without having "the Globus user" for example. There's
little programming environment support. Plan 9 is ideal for grid stuff,
but there are bits missing that we need to get done.

I have built a sample task bag file system using ramfs, and I did run a
parallel app between here and Bell Labs and all the Plan 9 advantages
helped a lot.

The other problem is that right now 9grid is a "spare time" activity for
all of us, so it is moving more slowly than we would like.

ron

Re: [9fans] Plan 9 and PR

[Micah Stetson]

> P.S. have you hugged your librarian today?

That would be my wife, and yes I have.

Micah

Re: [9fans] Plan 9 and PR

[Dave Lukes]

On Mon, 2004-02-09 at 16:28, Micah Stetson wrote:
> > P.S. have you hugged your librarian today?
>
> That would be my wife, and yes I have.

OK, I admit it, I'm jealous:-).

	Dave.

Re: [9fans] Plan 9 and PR

[Micah Stetson]

> > > P.S. have you hugged your librarian today?
> >
> > That would be my wife, and yes I have.
>
> OK, I admit it, I'm jealous:-).

Too bad.  Get your own librarian ;-).

Micah

Re: [9fans] Plan 9 and PR

[Dave Lukes]

Dammit, they're in short supply over here in the UK.

On Mon, 2004-02-09 at 18:23, Micah Stetson wrote:
> > > > P.S. have you hugged your librarian today?
> > >
> > > That would be my wife, and yes I have.
> >
> > OK, I admit it, I'm jealous:-).
>
> Too bad.  Get your own librarian ;-).
>
> Micah

Re: [9fans] Plan 9 and PR

[boyd, rounin]

> P.S. have you hugged your librarian today?

well not today, but at xmas -- my mother.

Re: [9fans] Plan 9 and PR

[Wes Kussmaul]

I have friends at the School of Library Science at Simmons College. Shall I
send this whole thread over to the manager of their list-serv?

One caveat: Simmons is one of three women's colleges that are nestled by
some odd coincidence right next to Harvard Medical School.

At 01:29 PM 2/9/2004, Dave Lukes wrote:
>Dammit, they're in short supply over here in the UK.
>
>On Mon, 2004-02-09 at 18:23, Micah Stetson wrote:
> > > > > P.S. have you hugged your librarian today?
> > > >
> > > > That would be my wife, and yes I have.
> > >
> > > OK, I admit it, I'm jealous:-).
> >
> > Too bad.  Get your own librarian ;-).
> >
> > Micah

Re: [9fans] Plan 9 and PR

[Jack Johnson]

On Feb 9, 2004, at 4:47 AM, Dave Lukes wrote:
> Also, having an outside perspective means that they tend to lack
> the inbuilt bigotries about technology that so-called
> IT professionals suffer from
> ("No-one ever got fired for buying "IBM/Microsoft/Linux ...")
> so they'll use whatever works.

It's also these groups that have been marginalized by MS, etc.

Librarians might be tempted to buy Microsoft if they didn't have to
roll their own catalogue in Excel or Access.

-Jack

Re: [9fans] Plan 9 and PR

[Bruce Ellis]

flat files work fine under most "not huge" datasets.
check out how fortune works for a good fixed-sized
record solution (i think td did it).  i wrote my db under
32V back in the hippie days.  it was an ingress
into ingress - cause it was a zillion times faster.
(i used those things called algorithms.)
i commercialized my ideas and sold a few (at really
quite stupidly high a price).  the new one is better,
far better, and in limbo.

brucee
----- Original Message -----
From: "Jack Johnson" <fragment@nas.com>
To: <9fans@cse.psu.edu>
Sent: Tuesday, February 10, 2004 2:13 PM
Subject: Re: [9fans] Plan 9 and PR


> Librarians might be tempted to buy Microsoft if they didn't have to
> roll their own catalogue in Excel or Access.

Re: [9fans] Plan 9 and PR

[Fco.J.Ballesteros]

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We'd like to join too.
Just let us know what to do. (No firewall here).

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If you can figure out how ti get in/out of your world,  you're
welcome to the grid.  I'll set up an account at bell labs right away.

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Hi Ron,

Can I join your grid project from our firewalled Plan 9 system,
where I have one Plan 9 cpu server exposed to internet
(peridotite.cias.osakafu-u.ac.jp(157.16.101.70).   We have
firewall by our University which prevent us to login to our
machine from outside, which however does not filt HTTP etc.

Kenji

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From: ron minnich <rminnich@lanl.gov>
To: 9fans@cse.psu.edu
Subject: Re: [9fans] Plan 9 and PR
Date: Sun, 8 Feb 2004 09:36:25 -0700 (MST)
Message-ID: <Pine.LNX.4.44.0402080935260.13641-100000@maxroach.lanl.gov>

we're trying to get the 9grid ready for general use but it is hard to get
these things going -- I wish it were further along so you could point
people to it.

But yes, Plan 9 has the one thing that the other Grids lack -- an
operating system that makes sense for Grids.

ron

Re: [9fans] Plan 9 and PR

[David Presotto]

[-- Attachment #1: Type: text/plain, Size: 133 bytes --]

If you can figure out how ti get in/out of your world,  you're
welcome to the grid.  I'll set up an account at bell labs right away.

[-- Attachment #2: Type: message/rfc822, Size: 5215 bytes --]

[-- Attachment #2.1.1: Type: text/plain, Size: 323 bytes --]

Hi Ron,

Can I join your grid project from our firewalled Plan 9 system,
where I have one Plan 9 cpu server exposed to internet
(peridotite.cias.osakafu-u.ac.jp(157.16.101.70).   We have
firewall by our University which prevent us to login to our
machine from outside, which however does not filt HTTP etc.

Kenji

[-- Attachment #2.1.2: Type: message/rfc822, Size: 2771 bytes --]

From: ron minnich <rminnich@lanl.gov>
To: 9fans@cse.psu.edu
Subject: Re: [9fans] Plan 9 and PR
Date: Sun, 8 Feb 2004 09:36:25 -0700 (MST)
Message-ID: <Pine.LNX.4.44.0402080935260.13641-100000@maxroach.lanl.gov>

we're trying to get the 9grid ready for general use but it is hard to get
these things going -- I wish it were further along so you could point
people to it.

But yes, Plan 9 has the one thing that the other Grids lack -- an
operating system that makes sense for Grids.

ron