From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 From: scj@yaccman.com (Steve Johnson) Date: Fri, 07 Apr 2017 14:58:22 -0700 Subject: [TUHS] Unix clones In-Reply-To: <1491527541.58e6e7750449e@www.paradise.net.nz> Message-ID: <026fcb0e618391672f8133bf75d4464b6d1579f3@webmail.yaccman.com> Thoth was under development at Waterloo when I was there, and I really enjoyed talking with those folks.  They viewed the parts of the system as inhabitants of a community and gave them clever names -- this led to some interesting discussions about the distribution of functions in the kernel.   For example, I remember that the guy who killed processes was called "Big Al", and when the process was dead the "Undertaker" was called, etc. There were also some B-inspired languages that got worked on:  eh?  was a simpler version of B, and its follow-on was called zed.  Don't know that they ever got out of the university, though... Steve ----- Original Message ----- From: "Wesley Parish" To:"Clem Cole" Cc:"The Eunuchs Hysterical Society" Sent:Fri, 07 Apr 2017 13:12:21 +1200 (NZST) Subject:Re: [TUHS] Unix clones 's/DNS/DNA/' - Not a problem. Thanks! I'd come across Thoth mentioned in an OS book at the U of Canterbury (NZ) Science Library; they also had a copy of the Tunis book. But I never took the time to read them. Getting them put into a time frame is useful - it gives an external perspective to Salus' book, eg, this is what some non-Unix folk thought of Unix at the time. Wesley Parish Quoting Clem Cole : > s/DNS/DNA/ - dyslexia sucks.... > > On Thu, Apr 6, 2017 at 2:02 PM, Clem Cole wrote: > > > âtry-II sorry about that...â > > > > > > On Wed, Apr 5, 2017 at 9:18 PM, Wesley Parish > > > wrote: > > > >> The mention of UNOS a realtime "clone" of Unix in a recent thread > raises > >> a question for me. How many > >> Unix clones are there? > >> > > > > âAn interesting question.... I'll take a shot at this in a second, > note > > there is a Wikipedia page: > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Unix_ > > variants that I don't fully agree with. > > > > The problem with all of this question is really depends where you > place > > which boundary on the following continuum: > > > > non-unix add-unix ideas trying to be > > unix might as well be unix research unix > > stream > > > > eg VMS eg Domain eg UNOS > > eg Sys V, BSD/386 & Linux Vx & BSD VAX > > > > > > Different people value different things. So here is my take from the > > "cloned" systems I used/was basically aware.... > > > > Idris was a V6 clone for the PDP-11, which I saw 1978ish. I can say I > > was able to recompile code from v6 and it "just worked" so from a > user's > > standpoint it might as well has been. But the compilers and > assemblers > > were different and I never tried anything "hard" > > > > The first attempt to "clone" v7 that I knew about was in France, and > > written in Pascal - I think at Ecole Tech in Paris? The name of the > > project escapes me, but they presented the work in the 1979/80 winter > > USENIX (Blackhole) conference in Denver. There were no proceedings in > > those days. I believe it also ran on the PDP-11, but I never ran it > so; so > > I have no idea how easy it was to move things from Seventh Edition. > But I > > also don't think they were working binary compatibility, so I think > it > > landed more toward the center. > > > > The Cruds folks (Goldberg) wrote UNOS shortly there after (early 80s) > > It was definitely not UNIX although it tried to have be mostly. We > had > > CRDS box at Masscomp and before I arrived they plan had been to use it > get > > code working before the RTU was running. But the truth was it failed > > because it was not UNIX. The 68000 vs Vax issues were far, far less of > an > > issue than UNOS != UNIX. To Goldberg's credit, he did have a couple > of > > cool things in it. I believe only system commercial systems that used > > Kanodia & Reed's Sequences and Eventcounts, were UNOS, Apollo Doman, > and > > Stellar's Stellix (I'm not sure about DG - they might have also at > one > > point). But these were hidden in the kernel. Also the driver model he > > had was different, so there was no gain writing drivers there. > > > > Mike Malcom & Dave Cheriton at Waterloo developed Thoth (Thoth - > Thucks), > > which was written in B, IIRC. Ran on the PDP-11 and was very fast and > > light. It was the first "ukernel" UNIX-like/clone system.. Moving > code > > from V7 was pretty simple and there was attempt to make it good enough > to > > make it easy to move things, but it was not trying to be UNIX so it > was > > somewhere in the middle. > > > > The Tunis folks seem to have been next. This was more in the left > side > > of the page than the right. I think they did make run on the PDP-11, > but > > I'm not so sure how easy it was to move code. If you used their > > concurrent Pascal, I suspect that code moved. But I'm not sure how > easy it > > was to move a raw K&R "White Book" C code. > > > > CMU's Accent (which was redo of Rochester's RIG) came around the same > > time. Like Tunis the system language was an extended Pascal and in > fact > > the target was the triple drip Perq (aka the Pascalto). The C > compiler > > for it was late, and moving code was difficult, the UNIX influence > was > > clear. > > > > Apollo's Aegis/Domain really came next - about 82/83 ish. Like Accent > it > > was written in hacked up Pascal and the command were in > Ratfor/Fortran > > (from the SW Tool User's Group). C showed up reasonably early, but > the > > focus did not start trying to be UNIX. In fact, they were very > > successfully and were getting ISV's to abandon VMS for them at a very > good > > clip. UNIX clearly influenced the system, but it was not trying to be > > UNIX, although moving code from BSD or V7 could be done fairly > easily. > > > > Tannebaum then did MINIX. Other than 8086 vs PDP-11-ism, it was a > pretty > > darned good clone. You could recompile and most things pretty much > "just > > worked." He did not support ptrace and few other calls, but as a basic > V7 > > system running on a pure PDP PC, it was remarkably clean. It also had > a > > large number of languages and it was a great teaching system - which > is > > what Andy created it be. A problem was that UNIX had moved on by the > > time Andy released it. So BSD & V8 were now pretty much the definition > of > > "UNIX" - large address spaces were needed. As were the BSD tools > > extensions, such as vi, csh. Also UUCP was now very much in the > thing, > > and while it was a pure v7 clone, it was the lack of "tools" that made > it > > not a good system to "use" and it's deficiencies out weighed the > value. > > Plus as discussed elsewhere, BSD/386 would appear. > > > > Steve Ward's crew at MIT created TRIX, which was a UNIX-like, > although > > instead of everything being a file, everything was a process. This > was > > supposed to be the system that rms was originally going to use for > GNU, but > > I never knew what happened. Noel might. I thought it was a cool > system, > > although it was a mono-kernel and around this time, most of the OS > research > > had gone ukernel happy. > > > > Coherent was announcement and its provenance is questioned, although > as > > discussed was eventually released from the AT&T official inquiry and > you > > can look it your self. It was clearly a V7 clone for the PC and was > more > > complete than Minix. I also think they supported the 386 fairly > quickly, > > which may have made it more interesting from a commercial standpoint. > It > > also had more of the BSD tools available than Minix did when it was > first > > released. > > > > CMU rewrites Accent to create Mach, but this time splices the BSD > kernel > > inside of it so that the 4.1BSD binaries "just work." So it's bit > UNIX > > and a new system all in one. So which is it? This system would begat > > OSF/1 and eventually become Apple's Mac OS? I think its UNIX, but one > can > > claim its not either.... > > > > By this point in time the explosion occurs. You have Lion's book, > Andy's > > and Maury Bach's book on the street. he genie is clearly out of the > bottle, > > and there is a ton of code out there and the DNS is getting all mixed > up. > > Doug Comer does Xinu, Sheraton does V-kernel, Thoth is rewritten to > become > > QNX, and a host of others I have not repeated. BSD's CSRG group would > > break up, BSDi would be created and their 386 code come out. It was > > clearly "might as well be" if it was not. Soon, Linus would start > with > > Minix and the rest is history on the generic line. > > > > Clem > > > > > "I have supposed that he who buys a Method means to learn it." - Ferdinand Sor, Method for Guitar "A verbal contract isn't worth the paper it's written on." -- Samuel Goldwyn -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: