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From: fair-tuhs@netbsd.org (Erik E. Fair)
Subject: [TUHS] Were all of you.. Hippies?
Date: Thu, 23 Mar 2017 22:37:17 -0700	[thread overview]
Message-ID: <2595.1490333837@cesium.clock.org> (raw)
In-Reply-To: <CAD-qYGrpzBxBGKrnDn8eokhO2CAaoUC8Xo=QpXZdNizyh9RYbQ@mail.gmail.com>

Andrew,
	I'm a fan of Plan 9's elegance and clean design, but beware of the limitations of the abstractions you choose. One place that files and connections don't work cleanly is in actual datagram networking. You can do TCP easily, but UDP and especially broadcast/multicast make a hash of the abstraction. That's how you end up with sendto(2), sendmsg(2), recvfrom(2), recvmsg(2).

One could also point to the seemingly endless number of ioctl(2) commands as a failure of the file abstraction to encompass all the necessary service elements - hence that escape mechanism.

This is the wonder and the problem of Turing machines: they can do almost anything - so what functions and services do you expose, and what do you hide? What is most useful to a large enough group of software developers and users that your model will be accepted, used, supported by contribution, and perhaps lauded?

Whenever we want total control, we can always revert to assembly and/or machine language. Or beach sand.

	Erik Fair


  parent reply	other threads:[~2017-03-24  5:37 UTC|newest]

Thread overview: 90+ messages / expand[flat|nested]  mbox.gz  Atom feed  top
2017-03-20 21:48 Steffen Nurpmeso
2017-03-20 22:10 ` Dave Horsfall
2017-03-20 22:32   ` Ron Natalie
2017-03-20 23:05     ` ron minnich
2017-03-21  2:51       ` Nick Downing
2017-03-21 20:28       ` Josh Good
2017-03-23 20:18         ` Michael Parson
2017-03-23 20:51           ` ron minnich
2017-03-24  0:18             ` Josh Good
2017-03-24  0:27               ` Larry McVoy
2017-03-24  1:03                 ` ron minnich
2017-03-24  1:05                   ` Larry McVoy
2017-03-24  2:33                   ` Andrew Warkentin
2017-03-24  5:17                     ` Random832
2017-03-24  5:37                     ` Erik E. Fair [this message]
2017-03-24 13:33                       ` Random832
     [not found]                     ` <20170324034915.GA23802@mcvoy.com>
2017-03-25  0:41                       ` Andrew Warkentin
2017-03-25  5:01                         ` Random832
2017-03-25 12:48                           ` Andrew Warkentin
2017-03-24  5:14                   ` Random832
2017-03-24  6:06                     ` ron minnich
2017-03-25  0:02                       ` Dave Horsfall
2017-03-25  0:42                         ` Toby Thain
2017-03-24  7:23                     ` shawn wilson
2017-03-24 23:55                       ` Josh Good
2017-03-25  3:55                         ` ron minnich
2017-03-25  4:52                           ` Steve Johnson
2017-03-25 13:48                             ` Jason Stevens
2017-03-25 18:51                           ` Clem Cole
2017-03-25 22:26                           ` Josh Good
2017-03-26  2:52                             ` Clem Cole
2017-03-24 10:21                   ` Tim Bradshaw
2017-03-24 13:55                     ` Random832
2017-03-24 14:53                       ` Tim Bradshaw
2017-03-24  2:33                 ` Dan Cross
2017-03-24  3:53                 ` Clem Cole
2017-03-24  7:15                 ` shawn wilson
2017-03-24  7:37                   ` Kurt H Maier
2017-03-24  8:06                     ` shawn wilson
2017-03-24 15:22                       ` Dan Cross
     [not found]                         ` <CALMnNGj6jcM5E1jJtxSnhnyQPBV7Hn4B06=tm1vv0TfKV=Bs1A@mail.gmail.com>
2017-03-24 22:09                           ` Dan Cross
2017-03-24 15:34                       ` Chet Ramey
2017-03-24 15:30                     ` Chet Ramey
2017-03-24 17:09                       ` Kurt H Maier
2017-03-20 23:08     ` Dave Horsfall
2017-03-21  0:10       ` Dan Cross
2017-03-21  2:09         ` Dave Horsfall
2017-03-22 12:50     ` Tim Bradshaw
2017-03-22 15:27       ` Dave Horsfall
2017-03-20 22:17 Noel Chiappa
2017-03-21 12:19 ` Steffen Nurpmeso
2017-03-21 12:48 ` arnold
2017-03-21 13:29 ` Jason Stevens
2017-03-23 10:13   ` Steffen Nurpmeso
2017-03-23 12:08     ` Jason Stevens
2017-03-20 23:28 Doug McIlroy
     [not found] ` <CAH_OBifeRyD__=TKTa=bMtFBMg9LsrCOyB+sSrO54Ezc-+zJbw@mail.gmail.com>
2017-03-21  1:24   ` shawn wilson
2017-03-21 16:20     ` Ron Natalie
2017-03-21  1:45 ` Derrik Walker v2.0
2017-03-22 17:49 Noel Chiappa
2017-03-22 22:35 ` Nick Downing
2017-03-23  8:56   ` shawn wilson
2017-03-23 13:13     ` Chet Ramey
2017-03-23 14:00   ` Tim Bradshaw
2017-03-23 16:22 Noel Chiappa
2017-03-23 23:40 ` Wesley Parish
2017-03-24 13:41 Noel Chiappa
2017-03-26  1:16 Noel Chiappa
2017-03-26  1:35 Noel Chiappa
2017-03-26  1:45 ` Kurt H Maier
     [not found]   ` <CAH1jEzb=ZzPMT6YWg9pbR4T=s_ckB4YFsBJnefj8AEatdBY_MQ@mail.gmail.com>
2017-03-26  4:46     ` Nick Downing
2017-03-26  2:49 ` ron minnich
2017-03-26  3:01 ` Andrew Warkentin
2017-03-26  3:11 Noel Chiappa
2017-03-26  3:17 ` Andrew Warkentin
2017-03-26  3:21 ` Kurt H Maier
2017-03-26  3:49 ` Dan Cross
2017-03-26  3:55 ` ron minnich
2017-03-26 16:26 ` Lyndon Nerenberg
2017-03-26 16:40   ` Larry McVoy
2017-03-26 18:35     ` Steve Simon
2017-03-26 20:05     ` Andy Kosela
2017-03-26  3:32 Noel Chiappa
2017-03-26  3:51 ` Dan Cross
2017-03-26 11:31   ` Ron Natalie
2017-03-26 22:06     ` Larry McVoy
2017-03-26 23:29       ` Wesley Parish
2017-03-27  4:20     ` Dave Horsfall
2017-03-26  4:31 ` Warner Losh
2017-03-27  3:36 Doug McIlroy

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