[TUHS] Richard Stevens

[TUHS] Richard Stevens

[wojciech]

Hello everyone,

I'm Wojciech Adam Koszek and I'm a new member here. After a short stint with Red Hat 6.0 and Slackware Linux around 2000-2001 (I think it was Slackware 7.0 or 7.1) my journey with UNIX started with FreeBSD 4.5. I fell in love with BSD and through Warner Losh, Robert Watson, and folks from a Polish UNIX scene, I became hooked. I ended up working with FreeBSD for the following 15 years or so.

Anyway: the volume of the UNIX literature back then in Poland was scarce, yet through a small bookstore and a friendly salesman I got myself a "UNIX Network Programming Volume 1" at a huge discount, and read it back-to-back. 

Looking back, his books had a huge impact on my life (I had all his books, and read everything line by line, with a slight exception of TCP/IP illustrated vol 2, which I used as a reference), and while Stevens's website sheds some light on what he did, I often wonder what is the story behind how his books came to be. It doesn't help he appeared a very private person--never have I seen a photo of him anywhere.

What was the reception of his books in the US?

Did you know him? Do you know any more details about what he did after 1990?

Thanks and take care,

Wojciech Adam Koszek

Re: [TUHS] Richard Stevens

[Adam Thornton]

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The Richard Stevens books were huge here.  I did not know him well but
emailed with him a few times in the year before he died.  I never met him
in person but he was very kind to a much younger and more ignorant me.

On Sun, Mar 7, 2021 at 7:21 PM wojciech@koszek.com <wojciech@koszek.com>
wrote:

> Hello everyone,
>
> I'm Wojciech Adam Koszek and I'm a new member here. After a short stint
> with Red Hat 6.0 and Slackware Linux around 2000-2001 (I think it was
> Slackware 7.0 or 7.1) my journey with UNIX started with FreeBSD 4.5. I fell
> in love with BSD and through Warner Losh, Robert Watson, and folks from a
> Polish UNIX scene, I became hooked. I ended up working with FreeBSD for the
> following 15 years or so.
>
> Anyway: the volume of the UNIX literature back then in Poland was scarce,
> yet through a small bookstore and a friendly salesman I got myself a "UNIX
> Network Programming Volume 1" at a huge discount, and read it back-to-back.
>
> Looking back, his books had a huge impact on my life (I had all his books,
> and read everything line by line, with a slight exception of TCP/IP
> illustrated vol 2, which I used as a reference), and while Stevens's
> website sheds some light on what he did, I often wonder what is the story
> behind how his books came to be. It doesn't help he appeared a very private
> person--never have I seen a photo of him anywhere.
>
> What was the reception of his books in the US?
>
> Did you know him? Do you know any more details about what he did after
> 1990?
>
> Thanks and take care,
>
> Wojciech Adam Koszek

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Re: [TUHS] Richard Stevens

[Larry McVoy]

I became troff buddies with him.  I love troff and all the other tools,
pic especially because you can read pic code and see the picture in your
head.  Richard and I shared that love for pic.  He and I talked quite a 
bit about how to do stuff in troff.  Troff buddies is the best way to
describe what we had, we bonded over that but I wasn't close to him 
otherwise.  Still miss him and our troff exchanges, he was a great 
guy, those books were the best in their day.

He was a lot like Dennis, willing to talk to you and educate you if you
had a clue.

On Sun, Mar 07, 2021 at 07:23:55PM -0700, Adam Thornton wrote:
> The Richard Stevens books were huge here.  I did not know him well but
> emailed with him a few times in the year before he died.  I never met him
> in person but he was very kind to a much younger and more ignorant me.
> 
> On Sun, Mar 7, 2021 at 7:21 PM wojciech@koszek.com <wojciech@koszek.com>
> wrote:
> 
> > Hello everyone,
> >
> > I'm Wojciech Adam Koszek and I'm a new member here. After a short stint
> > with Red Hat 6.0 and Slackware Linux around 2000-2001 (I think it was
> > Slackware 7.0 or 7.1) my journey with UNIX started with FreeBSD 4.5. I fell
> > in love with BSD and through Warner Losh, Robert Watson, and folks from a
> > Polish UNIX scene, I became hooked. I ended up working with FreeBSD for the
> > following 15 years or so.
> >
> > Anyway: the volume of the UNIX literature back then in Poland was scarce,
> > yet through a small bookstore and a friendly salesman I got myself a "UNIX
> > Network Programming Volume 1" at a huge discount, and read it back-to-back.
> >
> > Looking back, his books had a huge impact on my life (I had all his books,
> > and read everything line by line, with a slight exception of TCP/IP
> > illustrated vol 2, which I used as a reference), and while Stevens's
> > website sheds some light on what he did, I often wonder what is the story
> > behind how his books came to be. It doesn't help he appeared a very private
> > person--never have I seen a photo of him anywhere.
> >
> > What was the reception of his books in the US?
> >
> > Did you know him? Do you know any more details about what he did after
> > 1990?
> >
> > Thanks and take care,
> >
> > Wojciech Adam Koszek

-- 
---
Larry McVoy            	     lm at mcvoy.com             http://www.mcvoy.com/lm 

Re: [TUHS] Richard Stevens

[joe mcguckin]

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Speaking of PIC: What’s the worst example of PIC abuse you know of? The one that immediately comes to mind is an example I saw at Tolerant (an 80’s era multi-processor
computer company).


The board diagrams, e.g the outline diagram of the printed circuit card with the outlines of each IC and it’s label, AND the artwork of the board edge connectors and switches (DB25, pushbuttone, etc).
It looked like it was created by an artist in Ink. But of course, it was done in PIC!


Joe McGuckin
ViaNet Communications

joe@via.net
650-207-0372 cell
650-213-1302 office
650-969-2124 fax



> On Mar 7, 2021, at 6:37 PM, Larry McVoy <lm@mcvoy.com> wrote:
> 
> I became troff buddies with him.  I love troff and all the other tools,
> pic especially because you can read pic code and see the picture in your
> head.  Richard and I shared that love for pic.  He and I talked quite a 
> bit about how to do stuff in troff.  Troff buddies is the best way to
> describe what we had, we bonded over that but I wasn't close to him 
> otherwise.  Still miss him and our troff exchanges, he was a great 
> guy, those books were the best in their day.
> 
> He was a lot like Dennis, willing to talk to you and educate you if you
> had a clue.
> 
> On Sun, Mar 07, 2021 at 07:23:55PM -0700, Adam Thornton wrote:
>> The Richard Stevens books were huge here.  I did not know him well but
>> emailed with him a few times in the year before he died.  I never met him
>> in person but he was very kind to a much younger and more ignorant me.
>> 
>> On Sun, Mar 7, 2021 at 7:21 PM wojciech@koszek.com <wojciech@koszek.com>
>> wrote:
>> 
>>> Hello everyone,
>>> 
>>> I'm Wojciech Adam Koszek and I'm a new member here. After a short stint
>>> with Red Hat 6.0 and Slackware Linux around 2000-2001 (I think it was
>>> Slackware 7.0 or 7.1) my journey with UNIX started with FreeBSD 4.5. I fell
>>> in love with BSD and through Warner Losh, Robert Watson, and folks from a
>>> Polish UNIX scene, I became hooked. I ended up working with FreeBSD for the
>>> following 15 years or so.
>>> 
>>> Anyway: the volume of the UNIX literature back then in Poland was scarce,
>>> yet through a small bookstore and a friendly salesman I got myself a "UNIX
>>> Network Programming Volume 1" at a huge discount, and read it back-to-back.
>>> 
>>> Looking back, his books had a huge impact on my life (I had all his books,
>>> and read everything line by line, with a slight exception of TCP/IP
>>> illustrated vol 2, which I used as a reference), and while Stevens's
>>> website sheds some light on what he did, I often wonder what is the story
>>> behind how his books came to be. It doesn't help he appeared a very private
>>> person--never have I seen a photo of him anywhere.
>>> 
>>> What was the reception of his books in the US?
>>> 
>>> Did you know him? Do you know any more details about what he did after
>>> 1990?
>>> 
>>> Thanks and take care,
>>> 
>>> Wojciech Adam Koszek
> 
> -- 
> ---
> Larry McVoy            	     lm at mcvoy.com             http://www.mcvoy.com/lm 


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