29 Apr
2005
29 Apr
'05
5:59 p.m.
From: Jerry Peek <jpeek(a)jpeek.com>
To: tuhs(a)minnie.tuhs.org
Date: Thu, 28 Apr 2005 09:50:21 -0700
Subject: [TUHS] Mention TUHS in Linux Magazine (US)?
Hi everyone. I'm a short-time UNIX user (I started in 1981 :)
and also a columnist for Linux Magazine (in the US: not the UK
flavour). I just came across TUHS while I was searching for a
V7 cp(1) manpage. (I found it, BTW, via Warren Toomey's page
http://mirror.cc.vt.edu/pub/projects/Ancient_Unix/Documentation/PUPS/manpag….)
I'm writing a series of columns on "What's GNU in Old Utilities".
It describes new features of GNU utilities like cat(1) and
contrasts them to "how we used to do it." I'd like to mention
TUHS in the third column, which should be out in August. It
seems that TUHS is alive and well. If any of you have comments
or complaints about that idea, though, would you please let me
know before May 1 -- which is when the column is due? Thanks.
More power to you. Just keep a sharp eye out for things that
are touted as "new improved GNU features" that have been around
since the days of 6th Edition or 7th Edition Unix.
carl
--
carl lowenstein marine physical lab u.c. san diego
clowenst(a)ucsd.edu
29 Apr
29 Apr
7:10 p.m.
New subject: Mention TUHS in Linux Magazine (US)?
On Fri, 29 Apr 2005 10:59:21 -0700, Carl Lowenstein wrote:
More power to you. Just keep a sharp eye out for
things that
are touted as "new improved GNU features" that have been around
since the days of 6th Edition or 7th Edition Unix.
Thanks for that wise advice, Carl. I actually started on a VAX
running 4.1 BSD, so I'm not always clear about what's real. ;-)
I've been checking manpages online and trying to keep it straight.
While I'm at it, I wanted to say thanks to Tim Newsham for
reminding me of the paper "Program design in the UNIX environment"
(at http://plan9.bell-labs.com/cm/cs/doc/84/kp.ps.gz) and to Dennis
for his home page (http://plan9.bell-labs.com/who/dmr/index.html --
which I found, BTW, on Tim's "Links" page). Both of them have lots
of fascinating and useful info that took me way back from my GUI
GNU-ey ;-) environment. I've sat here for a couple of hours,
reading and thinking. I'll work this into my August column --
set off in a sidebar or some way to call attention to it.
Today's Linux users need to read and understand this stuff.
It was a great reminder for me. Thanks again, everyone.
Jerry
30 Apr
30 Apr
1:19 a.m.
New subject: Mention TUHS in Linux Magazine (US)?
On Friday 29 April 2005 15:10, Jerry Peek enlightened us thusly:
On Fri, 29 Apr 2005 10:59:21 -0700, Carl Lowenstein
wrote:
I quite agree. I started with some SVR3 UNIX but wound up using
Linux because it was free and worked with the hardware I had at
the time. It's a constant source of pleasure to work with the old
UNIX hands around my shop and learn what my roots are. I even
have some books around here with Jerry Peek's name on them... :-)
Kurt
More power to you. Just keep a sharp eye out for
things that
are touted as "new improved GNU features" that have been around
since the days of 6th Edition or 7th Edition Unix.
Thanks for that wise advice, Carl. I actually started on a VAX
running 4.1 BSD, so I'm not always clear about what's real. ;-)
I've been checking manpages online and trying to keep it straight.
While I'm at it, I wanted to say thanks to Tim Newsham for
reminding me of the paper "Program design in the UNIX environment"
(at http://plan9.bell-labs.com/cm/cs/doc/84/kp.ps.gz) and to Dennis
for his home page (http://plan9.bell-labs.com/who/dmr/index.html --
which I found, BTW, on Tim's "Links" page). Both of them have lots
of fascinating and useful info that took me way back from my GUI
GNU-ey ;-) environment. I've sat here for a couple of hours,
reading and thinking. I'll work this into my August column --
set off in a sidebar or some way to call attention to it.
Today's Linux users need to read and understand this stuff.
It was a great reminder for me. Thanks again, everyone. 
7:31 a.m.
New subject: Mention TUHS in Linux Magazine (US)?
And, FWIW, in one of the few GNUs Bulletins I actually have received, courtesy
of the FSF, RMS (I think) was advising that with the dropping price in
memory, GNU hackers could do without worrying about memory size, when it came
to replicating Unix utilities..
So perhaps that is a point to be taken into consideration? I know in some
respects FreeBSD - the only *BSD I've ever gotten around to installing -
comes across as smaller and faster than Linux. I hate to think of SysVRx -
everything I have read about that series of OSes said it was bloated, and the
SCO SysVR3 I learnt Unix on felt somewhat clumsier than Linux when I first
got it. But that's the result of Bash being nicer than sh to a 4DOS user.
Hope this is useful.
Wesley Parish
On Sat, 30 Apr 2005 05:59, Carl Lowenstein wrote:
--
Clinersterton beademung, with all of love - RIP James Blish
-----
Mau e ki, he aha te mea nui?
You ask, what is the most important thing?
Maku e ki, he tangata, he tangata, he tangata.
I reply, it is people, it is people, it is people.
From: Jerry
Peek <jpeek(a)jpeek.com>
To: tuhs(a)minnie.tuhs.org
Date: Thu, 28 Apr 2005 09:50:21 -0700
Subject: [TUHS] Mention TUHS in Linux Magazine (US)?
Hi everyone. I'm a short-time UNIX user (I started in 1981 :)
and also a columnist for Linux Magazine (in the US: not the UK
flavour). I just came across TUHS while I was searching for a
V7 cp(1) manpage. (I found it, BTW, via Warren Toomey's page
http://mirror.cc.vt.edu/pub/projects/Ancient_Unix/Documentation/PUPS/manp
ages.html.)
I'm writing a series of columns on "What's GNU in Old Utilities".
It describes new features of GNU utilities like cat(1) and
contrasts them to "how we used to do it." I'd like to mention
TUHS in the third column, which should be out in August. It
seems that TUHS is alive and well. If any of you have comments
or complaints about that idea, though, would you please let me
know before May 1 -- which is when the column is due? Thanks.
More power to you. Just keep a sharp eye out for things that
are touted as "new improved GNU features" that have been around
since the days of 6th Edition or 7th Edition Unix.
carl 
11:35 a.m.
New subject: Mention TUHS in Linux Magazine (US)?
Wes Parish wrote:
was advising that with the dropping price in memory,
GNU hackers could
do without worrying about memory size, when it came to replicating
Unix utilities..
I sometimes make fun of the strings of #ifdefs and huge size in source
of the GNU utilities, but I've never made (to take a utility that is
simple and takes few if any options) GNU pwd dump core. I have succesfully
made many commercial Unix implementations of "pwd" dump core!
Tim.
6:28 p.m.
New subject: Mention TUHS in Linux Magazine (US)?
On 30 April 2005 at 19:31, Wesley Parish <wes.parish(a)paradise.net.nz> wrote:
And, FWIW, in one of the few GNUs Bulletins I actually
have received, courtesy
of the FSF, RMS (I think) was advising that with the dropping price in
memory, GNU hackers could do without worrying about memory size, when it came
to replicating Unix utilities..
That's been on my mind as I thought back to my days on VAXen
with 100 users logged on and a load average of 30. Back then,
efficient programming was so very important. Now, when the GNU
"cp" has more than 20 options -- and some of those with several
possible arguments -- one side of me thinks how bloated the GNU
utilities seem. But, on the other hand, one of the things I'm
doing in this series of columns is to compare "how we used to
do it" vs. the usefulness of some of the new features. For
instance, back then we could copy a directory tree recursively
with "tar" or "find", carefully handling devices and etc. along
the way. Now we can do the same thing by typing a cp command
with a couple of options. With powerful machines on our desks,
which sort of "efficiency" do we want these days?
I'm not trying to answer that question! I'm trying to show
things in a balanced way and leave it to the reader to decide.
This has been debated and discussed so much over the years
that I can't shed any new light on it. I just want readers to
keep it in mind, think about where we've been and where we are.
Jerry
1 May
1 May
8:21 a.m.
New subject: Mention TUHS in Linux Magazine (US)?
Again, FWIW, I've successfully - with the expenditure of a good long period of
time - transferred an 80GB file system from one hard drive to another using
the GNU cp - I didn't read enough of the man page though, and missed out on
the -p switch to preserve my ownership on the files - I had to return the
entire 80 GB to my ownership manually ... ;) God, I felt like the Prize
Dork!
But it did the massive job without blinking an eyelid, over the three or so
hours it took to do it. It's good stuff. Just massive itself.
Wesley Parish
On Sun, 01 May 2005 06:28, Jerry Peek wrote:
On 30 April 2005 at 19:31, Wesley Parish
<wes.parish(a)paradise.net.nz> wrote:
--
Clinersterton beademung, with all of love - RIP James Blish
-----
Mau e ki, he aha te mea nui?
You ask, what is the most important thing?
Maku e ki, he tangata, he tangata, he tangata.
I reply, it is people, it is people, it is people.
And, FWIW, in one of the few GNUs Bulletins I
actually have received,
courtesy of the FSF, RMS (I think) was advising that with the dropping
price in memory, GNU hackers could do without worrying about memory size,
when it came to replicating Unix utilities..
That's been on my mind as I thought back to my days on VAXen
with 100 users logged on and a load average of 30. Back then,
efficient programming was so very important. Now, when the GNU
"cp" has more than 20 options -- and some of those with several
possible arguments -- one side of me thinks how bloated the GNU
utilities seem. But, on the other hand, one of the things I'm
doing in this series of columns is to compare "how we used to
do it" vs. the usefulness of some of the new features. For
instance, back then we could copy a directory tree recursively
with "tar" or "find", carefully handling devices and etc. along
the way. Now we can do the same thing by typing a cp command
with a couple of options. With powerful machines on our desks,
which sort of "efficiency" do we want these days?
I'm not trying to answer that question! I'm trying to show
things in a balanced way and leave it to the reader to decide.
This has been debated and discussed so much over the years
that I can't shed any new light on it. I just want readers to
keep it in mind, think about where we've been and where we are.
Jerry
_______________________________________________
TUHS mailing list
TUHS(a)minnie.tuhs.org
http://minnie.tuhs.org/mailman/listinfo/tuhs 
9 May
9 May
8:41 a.m.
New subject: Sad news from IBM...
I was reading Groklaw yesterday night when I came across this. It is a
very sad thought to know that possibly tons of old/ancient code is being
dumped in the trash bin.
More so now since the advent of software patents: it may become very
difficult to avoid a patent on a re-invention of the wheel if previous
knowledge has been dumped.
OK, the quote. It is from "the Todd Shaughnessy affidavit [PDF] from IBM
that Magistrate Judge Brooke Wells requested they file when they turned
over all the code and paperwork to SCO":
28. As I have noted above, IBM does not maintain revision control
information for AIX source code pre-dating 1991. To the extent that
any code for the AIX operating system (that did not duplicate the
code already being produced in CMVC) was found during the search
described in Paragraph 26-27 above, it was produced. Paragraphs
29-31 below describe additional search efforts IBM undertook to
locate pre-1991 versions of AIX code. No versions of AIX pre-dating
1991 were found.
29. In the 1980s and early 1990s, IBM prepared vital records backups
of AIX source code and transferred them to a remote storage location.
At some point in the 1990s, the AIX vital records tapes were transferred
to Austin, Texas. In late 2000, the tapes were determined to be obsolete,
and were not retained.
30. The AIX development organization contacted other IBM employees who
were known or believed to have been involved with the development or
product release of AIX versions prior to 1991. In addition, IBM
managers and attorneys asked current members of the AIX development
organization whether they were aware of the location of pre-1991
releases of AIX source code. No one asked was aware of any remaining
copies of pre-1991 AIX source code.
Perhaps we should do something to raise awareness about the relevance of
legacy (not only UNIX) source code. And in any case, it is a pity that all
that historical information had been lost forever.
I have always complained about this, and consider it the biggest drawback of
closed proprietary source code: it is OK that law protects developer interests
with the goal of promoting innovation and the public benefit at large. But it
is a lose for everybody whenever any such "protected" code is dumped into the
bin banning anyone else from further benefitting from or exploiting it, and
opening the road for opportunists to claim they "newly invented" it.
Sic. Sigh.
j
6926
days inactive
6936
days old
7 comments
6 participants
participants (6)
-
Carl Lowenstein -
J. R. Valverde -
Jerry Peek -
Kurt Wall -
shoppa＠trailing-edge.com -
Wesley Parish