Reno (was Re: What *was* the Tahoe?)

[Michael Sokolov]

   Tim Shoppa <SHOPPA at trailing-edge.com> writes:
> That's useful.  The Tahoe-specific documentation also mentions
> the Harris HCX-7, the Unisys 7000/40, and ICL Clan 7 - were
> these in any way compatible with the Tahoe, or just "other"
> ports?
   
   Well, they have to be compatible somehow, since the same BSD tape was
used for all of them. Actually, there is much more to it. The Tahoe
architecture was specifically designed for BSD. CCI first made a vendor
release for their machines, kinda like SunOS and Ultrix, based on 4.2BSD.
Then some time after the 4.3BSD release CSRG designed to integrate CCI's
changes into the mainstream BSD tree. The result was named 4.3BSD-Tahoe.
What's interesting is that 4.3BSD-Tahoe does not have any bootblocks for
the Tahoe architecture, and the documentation often refers to the BSD
kernels being loaded by the system ROM on Tahoe. As you can imagine, having
the system ROM load your OS's kernels is one hell of a requirement, and the
Harris and Unisys machines would have to REALLY compatible with the CCI for
this to work. My guess would be that they were identical clones, just like
the PC clones that run unmodified PC-DOS.
   
> And where does "Reno" come from, while we're at it?
   
   If I'm not mistaken, there is a city somewhere on the west side of the
U.S. called Tahoe/Reno. The BSD developers probably thought "OK, we already
have Tahoe, let's have Reno too." Reno also probably stands for
"renovation", although IMHO sawing the branch you are sitting on is pretty
damn stupid and certainly doesn't qualify as "renovation".
   
   Sincerely,
   Michael Sokolov
   Phone: 440-449-0299 (Home) 216-217-2579 (Cellular)
   ARPA Internet SMTP mail: mxs46 at k2.scl.cwru.edu

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