[TUHS] 4.3BSD-Tahoe Restoration

[Will Senn]

On 10/4/21 12:22 PM, Henry Bent wrote:
> My question is: how was this sort of thing done in the real world?  If 
> I was a site running stock 4.3BSD, would I have received (or been able 
> to request) updated tapes at regular intervals?  The replacement 
> process that I have been using is fairly labor intensive and on a real 
> VAX would have been very time intensive too.  Fortunately two to three 
> years' worth of changes were not so drastic that I ever found myself 
> in a position where the existing tools were not able to compile pieces 
> of Tahoe that I needed to proceed, but I could easily imagine finding 
> myself in such a place.  (This was, by the way, what I ran into when 
> attempting to upgrade from 2.9BSD to 2.10BSD, despite a fully 
> documented contemporary upgrade procedure).

Hi Henry,

I expect folks who actually ran this can weigh in with the 'real world' 
perspective. What I can offer is that the document entitled, "Installing 
and Operating 4.3BSD-tahoe UNIX* on the VAX" by the folks doing the 
release (CSRG) is probably canonical:

http://blog.livedoor.jp/suzanhud/BSD/4.3BSD_Tahoe_VAX.pdf

There's a section on migrating 4.2/4.3 to tahoe and the like. After it's 
up and running, it looks a little shy on details, but getting there 
seems well enough documented. If it's anything like 1bsd+, it seems like 
it was usually unpack and copy to the right locations, with the 
occasional compile with the right options thrown in.

Will