TUHS

tuhs@tuhs.org

17 participants
6470 discussions

by Rudi Blom

The spell check in 'cd' commands I remember from SCO UNIX 3.2 The 'sh' manual page has Spelling checker When using cd(C) the shell checks spelling. For example, if you change to a different directory using cd and misspell the directory name, the shell responds with an alternative spelling of an existing directory. Enter ``y'' and press <Return> (or just press <Return>) to change to the offered directory. If the offered spelling is incorrect, enter ``n'', then retype the command line. In this example the sh(C) response is boldfaced: $ cd /usr/spol/uucp cd /usr/spool/uucp?y ok Cheers, uncle rubl >Date: Mon, 04 Jan 2021 02:08:09 -0700 >From: arnold(a)skeeve.com >To: m.douglas.mcilroy(a)dartmouth.edu, egbegb2(a)gmail.com >Cc: tuhs(a)tuhs.org >Subject: Re: [TUHS] Question >Message-ID: <202101040908.104989TF022830(a)freefriends.org> >Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii > >The spelling corrector in the shell rings vague bell. I think >it's in the 8th or 9th edition Bourne shell. You should be able to >find those in the archives. > >Geoff Collyer has a modern port of the V9 shell at >http://www.collyer.net/who/geoff/v9sh.tar. > >HTH, .> >Arnold

4 years, 3 months

Re: [TUHS] Question

by M Douglas McIlroy

> I was a BTL person for 8 years between 1976 and 1984. During > that time there was a spelling corrector that was better than > anything I see today. There was a concept of "spelling distance" > that corrected a whole bunch of stuff that even today cannot be > corrected. > Who in that era worked on spelling correction at BTL. I was at > Columbus BTL (1976-1979) and Whippany BTL (1979-1984). Peter Nelson made an interface to spell(1) that showed putative errors in context. I believe it could suggest corrections. I remember the project; I installed hooks for it in spell(1). I don't remember the date, but it would probably not have been early enough for you to have used it in Columbus. If there's a chance that Peter's program is the one you remember and you'd like to get in touch with him, I can give you his email address. Doug

4 years, 3 months

The "File Store" at mid 1970's Murray Hill

by Paul Ruizendaal

Sandy Fraser was kind enough to share some papers from his archive that give further background to early networking at Bell Labs. One of these is about the “File Store”. For context I refer to an article that Sandy wrote back in 1975 and describes the network setup at Murray Hill at that time: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1_kg4CEsbGucsU8-jxi0ptfUdsznWcKWm/view?usp=… In the figure and legenda at the bottom of page 52/53, the "File Store" is item 10. The File Store paper itself is (temporarily) here: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1AhLmjJcHXFtfoIUlfvl0bzbB0zSPzpSq/view?usp=… The paper has a very interesting introduction: “Five machines currently use the file store. Three of them use it as if were a peripheral device not part of their main backing store. In these cases there exists programs to transmit complete files between the user’s machine and the file store." This was known and Noel Chiappa found the source for the main transfer program “nfs” (this program is also mentioned in Doug McIllroy’s manual compendium): https://chiselapp.com/user/pnr/repository/Spider/tree?ci=tip The introduction continues: “In the other two cases the file store is treated as an extension of the user machine’s backing store. Once a user has opened a file his program does reads, writes, and seeks without being aware of the file’s actual location.” This -- to me at least -- is a new fact and as such it would predate various other projects for a distributed Unix file system (the paper is dated December 1974). Unfortunately, the paper is short on how the integration was achieved. On one hand the work may have been related to "Peripheral Unix” as developed by Heinz Lycklama (https://www.tuhs.org/Archive/Documentation/TechReports/Heinz_Tech_Memos/TM-…) at the same time -- the memos are dated just a month apart. In essence the approach is to forward system calls over the network 1). Another possibility is that it worked much like the 1979 “RIDE” system (https://www.computer.org/csdl/proceedings-article/cmpsac/1979/00762533/12Om…) Here there is a modified C library that recognises certain path names and maps these to file server calls. A third possibility is that it was a precursor to the work on distributed Unix by Luderer et al. in 1980/81 (https://dl.acm.org/doi/abs/10.1145/1067627.806604) Here file system calls are redirected at the kernel level using the concept of a remote/forwarding inode. The File Store paper mentions that the server is a modified Unix. At first glance it would seem that the modifications are modest, with the file system partly rewritten to account for storage usage, and an automatic backup feature added. I am much interested in any recollections, insights and materials about these topics. Many thanks in advance, Paul Note 1) The tech report on the “high speed serial loop” (the Weller loop) has not surfaced yet, but the document for the Glance terminal gives a quick, high level overview on page 3/4: https://www.tuhs.org/Archive/Documentation/TechReports/Heinz_Tech_Memos/TM-… The recent 516 documents include a detailed description of how it worked: https://www.tuhs.org/Archive/Documentation/Other/516-TSS/516-10-11-12-Ring-…

4 years, 3 months

Question

by Ed Bradford

I was a BTL person for 8 years between 1976 and 1984. During that time there was a spelling corrector that was better than anything I see today. There was a concept of "spelling distance" that corrected a whole bunch of stuff that even today cannot be corrected. Who in that era worked on spelling correction at BTL. I was at Columbus BTL (1976-1979) and Whippany BTL (1979-1984). Who ever did that stuff should patent it and sell it. Today there is nothing like it. -- Advice is judged by results, not by intentions. Cicero

4 years, 3 months

Reviving the Research Unix speak(6) program

by Diomidis Spinellis

Happy new year to all! Over the holidays I found some time to port the recovered version of speak(6) to modern Unix systems and make its output compatible with the espeak system. The resulting sound is barely intelligible. I assume this is due to the imperfect matching between the speak and espeak phonemes. The process's details are available at https://www.spinellis.gr/blog/20210102#tu and the code at https://github.com/dspinellis/speak. Diomidis

4 years, 3 months

Re: [TUHS] G.W.R. Luderer

by Brian Walden

His autobiography, Go West, Young German! states it is luderer at asu.edu -- but that was published a decade ago. Paul Ruizendaal (pnr at planet.nl) wrote: > > I am looking for some more background on the 1980/81 "S/F-Unix" system. > > Gottfried W. R. Luderer, H. Che, J. P. Haggerty, Peter A. Kirslis, W. T. Marshall: > A Distributed UNIX System Based on a Virtual Circuit Switch. SOSP 1981: 160-168 > I have that paper, and Bill Marshall was kind enough to provide a lot of info. I think that Gottfried Luderer may have some further background, in particular on how this work relates to earlier distributed file system projects at Bell Labs. > > Would anybody have a current e-mail address for him? > > Paul

4 years, 3 months

G.W.R. Luderer

by Paul Ruizendaal

I am looking for some more background on the 1980/81 "S/F-Unix" system. Gottfried W. R. Luderer, H. Che, J. P. Haggerty, Peter A. Kirslis, W. T. Marshall: A Distributed UNIX System Based on a Virtual Circuit Switch. SOSP 1981: 160-168 I have that paper, and Bill Marshall was kind enough to provide a lot of info. I think that Gottfried Luderer may have some further background, in particular on how this work relates to earlier distributed file system projects at Bell Labs. Would anybody have a current e-mail address for him? Paul

4 years, 3 months

Re: [TUHS] The 2038 bug...

by M Douglas McIlroy

> I'll be (G-d willing) 79 then; I hope around, but I also hope not > overly involved with computers. >From the vantage point of 88, I can attest to the permanence of computing's grip. I guess the key word is "overly". The only code I've written in the last couple of weeks is a few lines of PostScript to touch up my seasonal map/greeting card, the creative part of which is at www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~doug/2020map.pdf. Doug

4 years, 3 months

Which years saw the introduction of (1) #! and (2) symbolic links

by ron minnich

I think I remember but want to ask the experts.

4 years, 3 months

Re: [TUHS] Fwd: For the archives: UNIX/24V for the Harris /6 Docs

by jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu

> Bill passed away this summer - you may have seen his epic farewell > message. Anyone have a copy of this? I did a Web search, but all I could find was the Subject line ("public static final void goodbye ()"). holding back the night with its increasing brilliance the summer moon -- Yoshitoshi's death poem Noel

4 years, 4 months

Jump to page:

2025

2024

2023

2022

2021

2020

2019

2018

2017

2016

2015

2014

2013

2012

2011

2010

2009

2008

2007

2006

2005

2004

2003

2002

2001

2000

1999

1998

1997

1996

1995

1994

1993

1992

1991

1990

TUHS