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6534 discussions

IBM's involvement (was: SCO's "evidence" (was: RIP Darl McBride former CEO of SCO))

by Douglas McIlroy

As a bit-part expert witness for the other side of the SCO case, I saw hundreds of pages of evidence in the form of side-by-side code comparison. As I recall, the vast majority of highlighted correspondences were small snippets, often rearranged. I didn't interact with the lawyers enough to form a solid opinion about where this stood on the spectrum of coincidence to fair use to plagiarism. It certainly wasn't wholesale copying. I do not recall being asked to opine on whether trade secrets had been stolen. Apropos of rearranged snippets, one of the diff algorithms I experimented with in the mid-70s identified rearrangements. I abandoned it because real life code contains lots of similar lines, so many in PDP-11 assembler programs as to suggest that these programs are largely permutations of each other. The phenomenon is much less common in C, but still present; witness the prevalence of code like int i, n; for(i=0; i<n; i++) { The phenomenon may have been afoot in the SCO evidence. In regard to trade secrets, I was surprised when I moved from Unix at Bell Labs to Linux at Dartmouth and found calendar(1) to be completely rewritten, but with logic absolutely identical to the original version I wrote at the Labs. That was so idiosyncratic that the identity of the two could not have been an accident. Doug

8 months, 1 week

QED Archive updated

by arnold＠skeeve.com

Hi All. For anyone who's interested, my QED archive at https://github.com/arnoldrobbins/qed-archive has been updated. Changes were provided by Sean Jensen. The usenix-80-caltech subdirectory is now more complete and the README.md points at Sean's updated QED port which now works with Unicode. I thank him. Arnold

8 months, 2 weeks

Other UNIX Archival Efforts?

by segaloco

So with all that has happened with the Internet Archive lately, I do find myself a bit concerned regarding the UNIX materials that I know to only exist there. Selfishly, this includes my own uploads here: https://archive.org/details/@segaloco I was curious if anyone has any suggestions on places beyond just IA and TUHS where I could see about getting this stuff mirrored? Unfortunately my stuff runs afoul of bitsavers's DPI requirements, that's the only other source that immediately comes to mind where these materials would find home. Any thoughts? Warren, I know you had mentioned a "write only" archive you maintain regarding materials that need to be mothballed until legal understandings are reached, would you be comfortable with my contributing any of my materials the Caldera license does not apply to there? - Matt G.

8 months, 3 weeks

v6 Unix Documents

by Dan Plassche

Hi, A scan of the printed UNIX Version 6 documents set is now online at the link below since last week. The set consists of documents accompanying the manual pages in the programmer's manual (similar to volume 2 in v7). https://www.computerhistory.org/collections/catalog/102659317 The [nt]roff user manual, tmg compiler-compiler, and m6 macro processor memos were previously missing from the distributions in TUHS and later efforts to re-create the documentation. I have been working on finding this documentation as part of researching roff history. Still interested in earlier copies of the internal memoranda from Ossanna that served as the NROFF User's Manual since v3, the TROFF User's Manual after v5, and TROFF Made Trivial starting around v4. Based on the manpage histories, the documentation was revised for v4, 5, and 6. Best, Dan Plassche

8 months, 3 weeks

Re: On computerese

by Douglas McIlroy

> Who created the "cat" command and did they have the > word "catenate" or "concatenate" in their heads? Ken Thompson wrote "cat" for the PDP-7, with "concatenate" in mind. The cat(1) page in the v1 manual is titled, "concatenate (or print) files". Only later did someone in Research--I don't know who--remark on the existence of the shorter synonym. It was deliberately adopted in v7, perhaps because it better mirrored the command name. But brevity is the defensible argument for "catenate", while familiarity boosts "concatenate". It stll takes some conscious effort for me to use the former, However, I sense sinister vibes in "concatenate", driven by the phrase "concatenation of events", which often is used to explain misfortune. Doug

8 months, 3 weeks

Re: lilian schwartz has died

by Rob Pike

I always forget that TUHS can't handle pictures. Perhaps Warren will let my post through, but in any case here's a link to the mail, reformatted but otherwise intact, with photos, on Mastodon. https://hachyderm.io/@robpike/113322062117546253 To pique your interest, here's the first paragraph. *In August 1981 we had a persistent problem with the RP06 on our PDP-11/70 crashing disks. It even crashed once while the DEC repairman was standing next to it trying to figure out why the previous pack had died. We collected a few dead packs, and they were forming a pile. Lillian, never one to miss an opportunity, suggested building a mobile.* -rob

8 months, 3 weeks

Can Ancient Unix be relicensed?

by Anton Shepelev

Hello, all. In 2002, Caldera released Ancient Unix code under Caldera license: <https://www.tuhs.org/Archive/Caldera-license.pdf> based on the four-clause BSD license: <https://spdx.org/licenses/BSD-4-Clause.html> Consequently, it was used by derived projects, such as Traditional Vi: <https://ex-vi.sourceforge.net/> This proect having been abandoned and orphaned since 2005, I wanted to host it on GNU Savanna and there to breath some life into it. Unfortunately, the 4-clause BSD license is incompatible with GPL: <https://www.gnu.org/licenses/license-list.html#OriginalBSD> The incompatibilty is due entirely to the infamous third clause about adverising. Three years prior to Caldera's release of old Unix code, The Berkley Univercity removed this clause, producing the GNU-compatible modified BSD License: <https://opensource.org/license/BSD-3-clause> They published a notice to that effect on their FTP: <ftp://ftp.cs.berkeley.edu/pub/4bsd/README.Impt.License.Change> Although it has been taken down[1], copies exist all over the internet, e.g.: <https://raw.githubusercontent.com/abbrev/punix/refs/heads/master/README.Imp…> That said, is there a chance that the copyright holder of Ancient Will agree to release a similar note regarding everying released under Caldera license? If there is, whom shall I contact about it? It will benefit everybody using Ancient Unix code. ____________________ 1. Why the murrain of FTP servers all over the world?

8 months, 3 weeks

Draft v5: London and Reiser's UNIX VAX port paper, reconstructed

by G. Branden Robinson

Hi folks, A few months ago I reported on my efforts to reconstruct London & Reiser's paper on their port of Unix to the VAX-11/780.[1] I formerly characterized this as "the UNIX/32V port", but since London & Reiser's paper predates the release of Seventh Edition Unix by about six months, UNIX/32V came _after_ Seventh Edition by about the same number of months, and the pace of Unix development was particularly ferocious in this period[2], I felt that my identification of London & Reiser's work with UNIX/32V may have been hasty. I also may have overinterpreted Dennis Ritchie's words on the subject. "Tom London and John Reiser, working from the 7th Edition and the Interdata 8/32 system, generated a VAX 11/780 version of the system, which, in its distribution format, would be called 32V." That phrase "in its distribution format" could cover a variety of changes, some of which perhaps did not match London & Reiser's intentions or views expressed in their paper. More conservative implications seemed prudent. I'd thus like to present what I consider to be my "final" draft, subject of course to feedback from these mailing lists. I'm pleased to report that I've addressed all of the XXX points I identified in the source of my first draft, points where I felt groff mm could be enhanced to aid the rendering of historical documents like this. I consequently expect groff 1.24's mm package to support several new features prompted specifically by this work. Quoting the forthcoming NEWS file... * The m (mm) macro package now supports a user-definable hook macro `AFX`, which if defined is called by `AF` in lieu of the latter's normal operation. Applications include customization of letterhead. * The m (mm) macro package now supports a user-definable hook macro `RPX`, which if defined is called by `RP` to format the reference list caption string `Rp` instead of the default formatting. * The m (mm) macro package now supports an `Aumt` string to suppress the appearance of positional arguments to the `AU` macro in the document heading used by memorandum types 0-3 and 6. By default, all such arguments appear, except the second (author initials). For example, a value of "3 4" more accurately reproduces London & Reiser's 1978 paper describing the porting of Unix to the VAX-11/780. * The m (mm) macro package now supports an `Rpfmt` string specifying the `LB` macro arguments that the package uses to format the items in a reference list. * The m (mm) macro package no longer superscripts _and_ brackets a reference mark (the `Rf` string). Instead, the new `Rfstyle` register controls its formatting. The default, 0, selects bracketing in nroff mode and superscripting in troff mode. Set `Rfstyle` to 3 in a document to obtain groff mm's previous mark formatting behavior. [I might still update or revert the changed default; I want to research the behavior of historical mm implementations.] The "32vscan.pdf" document from which I prepared this reconstruction is available at Dennis Ritchie's memorial home page.[3] I have attached the reconstructed mm source document and two PDFs, rendered with groff 1.23.0 (the current stable release), and groff Git HEAD (exercising the new features listed above).[4] I offer the caveat that these cannot be pixel-perfect recreations because (1) I have no information about the precise paper dimensions or margins London & Reiser used[5]; (2) the fonts employed in rendering the documents are not identical, metrically or otherwise; and (3) AT&T and GNU troffs use different hyphenation systems and therefore sometimes break words differently. These factors all impact the placement of line and page breaks, and these are avowedly and clearly distinguishable. There are furthermore a few discrepancies that I decided weren't worth the trouble at this time to reconcile, like selective encroachment of cover sheet material beyond the page margins. None affect the utility of the document (in my opinion). With that large disclaimer in place, I welcome feedback on the quality of the reproduction. Finally, I reiterate my encouragement that the document be _read_. In my opinion, the final two sections "Commands" and "Software portability" are well worth consideration in hindsight. To the extent that we continue to boast, sometimes glibly, of C as a "portable assembly language", be it in its current ISO C23 incarnation; as ANSI C89, the last revision blessed by Ritchie; or in the form used when London and Reiser wrote, their experiences and recommendations laid out a program of better delivering on that promise. Regards, Branden [1] https://www.tuhs.org/pipermail/tuhs/2024-June/030041.html [2] 1980, for example, saw releases of 3BSD, System III, PWB/UNIX 2.0, and 4BSD. [3] https://www.bell-labs.com/usr/dmr/www/portpapers.html [4] You may notice a difference in the sizes of the two PDFs, surprising in light of their shared source document. This is thanks to a new feature forthcoming in Deri James's gropdf(1) output driver: font subsetting. [5] ...or where, if anywhere, the authors "cheated" the margins temporarily, for instance with `ll` or `pl` requests. Even with mm macro package sources available, such things would be invisible to the reconstructor.

8 months, 3 weeks

Old troff files (1988-2007)

by Jacobson, Doug W [E CPE]

Folks: Long story short, I have a unpublished manuscript that a faculty member in my department wrote late 1980's early 2000's. He did the entire thing in troff, eqn, and pic. The faculty member is still alive. A publisher is interested in the manuscript. I have all of the source files on an old unix machine that still has troff, eqn and pic. It also has groff. This issue is that the pic commands are bracketed by .G1 and .G2 not .PS & .PE. The original machine he would have used would have ran AT&T Sys V on an AT&T 3B20. Below is one of the files. Any thoughts on the .G1 .G2? I can get the files that have only eqn and troff to create postscript, but the .G1/.G2 is not understood by pic. I tried replacing the .G1/.G2 with .PS/PE and it failed. I must be missing another program that uses the .G1/2 Thanks .sp -3.5 .fp 1 Z .fp 2 XI .ps 11 .tl ' ' '1-10' .EQ delim $$ gsize 11 .EN .po 0.9i .vs 15 .G1 frame wid 5.7 ht 6.0 invis coord x 0.2, 100 y -40, +22 log x grid left from -30 to +20 by 10 "" grid left from -40.04 to +19.96 by 10 "" grid left from -39.96 to +20.04 by 10 "" grid left from -39 to +22 by 1 "" grid bot from 0.4 to 40 by *10 "" grid bot from 1 to 100 by *10 "" grid bot from 0.2 to 20 by *10 "" grid bot from 0.3 to 30 by *10 "" grid bot from 0.5 to 50 by *10 "" grid bot from 0.6 to 60 by *10 "" grid bot from 0.7 to 70 by *10 "" grid bot from 0.8 to 80 by *10 "" grid bot from 0.9 to 90 by *10 "" ticks out left from -40 to +20 by 10 ticks out bot from 0.2 to 20 by *10 ticks out bot from 0.4 to 40 by *10 ticks out bot from 1 to 100 by *10 draw solid 0.2 19.93 2 19.93 10 5.97 100 -34.02 new solid 0.2 20.07 2 20.07 10 6.05 100 -33.95 new dotted for i=0.45 to 23 by *1.05 do { w=i*i f=200/sqrt(w*w+104*w+400) next at i,20*log(f) } label left "\u\udB \d\d" label bot "\(*w, rad/s" .G2 .in 2 Fig. 1.4. Graph of the magnitude in dB of $H(s)~=~200 over{s sup 2~+~12^s~+~20}^,$$~s~=~j^omega$. Doug Jacobson University Professor, Dept. Electrical & Computer Engineering Sunil & Sujata Gaitonde Professorship in Cybersecurity Director: ISU Center for Cybersecurity Innovation and Outreach Mail Address: 2520 Osborn Dr, 2215 Coover Hall Iowa State University PH: (515) 294-8307 Fax (515) 294-8432 Office: 371 Durham Hall Center web site: http://www.cyio.iastate.edu/<https://urldefense.com/v3/__http:/www.cyio.iastate.edu/__;!!DZ3fjg!oVZir7OL…> Personal web site: http://www.dougj.net<https://urldefense.com/v3/__http:/www.dougj.net/__;!!DZ3fjg!oVZir7OL4VMZHCY…>

8 months, 3 weeks

Re: lilian schwartz has died

by Douglas McIlroy

> lilian worked at bell labs in the 80s (and maybe 90s) > around tech and films and suchlike. Lillian was a real pioneer. She began collaborating at the Labs in the mid 1960s. Doug

8 months, 4 weeks

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