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Test, please ignore

by Warren Toomey

This e-mail going to the TUHS and Dave Horsfall to see if he's getting the mail from the list. Please ignore. Warren

5 years, 10 months

CMU Mach sources?

by Chris Hanson

Does anyone know whether CMU’s local Mach sources have been preserved? I’m not just talking about MK84.default.tar.Z and so on, I’m talking about all the bits of Mach that were used on cluster systems on campus, prior to the switch to vendor UNIX. I know at least one person who had complete MacMach sources for the last version, but threw out the backup discs with the sources in the process of moving. So I know they exist. If nothing else, CMU did provide other sites their UX source package (eg UX42), which was the BSD single server environment. So I know that has to be out there, somewhere. — Chris Sent from my iPhone

5 years, 10 months

Software Tools Users Group Archive

by Warren Toomey

All, a while back Debbie Scherrer mailed me a copy of a "Software Tools Users Group" archive, and I've been sitting on my hands and forgetting to add it to the Unix Archive. It's now here: https://www.tuhs.org/Archive/Applications/Software_Tools/STUG_Archive/ The mirrors should pick it up soon. I've gzipped most of it as I'm getting a bit tight on space. Thanks to Debbie for the copy and to her and Clem for reminding me to pull my finger out :) Cheers, Warren

5 years, 10 months

4.1c bsd ptrace man entry ("ptrace is unique and arcane")

by Norman Wilson

It's interesting that this comment about ptrace was written as early as 1980. Ron Minnich's reference to Plan 9 /proc misses the mark, though. By the time Plan 9 was written, System V already had /proc; see https://www.usenix.org/sites/default/files/usenix_winter91_faulkner.pdf And as the authors say, the idea actually dates back to Tom Killian's /proc in Research UNIX. I don't know when Tom's code first went live, but I first heard about it by seeing it in action on my first visit to Bell Labs in early 1984, and it was described in public in a talk at the Summer 1984 USENIX conference in Salt Lake City. I cannot quickly find an online copy of the corresponding paper; pointers appreciated. (Is there at least an online index of BTL CSTRs? The big search engine run by the place that still has some 1127 old-timers can't find that either.) As for ptrace itself, I heartily agree that /proc made it obsolete. So did everyone else in 1127 when I was there, but nobody wanted to update adb and sdb, which were big messes inside. So I did, attempting a substantial internal makeover of adb to ease making versions for different systems and even cross-versions, but just a quick hack for sdb. Once I'd done that and shipped the new adb and sdb binaries to all our machines, I removed the ptrace call from the kernel. It happened that in the Eighth (or was it Ninth by then? I'd have to dig out notes to find out) Edition manual, ptrace(2) was on two facing pages. To celebrate, I glued said pages together in the UNIX Room's copy of the manual. Would it were so easy to take out the trash today. Norman Wilson Toronto ON

5 years, 10 months

Re: [TUHS] Paper discussing Unix boot process?

by Pat Barron

The paper I am thinking of (gee, I wish I could remember any other details about it...) was *very* detailed and specific, and was hardware-specific to either the PDP-11 or VAX. It would not at all be applicable to Linux or any kind of modern OS. I am wondering if it is something in the Leffler et al book, I'll have to go back and review that. I'll have to find my copy of it first... --Pat.

5 years, 10 months

The Great NBN Out(r)age

by Dave Horsfall

A few bods have asked to see this, so... Actually, "extracted" would be better description than "redacted", but it's too late now; I could rename it and put in a CGI-redirect, but I'm too busy at the moment. ----- A redacted copy of my complaint to T$. www.horsfall.org/Telstra-comp-redact.rtf (yes, RTF; it was written on a Mac). Utterly inexcusable... Please share etc :-) -- Dave

5 years, 10 months

4.1c bsd ptrace man entry

by Doug McIlroy

Ptrace was short-lived at Research, appearing in 6th through 8th editions. /proc was introduced in the 8th. Norman axed it in the 9th. Norman wrote: nobody wanted to update adb and sdb, which were big messes inside. So I did ... Once I'd done that and shipped the new adb and sdb binaries to all our machines, I removed the ptrace call from the kernel. doug

5 years, 10 months

Re: [TUHS] 4.1c bsd ptrace man entry ("ptrace is unique and arcane")

by Kirk McKusick

> From: ron minnich <rminnich(a)gmail.com> > To: TUHS main list <tuhs(a)minnie.tuhs.org> > Subject: [TUHS] 4.1c bsd ptrace man entry ("ptrace is unique and > arcane") > Message-ID: > <CAP6exYJshbA5HxOJ_iM21Cs0Y4vGfLuFigXxh4WTeqbZreY8UA(a)mail.gmail.com> > Content-Type: text/plain; charset="UTF-8" > > I always wondered who wrote this, anyone know? I have my suspicions but ... > > ".SH BUGS > .I Ptrace > is unique and arcane; it should be replaced with a special file which > can be opened and read and written. The control functions could then > be implemented with > .IR ioctl (2) > calls on this file. This would be simpler to understand and have much > higher performance." > > it's interesting in the light of the later plan 9 proc interface. > > ron The manual pages were not yet under SCCS, so the best time gap that I can give you is that the above text was added between the release of 3BSD (Nov 1979) and 4.0BSD (Nov 1980). Most likely it was Bill Joy that made that change. Kirk McKusick

5 years, 10 months

4.1c bsd ptrace man entry ("ptrace is unique and arcane")

by ron minnich

I always wondered who wrote this, anyone know? I have my suspicions but ... ".SH BUGS .I Ptrace is unique and arcane; it should be replaced with a special file which can be opened and read and written. The control functions could then be implemented with .IR ioctl (2) calls on this file. This would be simpler to understand and have much higher performance." it's interesting in the light of the later plan 9 proc interface. ron

5 years, 10 months

OT: Need help getting old 9 track tapes read

by arnold＠skeeve.com

Hi All. Scott Lee, who worked with me on the Georgia Tech Software Tools Subystem for Pr1me Computers, recently unearthed two tapes with some version of that software. These may be the only copies extant anywhere. He says: | I was cleaning out the basement of my house. They're 35 years old, but | they've never been left in the heat or anything. I opened one of them | up and checked the tape and it's not self-sticky or anything. The odds | that they're readable is slim, because old 9-track bits tended to bleed | through each other. You were supposed to spin through the tape every | couple of years to make them last longer. That's obviously not happened. There was discussion here a while back about services that will recover such tapes and so on. But I didn't save any of that information. If you have information, PLEASE send it to me so that I can relay it to Scott. Dennis Boone & Bill Gunshannon (are you on this list?) - I may ask you to contribute $$ towards this once I know more. Thanks! Arnold

5 years, 10 months

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