> From: Kevin Bowling
> I wonder if we should collect resources like this on a wiki page or
> something?
My habit on the CHWiki is to have the articles on subjects where there is a
lot of documentation online is to have the articles mostly be 'executive
summeries', and corral the links to the stuff online to a section at the end,
so that people who want to see the gory details can look at the original
documentation. See, for example:
https://gunkies.org/wiki/AN/FSQ-7
That works well, even for material that later goes 404, because with the URL,
one can generally find it later in the Internet Archive (things like Google
won't find things that are only there).
Don't ask me to add them, though; I still haven't found time to add the links
to the BSD/OS stuff you found!
Noel
> From: Rodrigo Lopez
>> Google tells me: https://www.y-windows.org/
> from .. the code, that one has nothing to do with this.
It actually makes sense that there are two separate ones called 'Y'. The X
Window System was a descendant of the W window system, so if someone wanted
to do another one, 'Y' was the obvious namee to pick. All it needs now is two
separate people who decide they want to do a window system... voila!
Noel

On Aug 31, 2024, at 11:16 AM, Jaap Akkerhuis <jaapna(a)xs4all.nl> wrote:
> 
>> On 31 Aug 2024, at 20:09, Angel M Alganza <ama(a)ugr.es> wrote:
>>
>> On 2024-08-31 11:59, Rodrigo G. López wrote:
>>
>>> i'd love to know if any of you remembers this, and if so, would you share the story behind it?
>
> Google tells me: https://www.y-windows.org/
This is likely a different Y window sys than what Rodrigo found,
which is written in Alef and runs on 2nd ed plan9. Rodrigo may
want to trawl through 9fans mailing list/usenet group archives
or ask there.
Hey there folks, I'm going to find myself in Berkeley for the day this
week and was curious if the buildings where the CSRG group worked are
still standing? Thought it would be a fun place to visit after hacking
on BSD for all these years.
Cheers,
-pete
--
Pete Wright
pete(a)nomadlogic.org
> On Mon, 12 Aug 2024 01:16:41 -0700,"Erik E. Fair" <fair-tuhs(a)netbsd.org <mailto:fair-tuhs@netbsd.org>> wrote:
>
> The main campus computer center was in the basement, but they charged by the CPU/second, so only classes used those systems - in my day (1980-1983), the computer center had a CDC 6400 and six or seven DEC PDP-11/70s.
The CDC 6400 finally went away in September 1982:
September 3rd, 1982
Memo to: Computing Affairs Staff
From: M.Stuart Lynn, Director
Subject: CDC 6400 Departure
The CDC 6400 is no more. ...
https://caltss.computerhistory.org/archive/820903-cdc-6400-departure-msl.pdf
> From: Larry McVoy
{Moving this to COFF, as it's not UNIX-related. I'll have another reply there
as well, about the social media point.}
> The amazing thing, to me, is I was a CS student in very early 1980's
> and I had no idea of the history behind the arpanet.
I don't think that was that uncommon; at MIT (slightly earlier, I think -
-'74-'77 for me) the undergrad's weren't learning anything about networking
there either, then.
I think the reason is that there wasn't much to teach - in part because we
did not then know much about networking, and in part because it was not yet
crystal clear how important it would become (more below on that).
There was research going on in the area, but even at MIT one doesn't teach
(or didn't then; I don't know about now) on-going research subjects to
undergrads. MIT _did_ have, even then, a formal UROP ('undergrad research
opportunities') program, which allowed undergrads to be part of research
groups - a sheer genius idea - which in some fast-moving fields, like CS, was
an inestimable benefit to more forward undergrads in those fields.
I joined the CSR group at LCS in '77 because I had some operating system
ideas I wanted to work on; I had no idea at that point that they were doing
anything with networks. They took me on as the result of the sheerest chance;
they had just gotten some money from DARPA to build a LAN, and the interface
was going to be built for a UNIBUS PDP-11, and they needed diagnostics, etc
written; and they were all Multicians. I, by chance, knew PDP-11 assembler -
which none of them did - the MIT CS introductory course at that point taught
it. So the deal was that I'd help them with that, and I could use the machine
to explore my OS ideas in return.
Which never really happened; it fairly became clear to me that data
networking was going to have an enormous impact on the world, and at that
point it was also technically interesting, so I quickly got sucked into that
stuff. (I actually have a written document hiding in a file drawer somewhere
from 1978 or so, which makes it plain that that I'm not suffering 20-20
hindsight here, in talking about foreseeing the impact; I should dig it up.)
The future impact actually wasn't hard to foresee: looking at what printed
books had done to the world, and then telgraphs/telephones, and what
computers had already started to do at that point, it was clear that
combining them all was going to have an incredible impact (and we're still
adapting to it).
Learning about networking at the time was tricky. The ARPANET - well, NCP and
below - was pretty well documented in a couple of AFIPS papers (linked to at
the bottom here:
https://gunkies.org/wiki/ARPANET
which I have a very vague memory I photocopied at the time out of the bound
AFIPS proceedings in the LCS library). The applications were only documented
in the RFC's.
(Speaking of which, at that level, the difference between the ARPANET and the
Internet was not very significant - it was only the internals, invisible to
the people who did 'application' protocols, that were completely different.
HTTP would probably run just fine on top of NCP, for instance.)
Anything past that, the start of the internet work, that, I picked up by i)
direct osmosis from other people in CSR who were starting to think about
networks - principally Dave Clark and Dave Reed - and then ii) from documents
prepared as part of the TCP/IP effort, which were distributed electronically.
Which is an interesting point; the ARPANET was a key tool in the internet
work. The most important aspect was email; non-stop discussion between the
widely separated groups who were part of the project. It also made document
distribution really easy (which had also been true of the latter stages of
the ARPANET project, with the RFC's). And of course it was also a long-haul
network that we used to tie the small internets at all the various sites
(BBN, SRI, ISI - and eventually MIT) into the larger Internet.
I hate to think about trying to do all that work on internets, and the
Internet, without the ARPANE there, as a tool.
Noel
I thought some may appreciate the linked photo: Unix spotted near Mumbai
Central Railway Station, Mumbai (Bombay), Maharashtra, India.
https://photos.app.goo.gl/acTTsfvYt5suP4wS6
- Dan C.

On Aug 13, 2024, at 6:48 AM, Dan Cross <crossd(a)gmail.com> wrote:
>
>
>
> I thought some may appreciate the linked photo: Unix spotted near Mumbai Central Railway Station, Mumbai (Bombay), Maharashtra, India.
> https://photos.app.goo.gl/acTTsfvYt5suP4wS6
A lot of shells under that Unix umbrella!
Coconut water + its jelly like flesh can be quite refreshing
on a hot Mumbai day. Did you try any?
> From: "Erik E. Fair"
> before that, ARPANET was connected
NOTE: "ARPANET" is _always_ (**ALWAYS**) used with the definite article
("the"). Don't take my word for it; check out, e.g.
A History of the ARPANET: The First Decade
https://walden-family.com/bbn/arpanet-completion-report.pdfhttps://apps.dtic.mil/sti/pdfs/ADA115440.pdf
(There are a lot more contemporaneous documents - AFIPS conference papers,
etc - if anyone is interested in them.)
I was somewhat polite about it _this_ time.
Noel
I'm paraphrasing here but I've read in a few places something to the effect that UNIX was "selected" as the basis on which to build a portable operating system standard, which of course we all know as POSIX. However, I got thinking on the implications of that phrasing, and have to ask, was there actually a "selection" made picking UNIX over some other candidate, or was it pretty much established from the outset of pursuing a standard that UNIX was going to get standardized?
Another way to put it would be as a chicken and egg, which came first, desire for a portable base system definition that UNIX happened to fit nicely, or the ongoing need for UNIX standardization finding sponsorship by the working groups, IEEE, etc.? Did any other OS contend for this coveted honor?
- Matt G.
