TUHS

tuhs@tuhs.org

6420 discussions

by norman＠nose.cs.utoronto.ca

Michael Sokolov: It feels so great knowing that my current modern OS (last release 2003-12-07 counts as current and modern to me) still has nearly all original V7 UNIX code almost completely untouched. It's what gives me the right to call it UNIX. ======= You mean you've restored the original version of cat that had only one option, and the version of ls that had fewer than a dozen and didn't care how wide the screen was; that filenames are only 14 characters long; that fsck has been abolished in favour of icheck and ncheck and dcheck; and that file system blocks have returned to their original V7 size of 512 bytes? My hat's off to you if so. On the other hand, I have to question either your stability or that of your system if you have reinstated the original V7 code implementing mpx(2). Norman Wilson Toronto ON (who actually used the old multiplexor once, but had to fix it first!)

21 years, 1 month

Re: [TUHS] is learn(1) free now?

by msokolov＠ivan.Harhan.ORG

Kenneth Stailey <kstailey(a)yahoo.com> wrote: > Warren, I see that there is a 4.4BSD-Alpha subdir in the TUHS archive. Do you > want a final CSRG 4.4BSD tape to add there too? I would definitely want an image of the 4.4BSD tape too! But I do mean *tape*, not what's on Kirk's CD-ROM. I'm talking about a record-for-record image of the Official Release Master tape. > Thanks, I have to go through your archive for it now. Actually I just took a closer look and it has been in the distributed /usr/lib/learn since 4.3BSD, it was just never added to /usr/src/usr.lib/learn for some reason (not even in Quasijarus, I probably didn't notice it). So you don't have to go through the pain of downloading a dist from Harhan to pull it out of there, you can just take it from your CD-ROM set. > It's so difficult being you. :-) > I was able to save myself the time by > using the 4.4BSD version of learn(1) since it has already been > modified for CRT terminals. You will have to re-invent the wheel > because of your politics. Well I'll take a look at what they did to learn in 4.4BSD and see if any of it is acceptable for Quasijarus. Hopefully I won't have to reinvent the wheel. I believe in adding new features without breaking or disturbing historical stuff. It feels so great knowing that my current modern OS (last release 2003-12-07 counts as current and modern to me) still has nearly all original V7 UNIX code almost completely untouched. It's what gives me the right to call it UNIX. As far as learn goes I think I would need to add new lessons for UNIX on a CRT or some options or somesuch, but I do NOT want to remove the facility for teaching UNIX on a hardcopy tty. That's such a gem, it should be kept! MS

21 years, 1 month

Re: [TUHS] is learn(1) free now?

by msokolov＠ivan.Harhan.ORG

Kenneth Stailey <kstailey(a)yahoo.com> wrote: > When I purchased my copy of _The > CSRG Archives_ CDROM set I was told in E-mail by McKusick that I did not need > to sign any license agreements. I am assuming that this is due to Caldera > proclaiming that V32 sources and binaries could be redistributed by the public > legally. Yes, this is correct, this is the same reason why Warren was able to remove the password system from his UNIX Archive and make it completely open. > In the CDROM set is a fully encumbered 4.4BSD source tree which > includes the learn(1) source code. Yup, I have it too (the whole CD-ROM set). learn(1) is far older than 4.4BSD though, and goes way back. 4.3BSD-Quasijarus has it too. > I also have yet to > get the vi lesson data which the source code that I do have says came on a > separate user-contributed tape. I just looked and 4.3BSD-Quasijarus has the vi lesson data as part of the standard system. > I got here because I have newbies in my life now and I need UNIX online > courseware. Hear hear. I sometimes get into this situation too, usually when dating and getting faced with the need to teach a prospective female how to use a real operating system, since the one woman who finally makes it would absolutely have to use 4.3BSD-Quasijarus on my VAXen. I looked into learn, but one thing it disappointed me with is that it's woefully outdated. It starts by setting the tty erase and kill chars to '#' and '@' respectively and teaching you how to edit the command line on a hardcopy tty. Well, OK, some would see this as good educational value, but the problem is, if you don't actually *have* a hardcopy tty, and most of us don't, it doesn't work too well. It prints out lessons longer than 24 lines and they scroll off the top of the VT terminal. It was definitely written with the assumption that one has a hardcopy tty with a long roll of continuous paper, and it expects the student to grab the paper coming out of the teletype and look at what's been printed, but it just doesn't work on a VT terminal. Not to mention that in the end the lessons give the student little practical learning that would actually be useful when using UNIX on a CRT terminal. (For example, it would be very practical to explain to the student the difference between ^H and ^? and teach him/her how to deal with it.) > I'm wondering about distributing the results of my porting effort once it > matures enough to be worth doing so. Well, as a I said 4.3BSD-Quasijarus contains learn and all other "encumbered code" and it is freely available via anonymous FTP from ifctfvax.Harhan.ORG, so... BTW for those who missed it I released 4.3-QJ0b on 2003-12-07. MS

21 years, 1 month

web site detailing Apple's mc68k UNIX, A/UX

by Al Kossow

> I would be interested to know if there is any chance of getting a hobbyist > A/UX license out of Apple. A/UX started out as a port of Unisoft SysV. Prior to version 2.0, there was no Finder interface at all. A real history of the product should be done at some point, as opposed to the half-baked opinions of someone who has only seen a very late version of the product. Since there were per-copy licensing fees to Unisoft, at least for the early versions, it seems unlikely that a hobbyist license for A/UX would be possible.

21 years, 1 month

[TUHS] m68k SVR2 on Perq (was: web site detailing Apple's mc68k UNIX, A/UX)

by Roger Willcocks

Incidentally, the Unisoft m68k port of SVR2 at the core of A/UX was also ported to the Perq-5 in 1986/1987, to create the Crosfield Studio 9500. Perq had just folded, but a core group of ex-Perq employees worked with a team from the UK company Crosfield Electronics to take the machine (which at that time existed only as a wire-wrap prototype) through to production. I was a member of that team and I have fond memories of sitting in a basement office in Pittsburgh surrounded by kernel listings (with a very puzzled look on my face). Just a small footnote in Unix history... -- Roger

21 years, 1 month

web site detailing Apple's mc68k UNIX, A/UX

by Kenneth Stailey

http://www.applefritter.com/ui/aux/ Site discusses what it was like to use A/UX, why Apple discontinued it, etc. __________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Protect your identity with Yahoo! Mail AddressGuard http://antispam.yahoo.com/whatsnewfree

21 years, 1 month

is learn(1) free now?

by Kenneth Stailey

Hi, When 4.4BSD-lite was released one of the 4.4BSD encumbered things that was cut was the online courseware program, learn(1). When I purchased my copy of _The CSRG Archives_ CDROM set I was told in E-mail by McKusick that I did not need to sign any license agreements. I am assuming that this is due to Caldera proclaiming that V32 sources and binaries could be redistributed by the public legally. In the CDROM set is a fully encumbered 4.4BSD source tree which includes the learn(1) source code. I spent a few hours last night porting it to NetBSD and FreeBSD and tightening up a few bits like gets() vs. fgets(). I haven't finished and have yet to distributed the results. I also have yet to get the vi lesson data which the source code that I do have says came on a separate user-contributed tape. I got here because I have newbies in my life now and I need UNIX online courseware. The only thing I could find in the FreeBSD ports tree was something called vilearn. I'm wondering about distributing the results of my porting effort once it matures enough to be worth doing so. Thanks, Ken __________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Protect your identity with Yahoo! Mail AddressGuard http://antispam.yahoo.com/whatsnewfree

21 years, 1 month

earily Supnik paper on SIM the precursor to SIMH

by Kenneth Stailey

http://research.compaq.com/wrl/DECarchives/DTJ/DTJN02/DTJN02HM.HTM This web page also discusses restoring actual DEC hardware. __________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Protect your identity with Yahoo! Mail AddressGuard http://antispam.yahoo.com/whatsnewfree

21 years, 1 month

by Larry J. Blunk

Apologies if this has been answered before, but I noticed that there are AT&T copyright notices in the kernel sources for Unix Edition 5, but they were removed in Edition 6. You can still see the comment blocks for the notices in Edition 6, but the notices themselves have been removed. Does anyone have the history on this? I noticed that USL registered Editions 5, 6, 7 and 32V in 1992. I would assume that Editions 4 and earlier are free and clear because, prior to 1978, registration was a requirement for protection. Further, since USL waited longer than 5 years to register the copyrights for 5, 6, 7 and 32V, these may be free and clear as well. As I understand it, Editions 7 and 32V could have had copyright protection without registration since they were released after 1978. However, because they lacked copyright notices when released, they may very well be considered public domain. It was not until 1989 that the requirement for including copyright notices was dropped.

21 years, 1 month

by norman＠nose.cs.utoronto.ca

Larry J. Blunk: Apologies if this has been answered before, but I noticed that there are AT&T copyright notices in the kernel sources for Unix Edition 5, but they were removed in Edition 6. [...] I noticed that USL registered Editions 5, 6, 7 and 32V in 1992. I would assume that Editions 4 and earlier are free and clear [...] As I understand it, Editions 7 and 32V could have had copyright protection without registration since they were released after 1978. However, because they lacked copyright notices when released, they may very well be considered public domain. It was not until 1989 that the requirement for including copyright notices was dropped. ======== Notwithstanding other comments about the history, for practical purposes none of this matters for Seventh Edition and 32V and anything earlier, because Caldera (as it then was) open-licensed them in January 2002; see http://www.tuhs.org/Archive/Caldera-license.pdf. To be precise, that license covers 32-bit 32V UNIX 16 bit UNIX Versions 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 with specific exclusion of System III and System V and successors. That is why source code for the Seventh Edition system (for example) is openly accessibly on the TUHS web server. Among those whose dog work produced first a hobbyist-specific per-person license, then the current BSD-like license, was Warren Toomey, who manages that web server and this mailing list. I don't think it will give him a swollen head (or a wooden leg) to thank him now and then, and I do so here. Long-time readers know all that, but those who have joined us recently might not. Norman Wilson Toronto ON

21 years, 1 month

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