Re: 4.4BSD - TUHS

27 Jan 1999

Joerg B. Micheel &lt;joerg(a)krdl.org.sg&gt; wrote:

...
  I don't think UCB has been using this term for 15
years. 
1995 - 1980 = 15

1980 is the year of the 3BSD release, the first release from CSRG that's an
actual operating system kernel and not just a package of userland enhancements.
If you include the latter (1BSD and 2BSD) too, it'll be more than 15 years.

...
  That
 is because research is a different world from commercial efforts. There is no
 such thing as "this is BSD / not BSD" as compared to the "one true
JAVA(tm)".
 You cannot steal BSD, you can only contribute to it. 
That's exactly what I'm arguing! This is not a fight, this is research OS
development. I'm not stealing BSD, I'm contributing to it. Volunteering to do
the job of the principal maintainer of 4.3BSD-*, which no one has done since
1988, is one of the greatest contributions one can make.

Marshall Kirk McKusick tells me that he started the same way: first a
contributor, then the principal maintainer. He didn't just assume the title, he
earned it. I followed the same path. I have been doing miscellaneous work in
preparation for this project for the past 3 years. I became the principal
maintainer and architect only when I actually started doing this job, i.e.,
maintaining the master SCCS tree and making architectural decisions.

I have a proposal: Let's end this pointless flame war. Titles are earned, not
assumed. So far the only people participating in it are the ones who have never
actually tried my system on a VAX. It's funny that you guys started challenging
my maintainer job only now and not when I made my first release a month ago.
When I made my release, there was absolutely no dissent from anyone. Instead, I
was getting direct E-mails from several people asking me how to install it on
their VAXen. There is only one way to earn the high title of the principal
maintainer: do a good job at it. The former CSRG folks certainly did this. If
you believe that I haven't done anough for VAX BSD to earn the title of its
maintainer, how about ending this flame war and letting me go back to work so
that I can do my job and prove myself with deeds instead of words?

...
  And since the core team of BSDI today
 consist of people formerly involved in BSD, what problem should there be they
 keep calling their work BSD ? 
No problem at all! All I'm saying is that despite what someone has suggested,
they have no authority to bar others from doing the same.

Michael Sokolov
TUHS 4BSD Coordinator
4.3BSD-* Maintainer
Quasijarus Project Principal Architect & Developer
Phone: 440-449-0299 or 216-217-2579
ARPA Internet SMTP mail: mxs46(a)k2.scl.cwru.edu
TUHS WWW page: http://minnie.cs.adfa.edu.au/TUHS/
Quasijarus WWW page: http://minnie.cs.adfa.edu.au/Quasijarus/

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