31 Aug
2024
31 Aug
'24
1:07 p.m.
From: Noel Chiappa
Was there ever actually a '386/BSD'?
I decided (for not particular reason) to take a quick read through Marshall
Kirk McKusick's "Twenty Years of Berkeley Unix From AT&T-Owned to Freely
Redistributable":
https://www.oreilly.com/openbook/opensources/book/kirkmck.html
and he refers to Jolitz's system as "386/BSD" (apparently incorrectly).
(So
there's a lesson there; even people who '_were_ there' can occasionally get
it
wrong - something that professional historians are well aware of. I have a
funny story of my learning that lesson, here:
http://www.chiappa.net/~jnc/nontech/tmlotus.html
in a totally different technical area.)
I have yet to see a _scan_ of contemporary documentation (I believe nothing
that isn't a contemporary _physical artifact_) that confirms it was actually
named "386BSD", but that does seem to be the name as given in the Dr. Dobbs
series on it. That series confirms that it was based directly on the 'Net/2'
BSD release (although 'diff's on the sources are probably the most reliable
proof).
Noel
1 Sep
1 Sep
2:14 a.m.
New subject: BSD/OS
On Sat, 31 Aug 2024, Noel Chiappa wrote:
and he refers to Jolitz's system as
"386/BSD" (apparently incorrectly). (So
there's a lesson there; even people who '_were_ there' can occasionally
get it
wrong - something that professional historians are well aware of. I have a
funny story of my learning that lesson, here:
http://www.chiappa.net/~jnc/nontech/tmlotus.html
in a totally different technical area.)
I have yet to see a _scan_ of contemporary documentation (I believe nothing
that isn't a contemporary _physical artifact_) that confirms it was actually
named "386BSD", but that does seem to be the name as given in the Dr. Dobbs
series on it. That series confirms that it was based directly on the 'Net/2'
BSD release (although 'diff's on the sources are probably the most reliable
proof).
Is this "apparently incorrectly" about the / slash? As for use
(regardless of artifact) with / I only see in McKusick's histories and
one use in the old 386bsd.faq (which uses without slash in all but
once),
Another mistake was use of "386/BSD" for BSDI's software in the Civil
Action No.92-1667 AMICUS BRIEF (930107.amicus.txt) where all the other
legal references were "BSD/386".
Or is this about the 386BSD name itself (without the slash)?
An early mention of it is from
src/sys/i386/i386/locore.s from net.2
* @(#)locore.s 7.3 (Berkeley) 5/13/91
*/
/*
* locore.s: 4BSD machine support for the Intel 386
* Preliminary version
* Written by William F. Jolitz, 386BSD Project
and gdb/config/m-i386bsd.h change from him
but I don't know of a physical artifact around then other than the CD
that came with the magazine.
Does anyone have the CD or print magazines? (Sadly I lost or threw mine
away in the 1990s. I got the subscription as a Christmas present and
didn't realize that "BSD" value until near a decade later.)
Someday I need to finish my book where I did over 80 email, phone, or
in-person interviews.
t1:svn-bsd-history$ wc 386bsd* patchkit.tex lawsuit.tex bsdi* 43bsd-part2.tex
87 471 3319 386bsd-part3.tex
530 3264 23198 386bsd.tex
1258 7793 52650 patchkit.tex
3155 21517 137284 lawsuit.tex
929 5177 36451 bsdi-part2.tex
499 3477 22738 bsdi.tex
3879 28436 180396 43bsd-part2.tex
10337 70135 456036 total
(which is less than a quarter of the story)
4 Sep
4 Sep
1:47 p.m.
New subject: BSD/OS
On 8/31/24 10:14 PM, Jeremy C. Reed wrote:
Someday I need to finish my book where I did over 80
email, phone, or
in-person interviews.
I'd read that book.
--
``The lyf so short, the craft so long to lerne.'' - Chaucer
``Ars longa, vita brevis'' - Hippocrates
Chet Ramey, UTech, CWRU chet(a)case.edu http://tiswww.cwru.edu/~chet/
1 Sep
1 Sep
2:48 a.m.
New subject: BSD/OS
Certainly, that was the impression I got from reading the 386BSD
text/help files that came with the 386BSD CDROM Dr Dobbs were selling.
The 386BSD was Net/2 ported to the 386.
Wesley Parish
On 1/09/24 01:07, Noel Chiappa wrote:
From: Noel
Chiappa
Was there ever actually a '386/BSD'?
I decided (for not particular reason) to take a quick read through Marshall
Kirk McKusick's "Twenty Years of Berkeley Unix From AT&T-Owned to Freely
Redistributable":
https://www.oreilly.com/openbook/opensources/book/kirkmck.html
and he refers to Jolitz's system as "386/BSD" (apparently incorrectly).
(So
there's a lesson there; even people who '_were_ there' can occasionally
get it
wrong - something that professional historians are well aware of. I have a
funny story of my learning that lesson, here:
http://www.chiappa.net/~jnc/nontech/tmlotus.html
in a totally different technical area.)
I have yet to see a _scan_ of contemporary documentation (I believe nothing
that isn't a contemporary _physical artifact_) that confirms it was actually
named "386BSD", but that does seem to be the name as given in the Dr. Dobbs
series on it. That series confirms that it was based directly on the 'Net/2'
BSD release (although 'diff's on the sources are probably the most reliable
proof).
Noel
15
days inactive
19
days old
3 comments
4 participants
participants (4)
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Chet Ramey -
Jeremy C. Reed -
jnc＠mercury.lcs.mit.edu -
Wesley Parish