On Tue, Apr 09, 2002 at 06:32:47PM -0400, Stephen Ryan wrote: > On Tue, 2002-04-09 at 18:23, Ron Reinhart wrote: > > >It requires at least a 386 to run. The kernel of the GNU/Linux system > > > (Linux) is a 32 bit kernel and 386 is the start of 32 bit chips from > > > Intel. > > > > I hate to date myself so badly but it seems to me that professors where running > > Linux on 8088's and 8086's around 1990 or so before 32bit Intel chips. I was > > running OS9 on a CoCo3 at the time so I can't say from my own experience. > > Regards, > > Ron > > Linux, no. Minix, maybe. However, the Intel 80386 had been available > for a couple of years already by 1990, and Linux was started as an > experiment to use the "advanced features" of the 386, and so was 32 bit > right from the start. >
And just to come full-circle, there is now a port of linux to the 8086 called ELKS. See it at <http://elks.sourceforge.net>. I have half a mind to try it out on an old PC I have here. dt -- Dave Thayer | If trees could scream, would we be so cavalier about Denver, Colorado USA | cutting them down? We might, if they screamed all [EMAIL PROTECTED] | the time, for no good reason. - Jack Handey -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
