Re: [9fans] the old floppy set
On Fri, Aug 7, 2009 at 23:49, John Florenslawmas...@gmail.com wrote: With a little help from FreeDOS, I am now successfully running 2e i can't get past the first disk. it seems there is no suitable fat partition. no amount of partitioning and formatting under freedos or freebsd results in anything disk one will put files on. so what exactly constitutes a suitable fat partition?
Re: [9fans] the old floppy set
I booted the FreeDOS disk and created a small partition (something like 50 MB) on the hard disk, leaving the rest unpartitioned. Then I installed FreeDOS to the small partition and started the Plan 9 installation. i don't have the 2e sources so i'm guessing. (apologies.)i don't know what versions of fat 2e supported, but i would imagine restricting oneself to fat16 (and not fat16 lba) would be safest. - erik
Re: [9fans] the old floppy set
On Thu, Aug 13, 2009 at 7:11 AM, michael blockmichaelmuf...@gmail.com wrote: On Fri, Aug 7, 2009 at 23:49, John Florenslawmas...@gmail.com wrote: With a little help from FreeDOS, I am now successfully running 2e i can't get past the first disk. it seems there is no suitable fat partition. no amount of partitioning and formatting under freedos or freebsd results in anything disk one will put files on. so what exactly constitutes a suitable fat partition? Ok, first note that I didn't have any luck with QEMU, I had to install on an actual 486. I booted the FreeDOS disk and created a small partition (something like 50 MB) on the hard disk, leaving the rest unpartitioned. Then I installed FreeDOS to the small partition and started the Plan 9 installation. John -- Object-oriented design is the roman numerals of computing -- Rob Pike
Re: [9fans] the old floppy set
On Thu, Aug 13, 2009 at 09:23, John Florenslawmas...@gmail.com wrote: Ok, first note that I didn't have any luck with QEMU, I had to install on an actual 486. i have the same error with both qemu and period hardware. i'm running qemu-8.2.0 and a pentium 266MHz laptop. on the laptop both my freedos partition and space for 2e are near the end of a 20G disk. same for qemu but with a 200M hda file. was your qemu problem similar to mine? I booted the FreeDOS disk and created a small partition (something like 50 MB) on the hard disk, leaving the rest unpartitioned. Then I installed FreeDOS to the small partition and started the Plan 9 installation. yep, did the same On Thu, Aug 13, 2009 at 09:26, erik quanstromquans...@quanstro.net wrote: i don't know what versions of fat 2e supported, but i would imagine restricting oneself to fat16 (and not fat16 lba) would be safest. i used fat16, i think lba. i figured plan 9 would be smart enough to deal with lba and large disks, but wikipedia tells me that 1995 was sort of a chs-lba transition period, so perhaps i was wrong. i won't be able to experiment with chs on the laptop as it has a large disk with freebsd filling it except for the very end
Re: [9fans] the old floppy set
On Thu, Aug 13, 2009 at 09:26, erik quanstromquans...@quanstro.net wrote: i don't know what versions of fat 2e supported, but i would imagine restricting oneself to fat16 (and not fat16 lba) would be safest. i used fat16, i think lba. i figured plan 9 would be smart enough to deal with lba and large disks, but wikipedia tells me that 1995 was sort of a chs-lba transition period, so perhaps i was wrong. i won't be able to experiment with chs on the laptop as it has a large disk with freebsd filling it except for the very end even the current 9load won't deal with fat16 lba or fat32 lba. 9load-e820 does, though. - erik
Re: [9fans] the old floppy set
the CD includes sources to the kernel on platforms which required NDAs to get the information to do the port. part of the NDA, as i understand it, required the sorts of restrictions on redistribution in the commercial license. people have tried to get at least some bits of that opened up, and at least one vendor has given a definitive no. so i don't think the CD, per se, will ever be available without a license. CDs with licenses do, every so often, come up for sale. after my original copy got lost in a move, i bought one off someone here about two years ago. but i think at this point, it's a good bet that no new licenses for the CD will be generated. i believe it would, theoretically, be possible for the Labs to offer the CD contents, minus the restricted platforms, under the current licensing terms, but i wouldn't hold out too much hope that anyone with the authority to do so will find 2e worth the time. on the chance i'm wrong: if anyone with such authority can give the OK, i'm more than happy to do the legwork: prune the tree of restricted stuff (which i understand to be the SGI, MIPS, and NeXT kernel and boot loader bits, /sys/src/9/(chm indigo3k indigo4k next power) and /sys/src/boot/(indigo magnum)) and stick either the tree or a .tgz up somewhere. failing that, i think you're left to ebay. sorry.
Re: [9fans] the old floppy set
On Sat, Aug 8, 2009 at 6:49 AM, John Florenslawmas...@gmail.com wrote: On Fri, Aug 7, 2009 at 2:15 AM, Steve Simonst...@quintile.net wrote: As Anthony says it is very very old, but I might be fun if you had the time on your hands. The 2nd edition books/cdrom are nolonger available but you might find a set seccond hand (abebooks.com etc). The floppys are here: /n/sources/contrib/steve/historic/2nd-edition/pcdist/ I found a complete mirror of the old 2nd edition site and I think uriel has copied it to cat-v.org. You will need 16Mb to install and 8Mb to run a terminal though It will work at 640x480x1 resolution. The 4th edition should run on a 486, though you will need (say) 128Mb of ram - much more if you want to recompile gs(1). -Steve With a little help from FreeDOS, I am now successfully running 2e on a 66MHz 486 with 32 MB of RAM and little bitty hard drive ( 300 MB). It's fun; on the surface, it's not a lot different, although 800x600x1 makes things interesting (I like it, actually... rio hacking time?). I'd kill for the full CD, which I guess would have to go on my other 486, since I seem to recall that the full system needs 500 MB. However, given licensing, I suppose it's out of reach for the time being--anybody with experience in this sort of thing, is there a point in time when it could be distributed freely, or will it be stuck in the You can't have 2e without a license, and you can't have a license state forever? If you follow the insane rules of copyright, you will have to wait at least 90 years or so before it falls into the public domain. And by then they probably will have expanded copyright terms by another extra hundred years, so 'forever' seems about right. uriel
Re: [9fans] the old floppy set
On Sat, Aug 8, 2009 at 11:45, ron minnichrminn...@gmail.com wrote: I wonder how many of the companies involved still exist :-) i suspect ron knows all this already; this is intended for anyone else who comes along and thinks this might make getting 2e CDs out easier (instead of harder). again, this is all from my memory, mostly from discussions on 9fans. various people with more first-hand knowledge of the situation have spoken on the subject in the past; check the archives if you want a more definitive answer. the relevant companies were Sun, NeXT, SGI, and MIPS. One way or another, the Sun sources are available; i think, but am not certain, that Sun was asked and said okay (but maybe the original NDA just never had that sort of restriction). see extra/sun.tgz for the results. NeXT was acquired by Apple, who in legal terms became a successor entity (while I haven't seen the NDAs in question, that or similar is pretty standard language). While I was still at the Labs, word was that someone in 1127 (named at the time, but I don't remember now) with a good relationship with higher-up types there asked and was summarily denied. SGI bought MIPS, then spun them out again, but kept parts. No clear successor organization, which makes it likely that it'd be far more work on the part of SGI and/or MIPS to figure out who can even say yes. even if there is a clear answer, neither company seems like they've got a lot of spare personnel to devote the the question. SGI's own NDA is almost certainly with SGI (sorry: sgi). that's probably the easiest of the three to deal with, if someone were really, really inclined. but really: don't be. these are kernels for very, very outdated platforms, some of which even eBay has trouble turning up. cobbling together a 2e-supported pc would no doubt be faster and cheaper - and you could likely get beefier results out of the deal. none of the described platforms even have modern equivalents in their line. sun was probably the closest here, and we've got that already. anyway, to ron's question, for those keeping score: Sun: released their stuff; recently acquired by Oracle. NeXT: acquired by Apple, ate it from within. MIPS: acquired by SGI. a smaller MIPS was then spit out when SGI realized Itanium was their future (oops). SGI: went backrupt, twice, then acquired by Rackable before the whole shebang was renamed sgi. i was going to say that having Plan 9 ported to your platform seemed like a bad omen for your company, but equally valid is the observation that being a platform vender (other than Apple) is bad for your company.
Re: [9fans] the old floppy set
i was going to say that having Plan 9 ported to your platform seemed like a bad omen for your company, but equally valid is the observation that being a platform vender (other than Apple) is bad for your company. ibm seems to be doing ok. but sequent, the original home of ken's fs kernels, is not, having been swallowed by the aforementioned ibm. another platform vendor to fail recently which has been mentioned here is sicortex, the guys who made the low-power supercomputers. - erik
Re: [9fans] the old floppy set
anyway, to ron's question, for those keeping score: Sun: released their stuff; recently acquired by Oracle. NeXT: acquired by Apple, ate it from within. MIPS: acquired by SGI. a smaller MIPS was then spit out when SGI realized Itanium was their future (oops). SGI: went backrupt, twice, then acquired by Rackable before the whole shebang was renamed sgi. i was going to say that having Plan 9 ported to your platform seemed like a bad omen for your company, but equally valid is the observation that being a platform vender (other than Apple) is bad for your company. Last I had read, Rob Pike had tried several times to get SGI to allow the release of their stuff, but they always said no. I don't think any attempt has been made since Rackable acquired SGI. It still might be interesting to see someday, since I thought I had heard that Bell Labs still has an SGI Power Challenge running a 4th Edition kernel whose release is also barred by the 2e NDA... Maybe it's been turned off for good by now, though... -Ben winmail.dat
Re: [9fans] the old floppy set
probably the easiest of the three to deal with, if someone were really, really inclined. but really: don't be. these are kernels for very, very outdated platforms, some of which even eBay has trouble turning up. cobbling That's besides the point. This stuff should be saved for posterity, and hopefully at some point, shared for its educational and historic value. The legal issues will probably lead to the software being lost sooner or later, if not resolved... If someone is really, really inclined, please DO... There are lots of us who would be very grateful. Tim Newsham http://www.thenewsh.com/~newsham/
Re: [9fans] the old floppy set
On Thu, Aug 6, 2009 at 10:04 PM, Anthony Soraceano...@gmail.com wrote: that was for 2nd edition. it's now horribly outdated. it is also only available under an older, for-pay license that i'm not sure it's actually possible to buy any more. you don't actually want that set unless you're doing archeology. I was under the impression that it was a sort of evaluation thing, and then I guess you bought the license which gave you source and other stuff. I'm probably wrong. And yes, I basically am doing archaeology--I don't expect much, I just want to poke around at the old system John -- Object-oriented design is the roman numerals of computing -- Rob Pike
Re: [9fans] the old floppy set
As Anthony says it is very very old, but I might be fun if you had the time on your hands. The 2nd edition books/cdrom are nolonger available but you might find a set seccond hand (abebooks.com etc). The floppys are here: /n/sources/contrib/steve/historic/2nd-edition/pcdist/ I found a complete mirror of the old 2nd edition site and I think uriel has copied it to cat-v.org. You will need 16Mb to install and 8Mb to run a terminal though It will work at 640x480x1 resolution. The 4th edition should run on a 486, though you will need (say) 128Mb of ram - much more if you want to recompile gs(1). -Steve
Re: [9fans] the old floppy set
The 4th edition should run on a 486, though you will need (say) 128Mb of ram - much more if you want to recompile gs(1). i got a couple of 64mb via terminals a few years ago. they were fine for normal work, compiling the kernel, even with the giant myricom driver, even with 64mb. cpu(1) plays its traditional role with that terminal. - erik
Re: [9fans] the old floppy set
On Fri, Aug 7, 2009 at 11:15 AM, Steve Simonst...@quintile.net wrote: As Anthony says it is very very old, but I might be fun if you had the time on your hands. The 2nd edition books/cdrom are nolonger available but you might find a set seccond hand (abebooks.com etc). The floppys are here: /n/sources/contrib/steve/historic/2nd-edition/pcdist/ I found a complete mirror of the old 2nd edition site and I think uriel has copied it to cat-v.org. Yes, you can find a mirror of the 2nd ed site at http://doc.cat-v.org/plan_9/2nd_edition/plan9.att.com/ And the floppy is available at http://doc.cat-v.org/plan_9/2nd_edition/plan9.att.com/pcdist/ but I have not tested it, if you do I would love to hear about it. Enjoy uriel You will need 16Mb to install and 8Mb to run a terminal though It will work at 640x480x1 resolution. The 4th edition should run on a 486, though you will need (say) 128Mb of ram - much more if you want to recompile gs(1). -Steve
Re: [9fans] the old floppy set
And the floppy is available at http://doc.cat-v.org/plan_9/2nd_edition/plan9.att.com/pcdist/ but I have not tested it, if you do I would love to hear about it. I had found that about a year ago, and was able to get the floppy set up and running in Virtual PC without much trouble. It'll only work at 800x600x1, but otherwise, it wasn't terribly difficult... I've still got the VPC image, but it hasn't been fired up in some time. -Ben winmail.dat
Re: [9fans] the old floppy set
the floppies were available without the book+cd; at least as late as 1996 i remember downloading them from att's web site. they represented a fairly minimal system. i don't remember specifically, but it seems likely that there were license terms specific to the download.
Re: [9fans] the old floppy set
The 4th edition should run on a 486, though you will need (say) 128Mb of ram - much more if you want to recompile gs(1). All versions of Plan 9 need an FPU (awk usually caught me out) so beware of 486SX chips. ++L
Re: [9fans] the old floppy set
On Fri, Aug 7, 2009 at 2:15 AM, Steve Simonst...@quintile.net wrote: As Anthony says it is very very old, but I might be fun if you had the time on your hands. The 2nd edition books/cdrom are nolonger available but you might find a set seccond hand (abebooks.com etc). The floppys are here: /n/sources/contrib/steve/historic/2nd-edition/pcdist/ I found a complete mirror of the old 2nd edition site and I think uriel has copied it to cat-v.org. You will need 16Mb to install and 8Mb to run a terminal though It will work at 640x480x1 resolution. The 4th edition should run on a 486, though you will need (say) 128Mb of ram - much more if you want to recompile gs(1). -Steve With a little help from FreeDOS, I am now successfully running 2e on a 66MHz 486 with 32 MB of RAM and little bitty hard drive ( 300 MB). It's fun; on the surface, it's not a lot different, although 800x600x1 makes things interesting (I like it, actually... rio hacking time?). I'd kill for the full CD, which I guess would have to go on my other 486, since I seem to recall that the full system needs 500 MB. However, given licensing, I suppose it's out of reach for the time being--anybody with experience in this sort of thing, is there a point in time when it could be distributed freely, or will it be stuck in the You can't have 2e without a license, and you can't have a license state forever? John -- Object-oriented design is the roman numerals of computing -- Rob Pike
[9fans] the old floppy set
Looking at the very old mailing list archives, I noticed something about a 3-disk (or was it 4-disk?) floppy-based distribution of the earliest PC dist. Is that still available in some form? I just came into possession of a stack of floppies and a pair of 486s and I'm ready to dare to be stupid. John -- Object-oriented design is the roman numerals of computing -- Rob Pike
