subject:"\[9fans\] sad commentary"


it seems like you are avoiding the point on purpose.


No purpose I'm aware of :-)


i don't think you can pick up a kernel with tweezers and make
a bunch of abstract statements about it.  and so i think the fact
that unicode may be used anywhere a character is expected in plan9
does have a lot to do with the system's functionality.


Unicode is mainly about being able to represent human written word. Its 
availability is no use if the data being passed around will be just fine as 
an octet stream. To my meager understanding, there's a classification of a 
computer system's functions that puts encoding text along with 
representing text and into the realm of applications and not systems. 
Hence my claim that UTF-8 adds not to OS functions, while it may improve 
application functionality.



what do you base this claim on?  i'm pretty sure that the fonts
distributed with the system are enough to support japanese, greek,
and russian, to name only the ones i can think of quickly


I asked for clarification on the point and said that I may be mistaken. 
Though, I'm still not sure I'll be able to successfully view a Russian web 
page. Do you think that's feasible? What about Hebrew, Arabic, or Persian?



there is not.  perhaps this is something you could contribute.


Spare me. I'm no hacker, I want to Get My Personal Job Done (tm). In 
fact, that was my main point; lowlifes like me will use your system if it 
can Get Their Job Done (tm) or they'll migrate to another system that can. 
They won't bother coding.


--On Monday, June 30, 2008 6:56 PM -0400 erik quanstrom 
[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:



The fact the UTF-8 was first implemented on Plan 9 has nothing to do
with  Plan 9's funtionality as an OS.


it seems like you are avoiding the point on purpose.

i don't think you can pick up a kernel with tweezers and make
a bunch of abstract statements about it.  and so i think the fact
that unicode may be used anywhere a character is expected in plan9
does have a lot to do with the system's functionality.


If the availability of UTF-8 is an advantage, the absence of a single
Unicode font in the system useful for non-Latin languages is a very
strong  disadvantage.


what do you base this claim on?  i'm pretty sure that the fonts
distributed with the system are enough to support japanese, greek,
and russian, to name only the ones i can think of quickly

and i am certain that code2000 and cyberbit which are available
on sources provide some of the best unicode coverage for free fonts.
they're not great fonts nor do they have total coverage, but no
fonts do.


I even doubt there's a simple way of inputting, say, Hebrew
or Arabic in Plan 9. It'll be kind of you to clarify that point for me
if  I'm mistaken.


there is not.  perhaps this is something you could contribute.

- erik

Re: [9fans] sad commentary

2008-07-01 Thread John Stalker

Maybe this is a troll, but I'll answer anyway.

I would say 1, 2, 3, and 5 benefit from using plan9.
4 and 7 don't notice much whether they are using plan9.
6 aren't likely to get to use plan9, though their jobs
would be a lot easier if they could use acid (the
debugger, not the recreational substance).

 Which types of programmers?
 
 1. Casual programmers, e.g. an admin who finds out a few lines of code 
 could lighten their burden
 
 2. Programmers in need of a dirty-but-quick solution, e.g. a prototype
 
 3. Hobby programmers, i.e. those who learn out of curiosity and aren't 
 forced to remain loyal to a specific system's quirks and general edginess
 
 4. Reluctant programmers, i.e. those who aren't programmers per se but need 
 to write one program in the course of solving another--probably 
 non-computerish--problem
 
 5. Ueberprogrammers, e.g. those who write one new OS in each circadian cycle
 
 6. Plain vanilla programmers, i.e. people whose job revolves around 
 programming computers most of whom have to develop codebases of their 
 predecessors and are stuck with whatever the original designers thought was 
 best be it a Plan 9 mod or whatever
 
 7. Abstract computer science programmers, i.e. those who want to test and 
 profile right here right now that brand new hybrid of stack, trie, and 
 tuatara they've thought up
 
 If Plan 9 is really an OS only for people of types (5) and (6), and some of 
 (2), well then my statement is true that Plan 9 is a 'niche' OS. No one 
 should wonder why it isn't more widely used or even remembered in less 
 elite circles.

Personally, I never wondered.  But I don't really care either.

-- 
John Stalker
School of Mathematics
Trinity College Dublin
tel +353 1 896 1983
fax +353 1 896 2282

Re: [9fans] sad commentary


I still don't get your point.

And does your point include these For Dummies books?

1. Alan Simpson - Visual Web Developer 2005 Express Edition For Dummies
2. Allen Wyatt - Cleaning Windows XP For Dummies
3. Barry Burd - Beginning Programming With Java For Dummies
4. Bill Sempf - Visual Basic 2005 For Dummies.pdf
5. Damon Dean And Andy Cowitt - Macromedia Studio 8 All-In-One Desk 
Reference For Dummies

6. Dee-Ann LeBlanc - Linux For Dummies
7. Frederic Jones - Digital Photography, Just The Steps For Dummies
8. Steve Holzner - Ajax For Dummies
9. Kevin Beaver - Hacking For Dummies
10. Janine Warner - Dreamweaver 8 For Dummies

Does Dreamweaver 8 sound like a piece of very complex, organically 
developed software, and lacking a central design idea?


For Dummies books are essentially non sequiturs arising from marketing 
schemes. RTFM is really the way to go, but you need to have an incentive, 
a promise, to RTFM. Obviously, sometimes the incentive is replaced by a 
compelling to obey company/university/institution policies.


--On Monday, June 30, 2008 4:11 PM -0700 Skip Tavakkolian 
[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:



By the way, I provided a description of my person to avoid dummy
labels.  I may well be a dummy in your league but that doesn't mean
I'm unable of  reading a normal technical manual. I can do and have done
that, on Linux,  FreeBSD, and Plan 9.


you've missed my point.  most of the dummies books on software try
to explain how to deal with very complex, organically developed
systems that lack any central design idea.  the fact that it requires
the reader to admit to being a dummy to buy the book is telling
enough.

Re: [9fans] sad commentary


Having said that, but for web browsing, I'm quite
happy using Plan 9 as an end user that mostly writes code, slides, and
docs and reads mail. I mean, I use it not just to modify it. This does not
mean I cannot use others as well.


It's fine, if you're fine with it ;-) Do you ever visit any AJAX enabled 
websites? Do you consider AJAX a superfluous technology? Do you switch to 
your other OS machine--or reboot your current machine--if and when you 
visit GMail's pages (at least to enable IMAP access for the first time)? 
What's your opinion on good ol' non-standard CSS? Won't you ever want to 
use one of these new content delivery systems, such as Microsoft 
Silverlight or Adobe Flash?


Do you sometimes need to write an XML document? Do you need to validate it? 
Do you need to transform it? Are you going to write or port each and every 
application you need for doing so?


All these could theoretically become supported (that's different from 
being included) in an OS if it manages to gather enough public momentum. 
Without that you can do only your serious stuff which excludes quite some 
of the good stuff. Public momentum comes from providing the public with 
enough incentive so that a small portion of that public actually writes 
what the rest will need.


Incidentally, I find it a bit hypocritical to do research (read: find out 
how a system can Get New Jobs Done (tm)) on a system but turn to another 
whenever one actually needs to Get Something Done (tm).


--On Tuesday, July 01, 2008 1:17 AM +0200 Francisco J Ballesteros 
[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:



Many of the ideas have been/will be applied to other
systems, and that will affects end users as well. It's just that there's
no need to use the same system for doing research and for, say,
browsing the web.

Having said that, but for web browsing, I'm quite
happy using Plan 9 as an end user that mostly writes code, slides, and
docs and reads mail. I mean, I use it not just to modify it. This does not
mean I cannot use others as well.

Re: [9fans] sad commentary

I have never done any kernel programming or any major programming. I 
thought I said that on my original post. That line was to be taken 
tongue-in-cheek. It meant that I, as a user, shouldn't need to actually 
read code to appreciate what Plan 9 has to offer.


--On Monday, June 30, 2008 8:23 PM -0300 Iruata Souza [EMAIL PROTECTED] 
wrote:



On Mon, Jun 30, 2008 at 6:20 PM, Eris Discordia
[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:

Barring a mystical bond with its exquisite kernel, of course.



it seems you have done much kernel programming, eh?

iru

Re: [9fans] sad commentary

2008-07-01 Thread Francisco J Ballesteros

You have not read even a single word before replying.
I said I do use Plan 9 for all the things that have to be done
for my daily work.

Enough of this rant, time to write some code.

On Tue, Jul 1, 2008 at 10:25 AM, Eris Discordia
[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
 Having said that, but for web browsing, I'm quite
 happy using Plan 9 as an end user that mostly writes code, slides, and
 docs and reads mail. I mean, I use it not just to modify it. This does not
 mean I cannot use others as well.

 It's fine, if you're fine with it ;-) Do you ever visit any AJAX enabled
 websites? Do you consider AJAX a superfluous technology? Do you switch to
 your other OS machine--or reboot your current machine--if and when you
 visit GMail's pages (at least to enable IMAP access for the first time)?
 What's your opinion on good ol' non-standard CSS? Won't you ever want to use
 one of these new content delivery systems, such as Microsoft Silverlight
 or Adobe Flash?

 Do you sometimes need to write an XML document? Do you need to validate it?
 Do you need to transform it? Are you going to write or port each and every
 application you need for doing so?

 All these could theoretically become supported (that's different from
 being included) in an OS if it manages to gather enough public momentum.
 Without that you can do only your serious stuff which excludes quite some
 of the good stuff. Public momentum comes from providing the public with
 enough incentive so that a small portion of that public actually writes what
 the rest will need.

 Incidentally, I find it a bit hypocritical to do research (read: find out
 how a system can Get New Jobs Done (tm)) on a system but turn to another
 whenever one actually needs to Get Something Done (tm).

 --On Tuesday, July 01, 2008 1:17 AM +0200 Francisco J Ballesteros
 [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:

 Many of the ideas have been/will be applied to other
 systems, and that will affects end users as well. It's just that there's
 no need to use the same system for doing research and for, say,
 browsing the web.

 Having said that, but for web browsing, I'm quite
 happy using Plan 9 as an end user that mostly writes code, slides, and
 docs and reads mail. I mean, I use it not just to modify it. This does not
 mean I cannot use others as well.

Re: [9fans] sad commentary

You've misread me. I'm far from understanding which facilities Plan 9 
provides for ron minnich, the CS/CE person. I should be able of finding 
facilities it provides for me, the lowlife. Or I'd dump it as an option 
for Getting My Job Done (tm), as did many before me. No public recognition 
of Plan 9 lies in that direction.


In passing, I may actually be able to figure out how to cope with your 
challenge. That wouldn't change Plan 9's status as a niche OS, however. 
I happen to know that Plan 9 presents a network transparent environment, so 
trying out a C compiler at plan9.bell-labs.com shouldn't be any harder than 
trying it out at the local machine which is incidentally much harder to 
grasp conceptually than the same task performed on FreeBSD because 
network transparency involves additional layers of abstraction whether you 
admit it or not. A stand-alone Plan 9 system amounts in conceptual 
complexity for the user to at least three interconnected machines. Very 
little has been done to cover that.


--On Monday, June 30, 2008 5:22 PM -0700 ron minnich [EMAIL PROTECTED] 
wrote:



On Mon, Jun 30, 2008 at 2:20 PM, Eris Discordia
[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:

Not a very kind comment. Though, it is possible that it's true.

What was there for me to understand about Plan 9 that I did not? Barring
a mystical bond with its exquisite kernel, of course.



Let's pretend I want to try out the C compilers at
plan9.bell-labs.com. i want to see what they do, maybe differently
than my local ones do.

How do you do that?

ron

Re: [9fans] sad commentary

9fans is 99 out of 100 times all code, code, code. You can ignore me as 
an irrelevancy and read the other 99/100 posts. Good luck deep diving.


--On Tuesday, July 01, 2008 1:23 AM -0600 andrey mirtchovski 
[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:



My sad commentary is that for whatever reason plan9 keeps attracting
those who like to talk, talk, talk, and not those who like to code,
code, code.

Re: [9fans] sad commentary

2008-07-01 Thread Andrés Domínguez

2008/7/1 Federico G. Benavento [EMAIL PROTECTED]:
 eris,

 stop trolling and sending apples to the parties you're not invited.

Eris _Discordia_, good nick for a troll:

discordia: f discord

--
Andrés

Re: [9fans] sad commentary

2008-07-01 Thread hiro

Haha, sarcasm at it's finest.
Eris, you are my hero.

--
hiro

Re: [9fans] sad commentary

2008-07-01 Thread john


 Window decorations (as they're called in X-speak) are not mere 
 decorations, they're useful. The two button (+/- wheel) mouse is prevalent 
 because for most people only the index and middle finger are robust enough. 
 The ring finger is never on par with them, except of course with the 
 unnecessary adjustment Plan 9 users seem to go through. Assigning the 
 middle finger to both second and third buttons is another solution which is 
 equally uncomfortable.


Somebody call the X guys and tell them that they've been using too
many buttons for 20 years and THAT'S why their system has failed.

John

Re: [9fans] sad commentary

2008-07-01 Thread john

 On Tue, Jul 1, 2008 at 1:47 AM, Eris Discordia [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:

 Plan 9 is not for end users.  Plan 9 is for programmers.

 
 Maybe more appropriate in your case - Plan 9 is not for Windows sys admins.
 
 Please describe the process of accessing an audio device on a computer
 across the room with windows and describe how you can do it from the
 shell...
 
-eric

Eric, I don't know what this audio thing you CS/CE type researchers
are using but us lowlifes just need Firefox and Excel before we can
use Plan 9.  I'm afraid that until you can provide those, Joe Public
will never use Plan 9 and it will be forever doomed to run only on
supercomputers and storage systems and in research settings.

John Bob Dobbs Floren

Re: [9fans] sad commentary

2008-07-01 Thread cummij

 lowlifes like me will use your system if it 
 can Get Their Job Done (tm) or they'll migrate to another system that can. 
 They won't bother coding.

then migrate, already ...

john

Re: [9fans] sad commentary

2008-07-01 Thread David Leimbach

On Tue, Jul 1, 2008 at 6:59 AM, John Waters [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:

 I have always felt guilty about wanting Common LISP on Plan 9; but I
 am not entirely sure why.
 John


Eh, there's lots of code for Common Lisp out there that'd be nice to run on
Plan 9 in my opinion.  I don't think we're alone in our feelings :-).

A lot of time Unix and Lisp have seem a bit at odds... I think there's been
papers written on the topic even.

Dave



 On Tue, Jul 1, 2008 at 4:35 PM, David Leimbach [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
 
 The question is what new function Plan 9, as an OS, defines for
  the end user.
  Plan 9 is not for end users.  Plan 9 is for programmers.
 
  I think I just heard the sound of a nail being struck on the head.
 
  I do find myself wanting Lisp, Scheme, and Haskell and all my other weird
  programming toys for Plan 9 too.  I believe Haskell and Scheme are
 handled,
  but has there ever been a Common Lisp implementation for it?   Perhaps I
  should look into a port of SBCL or something.
  Dave
 
  -rob

Re: [9fans] sad commentary

2008-07-01 Thread hiro

I am not even a programmer. I'm using plan9 and inferno because the
systems are so simple and flexible, that I only have to use two-liner
shell scripts for my tasks.

Re: [9fans] sad commentary

2008-07-01 Thread Uriel

On Tue, Jul 1, 2008 at 11:21 AM, Federico G. Benavento
[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
 That has a very long beard! Isn`t programming without endusers just like
 wanking?

 how is that related to Plan 9 being for programmers?


That means that Plan 9 is like porn for hackers.

uriel

Re: [9fans] sad commentary

2008-07-01 Thread bblochl


Uriel wrote:

On Tue, Jul 1, 2008 at 11:21 AM, Federico G. Benavento
[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
  

That has a very long beard! Isn`t programming without endusers just like
wanking?
  

how is that related to Plan 9 being for programmers?




That means that Plan 9 is like porn for hackers.

uriel


  

I would say that is hard core stuff for hackers. (Some need that urgently!)

bblochl

Re: [9fans] sad commentary

On Tue, Jul 1, 2008 at 4:47 AM, Eris Discordia [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
 Window decorations (as they're called in X-speak) are not mere
 decorations, they're useful. The two button (+/- wheel) mouse is prevalent
 because for most people only the index and middle finger are robust enough.
 The ring finger is never on par with them, except of course with the
 unnecessary adjustment Plan 9 users seem to go through. Assigning the middle
 finger to both second and third buttons is another solution which is equally
 uncomfortable.

I see you have been doing a lot of research on ergonomics.

 Microsoft certainly has put a lot of money into researching human
 interfacing and the outcome is free for all to get and implement. Don't
 think for a moment that because it's Microsoft it has to be taken lightly.
 Hundreds of small rounded corners have made the Windows GUI experience a
 much better experience than that of any alternative GUI.

of course I agree your personal opinions could be taken as
representatives of human kind's opinions but, just in case, would you
mind showing the results of your great research on the subject?

thanks,
iru

Re: [9fans] sad commentary

On Tue, Jul 1, 2008 at 5:25 AM, Eris Discordia [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
 All these could theoretically become supported (that's different from
 being included) in an OS if it manages to gather enough public momentum.
 Without that you can do only your serious stuff which excludes quite some
 of the good stuff. Public momentum comes from providing the public with
 enough incentive so that a small portion of that public actually writes what
 the rest will need.

like you do with your system, right?

 Incidentally, I find it a bit hypocritical to do research (read: find out
 how a system can Get New Jobs Done (tm)) on a system but turn to another
 whenever one actually needs to Get Something Done (tm).

sorry if I can't write a flash player in two minutes. it won't happen again.

iru

Re: [9fans] sad commentary

On Tue, Jul 1, 2008 at 5:42 AM, Eris Discordia [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
 A stand-alone Plan 9 system amounts in conceptual complexity for
 the user to at least three interconnected machines. Very little has been
 done to cover that.

does distributed gets translated to something else in your web browser?

iru

Re: [9fans] sad commentary

On Tue, Jul 1, 2008 at 5:01 AM, Eris Discordia [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
 For Dummies books are essentially non sequiturs arising from marketing
 schemes. RTFM is really the way to go, but you need to have an incentive,
 a promise, to RTFM. Obviously, sometimes the incentive is replaced by a
 compelling to obey company/university/institution policies.

I'm glad to see curiosity or research are not incentive nor promise.

thanks,
iru

Re: [9fans] sad commentary

2008-07-01 Thread Pietro Gagliardi


On Jul 1, 2008, at 9:32 AM, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:

Eric, I don't know what this audio thing you CS/CE type researchers
are using but us lowlifes just need Firefox and Excel before we can
use Plan 9.  I'm afraid that until you can provide those, Joe Public
will never use Plan 9 and it will be forever doomed to run only on
supercomputers and storage systems and in research settings.


- WARNING: It's time to be brutally honest again. Take a deep breath.  
-


I'm 15. I run Plan 9 on a 20 iMac in the corner of my room at home. I  
hardly use Excel, and I don't usually browse the web on Plan 9 (or  
with Firefox - I use Safari on Mac). Yet I find myself using Plan 9  
50% of my computing day. The commonest two things I do are coding and  
document typesetting. I like Plan 9's completeness of programming  
environment (I'd like to see Ruby beat lib*) and the authenticity of  
the typesetting tools (the original reason I started with Plan 9) was  
compelling.


Yep. I'm a nerd. But I'm not in a CS/CR (at least not yet). And yes, I  
do normal stuff too. I browse the web. I listen to music. I watch  
movies. And unlike most people my age, I go to school and succeed. (I  
don't play sports because I have a vision disability.)


Please reconsider your statement.

Re: [9fans] sad commentary

2008-07-01 Thread Dan Cross

(But sarcasm seems to escape you  :-))

On Tue, Jul 1, 2008 at 5:35 PM, Pietro Gagliardi [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
 On Jul 1, 2008, at 9:32 AM, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:

 Eric, I don't know what this audio thing you CS/CE type researchers
 are using but us lowlifes just need Firefox and Excel before we can
 use Plan 9.  I'm afraid that until you can provide those, Joe Public
 will never use Plan 9 and it will be forever doomed to run only on
 supercomputers and storage systems and in research settings.

 - WARNING: It's time to be brutally honest again. Take a deep breath. -

 I'm 15. I run Plan 9 on a 20 iMac in the corner of my room at home. I
 hardly use Excel, and I don't usually browse the web on Plan 9 (or with
 Firefox - I use Safari on Mac). Yet I find myself using Plan 9 50% of my
 computing day. The commonest two things I do are coding and document
 typesetting. I like Plan 9's completeness of programming environment (I'd
 like to see Ruby beat lib*) and the authenticity of the typesetting tools
 (the original reason I started with Plan 9) was compelling.

 Yep. I'm a nerd. But I'm not in a CS/CR (at least not yet). And yes, I do
 normal stuff too. I browse the web. I listen to music. I watch movies. And
 unlike most people my age, I go to school and succeed. (I don't play sports
 because I have a vision disability.)

 Please reconsider your statement.

Re: [9fans] sad commentary

2008-07-01 Thread john

 On Jul 1, 2008, at 9:32 AM, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
 Eric, I don't know what this audio thing you CS/CE type researchers
 are using but us lowlifes just need Firefox and Excel before we can
 use Plan 9.  I'm afraid that until you can provide those, Joe Public
 will never use Plan 9 and it will be forever doomed to run only on
 supercomputers and storage systems and in research settings.
 
 - WARNING: It's time to be brutally honest again. Take a deep breath.  
 -
 
 I'm 15. I run Plan 9 on a 20 iMac in the corner of my room at home. I  
 hardly use Excel, and I don't usually browse the web on Plan 9 (or  
 with Firefox - I use Safari on Mac). Yet I find myself using Plan 9  
 50% of my computing day. The commonest two things I do are coding and  
 document typesetting. I like Plan 9's completeness of programming  
 environment (I'd like to see Ruby beat lib*) and the authenticity of  
 the typesetting tools (the original reason I started with Plan 9) was  
 compelling.
 
 Yep. I'm a nerd. But I'm not in a CS/CR (at least not yet). And yes, I  
 do normal stuff too. I browse the web. I listen to music. I watch  
 movies. And unlike most people my age, I go to school and succeed. (I  
 don't play sports because I have a vision disability.)
 
 Please reconsider your statement.

Pietro, once again you've completely failed to see the intent of a
message.  I was pre-empting Eris' idiot complaints by pretending audio
was too research-y and complicated for the Joe Public he is always
referring to.  I wasn't asking for a brutally honest description of
your computing habits, although some of the information does explain
your previous patterns of posting.

You apparently succeed at school; didn't they teach you about sarcasm,
satire, irony, all the various methods people use to insult and mock
each other without actually coming out and saying, I hate you and
hope you die?


John

Re: [9fans] sad commentary

2008-07-01 Thread Pietro Gagliardi

If only we transmitted messages by voice. It's much easier to  
understand the sarcastic nature. (And you need to get me in a good  
mood.)


On Jul 1, 2008, at 5:53 PM, Dan Cross wrote:


(But sarcasm seems to escape you  :-))

On Tue, Jul 1, 2008 at 5:35 PM, Pietro Gagliardi [EMAIL PROTECTED]  
wrote:

On Jul 1, 2008, at 9:32 AM, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:


Eric, I don't know what this audio thing you CS/CE type  
researchers

are using but us lowlifes just need Firefox and Excel before we can
use Plan 9.  I'm afraid that until you can provide those, Joe Public
will never use Plan 9 and it will be forever doomed to run only on
supercomputers and storage systems and in research settings.


- WARNING: It's time to be brutally honest again. Take a deep  
breath. -


I'm 15. I run Plan 9 on a 20 iMac in the corner of my room at  
home. I
hardly use Excel, and I don't usually browse the web on Plan 9 (or  
with
Firefox - I use Safari on Mac). Yet I find myself using Plan 9 50%  
of my

computing day. The commonest two things I do are coding and document
typesetting. I like Plan 9's completeness of programming  
environment (I'd
like to see Ruby beat lib*) and the authenticity of the typesetting  
tools

(the original reason I started with Plan 9) was compelling.

Yep. I'm a nerd. But I'm not in a CS/CR (at least not yet). And  
yes, I do
normal stuff too. I browse the web. I listen to music. I watch  
movies. And
unlike most people my age, I go to school and succeed. (I don't  
play sports

because I have a vision disability.)

Please reconsider your statement.

Re: [9fans] sad commentary

2008-07-01 Thread erik quanstrom

 4. The apple with καλλιστι on it is totally Russ', for he posted 
 the most sensible response. Thank you Russ.
 
 5. Oh, and that thing on (4) is the Discordian transliteration of whatever 
 was written on the apple. Greek text input to a mail client on Windows. 
 Check if you can read it on the mother of UTF-8. If you do you're 
 almost there, if you don't...

i have been using non-latin characters with plan 9 tools on unix
and later on plan 9 since 1991 or so both in filenames and data.

the fact that utf-8 just works even in environments not designed for it,
is a testament to its excellent design.

unfortunately, unix tools no longer do the right thing with utf-8.
they've gotten too smart for that.  locales get in the way.

- erik

Re: [9fans] sad commentary

2008-07-01 Thread a

// 5. Oh, and that thing on (4) is the Discordian transliteration of whatever 
// was written on the apple. Greek text input to a mail client on Windows. 
// Check if you can read it on the mother of UTF-8. If you do you're 
// almost there, if you don't...

I was surprised by this, so I actually fired up my XP install. Yes, it looks
like you finally can get some non-latin characters into thing. Good for
them. It looks like the command prompt even *almost* gets it right:
?α???στ?
Well, three characters for eight isn't so bad, right? And it's just glyphs,
right? Surely the gui stuff does better. Let's stick it in the search box...
ooo, look at that! All characters show up! And the search... looks for
?a???st?. Uh, what? Note the transposition into roughly similar latin
characters. It clearly has some understanding of what the characters
are, but has decided to look for something else. IE and Firefox will let
me search for such things properly, but (as with the καλλιστι in your
original message) the tops of many of the returned glyphs are cut off.

That is to say, the Unicode is *almost* there.

Conversely, in Plan 9, the following involves a number of tools
certainly not designed for the task, but works just fine:
{echo /καλλιστι ; echo '-/^$/,+/^$/'} |
 sam -d `{grep -l [Α-ω] /mail/fs/mbox/*/body} [2] /dev/null |
 sed -n '2,$p'
I'm curious how you'd do something similar elsewhere.

You really just haven't bothered, have you?
Anthony

Re: [9fans] sad commentary

2008-07-01 Thread lucio

 It's fine, if you're fine with it ;-) Do you ever visit any AJAX enabled 
 websites? Do you consider AJAX a superfluous technology? Do you switch to 
 your other OS machine--or reboot your current machine--if and when you 
 visit GMail's pages (at least to enable IMAP access for the first time)? 
 What's your opinion on good ol' non-standard CSS? Won't you ever want to 
 use one of these new content delivery systems, such as Microsoft 
 Silverlight or Adobe Flash?

You're putting the cart before the horse.  Of course there is
utility computing out there and of course there is Microsoft to fill
that niche.  And Linux to follow in its footsteps.  But there is a
frightening prospect if you assume that utility computing is all that
computing is about, namely that only massive programming effort is
required to produce any sort of computing product.

Let me try this as a comparison.  Less than a hundred years ago,
Bugatti manufactured one motorvehicle a year, from scratch.  I'm not
sure how many persons were involved, the impression I have from
hearsay is that it was a single individual.  Today, you need the might
of the Chinese or Indian manufacturers to enter the motorvehicle
manufacturing business.  Or huge investment effort for the new
eco-friendly vehicles.

Utility computing is perfectly fine as long as it is balanced by
original development, but it is poisonous if it preclueds any original
participation.  Open Source is one form of rebellion, but it lacks the
robust foundations of sound program development.  Plan 9 is a much
smaller, better designed approach.  I'm sure we won't see Plan 9
deployed widely any time soon, it lacks the utility nature of the
contenders and I'm sorry to see that happening, but that is the nature
of the beast.  Had Plan 9 caught the imagination of the masses, it
would have grown the same tumors as Linux, and that would have
defeated its nature.

Think Pascal: it is hardly the language of choice today, but the
principles it enshrines have totally altered the programming language
landscape.  C is the utility version, and C++ and Java its obvious
offsprings.  Alef has been abandoned and Limbo remains a very
specialised language, but they will also leave their mark.

So, I think this dicussion is based on a premise whose value is purely
emotional: we'd all be more comfortable if Plan 9 was widely accepted,
but there is no intellectual reason for it to be so.  Rob Pike says
the same thing in a nutshell, but in reality it is the philosophy
behind Plan 9 that needs spreading: careful design, generalised
objects, simplicity rather than bulk, etc.  Not Rio or Acme, Fossil or
Venti, but the environment in which they can thrive.  The environment
in which Mozilla is difficult to create so that simpler solutions can
be sought.

++L

Re: [9fans] sad commentary

2008-07-01 Thread Robert William Fuller


[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:

snip


Utility computing is perfectly fine as long as it is balanced by
original development, but it is poisonous if it preclueds any original
participation.  Open Source is one form of rebellion, but it lacks the
robust foundations of sound program development.  Plan 9 is a much
smaller, better designed approach.  I'm sure we won't see Plan 9


O yeahhh umm yeah like r u 3l3t3?  Err uh yeah or is it 1337?


contenders and I'm sorry to see that happening, but that is the nature
of the beast.  Had Plan 9 caught the imagination of the masses, it
would have grown the same tumors as Linux, and that would have
defeated its nature.

Think Pascal: it is hardly the language of choice today, but the
principles it enshrines have totally altered the programming language
landscape.  C is the utility version, and C++ and Java its obvious


Sure uhhh yeah whatever you say  Or was it Algol?


offsprings.  Alef has been abandoned and Limbo remains a very
specialised language, but they will also leave their mark.


So does a dog pissing on a fire hydrant.


So, I think this dicussion is based on a premise whose value is purely
emotional: we'd all be more comfortable if Plan 9 was widely accepted,
but there is no intellectual reason for it to be so.  Rob Pike says
the same thing in a nutshell, but in reality it is the philosophy
behind Plan 9 that needs spreading: careful design, generalised
objects, simplicity rather than bulk, etc.  Not Rio or Acme, Fossil or
Venti, but the environment in which they can thrive.  The environment
in which Mozilla is difficult to create so that simpler solutions can
be sought.


Mozilla didn't create the web.  The web created Mozilla.

Re: [9fans] sad commentary

2008-07-01 Thread Federico G. Benavento

I have no idea what that discordian crap is nor what your
intentions are, but I do know that you're either a troll
or complete idiot.

what do you try to achieve ... it is the wrong'em boyo

Re: [9fans] sad commentary

2008-06-30 Thread Francisco J Ballesteros

Octopus sessions persist by definition as long as you do not
reboot your central PC. All other machines are used to run viewers, but
the layout is preserved by the (window) file system kept at the PC.

Also, you may use tar to capture (most of) the window system state
and restore it later (eg., upon reboots).

On Mon, Jun 30, 2008 at 7:24 AM, underspecified
[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
 This is actually something I am very interested in as well.
 If a persistent version of Acme (-SAC) was available it would
 completely obviate my use of screen.
 Would something like this be feasible outside of Octopus as well?

 --underspecified

 On Mon, Jun 30, 2008 at 12:10 PM, Tim Wiess [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
 this slashdot article almost asks for cpu
 functionality for plan 9 by name.

 http://ask.slashdot.org/askslashdot/08/06/29/1417247.shtml

 not a single mention of plan 9.  i hope
 this is an indication that slashdot has
 slipped.

 screens?  1978 called and wants its
 terminal server mentality back.

 - erik

 cpu is not persistent, at least not in the way
 he wants it.

 Yeah, seems like the poster is more interested in something similar to
 what Octopus give you.

Re: [9fans] sad commentary

People do acknowledge the new free systems. Unfortunately, RMS got
them off it in a microsecond when 3e came out:

http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/plan-nine.html

And I don't believe the Note at the top will change people's minds.

And even if we do manage to make people remember Plan 9, we live in a
world ruled by the standard set up by Windows 95. Even Mac OS X seems
influenced (the three buttons scenario - take a look at that Ah,
minimalism if you don't use that system). If people say Plan 9 is
too hard to use they will allocate blame to Rob Pike's rio before
reading his tirade on other windowing systems (which you can find at http://cm.bell-labs.com/cm/cs/doc/88/1-07.ps.gz)
. And I don't think they would be open to using Inferno, where the
windowing system has to be started manually and each and every program
isn't available from that menu. I'm not complaining, though - I like
them both - but I'm warning you.

On Jun 29, 2008, at 10:38 PM, Uriel wrote:

No, slashdot has not slipped (but then, I stopped reading it a few
years ago, and the comments there have always been most depressing).

But the world has pretty much forgotten Plan 9 even exists (and lets
not even mention Inferno). In a story about 9vx in reddit.com (where
supposedly all the cool kids hang out this days) somebody mentioned
'last I got interested in Plan 9 you had to pay a few hundred bucks to
get a copy' (or something to that effect).

So, that is what anti-propaganda brings you, but at least you don't
have to deal with clueless users... oh wait, never mind.

uriel

On Mon, Jun 30, 2008 at 4:21 AM, erik quanstrom
[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:

this slashdot article almost asks for cpu
functionality for plan 9 by name.

http://ask.slashdot.org/askslashdot/08/06/29/1417247.shtml

not a single mention of plan 9. i hope
this is an indication that slashdot has
slipped.

screens? 1978 called and wants its
terminal server mentality back.

- erik

Re: [9fans] sad commentary

2008-06-30 Thread bblochl


Pietro Gagliardi schrieb:
If people say Plan 9 is too hard to use they will allocate blame to 
Rob Pike's rio before reading his tirade on other windowing systems 
(which you can find at http://cm.bell-labs.com/cm/cs/doc/88/1-07.ps.gz).
With this link ione only gets the starting page of the paper. Is there 
any other source for the complete Paper (without cost)?


bblochl

Re: [9fans] sad commentary

2008-06-30 Thread bblochl


Pietro Gagliardi schrieb:

People do acknowledge the new free systems. Unfortunately, RMS got 
them off it in a microsecond when 3e came out:


http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/plan-nine.html

And I don't believe the Note at the top will change people's minds.


Wikipedia says:
License
The full source code is freely available under Lucent Public License 
1.02, and considered to be open source by the OSI and free software by 
the FSF (although incompatible with the GNU General Public License). It 
passes the Debian Free Software Guidelines.


From another mail: But the world has pretty much forgotten Plan 9 even 
exists (and lets not even mention Inferno)


I do think, that its not the license, the main problem of plan 9 is the 
lack of a tutorial for beginners and examples for some applications and 
at best with some exercises to practice. Well, there is a bulky manual. 
The collection of papers Plan 9 — The Documents (Volume 2) is more 
readable. But learning from manuals compares to learning a language from 
a dictionary. There is a need for some more readable. For example the 
role of make as an equivalent for cc is not self-evident for a 
traditional normal OS-user. It is a regret that alef has gone and limbo 
is not available under Plan 9. (Or is it?) As there is no simple 
introduction to Plan 9 new users will just go the easy way and get 
Windows or Linux.


bblochl

Re: [9fans] sad commentary

2008-06-30 Thread john

 Pietro Gagliardi schrieb:
 If people say Plan 9 is too hard to use they will allocate blame to 
 Rob Pike's rio before reading his tirade on other windowing systems 
 (which you can find at http://cm.bell-labs.com/cm/cs/doc/88/1-07.ps.gz).
 With this link ione only gets the starting page of the paper. Is there 
 any other source for the complete Paper (without cost)?
 
 bblochl

I'm not sure what you're looking at, but when I downloaded and
uncompressed that paper I got the whole thing.

John

Re: [9fans] sad commentary

2008-06-30 Thread bblochl


[EMAIL PROTECTED] schrieb:

Pietro Gagliardi schrieb:

If people say Plan 9 is too hard to use they will allocate blame to 
Rob Pike's rio before reading his tirade on other windowing systems 
(which you can find at http://cm.bell-labs.com/cm/cs/doc/88/1-07.ps.gz).
  
With this link ione only gets the starting page of the paper. Is there 
any other source for the complete Paper (without cost)?


bblochl



I'm not sure what you're looking at, but when I downloaded and
uncompressed that paper I got the whole thing.

John



  

1. Where are the examples?
2. Have you ever worked with srtudents?

bblochl

Re: [9fans] sad commentary

2008-06-30 Thread erik quanstrom

 is not available under Plan 9. (Or is it?) As there is no simple 
 introduction to Plan 9 new users will just go the easy way and get 
 Windows or Linux.

lack of an introduction is not the problem.  not being unix
is the problem.

 For example the 
 role of make as an equivalent for cc is not self-evident for a 
 traditional normal OS-user.

come again?

- erik

Re: [9fans] sad commentary

2008-06-30 Thread Charles Forsyth

 For example the 
 role of make as an equivalent for cc is not self-evident for a 
 traditional normal OS-user.

come again?

i thought it meant that he always types in cc commands on unix.
of course you could do that too with 8c/8l but normally on plan 9 i
create a mkfile except for the tiniest one-off things.

Re: [9fans] sad commentary

2008-06-30 Thread Steven D. Vormwald


erik quanstrom wrote:
is not available under Plan 9. (Or is it?) As there is no simple 
introduction to Plan 9 new users will just go the easy way and get 
Windows or Linux.


lack of an introduction is not the problem.  not being unix
is the problem.



Looking too much like UNIX while acting differently is part of the 
problem.  However, the bigger part is that the existing documentation 
can be a bit daunting for someone who is new to Plan 9, and still has 
only a vague notion of how the system works.  Like the UNIX man pages, 
the documentation is very detailed, and great for a reference.  But many 
new users need a bit of hand-holding, of the Trust me, you want to run 
this command.  You'll learn why/how later, but for now, just RUN THIS 
COMMAND. sort.  At least until the 'new user' anxiety dies down a bit, 
and the return of rational thought allows one to digest the more 
extensive documentation.


Besides, isn't not being UNIX one of the prominent features of Plan 9?

Steven Vormwald

PS: John, thanks for the link to the RIT Intro paper (in another message 
in this thread).  It helped a lot.

Re: [9fans] sad commentary



On Jun 30, 2008, at 9:48 AM, bblochl wrote:


Pietro Gagliardi schrieb:
If people say Plan 9 is too hard to use they will allocate blame  
to Rob Pike's rio before reading his tirade on other windowing  
systems (which you can find at http://cm.bell-labs.com/cm/cs/doc/88/1-07.ps.gz) 
.
With this link ione only gets the starting page of the paper. Is  
there any other source for the complete Paper (without cost)?


bblochl



Get a different PostScript viewer. It works for me.

Re: [9fans] sad commentary

RMS has the power to turn people away from bad technology. Remember  
that now.


On Jun 30, 2008, at 9:46 AM, bblochl wrote:


Pietro Gagliardi schrieb:

People do acknowledge the new free systems. Unfortunately, RMS got  
them off it in a microsecond when 3e came out:


http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/plan-nine.html

And I don't believe the Note at the top will change people's minds.


Wikipedia says:
License
The full source code is freely available under Lucent Public License  
1.02, and considered to be open source by the OSI and free software  
by the FSF (although incompatible with the GNU General Public  
License). It passes the Debian Free Software Guidelines.


From another mail: But the world has pretty much forgotten Plan 9  
even exists (and lets not even mention Inferno)


I do think, that its not the license, the main problem of plan 9 is  
the lack of a tutorial for beginners and examples for some  
applications and at best with some exercises to practice. Well,  
there is a bulky manual. The collection of papers Plan 9 — The  
Documents (Volume 2) is more readable. But learning from manuals  
compares to learning a language from a dictionary. There is a need  
for some more readable. For example the role of make as an  
equivalent for cc is not self-evident for a traditional normal OS- 
user. It is a regret that alef has gone and limbo is not available  
under Plan 9. (Or is it?) As there is no simple introduction to Plan  
9 new users will just go the easy way and get Windows or Linux.


bblochl

Re: [9fans] sad commentary



On Jun 30, 2008, at 10:07 AM, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:


Are we talking about the same thing?  Pietro's link is for an old
paper by Rob Pike talking about the mux windowing system.  There
aren't really any examples.


Much of the paper still applies to rio. From mux to rio few changes  
were made. Possibly the two biggest changes were resizing/moving from  
the borders and hold mode.

Re: [9fans] sad commentary

2008-06-30 Thread ron minnich

On Sun, Jun 29, 2008 at 7:21 PM, erik quanstrom [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
 this slashdot article almost asks for cpu
 functionality for plan 9 by name.


actually, this the scenario for which we designed xcpu, almost exactly.

Mount, start up, disconnect, come back later ... I've used it this way.

ron

Re: [9fans] sad commentary

2008-06-30 Thread a

This is a very good point. I mostly learned Unix in a corporate
environment, but the same logic holds: somebody else had set
up and maintained the systems.

// I'm afraid there's not much we can do about this.

Other, obviously, than getting uni types to use it there. Plan 9
(like Inferno) has quite a bit to offer from pedagogical view.

// Trinity College Dublin

Pretty campus, warm sweatshirts. Convince your IT folks. ;-)

anthony

Re: [9fans] sad commentary

2008-06-30 Thread Francisco J Ballesteros

 I have not even started such thing, but, if you go for it and want help,
count me in :)

 I've been thinking of writing a Plan 9 for Dummies style thing;
  Nemo's book is excellent but definitely aimed at someone most
  interested in writing code immediately.  Basically stealing the format
  from all UNIX beginner's books ever written, it would have a chapters
  about logging on, basic rio usage, basic commands, the file system
  layout, acme and sam (to match the standard vi and emacs sections!),
  rc programming, and C under Plan 9.  Imagine chapter one of Nemo's
  book except greatly expanded.

  Now, before I set quill to parchment (or fingers to keyboard as may
  be), has anyone else started something like this?

Re: [9fans] sad commentary

2008-06-30 Thread Tom Lieber

On Mon, Jun 30, 2008 at 2:33 PM, Francisco J Ballesteros [EMAIL PROTECTED] 
wrote:
  I have not even started such thing, but, if you go for it and want help,
 count me in :)

And I would read it! :)

-- 
Tom Lieber
http://AllTom.com/

Re: [9fans] sad commentary


Hi 9fans,

I'm writing this in an open letter style because I find eric's original 
post and the follow-up quite on-topic with respect to my unsuccessful 
Plan 9 experience. To provide context, let me describe myself as a serious 
hobbyist, which means I know my way around Windows and at least 2 other 
(UNIX-like) OS's--I can set up a reasonably secure sendmail and BIND 
installation, write a little Perl or C program to do my bidding, and 
wouldn't gawk at you if you talked about using xmllint to check a 
document's well-formedness but I'm not a kernel hacker or a hacker of 
any sort for that matter. I can Get My Personal Job Done (tm) but you 
wouldn't hire me as an admin.


When I downloaded the Plan 9 4e ISO image I thought to myself one more OS 
adventure. It turned out to be a very frustrating one. Plan 9 wouldn't 
work fine, or work at all, on a number of freeware virtualization platforms 
which I am sure weren't especially rigged to run the other OS's they 
happened to run fine. It eventually worked on QEMU. Since I'm a serious 
hobbyist bad installation experience is hardly a deterrent to me--not 
anymore.


When I came to actually use Plan 9 I found out the two interfaces I'd 
heard about, i.e. rc and rio, are both awkward despite how everybody on 
9fans thought they were such glorious climaxes of simplicity and usability 
and how everybody would bash Bash. If I were to save one interface (textual 
or graphical) out of all interfaces that exist today that'd be Bash. 
Perhaps I'm a brainwashed FSF zombie in thinking so but I am once again 
sure rc or rio won't even be on my top ten list and that's no FSF zombie 
attitude.


Some 9fans members may remember my original zeal to participate in 9fans 
and learn about Plan 9. That zeal was subdued when I went through the first 
few chapters of Francisco Ballesteros' fine book. Since then I've only been 
quietly reading 9fans posts and not using Plan 9.


I believe this reasoning from Eris Raymond's The Art of UNIX Programming 
(a book that is more than a little on the snob side, by the way) is mutatis 
mutandis appropriate:


The long view of history may tell a different story, but in 2003 it looks 
like Plan 9 failed simply because it fell short of being a compelling 
enough improvement on Unix to displace its ancestor. Compared to Plan 9, 
Unix creaks and clanks and has obvious rust spots, but it gets the job done 
well enough to hold its position. There is a lesson here for ambitious 
system architects: the most dangerous enemy of a better solution is an 
existing codebase that is just good enough.


--20.2 Plan 9: The Way the Future Was

Let me say that Plan 9 didn't seem to me, as a user and not a hacker, to 
even cover any meaningful rust spots, for example, of FreeBSD. Rio is 
actually a failure despite whatever the 9fans people and Rob Pike may say. 
Fossil/Venti, however brilliant it may look like to the code junkie, does 
not offer anything for me but added complexity. Plan 9 neither fulfills 
previous functions nor defines new ones for any end user or even 
hobbyist, except perhaps the most sturdy of them. It is probably a 
wonderful research platform for computer science students but it cannot and 
will not support even the simpler tasks a student of, say, mathematics 
expects of their PC these days, e.g. symbolically solving an equation 
system (without going through implementing or porting a computer algebra 
system or learning some twisted Lisp, of course). Good software--to a 
mathematics student--like Maple will never become available on Plan 9, as 
it did on Linux, and for the third time I am sure this isn't because 
Maplesoft has any special affiliation with the Linux people. It's simply 
because Plan 9 is not the user's OS, it isn't even the geek's OS, or the 
nerd's OS, it is only the CS/CE OS Design student's OS, with a little 
margin kept to accommodate a few sturdy geeks and professionals interested 
in special applications.


In fact, I suspect Bell/Lucent made Plan 9 publicly available because they 
found no better use for it. Plan 9 was not released to the public, instead 
jettisoned into the public's care. Of course, this accusation of mine 
remains as undocumented as any conspiracy theory but I'm inclined to 
believe it.


No one should wonder why Plan 9 isn't remembered or used even in such geeky 
communities as Slashdot. It just isn't our kind of OS and by us I mean 
lowlifes like me in contrast to the grand exalted Plan 9 user.


Best wishes,
Eris Discordia

P.S. Heck, this is some sad commentary.

Re: [9fans] sad commentary

2008-06-30 Thread ron minnich

well, Eris, it is quite possible that you're right. It is also
possible that you never quite got it.

Or both are possible.

ron

Re: [9fans] sad commentary

2008-06-30 Thread michael block

On Mon, Jun 30, 2008 at 2:12 PM, Eris Discordia
[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
 Fossil/Venti, however brilliant it may look like to the code junkie, does
 not offer anything for me but added complexity.

i'm using p9p venti on linux, and it's been a total breeze to
configure and administer. the utility of hist and yesterday in my
opinion far outweigh the couple megabytes of memory that venti needs
to be running all the time (i run it on my desktop machine, not a
dedicated file server). i'm curious to know what backup system you're
using that is simpler than venti. my interest in plan 9, inferno,
octopus, c stems mainly from my using venti for backups and finding
it to be far better that anything unix had to offer. so it you really
do have a backup system simpler and more robust than venti, i'd love
to try it out

--
i apologize in advance if gmail has in anyway mutilated this messege.
stay beautiful!

Re: [9fans] sad commentary

2008-06-30 Thread Skip Tavakkolian

 Plan 9 neither fulfills 
 previous functions nor defines new ones for any end user or even 
 hobbyist, except perhaps the most sturdy of them.

this blog-style opinion piece does not offer anything constructive.
for example, would utf-8 qualify as a functionality that didn't exist
before plan9?

there are many plan9 ideas that have been adopted by other os --
though the results often are Frankenstein-esque.

 Eris Discordia
 
 P.S. Heck, this is some sad commentary.

what's sad is that unless there's a dummy's guide to
something, that something is not considered a success.

-Skip

Re: [9fans] sad commentary

2008-06-30 Thread Eric Van Hensbergen

On Mon, Jun 30, 2008 at 3:42 PM, Skip Tavakkolian [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:

 P.S. Heck, this is some sad commentary.

 what's sad is that unless there's a dummy's guide to
 something, that something is not considered a success.


Its worse than that Skip -- I imagine many would rank Apple's time
machine greater than venti just because it puts a pretty GUI on top of
crap methodology versus doing something clever under the hood.  You
can't be a success unless you have an animated 3D GUI consuming most
of your CPU resources and expending all sorts of power.  We should
have spent the last 20 years working on movie-OS versus actually
trying to do systems research.

   -eric

Re: [9fans] sad commentary

2008-06-30 Thread erik quanstrom

 Besides, isn't not being UNIX one of the prominent features of Plan 9?

tautology, no?  to be plan 9 it must be different.  if it were not, it would be 
unix.

- erik

Re: [9fans] sad commentary


crap methodology versus doing something clever under the hood.  You
can't be a success unless you have an animated 3D GUI consuming most
of your CPU resources and expending all sorts of power.


That couldn't be farther from truth, at least in my case. No one wants to 
waste their computer's time :-) Yet, when it comes to choose between 
wasting their time or that of their computer's then most normal people will 
go for the latter.


I'm a regular Windows user. My Windows installation has been reduced to 
bare minimum. It runs fine and hell it really can compete with any of the 
top dogs in desktop applications. And when it comes to running a DNS 
server, well, there's FreeBSD and OpenBSD.


Where is the incentive for someone other than a CS/CE OS Design/Research 
student (or the like) who's a vested interest in learning exotic OS's to 
switch to Plan 9? Plan 9 seems to be a niche OS, as I pointed out before.



We should have spent the last 20 years working on movie-OS versus actually
trying to do systems research.


Systems research? Did you actually research how a normal user used their 
computer? Did you even try to guess how a normal user used their system? 
Did you do that and end up with a technical manual whose prime example for 
backup strategy involves a Jukebox? Systems research, as you know it, 
provides a student/researcher/professor/professional with academic credit, 
three meals a day, and a place to sleep--it won't Get the Users' Job Done 
(tm).


Best wishes,
Eris Discordia

--On Monday, June 30, 2008 3:55 PM -0500 Eric Van Hensbergen 
[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:



On Mon, Jun 30, 2008 at 3:42 PM, Skip Tavakkolian [EMAIL PROTECTED]
wrote:


P.S. Heck, this is some sad commentary.


what's sad is that unless there's a dummy's guide to
something, that something is not considered a success.



Its worse than that Skip -- I imagine many would rank Apple's time
machine greater than venti just because it puts a pretty GUI on top of
crap methodology versus doing something clever under the hood.  You
can't be a success unless you have an animated 3D GUI consuming most
of your CPU resources and expending all sorts of power.  We should
have spent the last 20 years working on movie-OS versus actually
trying to do systems research.

   -eric

Re: [9fans] sad commentary


this blog-style opinion piece does not offer anything constructive.
for example, would utf-8 qualify as a functionality that didn't exist
before plan9?


The fact the UTF-8 was first implemented on Plan 9 has nothing to do with 
Plan 9's funtionality as an OS. Similarly, the fact that Windows is still 
the best platform if you need to do word processing in many languages has 
nothing to do with its comparatively low performance with many 
applications--an important OS functionality it lacks.


FreeBSD's very good process scheduling, which manifests to a user like me 
in not having to worry about a non-responsive system in case a process is 
poorly performing, is an OS funtionality.


If the availability of UTF-8 is an advantage, the absence of a single 
Unicode font in the system useful for non-Latin languages is a very strong 
disadvantage. UTF-8 in an English-only user paradigm is only 
extravagance. I even doubt there's a simple way of inputting, say, Hebrew 
or Arabic in Plan 9. It'll be kind of you to clarify that point for me if 
I'm mistaken.



what's sad is that unless there's a dummy's guide to
something, that something is not considered a success.


The question is what new function Plan 9, as an OS, defines for the end 
user. Does it enable me of doing something Windows doesn't? Does it enable 
me of doing something better than I could do on FreeBSD? Does its default 
GUI even match Windows in ease of use (read: switching to another window, 
killing the window you're running, doing a simple copy without typing in 
regexps/wildcards, et cetera)?


By the way, I provided a description of my person to avoid dummy labels. 
I may well be a dummy in your league but that doesn't mean I'm unable of 
reading a normal technical manual. I can do and have done that, on Linux, 
FreeBSD, and Plan 9.


And success, by definition, doesn't need an apology. When there's an 
apology there must have been a measure of failure.


Best wishes,
Eris Discordia

--On Monday, June 30, 2008 1:42 PM -0700 Skip Tavakkolian 
[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:



Plan 9 neither fulfills
previous functions nor defines new ones for any end user or even
hobbyist, except perhaps the most sturdy of them.


this blog-style opinion piece does not offer anything constructive.
for example, would utf-8 qualify as a functionality that didn't exist
before plan9?

there are many plan9 ideas that have been adopted by other os --
though the results often are Frankenstein-esque.


Eris Discordia

P.S. Heck, this is some sad commentary.


what's sad is that unless there's a dummy's guide to
something, that something is not considered a success.

-Skip

Re: [9fans] sad commentary


Not a very kind comment. Though, it is possible that it's true.

What was there for me to understand about Plan 9 that I did not? Barring a 
mystical bond with its exquisite kernel, of course.


--On Monday, June 30, 2008 1:01 PM -0700 ron minnich [EMAIL PROTECTED] 
wrote:



well, Eris, it is quite possible that you're right. It is also
possible that you never quite got it.

Or both are possible.

ron

Re: [9fans] sad commentary

2008-06-30 Thread Rob Pike

The fact the UTF-8 was first implemented on Plan 9 has nothing
to do with Plan 9's funtionality as an OS.
Not true. The ability to adapt the system quickly in response to a
changing standards situation made a critical difference in having
UTF-8 rather than a weaker proposal accepted by X/Open and hence ISO.

The question is what new function Plan 9, as an OS, defines for
the end user.
Plan 9 is not for end users.  Plan 9 is for programmers.

-rob

Re: [9fans] sad commentary

2008-06-30 Thread erik quanstrom

 The fact the UTF-8 was first implemented on Plan 9 has nothing to do with 
 Plan 9's funtionality as an OS.

it seems like you are avoiding the point on purpose.

i don't think you can pick up a kernel with tweezers and make
a bunch of abstract statements about it.  and so i think the fact
that unicode may be used anywhere a character is expected in plan9
does have a lot to do with the system's functionality.

 If the availability of UTF-8 is an advantage, the absence of a single 
 Unicode font in the system useful for non-Latin languages is a very strong 
 disadvantage.

what do you base this claim on?  i'm pretty sure that the fonts
distributed with the system are enough to support japanese, greek,
and russian, to name only the ones i can think of quickly

and i am certain that code2000 and cyberbit which are available
on sources provide some of the best unicode coverage for free fonts.
they're not great fonts nor do they have total coverage, but no
fonts do.

 I even doubt there's a simple way of inputting, say, Hebrew 
 or Arabic in Plan 9. It'll be kind of you to clarify that point for me if 
 I'm mistaken.

there is not.  perhaps this is something you could contribute.

- erik

Re: [9fans] sad commentary

2008-06-30 Thread Uriel

On Tue, Jul 1, 2008 at 12:32 AM, Eris Discordia
[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
 crap methodology versus doing something clever under the hood.  You
 can't be a success unless you have an animated 3D GUI consuming most
 of your CPU resources and expending all sorts of power.

 That couldn't be farther from truth, at least in my case. No one wants to
 waste their computer's time :-) Yet, when it comes to choose between wasting
 their time or that of their computer's then most normal people will go for
 the latter.

 I'm a regular Windows user. My Windows installation has been reduced to bare
 minimum. It runs fine and hell it really can compete with any of the top
 dogs in desktop applications. And when it comes to running a DNS server,
 well, there's FreeBSD and OpenBSD.

 Where is the incentive for someone other than a CS/CE OS Design/Research
 student (or the like) who's a vested interest in learning exotic OS's to
 switch to Plan 9? Plan 9 seems to be a niche OS, as I pointed out before.

 We should have spent the last 20 years working on movie-OS versus actually
 trying to do systems research.

 Systems research?

Is dead. Utah2000.

uriel

Re: [9fans] sad commentary

2008-06-30 Thread Bakul Shah

 Its worse than that Skip -- I imagine many would rank Apple's time
 machine greater than venti just because it puts a pretty GUI on top of
 crap methodology versus doing something clever under the hood.  

Pretty GUI doesn't hurt but it is the ease of use that makes
time machine popular. Kudos to Apple for making something as
unsexy as backups a desirable feature!

Pretty GUI may attract people initially but in the end it is
really about the ease of use.  Most people just want to use a
computer, not learn all about it (just as they want to drive
a car and not look under the hood). A Plan9 for Dummies
book will be great but that won't help all those people who
just want to take Plan9 for a spin.  With 9vx at least one
major hurdle has been removed.

BTW, I primarily use venti for backups in my multi-os
environment.  I would love a fancy GUI on it. Much easier to
look for a lost picture by what it looks like than try to
remember its camera generated name like P314159.JPG.

There is no reason in principle why venti can't be made as
easy to use as the time-machine.  If anything, plan9 is
perhaps a superior platform for building an easy to use
system as it has a regular structure.  It is just that most
people who use plan9 are programmers and seem happy with the
status quo.

 You
 can't be a success unless you have an animated 3D GUI consuming most
 of your CPU resources and expending all sorts of power.  We should
 have spent the last 20 years working on movie-OS versus actually
 trying to do systems research.

Didn't someone say back in 2000 that system software research
is irrelevant?!

Re: [9fans] sad commentary

2008-06-30 Thread a

// Systems research? Did you actually research how a normal user used their 
// computer? Did you even try to guess how a normal user used their system? 
// Did you do that and end up with a technical manual whose prime example for 
// backup strategy involves a Jukebox?

You clearly have a very particular, narrow idea of what a user is, and a very
muddy idea of how research works. Obviously getting an optical jukebox isn't
practical for Joe Public sitting in his flat, but it makes great sense for lots 
of
users in larger settings. Perhaps more to the point, experience with fs(4) led
pretty directly to the current construction of fs(3), fossil(4), and venti(6) - 
all of
which are much more suitabe for Joe.

Put another way: the topic under research wasn't how do we provide the
backup functionality people are asking for?, but how would having daily
dumps change the way you work? would that be useful?. It's a less product-
oriented set of questions, but produces more fundamental results.

// Plan 9 seems to be a niche OS, as I pointed out before.

That may well be true, or at least that it isn't mainstream and mass-market.
That's never been its objective, and I'm sorry if you wasted your time based
on misunderstanding that.

// UTF-8 in an English-only user paradigm is only extravagance.

We've got enough folks around here who use something other than English
as their primary language with their computer that this complaing falls
down. You're right that there's more research to be done here, such as on
right-to-left input methods and composing characters, but that's far from
the same thing.

If the UI model doesn't work for you, well, that's a shame, I guess. Based
on the bash love from earlier posts, I'm going to hazard a guess that your
complaints are largely based on the old keyboard vs. mouse argument. I
doubt hauling out the old references would be convincing once you've
already made up your mind.
Anthony

Re: [9fans] sad commentary

2008-06-30 Thread Skip Tavakkolian

 By the way, I provided a description of my person to avoid dummy labels. 
 I may well be a dummy in your league but that doesn't mean I'm unable of 
 reading a normal technical manual. I can do and have done that, on Linux, 
 FreeBSD, and Plan 9.

you've missed my point.  most of the dummies books on software try
to explain how to deal with very complex, organically developed
systems that lack any central design idea.  the fact that it requires
the reader to admit to being a dummy to buy the book is telling
enough.

Re: [9fans] sad commentary

2008-06-30 Thread Lyndon Nerenberg


Most people just want to use a
computer, not learn all about it (just as they want to drive
a car and not look under the hood).


And Windows is the Chevrolet|Ford|Toyota|\* for the common man.

We are not the common man. Buy a bus pass and push off.

Re: [9fans] sad commentary

2008-06-30 Thread Iruata Souza

On Mon, Jun 30, 2008 at 6:20 PM, Eris Discordia
[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
 Barring a mystical bond with its exquisite kernel, of course.


it seems you have done much kernel programming, eh?

iru

Re: [9fans] sad commentary

2008-06-30 Thread Federico G. Benavento

 Plan 9 is not for end users.  Plan 9 is for programmers.


-- 
Federico G. Benavento

Re: [9fans] sad commentary