response 44 of 198:

Oct 6 20:58 UTC 2000

  Yeah, look at how much trouble it was sending a single six-year-old back!

response 46 of 198:

Oct 7 16:41 UTC 2000

The translation agency owner who suggested this will put us in touch with
CubaMed.  Why is a 486 needed to access a database?

response 48 of 198:

Oct 8 19:52 UTC 2000

I'd probably suggest Slackware.  It's fairly easy to install, but doesn't
require as much of the machine it's on as some of the more elaborite
releases.  Just about any release *should* work if you're careful what you
install, though.

response 50 of 198:

Oct 10 16:05 UTC 2000

Where might I find a list of rtf commands for things like center and
underline?  

response 52 of 198:

Oct 10 23:20 UTC 2000

(umm, all versions of Linux do networking)

response 60 of 198:

Oct 11 23:08 UTC 2000

v7 -> v32 -> 3bsd -> 4bsd -> 4.1bsd -> 4.2bsd -> 4.3bsd -> 4.4bsd
4.2bsd-> sunos
4.4bsd -> 386bsd -> netbsd -> freebsd 386bsd -> bsdi
netbsd + freebsd -> openbsd
--
minux -> linux

The path from v7 to 4.4bsd is very clear; each step is clearly one small
increment along an evolutionary process, which extends right up to
386bsd.  sunos branched off at 4.2bsd, but borrowed quite a bit of
4.3bsd functionality.  4.4bsd supports shared memory semantics similar
to sunos 4, which was the prelude for the shared library support in
netbsd,freebsd,openbsd.  Netbsd, freebsd, & openbsd are roughly parallel
efforts that borrow ideas from each other.  All of these are clearly
direct descendents from the original v7 code base.

minux is a completely separate effort that borrowed the unix api, but
had its own original kernel design.  It also had obvious short comings,
such as no swap, no vm facility, 16-bit only, etc.  Linux may be a
complete rewrite, but it was clearly spawned off of minux.  Artifacts of
this include the minux fs support in linux, and also the general
organization of kernel files in linux (such as "mm", "fs", "drivers",
etc.)

When linux was introduced, bsd was still encumbered with AT&T copyright
restrictions, and AT&T was becoming increasingly intractable.  This is
why linux became so popular so fast.  When bsd won their court suit, a
very few pieces of bsd were found to be in non-compliance, and netbsd &
bsdi had to introduce new versions to replace those pieces.

Linux "proper" only refers to the kernel.  Even before minux, FSF had
started its project of writing "free" equivalents to the entire Unix
command suite.  Minux actually came with its very own 16-bit C compiler
& command set, but they really didn't compare well to their unix
equivalents, and the compiler was of course specific to the 16-bit 8086.
One of the early things the gnu folks did was to introduce a high
quality portable compiler (gcc), and this compiler is monstrously
successful today.  It's used on all the bsd & linux efforts.  Most of
linux outside of the kernel proper consists of Gnu project tools - so
what people commonly think of as the "linux" environment is really
better described as the "gnu" environment.  The bsd folks had their own
independent set of unix command tools, many of them descended from V7,
so much, but not all of the bsd tools are not gnu.  X comes from neither
gnu nor bsd, but actually came out of MIT.  It came with a bsd (not gpl)
style license, so there are today a variety of commercial X
implementations as well as free implementations.

4.2bsd introduced the unix "socket" networking api, which happened
before minux was ever invented.  Minux & early versions of linux had no
networking, and only acquired it about the time that 386bsd came out.

response 62 of 198:

Oct 12 14:57 UTC 2000

Unrelated, but we were cleaning out the back aisle at Kiwanis yesterday
(mostly the last 40 dead VCRs, which someone wants for parts) and got rid of
two more 286s and 2 9-pin printers.  Amazing how long people save these before
they think to donate them.
I also picked up an introduction to UNIX from 1989.  When does UNIX date from?

response 64 of 198:

Oct 13 01:04 UTC 2000

Are you back to working at Kiwanis, keesan?

response 66 of 198:

Oct 13 15:22 UTC 2000

No we are not working at Kiwanis, but we promised to remove all the broken
stuff that Jim had saved for repairs.  Or repair it.  (Jim took home most of
it and his house is now much worse than Kiwanis ever was).  I have asked the
Kiwanis sales committee to find someone to come in one weekday evening to let
several of the other former volunteers in to test stereo equipment as the
member cannot keep up with all of this and the volunteers are not free during
the normal Kiwanis open hours (weekday mornings).  Most of what is currently
for sale on the shelves is what we tested/repaired before quitting (or since
then) and we are not going to keep rescuing the department - the aisles are
always clogged with carts full of untested stuff and it will get a lot worse
now that all the empty space we made in the back storage aisle by removing
broken stuff has been all filled with new untested stuff.  The main aisle was
two deep in little TV carts that blocked two levels of shelf behind them.
Two electronics engineers and a TV/VCR repairman have been waiting since June
for the member to contact them and let them know when to come help.