Newsgroups: comp.arch
Path: utzoo!henry
From: henry@zoo.toronto.edu (Henry Spencer)
Subject: Re: processor for graphics terminal [was: PC/AT clones with RISC cpu]
Message-ID: <1990Nov7.202903.23485@zoo.toronto.edu>
Organization: U of Toronto Zoology
References: <2081@aber-cs.UUCP> <0093F0E4.0B02A980@KING.ENG.UMD.EDU> <1990Nov2.000650.18866@jarvis.csri.toronto.edu> <0093F1A8.A28E4920@KING.ENG.UMD.EDU> <1990Nov3.052952.1786@zoo.toronto.edu> <3698@skye.ed.ac.uk>
Date: Wed, 7 Nov 90 20:29:03 GMT

In article <3698@skye.ed.ac.uk> richard@aiai.UUCP (Richard Tobin) writes:
>>Both [PC compatibility and X] do terrible things to your system design if you
>>enshrine them as fundamental goals...
>
>I would be interested to hear you elaborate on this - in particular,
>what does "enshrining X as a fundamental goal" involve other than
>having "a sane machine with a clean frame buffer".

The problem with fundamental PC compatibility is obvious:  it dooms you to
using a grossly obsolete CPU architecture.  The problem with X is more
subtle:  it's so huge and slow that you end up struggling desperately to
provide more and more computational resources just so X will run tolerably,
at the expense of rather greater cost and complexity than would be needed
in a just world.

I may perhaps have been a little harsh on X in that comment.  A little.
-- 
"I don't *want* to be normal!"         | Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology
"Not to worry."                        |  henry@zoo.toronto.edu   utzoo!henry