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From: ast@cs.vu.nl (Andy Tanenbaum)
Newsgroups: comp.os.minix
Subject: Re: Where is MINIX going?
Keywords: MINIX
Message-ID: <8395@star.cs.vu.nl>
Date: 2 Dec 90 14:22:13 GMT
References: <61262@bbn.BBN.COM>
Sender: news@cs.vu.nl
Distribution: comp
Organization: Fac. Wiskunde & Informatica, VU, Amsterdam
Lines: 78

In article <61262@bbn.BBN.COM> saustin@bbn.com (Steve Austin) writes:
>I would like to ask some question (which I do
>not mean to be criticisms of Glen Overby, Michael Tannenbaum, the MINIX users'
>group or MINIX itself).
My brother's name is Mitchell, not Michael.

>1)	Why is Prentice-Hall jacking the price up and who is getting the money?
The 1.5 distribution has 17 disks and an 688 page manual.  It costs $169.
The original 1.1 version had 8 disks and no manual and cost $79.  There is
a certain linearity there.  A substantial amount of the price is related to
the manufacturing and distribution costs (not to mention advertising and
general corporate overhead).  While it is true that a blank disk costs under
a dollar, the cost of producing a color box with 17 disks full of information,
a manual, a binder, etc. plus the cost of people who take orders etc is 
nonzero.  One of the reasons Coherent was cheaper was their special
introductory price (now raised, I believe), plus the fact that they use 1.2M
disks and distribute binary only, so they can get away with only 4 disks.
This excludes PCs and XTs.  I have made a deliberate decision to stick with
360K disks to keep supporting XTs for the moment.  Having two versions
(XT and AT) in the past caused endless problems.  How much
does full XENIX, with C compiler, cost these days?

>	So who is getting the extra money? I would hope that it is the
>	programmers who contribute to MINIX, but if (as I suspect)
>	Prenitce-Hall is trying to milk what it thinks is a cash cow, they
>	can take a walk. There are other, cheaper, versions of UNIX for the
>	PC.
P-H is making a smaller profit on MINIX than they make on books.  They tend
to regard MINIX sort of the way they regard Solutions Manuals that go with
textbooks--as an extra added attraction to sell books.  As to other, cheaper
versions of UNIX, the only one I know of is Coherent, which I think is now
$159 (but check this).  For this $10 difference you get all the source code.
Furthermore, I have posted all the upgrades to the net, and will continue
to do so in the future, so everyone can upgrade for free indefinitely.

>2)	What is going to happen to the price when MINIX gets virtual memory?
>	It seems to me that various dedicated souls are working on
>	implementing VM for free. Can I expect to see another price hike
>	when this happens. If so, who gets the money?
If VM goes in and more disks are needed, the price will invariably go up.
However, perhaps I should state once more that which I have stated about 
n factorial times in the past.  It isn't like I am sitting back on my rear
end waiting for all these free software to appear and then greedily grabbing
it.  Rather the opposite.  I don't want 32-bit mode.  I don't want virtual
memory.  I don't want swapping.  I don't want multiple consoles.  I don't
want X windows.  I don't want uucp.  I don't want mail.  I don't want news.
I don't want Berkeley anything. etc. etc. etc. etc. etc. etc. etc. etc. etc.
I have been actively resisting all this stuff, as everyone who has been
reading this newsgroup well knows.  I even once categorically stated that
I wouldn't accept protected mode, but the hue and cry from everybody made me
eat crow and take it.  All I really want is a simple 16-bit MINIX that
conforms to P1003.1 and P1003.2 which students can fully understand.
If history is any guide, I will probably end up taking some of the above stuff
if put under enough pressure from the user community, but grudgingly at best.
I find it slightly unfair to be accused of profiteering by taking all this
stuff when actually I am being force fed it rather against my will.

>3)	On a less emotional note, what is the max size of program you can
>	run on MINIX for a 386. If it runs in the same mode as an 8086,
>	I suppose the answer is 640k. 
Nope.  The maximum size for programs is 64K + 64K. This keeps X windows at bay.

>4)	I notice that a ANSI C compiler is being developed. However,
>	somebody has recently announced that GNU's gcc works for 
>	386 MINIX. Also, gcc has been producing 68k code for a long time.
>	Wouldn't it be easier to work with GNU to get gcc, gdb, g++ etc
>	integrated into the MINIX environment.
GNU is huge and won't run in 64K.  Furthermore, it has legal restrictions
that certainly add complications at the very least.  Besides, MINIX was
never intended as a GNU clone.  The ACK ANSI C compiler is now in beta test.

>Again, no offence to MINIX intended, I am basically wondering whether
>history is repeating itself with MINIX.
It probably is.  I regard MINIX as the competitor and possibly successor to
XINU.  It is aimed at the same audience as XINU.  To me, success or failure is
measured in some sense in how well it does compared to XINU.

Andy Tanenbaum (ast@cs.vu.nl)