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From: comrade@uniwa.uwa.oz (Peter Cooper (GUILD))
Newsgroups: comp.os.minix
Subject: Initial impressions of Macintosh Minix
Summary: What happened when I tried to get Minix for my computer
Keywords: Macintosh Minix
Message-ID: <1991Feb6.032849.8832@uniwa.uwa.oz>
Date: 6 Feb 91 03:28:49 GMT
Distribution: comp
Organization: University of Western Australia
Lines: 62

My club, the University Computer Club at U.W.A. decided to order Minix
1.5 for the PC on 3.5" disks late last year.  (This -does- actually
have something to do with MacMinix, believe it or not!)

We ordered it from our local PH office here in Perth.  A couple of days 
later, when it was decided that the AT (the only PC we have with 3.5"s) 
had better things to do, we tried to change our order to PC 5.25".  

Unfortunately the local office is closed for a few months around 
Christmas, so we had to deal with the Sydney office.  They said that 
would be okay, and that we'd be getting the 5.25" version soon.

What arrived, of course, was a PC 3.5" version from Sydney.  We talked
to an extremely helpful salesperson who assured us that a new copy
would be freighted immediately.

Well.  What we got was a 3.5" version again!  But for the _Macintosh_!
The invoice actually said 'IBM PC 5.25" version'.

Since I have a Mac of my own, I decided to purchase it anyway (it
saves on freight charges...).  Some things I noticed about MacMinix
1.5 were:

1.	The installation guide had numerous (critical) typographical
	errors.  In addition many aspects of the installation
	procedure are neglected.  Pity someone who has never installed
	a Unix system before...

2.	The installation guide said that 1.5 would run under System
	6.0 or better.  I -was- running 6.07.  No go.  I found an
	install disk for 6.01.  It doesn't seem to run under -any-
	Multifinder I have tried (contrary to advertised features) and
	certainly not 1beta9 (upgrade to it...great improvement).

3.	Simple things like making the /usr/include directories
	readable to users -other- than bin weren't done.  Why was this
	the case?  It is a matter of 2 minutes work for the person(s)
	creating the distribution filesystems, and means that users
	new to Minix won't tend to run screaming from the room. 

4.	NO ON-LINE MANUALS.  For whatever the reasons, this is simply
	not appropriate.  I will be ftping them shortly, but what
	about those Minix users who don't have Internet access?

5.	The tty seems a bit slow.  There have been suggestions here on
	how to speed it up, but the critical sections of code may lie
	in the 'MacBoot' application.  I haven't seen source for it.
	Where can I find such things?

Even with these criticisms, I quite like MacMinix and intend to use it
quite intensively.

Oh, and something for alt.conspiracy:
Could Prentice-Hall be sending the wrong packages on purpose?  They've
already made twice the number of sales that they would have otherwise.
:-)
-----
snail:				email:
Peter Cooper			comrade@uniwa.uwa.oz.au
Box 22
Guild of Undergraduates
University of Western Australia