Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!uflorida!haven!ames!amdahl!pyramid!athertn!paul
From: paul@athertn.Atherton.COM (Paul Sander)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.apple
Subject: Re: GCC, Minix (was:  Contructive discussions on Apple future)
Summary: A nit to pick
Message-ID: <447@athertn.Atherton.COM>
Date: 24 Mar 89 18:01:41 GMT
References: <8903181257.aa27040@SMOKE.BRL.MIL> <931@n8emr.UUCP> <2692@ncsuvx.ncsu.edu>
Organization: Atherton Technology, Sunnyvale, CA
Lines: 42

In article <2692@ncsuvx.ncsu.edu>, mikes@ncsuvx.ncsu.edu (Michael Steele) writes:
> 	Will someone PLEASE port gcc to the GS.  I would do it but my 
> 	knowledge of 65816 assembly isn't too hot.  GCC is a PD compiler
> 	available for UNIX machines, Amigas, and Atari ST's ( the group
> 	of PC's that the Gs should be in).

GCC (and all software available from the Free Software Foundation) is NOT,
repeat _NOT_ public domain.  It is free, but it is copyrighted, and has a
licensing and distribution agreement that its users must agree to (even
though it is much more reasonable than most).

By the way, porting GCC to a new platform is not a trivial task.  And
though GCC has been ported to 68000-based machines, I have doubts about
the 65816 as a viable target.  GCC's designers are reputed to have made
it _very_ difficult to port GCC to any 16-bit architecture (though this
is strictly hearsay).

[Stuff about EMACS omitted]

> 	              GNU has started working on generalized UNIX but we
> 	ought to get started on the kernel.  Minix would be and excellent
> 	place to start. Given a free compiler and multi-tasking OS would
> 	fill in Major gaps that Apple is never going to fill for us. I 
> 	personally like the line oriented environment for poking around
> 	the machine since it is considerably faster than Windowing!

Minix is available (with source code) for PC's and ST's.  It has also been
ported to other platforms.  However, its performance is not considered to
be real great (this comes from reviews which are on public record).

An alternative to Minix is XINU which was developed by Comer.  Textbooks
and source code are available for it, and it has been ported to several
platforms (including PDP-11s, Suns, and CP/M machines).  XINU is also
a multitasking OS, and I am under the impression that there is a
respectable base of utilities for it.  XINU is also more mature than MINIX,
having been available at least years before.

XINU appears to have the advantage that it has Internet support as well.
-- 
Paul Sander        (408) 734-9822       | Do YOU get nervous when a
paul@Atherton.COM                       | sys{op,adm,prg,engr} says
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