Path: utzoo!attcan!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!cs.utexas.edu!uunet!microsoft!michaelw
From: michaelw@microsoft.UUCP (Michael Winser)
Newsgroups: comp.os.minix
Subject: Re: Bruce Evans' opus
Message-ID: <5788@microsoft.UUCP>
Date: 23 May 89 15:55:09 GMT
References: <2570@ast.cs.vu.nl>
Reply-To: michaelw@microsoft.UUCP (Michael Winser)
Organization: Microsoft Corp., Redmond WA
Lines: 40

In article <2570@ast.cs.vu.nl> ast@cs.vu.nl (Andy Tanenbaum) writes:
>still out there.  Consequently, I am going to base V2.x on 1.4a, not on Bruce's
>version.  I just don't want all that extra complexity on the 8088 (remember,
>the goal was a teaching system).

Is this goal still reasonable?  I would guess that most of the buyers
are using MINIX to learn about UN*X (but not necessarily from an os design
point of view).

>This means that if you convert to Bruce's system now, you may have trouble
>converting to 2.x (POSIX-based) later.  It is clearly up to you which way you
>go, but at least you should be aware that there is a fork in the road here.
                                                      ^^^^:-)

>The long term plan for MINIX is to wait until not only the 8088, but the 286 
>has also vanished, and make MINIX 3.x (probably in 4 or 5 years) entirely
>a 386/486/585/686/786 based system, assuming these are all architecturally 
>compatible.  The 286's dwarf segments are a real nuisance, and hardly
>compatible with the Atari, Amiga, and other versions of MINIX in progress,
>whereas on the 386 one can use a single 32-bit segment (Motorola mode) and
>implement that fairly cleanly.

Four or five years is a long time to wait for a MINIX that can effectively
use the 386.  By that time we may all have moved to i860's or i960's!

I don't want to start yet another intel vs. motorola discussion here, but
to implement MINIX in a single 32-bit segment on the 386 is to ignore much
of the parts capabilities.  The 386/486 segments and  hardware tasks are
ideal for MINIX.  All the messy fork blitting that the Atari has to do is
because there is no mmu.

Michael

P.S.
Isn't it nice to know that the x86 line must stop with the 686.  The 786
is/was a specialised graphics part (not very flexible, but pretty cool
nonetheless).
-- 
/\ no guts                                                       michael winser
\/ no glory             microsoft corp. (206) 882-8080, michaelw@microsoft.uucp