Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!usc!apple!claris!peirce From: peirce@claris.com (Michael Peirce) Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac.programmer Subject: Re: Why not Mach as version 8.0 Message-ID: <10934@claris.com> Date: 14 Mar 90 02:16:56 GMT References: <39127@apple.Apple.COM> <1236@swbatl.sbc.com> <7100@goofy.Apple.COM> <164@farcomp.UUCP> Reply-To: peirce@claris.com (Michael Peirce) Organization: Claris Corporation, Santa Clara CA Lines: 47 In article <164@farcomp.UUCP> murat@farcomp.UUCP (Murat Konar) writes: >In article <7100@goofy.Apple.COM> chewy@apple.com (Paul Snively) writes: >[responding to suggestion that Apple use Mach as a future OS for the Mac] >> >>What about responsiveness? We'd like to stay more responsive than either >>a NeXT or a Sun. ;-) > > >Thank god somone at Apple considers response time as critical as I do. What >I'd like to see ideally is GUI co-processor that would be responsible for >all screen updating, mouse tracking, etc. That way no matter what was >going on in the background, you'd still get a menu right away when you >click, or your windows would update at full speed. Hear hear! I'd love to see future Macs become Multiprocessor machines. I see the trend going in the right direction with the new IIfx (or whatver it'll be called). This machine reportedly has processors to handle various i/o jobs. I'd like to see this extended so that I could plug in extra 680X0 modules for running applications. That what I could have at least one main processor running the foreground application with full responsiveness and maybe another processor or two running some sort of agent checking my stock portfolio or checking the usenet :-) Basic mac users could by single or double processor machines and let MultiFinder take care of sharing the processors (if you had two processors dedicate one to the foreground and share the other for the background tasks). Power users could pile on the processors. Using this idea. Joe Power user could buy some useful agent software and a processor module to dedicate to it. If I want four agents running all the time I'd add four processor modules and dedicate them to the four programs. Anyways, you get the idea. Claris Corp. | Michael R. Peirce -------------+-------------------------------------- | 5201 Patrick Henry Drive MS-C4 | Box 58168 | Santa Clara, CA 95051-8168 | (408) 987-7319 | AppleLink: peirce1 | Internet: peirce@claris.com | uucp: {ames,decwrl,apple,sun}!claris!peirce