🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <rmcassid-1508951050530001@dante.eng.uci.edu>, rmcassid@uci.edu (Robert Cassidy) writes:
:In article <40nrjt$q9g@eken.hv.se>, henke@hv.se wrote:
:
:But the things that you have mentioned are used by a relatively small
:group of people. I'll agree (except changing the window mgr. and caching
:ethernet network data with OpenTransport upon us) that the MacOS is
:limited in the ways you have described. How many people have 128 CPU's to
:play with? How many people need 100 people leeching off of their machine?
:Those people that do use UNIX but I think that those numbers are below the
:level of millions and into the 10K or 100K range. MacOS is in the 20
:Million range right now. For the majority of people, UNIX's only benefits
:are PM's and those aren't very strong benefits to most people - they are
:only improvements over what the Mac already has.

Wouldn't it be fine if you could run a HHTP daemon on your Macintosh
while you still could use it without any risk of disturbing the
HTTP daemon? Suppose your HTML pages are very popular and requests
overlap each other, you can't afford to stack the requests, you must
deal with them simultanously, and you are still using the machines for
other things. Does this sound like an extraordinary wish? Don't think so,
there are probably many who would like a HTTP server, but can't
dedicate a whole machine for this purpose. Modern technology *NEEDS*
multiuser support, and we are only looking through the keyhole to what
is comming in the future.

If you need a lot of computing power to be able to handle large
databases or making complex raytracing do need every MIPS you can
get. Tomorrows computers are not fast enough. You need to go parallel
because that's the only (known) option to get high performance.
Why should I be forced to switch between several platforms because
one of them can handle this. It is inefficient for humans to switch
contexts, because the time needed for contextswitch is way to long.
It is a lot better to go for the better right from start and ignore
systems which are likely to be incapable of some jobs.
Every possible thing is possible with unix, but this is not valid for
MacOS, so why should I use MacOS when there's a risk it is not enough
in a near future, and at that moment go unix? Wouldn't it be better
to go unix right from the start?

There's a lot more Unix users than your figures. I can't think of ANY
university without Sun Unix machines, at least not Swedish universities.
There are a lot of universities around the world, many of those who use
unix in their education wants unix at their jobs and also on the own
computers at home (Linux). 
The thing is that you never go out and buy a Unix (TM) computer from
Unix inc. , but you go and buy 80x86, DEC-alpha, PowerPC box, Amiga, Atari etc.
These machines disturbs the statistic by looking like some Windows, Amiga, etc.
when they infact are used as Unix machines. have a look at comp.sys.linux.*
or comp.sys.unix.* and tell me again that you actually think that there's
only a few thousands unix users.

:> :Then it was not configured properly - same argument as a UNIX system. I've
:> :never had MacTCP crash. It's all configuration.
:> 
:> Please understand... MacOS have no memoryprotection, therefor can a program
:> go nuts and destroy whatevver it feels like with out any limitations.
:> Sure, nobody wants this and does everything to avoid it, but you can never
:> prove that any software is bugfree (if you can, would for sure thousands
:> of software producing companies like to hear how you did it).
:> Unix on the other hand, accepted that software might contain bugs, but
:> concentrated and limiting the effect of them by using memory protection.
:> Just like information hiding is one of the strongest features of
:> object oriented programming hides data from each other, does MP hide
:> processes from each other.
:> You only have took at the basic architecture of MacOS and Unix to understand
:> which one is the better.
oth systems need to be configured properly.
:
:As for the 'go nuts and destroy whatever it feels like without
:limitations' - would that be the same as saying that without marshal law a
:society could 'go nuts and destroy whatever it feels like without
:limitations'? This society operates cooperatively and with minimal
:protection - not that the analogy holds completely - but reliability is
:relative to conditions. The conditions under which the Mac tends to
:operate can tolerate a lower level of reliability. All this will change
:soon, though.

What I ment was that you can NEVER prove the absence of errors, only
the presence of errors. An error in an open system like the Mac can
an error lead to much more serious conditions than unix, which is
built around the idea that bugs can always be present so it is better
to make any effort to limit the consequences.
The Amiga does, just as MacOS, suffer from the lack of memory protection
and I will never agree with people who tells me that software is so
good that no protection is needed. It is just that you will have to
live with more bugs and crashes in an unprotected environment.
This is a big difference between Unix and toys like MacOS, Windows, AmigaOS,
AtariOS, GEOS, MSDOS, etc. All these toys would need a major rewrite to
be able to feature memory protection as memory protection should be.
On the other hand, using these toys is usually very amusing and you
can live with a crash once in a while.

:But keep in mind, there are limitations on the Mac and that the argument
:only holds if it's routine that software 'goes nuts and destroys whatever
:it feels like'. That really doesn't seem to stand up in practice. My Mac
:crashes about as often as the campus' UNIX mail gateway goes to hell - I
:don't see the argument.

Your Unix gateway is probably badly configurated or not powerful enough to
handle the expected workload. Any OS under such conditions would do a poor
job. There plenty of machines that been up for decades without faults.
Unix systems are supposed to have an operator that configurates the
system, once this is done should the system be stable and secure. With
a Mac can a small change by a USER bring the computer down the drain.

:> :And most Mac users know what system does what they want to do with the
:> :least pain. I also know what system has the most potential to support
:> :future developments! (Primarily closed systems and systemwide support of
:> :technologies reduces redundent development and increases
:> :interoperability).
:> 
:> That's what Mac people often believe. It's ok for them to think so, it is just
:> that it's annoying when they try to convince people that a Mac Quadra
:should be
:> better than any Unix workstation, no matter the task is... It's like ignoring
:> the last decades discoveries in computer science.
:> Most mac people still think Unix is the same old system as it was in the 70's,
:> but things have changed. Unix is becomming a lot better each day. The
:complexity
:> of Unix is decreasing. It is no longer so difficult to learn is many people
:> think it is. With today's powerful computers is it avaible for most people,
:> so it DOES compete with MacOS.
:
:I agree that that is annoying as well. I'll be the first to admit that
:UNIX is the right tool for a lot of tasks. I'll admit that DOS is the
:right tool for a lot of tasks. But for most tasks that most people do,
:I'll stand by my claim that the MacOS is the right tool. 
:
:I'll also continue to argue that UNIX does not compete with MacOS. As it
:seems pretty clear that even MacOS is too complex for most people, I'd
:have to say that in spite of UNIX's advances in ease-of-use, it is still
:way out of most peoples reach.

Well, I've been teaching informationtechnology, first we used Unix boxes,
but this summer were all kinds students allowed at this course (not only
CS students) so management decided it would be easier for them to use
our PowerMacs. With the result in my hands do I doubt. Things that
come natural right of the box with Unix/X need a lot of strange
configuration to be done from the user of MacOS. Just polling email
from a remote machine with Eudora drove me and lots of students nuts.
It were a lot easier to use mailtool just as that from Unix/X.
Netscape is really the very same program so it would be the same.
The same for FTP-tool, News, X-archie. Most of it could be done without even
seeing a command prompt. No need of strange identifying configuration to
learn remote hosts who I am, since that comes natural from Unix.
I can't understand why it should be so much harder to choose to start
Framemaker for X than the same program for MacOS. As soon as the program
is up and running are most people not aware of the OS running in the
background somewhere...

:With the tasks that have been brought to the average user because of the
:Mac - desktop publishing, desktop video, etc. etc. I'd have to say that
:the UNIX is still missing the majority of the market that Mac and Windows
:is reaching. In spite of being free and open and protected and preemptive
:and all of those things, UNIX is not being chosen by people in any
:significant sense.

The average user does not use unix since he had not heard or learned
anything of Unix. There is little, or maybe I should say no, 
commercial merchandising of Unix, mostly because until recently were
standard desktop computers not powerful enough to run generic
system like Unix. Since todays computer are powerful enough do I
believe more and more will go unix because of it is generic and
can share the same program can directly be ported to thousand of
completely different machines. This means a lot of software reuse
can be made.

/Henrik