🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <41an1h$j4p@spider.hik.se>, henke@hv.se wrote:

> 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:
> :
> 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.

Well, it depends quite a bit. It would be great if the MacOS was beefed up
without slowing down UI progress - no argument. However it is less of an
issue if you can take an old $300 machine and dedicate it to being an HTTP
server. That's more difficult with many UNIX environments - the OS was
designed to offset hardware costs or to solve problems requiring multiple
users. The Mac was designed for cheap single user uses. The fact that a
PMac can run an HTTP server with at 350 connections/minute
(http://www.ziff.com/~macweek/mw_webedge/extra1.html) is an indication
that the MacOS can hold it's own quite nicely. UNIX does serve a needed
role but it holds almost no benefit for the majority of users. HTTP
servers are one of those roles, but users are finding that MacOS can serve
as well. (BTW, I suspect that most people don't dedicate a Mac to HTTP
servers - that they run other things on there as well)

> 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?

Every possible thing is possible with UNIX? Fine, but is it available? Is
it reasonable? Is it acceptable? 

Right now it is not possible for a user to buy a UNIX machine and set it
up and start doing page layout for a reasonable cost and a reasonable
expense of time and effort. The Mac does do this. Nobody cares what can
possibly be done, people need to perform tasks, they need to know what
*can* be done, reasonably. UNIX falls apart when viewed this way.

> 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.

There are a lot of UNIX boxes. We've got tons of them here - but it's Mac
and PC for handling the personal interaction. Are the numbers of UNIX
users in the tens of millions?

> 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.

I think you have it wrong. An error with UNIX is a much more serious
problem as UNIX typically deals with much more serious tasks. It exists
because it is more stable. The Mac deals with less serious tasks, it
exists because it allows people to use a tool with less training and
allows for more efficient usage by most people. If using the best tool for
the task means that it is a toy, then so be it.

> 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.

So basically the same things that apply to Mac apply to UNIX. I can
configure my Macs and restrict access to critical areas by users in much
the same way. Macs have been up and running without fail for many years -
haven't been around to claim decades - yet.

> 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...

Well, it seems you are missing many of the Mac benefits as well. Of course
a certain amount of configuration is needed, but I think I have set two
sets of config info on my machine - I can access any server, ftp site,
whatever without having to identify myself either. I can double-click on a
URL in my news or mail or text editor or whatever and have Netscape or
Anarchie (ftp) or whatever take me there - it's very natural. I can click
on the name of company in an about box and it will have Netscape take me
to their WWW site. The fact that the Mac is consistent benefits most users
significantly, something X does not typically offer.

> 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.

I think it will be quite different. It would seem that now that people are
willing to pay for development of systems to take the place of UNIX - look
at NT. The power of todays computers are what will drive UNIX away. UNIX's
strength was to allow people to get power out of their computer due to the
low overhead. As computers get more powerful, more assistance will be
asked of the system. There is no growth among people that will tolerate
UNIX. The market is the people that are just beginning to use computers
and those that still feel too distant from computers. UNIX will never
bridge that gap anytime soon. People need toasters, not complex systems.

-- 
Bob Cassidy
UC Irvine