Aucbvax.4983
fa.works
utzoo!decvax!ucbvax!works
Fri Nov 6 04:21:37 1981
WorkS Digest V1 #32
>From JSol@RUTGERS Fri Nov 6 03:49:56 1981
WorkS Digest Friday, 6 Nov 1981 Volume 1 : Issue 32
Today's Topics: Apollo Domain Systems
Software Engineering - OS/370 vs. Star
Laurel Manual Available
Fewer Programmers On Tomorrow's WorkStation
System 38 - Description Query
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Date: 5 Nov 1981 0544-MST
From: Griss at UTAH-20 (Martin.Griss)
Subject: Re: WorkS Digest V1 #31
I might comment that the Apollo Domain systems are 68000 based, do use
the 2 68000 hack to provide the VM. They run a multiprocess OS,
somewhat UNIX(tm) like; one can get about 5-9Mb per process. The
machines also communicate very smoothly across a Ring network, and our
experience with the OS, VM and network is very positive. We run their
PASCAL and FORTRAN, use some ASM too. There is likely to be a C, a
"eunice-like" system, and maybe even a full V7 Unix.
------------------------------
Date: 5 Nov 1981 0940-PST
From: Jim Archer <CSL.SUN.ARCHER AT SU-SCORE>
Subject: Why would anyone want to use OS/360 as an example?
To: Hamilton.ES at PARC-MAXC
I believe OS/360 passed 3 man-millenia somewhere in the early 1970's.
Given the general relationship between total effort and the quality of
the final product, pointing out that Star may have taken 200 man-years
tends to make me suspicious rather than confident.
Jim
------------------------------
Date: 5-Nov-81 11:46:35 PST (Thursday)
From: Hamilton.ES at PARC-MAXC
Subject: Re: Why would anyone want to use OS/360 as an example?
To: Jim Archer <CSL.SUN.ARCHER AT SU-SCORE>
Reply-To: Hamilton.ES @ PARC-MAXC
Before you get too "suspicious rather than confident" regarding Star,
let me remind you that the project started some four or five years ago
from ground zero -- all new hardware, microcode, network protocols,
etc. Permit me to recommend Hugh Lauer's paper, "Observations on the
Development of an Operating System" (which discusses the development
of the Pilot operating system kernel underlying Star and the other
Xerox 8000 series Ethernet products), to be published in the
proceedings of the ACM/ SIGOPS 8th Symposium on Operating System
Principles next month. Lauer's thesis is that every major new
operating system takes around five clock years and dozens of man-years
to move from conception to maturity.
--Bruce
------------------------------
Date: 5 Nov 1981 1204-PST
From: Rubin at SRI-KL
Subject: Star vs OS/360 manpower
To: hamilton.es at PARC-MAXC
If a 1,000 man months gets you a Star, then OS/360 should have been a
universe. That system took 20,000, according to what I have heard.
Excuse me, that's 20,000 man years. If you like comparisons, I
believe it took the Egyptians about 20,000 man years to build the
Great Pyramid at Cheops. In fact, the architecture of OS and its
descendants rather reminds one of the Great Pyramid (not that I'm
trying to compare IBM to pharaoh).
Who knows, it may even last as long.
--Darryl
------------------------------
Date: 5 Nov 1981 11:17 PST
From: Taft at PARC-MAXC
Subject: Laurel manual available
cc: Dake at PARC-MAXC, Taft at PARC-MAXC
Those of you who wanted to obtain Alto User's Handbooks may be
interested to know that an expanded version of the Laurel Manual,
which constituted one section of the Handbook, has recently been
brought out as a PARC report. The abstract is reproduced below. If
you would like a copy, please send a message to Sara Dake
<DAKE@PARC-MAXC>.
Laurel is a user interface to an electronic mail system.
Complementing it is a mail transport mechanism called Grapevine, which
maintains a distributed data base to deal with naming, authentication,
distribution lists, and mailbox location. A paper on Grapevine will
be presented at next month's SOSP.
Ed Taft
-------------------
Laurel Manual
by Douglas K. Brotz
Abstract: Laurel is an Alto-based, display-oriented computer mail
system interface. It provides facilities to retrieve mail and present
it for delivery, and to display, forward, classify, file, edit, and
print messages. Additional features include facilities to read,
write, and copy files, run programs, and a whole lot more. Laurel is
a component of a distributed message system that has been in operation
for several years in the Xerox Research Internet.
This document is a description of the facilities contained in Laurel.
Several tips on proper use of computer mail facilities in a social
context are included.
------------------------------
Date: 5 November 1981 18:57 est
From: SSteinberg.SoftArts at MIT-Multics
Subject: New programming styles on Work Stations.
I think that the largest single difference will be the
relatively smaller number of programmers at the level we
traditionally consider programming. Instead of 3% or 25% of
all people who use a system programming it at the bit or
language level only .1% or .03% will be doing this on the Work
Station of the future. How many people double clutch anymore?
A much larger group will still consider itself programmers
although they will be dealing with constraint oriented systems
such as DNA sequencers, VisiCalc, simulation systems, Star and
so on. While many old time bit shovelers won't consider this
programming it will be considered so by most people.
The quantities of (what is now called) programming which will
go into these systems will be immense, but the dividends will
be equally large. My feeling is that a lot of those early
computer pioneer predictions will come to pass in the next few
years.
------------------------------
Date: 5 November 1981 18:53 est
From: Frankston.SoftArts at MIT-Multics
Subject: Re: paging/mmu on 432
Reply-To: Frankston at MIT-Multics (Bob Frankston)
To: ARPAVAX.hickman at UCB-C70
Prime allows segments to be concatenated. This allows arrays >64K,
but does seem to miss the point of segments as independent objects.
------------------------------
Date: 5 November 1981 16:18-EST
From: Stavros M. Macrakis <MACRAK MIT-MC AT>
Subject: System 38
Is there any information available on the detailed structure of the
IBM System 38?
Stavros Macrakis
Harvard
------------------------------
End of WorkS Digest
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