Newsgroups: comp.sys.xerox
Path: cantaloupe.srv.cs.cmu.edu!rochester!rocksanne!gemini.scn.de!not-for-mail
From: leisner@gemini.scn.de (Marty Leisner 25733)
Subject: Re: IEEE Writeup
Message-ID: <1995Apr29.172433.9880@news.wrc.xerox.com>
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References: <3mgccd$1p3q@usenetp1.news.prodigy.com> <3n68r3$4r9@newsbf02.news.aol.com> <3n6kss$6n2@spool.cs.wisc.edu>
Date: Sat, 29 Apr 1995 17:24:33 GMT

Todd Austin (austin@aura.cs.wisc.edu) wrote:
: In article <3n68r3$4r9@newsbf02.news.aol.com>, rkell@aol.com (RKell) writes:
: |> <<We could all be running a Xerox GUI today>>
: |> 
: |> How true, how true. Anyone who has ever been exposed to the Xerox Network
: |> Services would probably tell you it is the most seamless implementation of
: |> a network operating system to this day. Maybe in about another 2-5 years
: |> either Microsoft or Novell will catch up!!!
: 
: Indeed!  Does anyone recall "snarftool" (?), just give it an executable, and it
: would start grabbing to the local machine all the sources used to create the
: executable.
: 

Hi Todd...

Funny...unixphiles don't understand the meaning of Network Operating System...

I always found the concept of "local machine" to be a pain.  The idea is to create
a filesystem on all machine which is the same (which is what NFS/automounters do).

Alto's had some advantages over the latter  machines (but this was built into applications).
For example, Laurel (the Mailtool) could specify mailfiles on services (in a syntax dependent way,
i.e.
[server]<path>

NFS is often much, much nicer (just specify a path name).

When I compile something with symbols, the debugger often knows where the source
is...where does snarf tool keep this information cached?


: Here's other unique and largely unreplicated niceties of Pilot OS and
: Tajo environment.  There was no need for a linker -- the linker/loader did
: exactly that, *link* and load.  No need for "make" since information stored in
: any executables was sufficient to rebuild it.  Re-startable exceptions...
: Sequences...  Zone allocation...  Position independent pointers...  A re-entrant,
: thread-friendly debugger...  Network debugging...  The best calandar program
: on the planet...  Hungarian identifiers (you wouldn't get abused for making
: one)...  XNS-Empire...  Mazewars...
: 
: I could go on.
: 

And a fragile machine, prone to crashing (a big PC without memory protection)
and subject to all-day scavenges...no thanks...


-- 
marty
leisner@sdsp.mc.xerox.com  
Member of the League for Programming Freedom (see http://www.lpf.org/)
Committees do not design!  They are never held responsible, nor are 
they rewarded or punished.  Committees can review.   
				C. Gordon Bell
