Subject: Re: NetBSD-Mach?
To: The Great Mr. Kurtz [David A. Gatwood] <davagatw@Mars.utm.edU>
From: Christian Kuhtz <kuhtz@ix.netcom.com>
List: port-mac68k
Date: 12/10/1996 00:25:44
On Mon, 9 Dec 1996 13:55:55 -0600 (CST), "The Great Mr. Kurtz [David A. =
Gatwood]" <davagatw@Mars.utm.edU> wrote:
> 1.	Is anyone working on/planning to work on a port of NetBSD to
> Mach3?

I've been messing around with various Mach mk's on the black NeXT hardware =
-- as a distraction from the NetBSD hacking. ;-)

Mach3 is a possibility, however, I would very much favor Mach4 instead of =
it.  Mach4 is predominantly Mach-UX and not Mach-US, though.

> 3.	What major sections would have to be replaced by Mach calls other
> than the video display code, ADB code, MMU code, and SCSI code?  How bad
> would the MMU part be?

Depending on the Mach mk architecture you chose, you can replace all the =
above and much more by calls to Mach servers (which sit somewhat underneath =
the OS servers for discussion sake).

> And yes, I'm looking at the NetBSD sources right now.  I've kinda come to
> the conclusion that the biggest pains would be in finding a way to start
> it from mach, and in finding a way to beta test without a second booting
> MkLinux partition.  That and pounding the Linux ext2fs code in for obvious
> reasons.

Look at the work at CMU, which is mostly Mach3, Lites by Johannes Helander =
(hope I got that right), and Mach4 at the University of Utah.

However, Mach3 is basically no longer evolving.  Mach4 evolution has stalled =
at Utah since Utah decided to write their own OS. (fools, IMHO; yes, I know =
they're reusing part of the flex kernel, but I still don't like what they're =
doing)

Regards,
--
Christian Kuhtz          kuhtz@ix.netcom.com - hm, ckuhtz@paranet.com - wk=20=

Network/UNIX Specialist      BOYCOTT INTERNET SPAM http://www.vix.com/spam
Paranet, Inc.                                      http://www.paranet.com/