From: bibhas@pico.engr.mun.ca (Bibhas Bhattacharya)
Subject: BYTE asks, is UNIX dead?
Date: Mon, 28 Sep 1992 13:03:41 GMT
This months BYTE screams out asking "Is UNIX dead?". A closer scrutiny
of the article proved it's just the otherwise. Are these people trying
to form a public opinion by some kind of a cheap sneaky media proaganda
or are these people smart as anybody else? Are they completely bought
out or just being responsible journalists to guide the common people towards
more productive computing. I can, frankly, never convince myself with the later
arguments. As always perhaps, money rules.
Bibhas.
From: talley@ashleigh.Kodak.COM (Brian K. Talley)
Subject: Re: BYTE asks, is UNIX dead?
Date: 28 Sep 92 15:28:59 GMT
In article <bibhas.717685421@femto.engr.mun.ca>
bibhas@pico.engr.mun.ca (Bibhas Bhattacharya) writes:
>This months BYTE screams out asking "Is UNIX dead?".
This bothered me a lot.
> A closer scrutiny
>of the article proved it's just the otherwise.
Interesting. I didn't buy Byte this month, partly because of the crap on
the cover. As such, I wasn't aware of the contents of the article.
> Are these people trying
>to form a public opinion by some kind of a cheap sneaky media proaganda
>or are these people smart as anybody else?
Propaganda? Hell, yes! Look at IBM! Look at Microsoft! They didn't get
where they are by creating great software and selling it cheap! Of course,
there's often a fine line between "Quality Marketing" and propaganda. :}
And yes, these folks are smart, in their own weird, twisted way.
> Are they completely bought
>out or just being responsible journalists to guide the common people towards
>more productive computing.
Well, when I look back at my old (*really* old) issues of Byte, I can see
how much it's changed. It's slanted towards the IBM realm, and touches on
the Mac realm sometimes. On occasion, they'll feature an article on a non-
IBM system, but that's pretty infrequent.
Let's put it this way: when I saw the cover of Byte, I mumbled to myself
"...of course it's not dead, you f*ckhead...". My assumption was that many
a brain-dead executive would read that and think "Hmmm...once NT comes out,
that'll mean the end of Unix!"
Hell, any organization that would voluntarily publish the findings of Jerry
Pournelle...[countless expletives and uncomplimentary text deleted].
> As always perhaps, money rules.
>Bibhas.
Unfortunate, but true all too often.
Just my opinions, folks.
--Brian
From: ketil@spurv.ii.uib.no (Ketil M. Malde)
Subject: Re: BYTE asks, is UNIX dead?
Reply-To: ketil@ii.uib.no
Date: 28 Sep 92 21:05:08
In article <3725@eastman.UUCP> talley@ashleigh.Kodak.COM (Brian K. Talley) writes:
[...]
> A closer scrutiny
>of the article proved it's just the otherwise.
Interesting. I didn't buy Byte this month, partly because of the crap on
the cover. As such, I wasn't aware of the contents of the article.
Well, did it now? My impression was that, sure, NT has (will have)
some advantages over UNIX, while UNIX also has some advantages over
NT. (Mostly networking, I think). That most Unices probably will run
Ms-DOS and Windows apps long befor NT runs at all, wasn't mentioned,
(as far as I remember)
Propaganda? Hell, yes! Look at IBM! Look at Microsoft! They didn't get
where they are by creating great software and selling it cheap! Of course,
there's often a fine line between "Quality Marketing" and propaganda. :}
And yes, these folks are smart, in their own weird, twisted way.
Yeah. And they're the havyweights that rule the market. If MS wants
Byte to proclaim Unix dead, Byte will do so, or be squashed to death,
I am afraid. I suppose that's what they call 'business' in the Real
World(tm)
Let's put it this way: when I saw the cover of Byte, I mumbled to myself
"...of course it's not dead, you f*ckhead...". My assumption was that many
a brain-dead executive would read that and think "Hmmm...once NT comes out,
that'll mean the end of Unix!"
What worries me most, is that NT doesn't even *exist* yet! While Unix
is already up and running in several different incantations(?) *today*
Money rules, and it is the scourge of all free software.
Unfortunately. I mean, how much coverage have you seen in serious
magazines about Gnu, FSF, and several of your favorite free software?
Sure, they've been mentioned occasionally, but never realy taken
seriously. Ever seen gcc compared to other C's in the market? I
haven't. An all because it is *free* (and thus most value for money,
beating everything else, thus leading the other C manufacturers down
the drain, magazine lose ad money..*sigh*) I'll stop now. :-)
BUT: Perhaps we could start letter campaigns to get more coverage for
free software? Mail a letter to Byte or whatever, ask for reviews etc
of Gnu stuff, and other free software. Perhaps it would be possible
to get hardware manufacturers on our side? Now that Dell issues their
own Unix, how about getting Gateway or someone to give out a
'commercial' (that is stable and polished) version of Linux, or
something?
I'll stop *now* :-)
--
= Ketil Malde In real life: ketil@ii.uib.no =
= Nuke the whales! Honk if you love unicorns! =
From: csthomas@gizmonic.UUCP (shane thomas)
Subject: Re: BYTE asks, is UNIX dead?
Date: 4 Oct 92 17:23:59 GMT
Reply-To: csthomas@gizmonic.UUCP (shane thomas)
ketil@spurv.ii.uib.no (Ketil M. Malde) writes:
~
~ Money rules, and it is the scourge of all free software.
~ Unfortunately. I mean, how much coverage have you seen in serious
~ magazines about Gnu, FSF, and several of your favorite free software?
~ Sure, they've been mentioned occasionally, but never realy taken
~ seriously. Ever seen gcc compared to other C's in the market? I
~ haven't. An all because it is *free* (and thus most value for money,
~ beating everything else, thus leading the other C manufacturers down
~ the drain, magazine lose ad money..*sigh*) I'll stop now. :-)
~
Amen, Bro! Like I try to tell my boss, just because Microsoft has a
bigger ad budget don't mean they make a better compiler. Computer
software in one case where, the best things in life are free. A
problem that reamins, however, is that without access to FTP or a
*serious* BBS you gotta rely on your buds to get at this stuff. But
if Joe Computerdoode ever catches on to this stuff, it could get
gloomy - a lot of folks (me for one) make their livin's writing s/w
which other people try to sell.
~ BUT: Perhaps we could start letter campaigns to get more coverage for
~ free software? Mail a letter to Byte or whatever, ask for reviews etc
~ of Gnu stuff, and other free software. Perhaps it would be possible
~ to get hardware manufacturers on our side? Now that Dell issues their
~ own Unix, how about getting Gateway or someone to give out a
~ 'commercial' (that is stable and polished) version of Linux, or something?
~
Not bad, but Free Software is really a popular revolt, and I think it
really must spread personally. And they told told two friends, and so
on...
shane
---
bm155@cleveland.freenet.edu {uucp:rutgers!devon!gizmonic!csthomas}
301-695-4059 = "But this one goes to eleven..."
From: eric@tantalus.nrl.navy.mil (Eric Youngdale)
Subject: Re: BYTE asks, is UNIX dead?
Date: 5 Oct 92 01:45:23 GMT
In article <NiR5RB1w165w@gizmonic.UUCP>
csthomas@gizmonic.UUCP (shane thomas) writes:
>Amen, Bro! Like I try to tell my boss, just because Microsoft has a
>bigger ad budget don't mean they make a better compiler. Computer
>software in one case where, the best things in life are free. A
>problem that reamins, however, is that without access to FTP or a
>*serious* BBS you gotta rely on your buds to get at this stuff. But
Actually, I have the GNU/X cdrom, and it contains *unpacked* sources
for all GNU utilities, plus the complete X11R5 sources (it also contains
binaries for Sparc machines). I am finding that this is probably the disk that
I use the most, because I can browse the sources for programming ideas (the GNU
stuff is usually well documented), or I can quickly transfer the contents to
the HD to rebuild something. There is no need to keep bulky tar.Z files
around, but I just copy the customized Makefile to an archive directory, and
delete the rest.
>if Joe Computerdoode ever catches on to this stuff, it could get
>gloomy - a lot of folks (me for one) make their livin's writing s/w
>which other people try to sell.
I do not feel that this will have to be the case. The idea is that
you can make money *supporting* free software (i.e. Cygnus), and actually do
quite well with it.
-Eric
--
Eric Youngdale
From: tytso@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Theodore Ts'o)
Subject: Re: BYTE asks, is UNIX dead?
Reply-To: tytso@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Theodore Ts'o)
Date: Mon, 5 Oct 1992 05:22:22 GMT
Excuse me, but could you please take this discussion (how great the
Aimga is) off comp.os.linux? It doesn't seem to be related to linux at
all, and people have been complaining about the volume of the newsgroup.
Thanks!
- Ted
P.S. Why comp.os.linux.advocacy? I could think of a much better group
--- alt.religion.computers. :-)