FreeLists / openbeos / [openbeos] Re: status of OpenBeOS

["Axel Dörfler" <axeld@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

"Michael Phipps" <mphipps1@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> >I would love to have better terminal capabilities, and better posix 
> >support. So that most unix terminal applications work without to 
> > much 
> >adjustements. I really like the *nix way of working in a terminal, 
> > for 
> >some tasks. And for others, i prefer a GUI. linux/bsd, etc, do very 
> > well 
> >on the terminal part, but the GUI is really not perfect. BeOS did 
> > very 
> >well on the GUI, but the terminal part needs some improvement. I 
> > just 
> >want the best from both worlds: Good GUI, a decent unix in the 
> > terminal ...
> R5 has nearly everything that most Unixes have, in terms of terminal.
> The two biggest lacks are sockets == file descriptor and mmap. We are 
> addressing both of those. If there is more missing that I am not 
> aware of, would you 
> email me offlist?

Well, just have a look at mkfifo to see one thing, but there is more 
(like CTRL-Z, etc.).

> >Also a full security model a la "option 2" is pretty usefull, i 
> > think. 
> >At least, "option 2" does not limit workstation usage, while "option 
> > 1" 
> >would make server capabilities very limited. Which is one of  THE 
> > good 
> >things from unix: it is fully multiuser.
> Option 2 does limit workstation usage. At the very least, it 
> complicates it.
> Multiple users log in (option 1) is a lot easier than option 2 to 
> build.
> I just can't see a real need for it, compared to the work required. 
> You are better 
> off with a BSD box for terminal logins.

Sure, it is much work, so is R1 - I haven't started writing a whole 
operating system to make any compromises in the long run, I want all 
the bells and whistles I can get :-)
For R2 I only see three main things to do in the kernel:
1) allow shared libraries (pretty easy, yes, I know, but it won't 
happen in R1)
2) partition resizing/moving, file system defragmentation
3) last but not least: making it secure

The rest should be maintenance (bug fixes, API changes, ...), 
optimizations, ports to other platforms, and perhaps rewriting the VM ;
-P

Adios...
   Axel.