Path: utzoo!attcan!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!ucsd!ogccse!blake!ndsuvax!ncoverby
From: ncoverby@ndsuvax.UUCP (Glen Overby)
Newsgroups: comp.os.minix
Subject: Re: Need a patch for Minix/ST 1.1
Summary: I've heard it before...
Message-ID: <2964@ndsuvax.UUCP>
Date: 26 Sep 89 18:30:36 GMT
References: <24162@louie.udel.EDU> <2391@ucsfcca.ucsf.edu> <1115@aurora.AthabascaU.CA> <9199@saturn.ucsc.edu>
Reply-To: ncoverby@ndsuvax.UUCP (Glen Overby)
Organization: North Dakota State University, Fargo
Lines: 55

In article <9199@saturn.ucsc.edu> sandy47@ucsco.UCSC.EDU (Larry McElhiney)
writes:
>I too would like to pay someone for a real, usable version of Minix-ST with 
>the latest patches installed, and I think that the number of people who
would doso is large enough to make it a commercial venture, though that 
doesn't seem
>the way it should be dealt with.

Several problems with that.  First, the person who ported Minix to the ST
doesn't have time, and Andy doesn't own an ST.  Even if they were very
actively supporting it, there would still be a rather significant time lag
between the fixes on the net (still a good way to distribute them!) and
their being shipped by `The Company'.  Prentice-Hall already sells Minix-ST,
and I really don't think they'd appreciate competition... and they have the
legal say.

Of couse, there HAVE been 12 OFFICIAL patches...

Why not consider the patches for "those weirdos on the net" and ignore
them?  One prof around here frequently uses that term, partly because I
botched the library ordering in v1.2 (oops... and the problem still isn't
REALLY solved).  If you can't handle the patches, then wait for
Prentice-Hall to ship the next release.



>How about some useful debate on the problems that have been troubling us all:

>	comp.os.minix.pc
>	comp.os.minix.st
>	comp.os.minix.new
>	comp.os.minix.exp


How many times has splitting comp.os.minix been suggested?  Last time it was
comp.sources.minix...

  Great, four newsgroups to read rather than one.  Problems that the PC
people are having might very well be the same ones that the ST people are
having and vice versa (then add other machines, when they're released), so I
(for one) would end up reading all the groups.  No, I like having Just One
group.  Use of keywords saying what machine people are talking
about would be nice...

  On the other hand, anybody who considers themself an 'expert' could just
ignore the .new group and their problems -- then we wouldn't have to feel
guilty about not helping them :-)

  I would expect crossposting in all of these groups to be rampant, meaning
that I would get to read stuff four times.  Great, just what I DONT want!

Minix is defined by whatever is running on Andrew Tanenbaum's machine.
-- 
		Glen Overby	
	uunet!ndsuvax!ncoverby (UUCP)	ncoverby@ndsuvax (Bitnet)