Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!husc6!mailrus!nrl-cmf!ames!pasteur!ucbvax!PURDUE.EDU!comer From: comer@PURDUE.EDU (Douglas Comer) Newsgroups: comp.os.xinu Subject: Re: 68k Minix Message-ID: <8805101934.AA04927@merlin.cs.purdue.edu> Date: 10 May 88 19:34:51 GMT Sender: daemon@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU Organization: The Internet Lines: 31 Clint, >> ... are the PC versions available in MSDOS format, or can one only >> get them in (minix,xinu) format? Also: The PC version of Xinu comes on standard MS-DOS disks. Only one of the disks contains a Xinu-style file system (and that's just for fun). >> Would some soul(s) *EMAIL* me a brief rundown on comparative features of >> Minix and Xinu? How do their models differ? Their interprocess >> communication? Performance on normal applications? Completeness of >> the standard unix tool sets? Briefly, Minix is a minature version 7 (circa 1978) UNIX system; Xinu is an entirely new, hierarchically structures operating system with only small resemblence to UNIX internally. They don't even attempt to do the same things. Minix tries to provide a small UNIX environment; Xinu tries to illustrate new operating system concepts including networking protocols. Minix looks to the past; Xinu looks to the future. Minix runs on PCs; Xinu runs on PCs, Vaxen, PDP11s, SUNs, National 32000s, etc. Go to your library and look at the two texts. Why are both distributions $80, and both books over $40? Prentice Hall publishes both books and distributes software; they set the price. In your case, contact Prof. Larry Peterson (in your cs dept) who probably has a verison of Xinu he can let you play with (Larry is a former Ph.D. student of mine). Doug