Other Web Browsers for Bell Labs' Plan 9? 83
SeanIBaby asks: "I was wondering if anyone used Plan 9, and Inferno/Charon for a web browser. Are there any other web browsers for Plan 9, or do you have to code your own? I've noticed that Inferno's company sells Plan 9 boxed sets for $150US. I guess this is because they include the Inferno/Charon binaries with the image, even though they let you download Inferno for free from their website.
Plan 9 is free from Bell Labs."
A Safe Assumption: (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:A Safe Assumption: (Score:4, Insightful)
I look at a system with plan9 on my desk (currently turned off), I read your answer, and I remember this quote: "The IQ of a crowd is inversely proportional to it's size".
This was not meant to be an offense, Farley Mullet, but I do know a couple of people who currently try out the OS, and your comment neglected to reflect that - that was not a safe assumption, but a rather centric one.
Re:A Safe Assumption: (Score:1)
Never mind. I had actually almost forgotten what Plan9 was until I went back to the site and reminded myself.
Seems to me that Plan9 was a good idea in its time. There was never anything really wrong with it, and for some people it's the best thing since unsliced bread, but it seems most of us have moved on.
You haven't moved on, you're still catching up. (Score:5, Interesting)
FreeBSD wants the namespaces.
Everybody wants the plumber only they don't know it yet.
GNU/Hurd would love to have a working microkernel OS.
Wake me up when grep, sed & awk and the rest of the bunch work on Unicode!
Then there are the ports - Wily, 9wm, 9menu
Gawk's extensions are lifted from the plan9 way.
The "next big thing" grid computing is old hat to us.
Don't worry, we'll be waiting for you.
Re:You haven't moved on, you're still catching up. (Score:1)
> on Unicode!
It's called Perl. It works on unicode (since 5.8 really, though
there was tenative unicode support in 5.6), and it has totally
obviated sed and awk -- and would have replaced grep too if grep
weren't too simple to need replacing.
At some point I intend to try out Plan9, just for the diversity of
exposure. I've read a little about it, and from what I read it seems
like it would be more interesting than practical, but I'd lik
Re:You haven't moved on, you're still catching up. (Score:2)
Like I said, catch up
Re:You haven't moved on, you're still catching up. (Score:1)
Who on earth needed Unicode support in the days of Perl4? Unicode
didn't gain buzzword status until a couple of years ago, right about
the same time as XML. I'm still not sure *why* we need it, other
than that of course everything has to support it these days to be
considered modern and hip. Bah. XML at least is occasionally useful.
your world view is too narrow (Score:2)
The irc channels with Europeans buzzes with UTF
http://www.xchat.org/encoding.html
like I keep saying, catch up
Wily RULES! (Score:2)
I felt obligated to say that.
No, I'm serious. Wily is one of the neatest editors I've ever used. The whole "arbitrary text is active menu-buttons-ish" interface is still quite a departure from the rest of the interface world, and a refreshing one, too.
Re:Wily RULES! (Score:2)
But each time I build it (about once a year), I find that I like nifty, but I need control keys, being able to use it without a mouse, fontification of code...
I've written a few emacs functions to mimick the column layout of wily, so I've got that aspect. I believe the users when they say you can get used or even addicted to mouse chording, but I like having control keys in muscle memory.
now, if only emacs-dev
Re:Wily RULES! (Score:2)
Heh. This goes to show that tastes differ. I have a difficult time reading source code in a proportional font[*], so I always built wily with a monospaced font, a slightly different cursor symbol, etc. They've a couple of alternative settings commented out in the code; just flip those and rebuild.
As for mouse chords, they're like heroin: you swear that you'll never need them, and then you try them, and suddenly you're hooked. :-)
[*] Except for lgrind/vgrind pretty-printed LaTeX forms of the code.
Re:You haven't moved on, you're still catching up. (Score:2)
That's why it's an appropriate question for Ask Slashdot.
You can get progress from building stuff on top of what you've got.
You can get progress from getting better stuff to build on top of.
Long term, the second matters more but there is nothing easy about it.
I have two distinct impressions of Unix. It has outlived its betters and it is deceptively simple. It would be surprising if some of that (soul?) were not in Plan 9.
Re:You haven't moved on, you're still catching up. (Score:2)
http://cm.bell-labs.com/who/rob/utah2000.ps
Re:You haven't moved on, you're still catching up. (Score:2)
Blecht!
"Where is the Innovation?
Microsoft, mostly. Exercise: Compare 1990 Microsoft software with 2000.
If systems research was relevant, we'd see new operating systems and new languages making inroads into the industry, the way we did in the '70s and '80s.
Linux's success may indeed be the single strongest argument for my thesis: The excitement generated by a clone of a decades-old operating system demonstrates the void that the systems software research community has failed to fill.
Besid
I hope so, I really do (Score:2)
Mozilla bumps up by 0.1 and it's on the front page.
Web browsers should have been finished in the 90's
HTML should be fixed in stone.
We don't need no steenkin extensions.
99% of web pages do just fine without DHTML and Embedded Objects and most can do without Javascript. Do we really need MIDI background music on a fsking web page?
"Oh but I *
Re:I hope so, I really do (Score:2)
That's the cure for Microsoft's problems with worms, but they won't listen, not for a long long time.
Grammatical Eye For The Dumb Guy (Score:3, Informative)
The Original:
Re:Grammatical Eye For The Dumb Guy (Score:1)
Its called 'dramatic effect', and 'style'. Just because his posting doesn't follow the most straightforward syntax doesn't mean that it is 'wrong'..
Chaucer on Tape? (Score:2)
You know, I probably would, except I don't know how to find mispronunciations in a book.
I suppose that's fair, but at least part of my intent was enforcing the age-old maxim: "if you're going to call someone stupid,
Re:Chaucer on Tape? (Score:2)
Re:Chaucer on Tape? (Score:1)
Re:Grammatical Eye For The Dumb Guy (Score:1)
I should try that when school starts up again. I'll turn in a paper full of missused punctuation marks and the letter u as a personal pronoun and call it style. Yes, many aspects of the English language can be interpreted as correct or incorrect differently by various authorities. However, there are quite a few hard rules which are no more variable than adding one and one together to make two. Dramatic effect and style are one thing, ignorance of some of the most
Re:A Safe Assumption: (Score:1, Flamebait)
Yes, it's flamebait. (Score:2)
Raises not begs - fucktard (Score:2)
The VM you are referring to is the I.E. plug-in for the Inferno Virtual machine so that it will run
Just because you don't see things doesn't mean they aren't there.
Inferno pays the salaries of 6 well paid computer scientists up there in York.
Even Linus needs a day job!
But you are right, why the fuck is this an Ask Slashdot. afaik only 5 or so of the regular comp.os.plan9 people even read slashdot, we could easily have a
Re:Raises not begs - fucktard (Score:2)
Re:Raises not begs - fucktard (Score:1)
The Wishful Thinking Factor (Score:2)
Re:A Safe Assumption: (Score:2)
1: Listen to others who have not tried Plan 9 talk about it.
2: Do not try Plan 9, but use experience of listening to people who did not try Plan 9 to extrapolate that nobody uses Plan 9.
3: ???
4: Profit?
You are quite wrong and so are main assumptions. (Score:3, Interesting)
Okay it is probably not more than 100 regular, everyday plan9 is my desktop users but it certainly isn't "nope". But "from my experience" is a really stupid extrapolation.
It certainly is a surprise to see this question on Ask Slashdot when it would be much easier to ask it in comp.os.plan9
All the assumptions in the question are totally wrong.
The VitaNuova Box Sets contain a set or printed manuals. It has nothing to do with inferno being included. Newsflash - Inf
Hmm... (Score:3, Funny)
I'm beginning to see a theme here... [eisa.net.au]
What is Plan 9? (Score:1)
Re:What is Plan 9? (Score:2)
Re:What is Plan 9? (Score:1)
Re:What is Plan 9? (Score:2)
Location of the binary is an implementation detail -- something isn't "more-OSy" just because it's in ROM. Besides, the very early MacOS wasn't a real OS -- like DOS, it was just a glorified loader. The fact that it was dressed up with a GUI actually supports my argument.
I tried it under VMware...... (Score:3, Interesting)
Now I'm all for hacking and learning and playing with operating systems, but QNX installed a heck of a lot easier.
I realize this doesn't help you too much, but I saw that a lot of people where getting flamebait mods for saying that Plan9 wasn't used by anyone. I can honestly say I don't know anyone that uses it, but I know several people that have talked about it.
Have you tried compiling Mozilla under it? It compiles under just about any other *Nix OS
Vertical
Make that would hang at booting.... (Score:1, Offtopic)
Vertical
yes, driver support is a problem (Score:3, Informative)
Since the downturn at Lucent no-one is being paid full time to work on plan9 and many in Bell Labs have been made redundant.
Getting a set of hardware together is a barrier to entry but if you look at the supported hardware list you may notice that much of the equipment is old and therefore cheap to get second hand and is often the sort of stuff people will just ditch, S3 Virge's and that kind of thing.
I can honestly say I don't know anyone that uses it
Yes, we are a
Re:yes, driver support is a problem (Score:5, Funny)
Crucify one of those, and you might make it to world domination.
Re:yes, driver support is a problem (Score:1)
In the meantime we grew to 14.
Re:yes, driver support is a problem (Score:2)
>Crucify one of those, and you might make it to world domination.
That only worked once, and then only because the guy who got crucified turned out to be a ringer: he was God.
Re:oh, he was not God (Score:2)
You can do anything to God that he'll let you do. God let them kill His physical body so that He could come back to life three days later, and show the world that the eternal life He's offering is real. And to fulfill the prophecies in the Old Testament. And to provide a sacrifice for all of us, and show that His sacrifice was sufficient propitiation for our sins. And so on.
Don't people ever think?
Not much. Fortunately, God doesn't require thought
Re:yes, driver support is a problem (Score:2)
Re:yes, driver support is a problem (Score:2)
Re:yes, driver support is a problem (Score:2)
Care to eloborate? You lack tact but serious I am curious as to how plan9 is better than unix(which is some cases I believe it is)?
Re:yes, driver support is a problem (Score:3, Informative)
user level file systems - Hurd
programmable debugger (debug programs running on a different machine with a differnt CPU)
it isn't POSIX compliant
no root
backups built in
UTF-8 throughout (source code included)
all services should be implemented using a common protocol - 9p
Only 17 system calls
http://plan9.bell-labs.com/sys/doc/index.html
Re:yes, driver support is a problem (Score:2)
If you and the other 12 guys could get together and support the hardware VMWare presents, you'd suddenly get tons of potential users, which would inevitably lead to more hardware support.
gosh - really (Score:2)
VMWare is already supported, numbnuts.
Re:gosh - really (Score:2)
Yet you replied to a guy who was having trouble getting Plan9 to run on VMWare by saying, "
yes, driver support is a problem
Maybe the Plan 9 adoption rate has something to do with the attitude of its proponents.
Re:yes, driver support is a problem (Score:1)
Re:I tried it under VMware...... (Score:1)
Plan 9 from Bell Labs?? (Score:1)
pricing of the Plan 9 boxed set (Score:1)
you don't get that with the downloads. obviously you can print off the .pdf from the download; then you'll find that doesn't give the same form factor as the printed manuals in the set.
the boxed set does include a copy of Inferno preloaded on the Plan 9 CD, but that's not the bulk of the cost, if any.
i know i paid $99 for another Free system's boxed set a
Re:pricing of the Plan 9 boxed set (Score:1)
$150?? Are the pages gilded?
Re:pricing of the Plan 9 boxed set (Score:1)
What about X Windows? (Score:1)
bould be easier to 'use' as opposed to 'port'
every application that is needed, and simply
utilize them as network resources.
Google didn't yeild anything positive, and I
don't use it so
barrier between program platform needs in a
diverse network setting?
Re:What about X Windows? (Score:2)
In general application porting serves little purpose.
If you want X you know where to find it.
Port! (Score:2)
It isn't all that wierdly difficult to port *nix software over to Plan 9, get porting
I haven't touched plan 9 since back around 1996 or so, but back then it shipped with a browser called Mothra I believe.
What is there for Plan 9 and what isn't (Score:4, Interesting)
charon -- the browser packaged with VitaNuova's Inferno [vitanuova.com] operating system which runs native atop Plan 9 (among other OS's). this is your best bet if you want to stick to using Plan 9 only.
Everything else [ucalgary.ca] the runs under UNIX/Windows (see Opera lurking in the background?). you only need to have a machine to run VNC on.
links -- two people have started a port of this graphical browser to Plan 9, one may succeed, who knows
as for mozilla, there is a slight problem with porting it to Plan 9 -- the browser sources are twice the size of the entire Plan 9 operating system (including the PostScript viewer).
Re:What is there for Plan 9 and what isn't (Score:2)
And why is this a problem? Mozilla is big, yes, but why should that be a problem specific to porting it to Plan 9 as opposed to porting it to some other larger OS? OS size to application size ratio is a new "problem" to me, and I reckon you'll have to explain it to me a bit more plainly.
Re:What is there for Plan 9 and what isn't (Score:2)
Porting a web browser that has more code than our OS sounds like masochism.
We might want to browse the web with DHTML & friends but not *that* much.
HTML was supposed to be *simple*. It has been trashed for the sake of eye-candy.
And on top is the DOM kludge.
HTML Applications - jeesh, a braindead idea and I should know, I've written quite a few.
Witness the crap that you have to go through to maintain state
Re:What is there for Plan 9 and what isn't (Score:2)
I can certainly see why a lack of interest in a port from the people capable of doing a port would be a problem.
No point in Plan9 (Score:2)
Plan 9 is and will always be too immature. The directory system is a departure from the tried and tested (and gotten used to) UNIX hier, and quite honestly, I dont see anything else new there. The niches have already been filled.
Now if people talked about freeing BeOS from the clutches of Palm (like paying for blender), I would be heck of a lot more interested. BeOS is exa
How long did you use plan9 for? (Score:2)
because it sounds like you either didn't use it for very long or are blind.
The directory system is a departure from the tried and tested
I would humbly inform you that this is the whole point.
plan9 isn't trying to be unix.
and quite honestly, I dont see anything else new there
Like I said, blind.
Open your eyes
http://plan9.bell-labs.com/sys/doc/index.html
Re:No point in Plan9 (Score:3, Interesting)
News break... Unix is not the ultimite OS. It is very good and has evolved over the years but in someways it is holding back Computer Science much like Windows is. Very few people are willing to work on anything in OpenSource that is not Linux/BSD/Unix based. I do not blame them. Linux has a lot of tools and apps now. I can use
Re:No point in Plan9 (Score:1)
BeOS isn't UNIX in any way.
Re:No point in Plan9 (Score:2)
My thinking exactly--where are the punch cards?
BeOS is exactly the OS everyone needs right now, a kind of Linux with a really good GUI strapped on top. Beautiful FS and networking and a SINGLE package system.
Plan9 is a research project. Plan9 actually has some nifty ideas in it.
BeOS, on the other hand, is an object-oriented commercial operating system--well executed, but neither the file system nor the G
Plan9 vs Unix (Score:2)
Major differences good and bad over unix?
I am not worried about current software and hardware support, but rather an overall picture of the us.
Yes, I have read the web-site.
Re:Plan9 vs Unix (Score:2, Informative)
links browser (Score:2)