Mach OS - NeXT computer

[Dean Rubine]

worms-emh1.army.mil>@adm.BRL.MIL (W. D. 'Cal' Calhoun) writes:
>I am considering the purchase of a UN*X mini called NeXT.  It runs a BSD4.3
>compatable OS known as Mach.  Does anyone have any experiance either with the 
>machine or the Mach OS?  If so, any recommendations, remarks, observations,
>etc. would be appreciated.

     Assuming you're serious, Cal, here's the scoop:  NeXT, Inc. is Steve
Jobs' attempt to do it again (Jobs was a cofounder of a successful computer
company named "Apple").  The machine has just been announced, and is supposed
to go on sale to EDUCATIONAL INSTITUTIONS and DEVELOPERS ONLY sometime real
soon.  The machine is rather impressive (to say the least) and you can expect
that it will eventually go on sale to the public at large, probably after the
manufacturing ramps up and some additional software gets written.  Don't expect
to be able to buy one in the 1980s.   

    Mach is an operating system developed here at Carnegie Mellon.  It is
4.3BSD compatible, and boasts many features not available from vanilla 4.3,
including sparse address spaces, multiple threads of control in a single
process, message based interprocess-communication, hi-tech shared memory,
and a whole lot more.

    The reason I (and maybe others on the net) didn't know whether or not
to take your request for information seriously is that all we've heard
about for the last couple of years has been how great the NeXT machine
is going to be (and that it's behind schedule again :-).  Lately, with the
release and all, the hype has been deafening.  It's hard to believe someone
on the net has managed to escape the NeXT publicity blitz, but I guess it's
possible.   By the way, there was this computer virus recently (actually
a worm) that you might not have heard about...;-)

	Hope this helps.

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ARPA:       Dean.Rubine at CS.CMU.EDU	UUCP: ...!seismo!k.gp.cs.cmu.edu!dandb
PHONE:	    412-268-2613		[ Free if you call from work]
US MAIL:    Computer Science Dept / Carnegie Mellon U / Pittsburgh PA 15213
DISCLAIMER: My employer wishes I would stop posting and do some work.
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