5 ms·

It's probably unfair to compare Plan9 to "modern" operating systems. Why not talk about everything it got right and smart instead of all the things which behave

It's probably unfair to compare Plan9 to "modern" operating systems. Why not talk about everything it got right and smart instead of all the things which behave differently than what our expectations set?

rcarmo 5y ago
I'm just pointing out the shortcomings I found. I've been using it and keeping tabs on resources for Plan 9 and Inferno since 2014: - https://taoofmac.com/space/os/plan9 https://taoofmac.com/space/os/plan9 ...so I do know a lot about it in practice. It's just that, also in practice, nearly ten years of tinkering with it have been mesmerising, mostly fun, but not useful enough for my particular use cases. YMMV.
gonzus 5y ago
I want to answer trying to interpret the GP. For me, I want to be able to tinker with Plan 9. I love everything I have read about it. But I also need a practical environment where this is possible. I would love to be able to do minimal (frugal?) development work on a pi running Plan 9, but the lack of a browser, an editor that feels familiar (at least for a while, until I learn the ropes) and the languages I want to tinker with, it is very hard to get going.
- enriquto 5y ago
  You can install it on a virtual machine and start playing.
- nix23 5y ago
  Try 9Front, they have two browsers ;)
Cloudef 5y ago
The strong point of plan9 is the universal IPC. This kills the need for a separate clients and servers that communicate with their own protocols to get access to remote resource. You can simply import / export anything, this isn't limited to static content as daemons can also export virtual resources. It also makes lots of programs unnecessary as traditional shell tools can access and modify resources and even system settings. Sort of like sysfs on linux but more on steroids. Plan9 was also far ahead with sandboxing by having namespaces, which means you can expose restricted views of the "filesystem" to each process. Since in plan9 there's no ioctls and every resource access is simply read/write syscall (even networking!), restricting the "filesystem" is all you need to restrict what a process can do on your system.
- pjmlp 5y ago
  No it wasn't. UNIX world had sandboxing via stuff like Tru64 and HP-UX vaults, while the cloud kind stuff kind of traces back to IBM System 360 capabilities, later improved in z/VM.
  - nix23 5y ago
    >cloud kind stuff kind of traces back to IBM System 360 capabilities Yes true with VM/370 (today called z/VM) released in 1972, but it's not directly the same, however pretty impressive what IBM did (in the past) One can test-drive it from here: http://www.vm370.org/vm http://www.vm370.org/vm
ThinkBeat 5y ago
Plan9 is a more "modern" operating systems than UNIX. WindowsNT is also a more modern operating system than UNIX. In so far as when they were created long after UNIX. And Plan9 certainly was at some point hoped to be a successor. That did not happen. and the new ideas they had.
- jhbadger 5y ago
  Although Windows NT was in many ways a version of the operating system VMS that failed against UNIX including having the same main architect, Dave Cutler, who hated everything about UNIX and who refused to learn from its success. Plan 9 on the other hand was created by some of the very same people who created UNIX. It learned from UNIX and while it failed, it failed because to most people UNIX was "good enough" and the improvements of Plan 9 weren't compelling enough to switch.
  - pjmlp 5y ago
    Mostly because VMS was commercial and UNIX free beer. History would have played quite differently had AT&T been allowed to sell UNIX from the get go.

rcarmo 5y ago

I'm just pointing out the shortcomings I found. I've been using it and keeping tabs on resources for Plan 9 and Inferno since 2014: - https://taoofmac.com/space/os/plan9 https://taoofmac.com/space/os/plan9 ...so I do know a lot about it in practice. It's just that, also in practice, nearly ten years of tinkering with it have been mesmerising, mostly fun, but not useful enough for my particular use cases. YMMV.

gonzus 5y ago

I want to answer trying to interpret the GP. For me, I want to be able to tinker with Plan 9. I love everything I have read about it. But I also need a practical environment where this is possible. I would love to be able to do minimal (frugal?) development work on a pi running Plan 9, but the lack of a browser, an editor that feels familiar (at least for a while, until I learn the ropes) and the languages I want to tinker with, it is very hard to get going.

enriquto 5y ago
You can install it on a virtual machine and start playing.
nix23 5y ago
Try 9Front, they have two browsers ;)

Cloudef 5y ago

The strong point of plan9 is the universal IPC. This kills the need for a separate clients and servers that communicate with their own protocols to get access to remote resource. You can simply import / export anything, this isn't limited to static content as daemons can also export virtual resources. It also makes lots of programs unnecessary as traditional shell tools can access and modify resources and even system settings. Sort of like sysfs on linux but more on steroids. Plan9 was also far ahead with sandboxing by having namespaces, which means you can expose restricted views of the "filesystem" to each process. Since in plan9 there's no ioctls and every resource access is simply read/write syscall (even networking!), restricting the "filesystem" is all you need to restrict what a process can do on your system.

pjmlp 5y ago
No it wasn't. UNIX world had sandboxing via stuff like Tru64 and HP-UX vaults, while the cloud kind stuff kind of traces back to IBM System 360 capabilities, later improved in z/VM.
- nix23 5y ago
  >cloud kind stuff kind of traces back to IBM System 360 capabilities Yes true with VM/370 (today called z/VM) released in 1972, but it's not directly the same, however pretty impressive what IBM did (in the past) One can test-drive it from here: http://www.vm370.org/vm http://www.vm370.org/vm

ThinkBeat 5y ago

Plan9 is a more "modern" operating systems than UNIX. WindowsNT is also a more modern operating system than UNIX. In so far as when they were created long after UNIX. And Plan9 certainly was at some point hoped to be a successor. That did not happen. and the new ideas they had.

jhbadger 5y ago
Although Windows NT was in many ways a version of the operating system VMS that failed against UNIX including having the same main architect, Dave Cutler, who hated everything about UNIX and who refused to learn from its success. Plan 9 on the other hand was created by some of the very same people who created UNIX. It learned from UNIX and while it failed, it failed because to most people UNIX was "good enough" and the improvements of Plan 9 weren't compelling enough to switch.
- pjmlp 5y ago
  Mostly because VMS was commercial and UNIX free beer. History would have played quite differently had AT&T been allowed to sell UNIX from the get go.