3 ms·
The existence of more than one article based on a talk does not by itself suggest that they are dependencies of one another; nor does it excuse rambling. The t
by torstenvl 3y ago
The existence of more than one article based on a talk does not by itself suggest that they are dependencies of one another; nor does it excuse rambling.
The title of the OP is "Forgetting the history of Unix is coding us into a corner." At no point do you explain who is forgetting what lessons, or why such forgetting is coding us into a corner.
In any case, the history is interesting and clearly well-researched. I offer as constructive criticism that your structure and clarity could benefit from continued editing.
- Nevermark 3y agoI couldn't agree with your comment more. I was trying to sort this out too. A title that reflects the laundry list of topics: Background Relevant to Revisiting Unix: The Tree of Unixes, Different Kernel Approaches, and the Baked But Broken "Everything is a File" Assumption
- lproven 3y ago> The existence of more than one article based on a talk does not by itself suggest that they are dependencies of one another I beg to differ. This is part 2 of an estimated 4. They are heavily interdependent; a talk is, of necessity, linear. > nor does it excuse rambling. Guilty as charged. My plan was 3 parts, but this section would have been circa 3½ thousand words, which is way too long, so I cut it in approximately half. Currently I think there'll be 4 parts, probably published over the next 2 weeks. And, as I said, if you want to skip to the end, the script is right there, but it's not as coherent as something intended to be read would be. P.S. Thanks for the comments! Sadly deadlines in online publishing come twice a day, and thus, on average, I only have 4 hours to bash an article into shape. As Blaise Pascal wrote in 1657: “I have only made this letter longer because I have not had the time to make it shorter." Or, as Churchill allegedly said: "If you want me to speak for two minutes, it will take me three weeks of preparation. If you want me to speak for thirty minutes, it will take me a week to prepare. If you want me to speak for an hour, I am ready now."
- zokier 3y agoYou might have some grand vision of all this ties together in part 4 or whatever, but the problem is that it doesn't exist yet so we are left on discussing now this part 2, and it really doesn't stand on its own at all. Nor does the article itself state this fact that there are still two parts coming, so at least I was quite surprised when I reached the end; it truly felt like half of the article was missing. So maybe the biggest problem here was just posting this on HN prematurely, maybe it would have worked better if you'd waited until the whole thing had been published.