3 ms·

Where did the author get a copy of pre-X-integration NeWS, I wonder (if indeed they did). I haven’t been able to locate one online after a lot of determined sea

Where did the author get a copy of pre-X-integration NeWS, I wonder (if indeed they did). I haven’t been able to locate one online after a lot of determined searching, but I also can’t bring myself to declare that there isn’t one because the name is so ungoogleable.

pell 5mo ago
Have you checked the Don Hopkins archive yet? https://www.donhopkins.com/home/pub/ https://www.donhopkins.com/home/pub/
- mananaysiempre 5mo ago
  I have now, but (especially with the article part of the website now killed in favour of the execrable Medium) it took 'DVRC’s reply above for me to realize there was more to it than it first appeared: besides https://www.donhopkins.com/home/pub/NeWS/ https://www.donhopkins.com/home/pub/NeWS/ there’s also https://www.donhopkins.com/home/archive/NeWS/ https://www.donhopkins.com/home/archive/NeWS/ https://www.donhopkins.com/home/archive/news-tape/ https://www.donhopkins.com/home/archive/news-tape/ (take care that the news-tape subdirectory of the former is very similar but not identical to the latter) and most notably https://www.donhopkins.com/home/code/NeWS/ https://www.donhopkins.com/home/code/NeWS/ https://www.donhopkins.com/home/NeWS/ https://www.donhopkins.com/home/NeWS/ (these are not identical either), while the correct place to look on Bitsavers is https://bitsavers.org/bits/Sun/sunDistributionTapes/ https://bitsavers.org/bits/Sun/sunDistributionTapes/
  - DVRC 5mo ago
    Fun fact: originally "/home/NeWS" displayed "forbidden" access and I stumbled upon it by pure luck, finding the missing "operators.h" (and I told Don, since I wanted to see if there was something else missing or different, like "DumbOSI.c" which I hoped to be different from SunOSI.c). There is also an hidden file in /lib/NeWS called ".NeWS", contains the following string: "(hello) playdemo", which should kick the journal tool. In any case, it was a "Pulcinella Secret", and anybody reading his replies on HN could easily find all his distributions, and it is replicated also on tenox.pdp-11.ru (but it's incomplete, since that there are only the contents of /home/code/NeWS". On BitSavers there are the OpenWindows 2.0 source tapes other than the binaries (these last ones are also available inside SunOS 4.1.1 install CD, both for Sun-3 and Sun-4), but to extract them you need a specific tool, then you extract the tar dists.
DVRC 5mo ago
He also got Parallax p/NeWS in his collection, which is super rare. I also wrote a person who has a SunDew QIC cassette, and another that has various NeWS sources (including the portable REF tree of the 1.1 version). Unfortunately they haven't released them yet, because of the unknown copyright situation. Another person has the OpenWindows 1.0 binary tapes for Sun-3 and Sun-4, among other stuff. https://github.com/larsbrinkhoff/bagley-nottingham-tapes https://github.com/larsbrinkhoff/bagley-nottingham-tapes For now we have the sources of NeWS 1.1 (and operators.h if you look more in depth) and X/NeWS 2.0. I also have the RBuss sources (an incomplete clone), but I have to ask the author if they can be put on the internet. P.S: check BitSavers and Don Hopkins archives...
- mananaysiempre 5mo ago
  Thank you for the pointers! > Unfortunately they haven't released them yet, because of the unknown copyright situation. I’m guessing that’s a euphemism for “almost all software archival work[1] is, technically, illegal enough to ruin the life of everyone who touches it”. This includes stuff like the Space Cadet Pinball for Linux that was on the front page recently and had approving comments from the original programmers. (I believe pre-commercialization Unix is one of the rare exceptions, assuming you ignore the copyrights of everyone who sent their patches to Bell Labs unofficially, as both the authors of those patches and the Bell Labs folks did.) And it’s fair and probably correct to be afraid here. I just want to point out that this is one of the places where “legal” and “ethical” unequivocally point in opposing directions, and waiting for the legal situation to become more favourable is pretty much equivalent to never doing it. Software has the misfortune of having happened after the advent of pervasive copyright, so there are no out-of-copyright old masters that we could legally base our art on. Any chance of getting them to donate the code anonymously to one of the willing sacrifices^W^W well-known community figures like Jason Scott?

pell 5mo ago

Have you checked the Don Hopkins archive yet? https://www.donhopkins.com/home/pub/ https://www.donhopkins.com/home/pub/

mananaysiempre 5mo ago
I have now, but (especially with the article part of the website now killed in favour of the execrable Medium) it took 'DVRC’s reply above for me to realize there was more to it than it first appeared: besides https://www.donhopkins.com/home/pub/NeWS/ https://www.donhopkins.com/home/pub/NeWS/ there’s also https://www.donhopkins.com/home/archive/NeWS/ https://www.donhopkins.com/home/archive/NeWS/ https://www.donhopkins.com/home/archive/news-tape/ https://www.donhopkins.com/home/archive/news-tape/ (take care that the news-tape subdirectory of the former is very similar but not identical to the latter) and most notably https://www.donhopkins.com/home/code/NeWS/ https://www.donhopkins.com/home/code/NeWS/ https://www.donhopkins.com/home/NeWS/ https://www.donhopkins.com/home/NeWS/ (these are not identical either), while the correct place to look on Bitsavers is https://bitsavers.org/bits/Sun/sunDistributionTapes/ https://bitsavers.org/bits/Sun/sunDistributionTapes/
- DVRC 5mo ago
  Fun fact: originally "/home/NeWS" displayed "forbidden" access and I stumbled upon it by pure luck, finding the missing "operators.h" (and I told Don, since I wanted to see if there was something else missing or different, like "DumbOSI.c" which I hoped to be different from SunOSI.c). There is also an hidden file in /lib/NeWS called ".NeWS", contains the following string: "(hello) playdemo", which should kick the journal tool. In any case, it was a "Pulcinella Secret", and anybody reading his replies on HN could easily find all his distributions, and it is replicated also on tenox.pdp-11.ru (but it's incomplete, since that there are only the contents of /home/code/NeWS". On BitSavers there are the OpenWindows 2.0 source tapes other than the binaries (these last ones are also available inside SunOS 4.1.1 install CD, both for Sun-3 and Sun-4), but to extract them you need a specific tool, then you extract the tar dists.

DVRC 5mo ago

He also got Parallax p/NeWS in his collection, which is super rare. I also wrote a person who has a SunDew QIC cassette, and another that has various NeWS sources (including the portable REF tree of the 1.1 version). Unfortunately they haven't released them yet, because of the unknown copyright situation. Another person has the OpenWindows 1.0 binary tapes for Sun-3 and Sun-4, among other stuff. https://github.com/larsbrinkhoff/bagley-nottingham-tapes https://github.com/larsbrinkhoff/bagley-nottingham-tapes For now we have the sources of NeWS 1.1 (and operators.h if you look more in depth) and X/NeWS 2.0. I also have the RBuss sources (an incomplete clone), but I have to ask the author if they can be put on the internet. P.S: check BitSavers and Don Hopkins archives...

mananaysiempre 5mo ago
Thank you for the pointers! > Unfortunately they haven't released them yet, because of the unknown copyright situation. I’m guessing that’s a euphemism for “almost all software archival work[1] is, technically, illegal enough to ruin the life of everyone who touches it”. This includes stuff like the Space Cadet Pinball for Linux that was on the front page recently and had approving comments from the original programmers. (I believe pre-commercialization Unix is one of the rare exceptions, assuming you ignore the copyrights of everyone who sent their patches to Bell Labs unofficially, as both the authors of those patches and the Bell Labs folks did.) And it’s fair and probably correct to be afraid here. I just want to point out that this is one of the places where “legal” and “ethical” unequivocally point in opposing directions, and waiting for the legal situation to become more favourable is pretty much equivalent to never doing it. Software has the misfortune of having happened after the advent of pervasive copyright, so there are no out-of-copyright old masters that we could legally base our art on. Any chance of getting them to donate the code anonymously to one of the willing sacrifices^W^W well-known community figures like Jason Scott?