Unix for 8080/Z80? [Re: WooHoo!! PC/XT Unix anyone?] - test-drb@ccmp.vtda.org

24 Jan 1999

Well . . . CP/M "looked a lot like" the old OS/8, yet it wasn't.  I guess
it depends on what your goal is.  With the CP/M, it was having a console
protocol which was already understood by any unemployed DEC programmer so
they could be put to work on the 8-bit micros.  Because it was already a
defined quantity, it didn't have to be too thoroughly documented, either.

I don't know about OS-9.  I never saw it on a 6809 though I did see it
running on a 68008, which is quite a bit more processor.  It didn't look
too much like *NIX either.l

Dick

----------
...
  From: Allison J Parent &lt;allisonp(a)world.std.com&gt;
 To: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers
&lt;classiccmp(a)u.washington.edu&gt;
...
  Subject: Re: Unix for 8080/Z80? [Re: WooHoo!! PC/XT
Unix anyone?]
 Date: Saturday, January 23, 1999 9:43 PM

 <This notion of cooking up or breathing new life into an old 8-bit model to
...
  <run *NIX is probably a mite more than has been
considered for one reason. 
...
  <*NIX tends to want to use virtual memory, without
which many systems would
...
  <quickly choke.  The old CPM-capables don't
support VM.  A good reason for
...
  <this is probably the lack of performance.  

 Unix didn't always have the idea of virtual memory.  See Minix for an 
 example of that also V4 and maybe V5 unix didn't either.

 Also It's been done!  UZI uses the total swaping model, IE: processes are 
...
  swaped out of core to make room for others.

 Allison 