HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.misc
Subject: Re: Mystery: NewsGrazer running really slow
From: frank@ifi.unibas.ch (Robert Frank)
Date: Tue, 28 Jul 1992 07:23:48 GMT
Reply-To: frank@ifi.unibas.ch
Distribution: na
Organization: Institut fuer Informatik

In article <1992Jul27.011200.1527@proforma.com>  writes:
> In article <1992Jul26.033037.2016@math.ucla.edu> barry@arnold.math.ucla.edu  
> (Barry Merriman) writes:
> >For the past few days, my NewsGrazer has been running really slow:
> >taking minutes to sort articles, retrieve an article etc, while this
> >used to take seconds. I get lots of wait cursor action, but no disk seeking
> >sounds.
> 
> I have noticed recently that NewsGrazer was suddenly eating up huge chunks of  
> CPU, usually after being hidden for a awhile.  Everything would go into slow  
> motion.  I have TimeMon, which shows the use really clearly.  Anyway, I just  
> quit now instead of hide.  This isn't exactly the problem you mention, but  
> something is strange.
> 
> Too bad NewsGrazer is unsupported.
> 
> --J Gregory

Hmm, peculiar things going on with newsgrazer 72.2. At our site we have two  
slabs and one cube. All are running release 2.1 of the OS and all have  
newsgrazer. On the slabs, newsgrazer shows no signs of abnormalty (Monitor and  
ps show normal CPU usage) but on the cube, newsgrazor takes MORE and MORE CPU  
the less we do! Eventually it will settle around 30% of CPU time, even if it  
sits idle (or seems to do so).
I have not the slightest clue as to what could be the cause, especially as the  
three machines are not all running exactly the same software. (They are being  
used for different purposes.)

- Robert
--
Robert Frank                         tel. + (061) 321 99 67                 
Institut fuer Informatik             fax  + (061) 321 99 15                 
University of Basel, Switzerland                                            
Mittlere Strasse 142      rfc822: frank@ifi.unibas.ch (NeXT mail accepted)  
CH-4056 Basel          X400: S=frank;OU=ifi;O=unibas;P=switch;A=arcom;C=ch
                   ( if all fails try frank@urz.unibas.ch )
From: dicosmo@dmi.ens.fr (Roberto DiCosmo)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.misc
Subject: Re: Preferences - UNIX setup
Date: 28 Jul 92 16:11:06 GMT
Reply-To: dicosmo@dmi.ens.fr
Organization: Ecole Normale Superieure, PARIS, France

In article <1992Jul27.213926.7386@pencom.com> alex@laos (Alex D. Nghiem)  
writes:
> + Large File System -- don't know anything about this one.  Anyone care to  
> comment?

If you use a large file system, then it is better to have some cache mechanism  
to hold directory information in memory, or otherwise you risk to spend a lot  
of time reading from disk when you change directory.

On the other hand, caching is not nice if you make frequent changes to the  
files via unix commands that do not interact directly with Workspace Manager.

I imagine the LArge File System option lets you choose between caching or  
not... (at least, it seems to work this way for me

--
Roberto Di Cosmo <dicosmo@dmi.ens.fr>

    Dipartimento di Informatica     LIENS
    Universita' di Pisa             Ecole Normale Superieure
    Corso Italia, 40                45, Rue d'Ulm
    56100 Pisa ITALY                75005 Paris FRANCE
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.misc
From: perelet@avignon.wri.com (Oleg Perelet)
Subject: Re: NeXTdimension -- what are the *official* specs?
Organization: Wolfram Research, Inc.
Date: Wed, 22 Jul 1992 18:53:09 GMT

In article <1992Jul22.180030.8569@cs.ucla.edu> esky@marathon.cs.ucla.edu  
(Eskandar Ensafi) writes:
> Hi,
> 3) Has anyone tried running RenderMan on a NeXTdimension? Is it much faster?
NOO!
--
Oleg Perelet
perelet@wri.com
From: jgrace@TetraSoft.com (Joseph R. Grace)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.misc
Subject: zsh help --- 2 "quirks"
Keywords: signals ^S
Date: 22 Jul 92 07:24:54 GMT
Organization: TetraSoft International

Hi,

I've installed zsh on my NeXT but have 2 problems I'd like to eliminate.   
Presumably, some zsh NeXT user has already fixed these so, please contact me  
with fixes if you have fixes (or can point me to them).  My zsh is 2.2.0.

1.  When I make zsh my Terminal:Preferences:Expert shell, it comes up fine  
multiple times.  BUT if I close the window on the *first* Terminal window,  
*all* the zsh windows die (and disappear).  Killing any other zsh window (but  
the first) seems to have no effect!  Any tips, fixes or pointers would be  
appreciated.  (What signal (?) could do this and how?)

2.  (Relatively minor but important.)  How do I get ^S/^Q to work as command  
characters with zsh.  Apparently, they are flow control'ling still --- which I  
don't need.

Thanks very much!

= Joe =
-- 
Joe Grace <jgrace@TetraSoft.com>
TetraSoft International   Business and Personal Productivity Tools for NeXTSTEP
From: sherwood@fenris.space.ualberta.ca (Sherwood Botsford)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.misc
Subject: Re: Checking disk space from terminal window
Date: 30 Jul 92 18:39:06 GMT
Organization: University Of Alberta, Edmonton Canada

Joseph Good writes
> 
> Is there a way to see how much space is left on the hard disk and not use the  
> workspace?  I'm wanting to check it on a remote machine (i.e. the printer  
> server) and that is in another room... and most of the time, somebody else is  
> on.

df [list of partitions or anything on a partition]

e.g.
df
df usr/spool
df /dev/sd0a
From: cedman@714-725-3165.nts.uci.edu (Carl Edman)
Subject: Re: Terminal
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.misc
Reply-To: cedman@golem.ps.uci.edu (Carl Edman)
Date: 24 Jul 92 23:55:29 GMT

Gene C. Van Nostern writes
> Is there a way to configure Terminal to take various
> default options for startup, like how many windows are
> opened, the windows' geometries (where and how big),
> whether the windows are iconified, etc?  If not with
> Terminal, is there another App that can? 

Yes, Stuart 2.3 can. It was written by Scott Hess (the author of Terminal) and  
is generally much preferable to it. I've not used Terminal a single time since  
Stuart became available. Get it from the purdue archives.

	Carl Edman
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.misc
From: pluther@percy.rain.com (Pat Luther)
Subject: Problem with mail
Organization: Percy's mach, Portland, OR
Date: Tue, 21 Jul 1992 21:45:31 GMT

Can someone tell me what's wrong here?
My computer, through its uucp link, accepts mail from the outside
world, but it won't send it.
Everytime I send mail to a user that's not at the system, I get a 
Returned mail: Host unknown message.

inside that message it says:
can't get working directory; will try to continue
and:
uux failed. code 68

Anyone know what this means?
Or where the command to tell it to dial its uucp link if it doesn't
recognize the host is?


					Thanks in Advance,
					??pat

-- 
Pat Luther: Lex's Evil Twin
picard!pat@percy.rain.com <-- NeXTmail OK.
pluther@percy.rain.com (sometimes quicker)
luther@uop.edu (slowest of all...)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.misc,comp.sys.next.advocacy
From: ray@mtl.mit.edu (Ray Ghanbari)
Subject: Re: Open letter to NextDevelopers (long)(Flamebait)
Reply-To: ray@mtl.mit.edu
Organization: Massachvsetts Institvte of Technology
Date: Tue, 21 Jul 1992 14:14:01 GMT

This article was probably generated by a buggy news reader.
From: jesperse@RFT28.NAS.NASA.GOV (Dennis Jespersen)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.misc
Subject: submission
Date: 29 Jul 92 12:53:03 GMT

[insert one-line description here]
-----------------------------------------------------
Folks -

    nxyplot1.84.README nxyplot1.84.tar.Z
have been deposited to ~pub/next/submissions.

Please let me know when it's in its proper place 
so it can be announced in comp.sys.next.announce.

    thanks,
    Dennis Jespersen
    jesperse@rft28.nas.nasa.gov
-----------------------------------------------------
[insert README file here]
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.misc
From: soward@slow.inslab.uky.edu (John Soward)
Subject: Re: Checking disk space from terminal window
Organization: University Of Kentucky, Dept. of Math Sciences
Date: Thu, 30 Jul 1992 18:45:07 GMT

Tim Reed writes
-> In article <1992Jul29.215806.23801@nmsu.edu> rscott@spock.NMSU.Edu  
-> (Joseph Good) writes:
-> > 
-> > Is there a way to see how much space is left on the hard disk and  
-> not use the  
-> > workspace?  I'm wanting to check it on a remote machine (i.e. the  
-> printer  
-> > server) and that is in another room... and most of the time,  
-> somebody else is  
-> > on.
-> > 
-> > any suggestions?
-> 
-> The unix command du does what you want.

I think "df" would be more apropos.

df == "disk free"
du == "disk used"

use "man du" and "man df" for more info.
--
    ________________________________________________________________________
   /   'The midnight sun will burn you up" -The Cure, Piggy in the Mirror  /
  /      soward@ms.uky.edu | soward@slow.inslab.uky.edu (NeXT Mail)       /
 /_______________________________________________________________________/
From: coke%net23@spectrx.saigon.com (Brian Policky)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.misc
Subject: chordic Keyboards
Date: Fri, 24 Jul 1992 01:42:51 GMT

Has anyone heard of any chordic (one hand) keyboards for the NeXT. I have  
seen them for the Mac, and even (echhh!) DOS.

--
coke%net23@spectrx.saigon.com  |  Life without
..szebra!spectrx!net23!coke    |  Coca-Cola
                               |  wouldn't be
NeXTMail now GLADLY accepted.  |  worth living.
-- 
coke%net23@spectrx.saigon.com  |  Life without
..szebra!spectrx!net23!coke    |  Coca-Cola
                               |  wouldn't be
From: aoml@enh.nist.gov
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.misc
Subject: Question about printing multiple documents...
Date: 27 Jul 92 22:00:00 GMT
Organization: NIST

I am currently programing a very large application.  It would be nice if I
could print several files with one command.  Does anyone know of a utility
which would do this?  I prefer non-commercial (of course) software.  If there
is a unix command that would accomplish the same thing, that would be fine.

Thanks in advance,

Kevin
(Please E-Mail Answers)
From: alex@laos (Alex D. Nghiem)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.misc
Subject: Re: Preferences - UNIX setup
Date: 27 Jul 92 21:39:26 GMT
Reply-To: alex@pencom.com
Organization: Pencom Software

Joseph:

Unix Expert shows/hides the Unix related file system, such as /tmp, /usr, /etc  
and so forth.
+ allows you to access the entire file system
- is very confusing for beginners, since the sheer number of filesystems is  
overwhelming

Public Sound Server -- allows/prohibits others from sending sounds over the  
network to your speaker
+ allows you to create "haunted house effect" (hey, where's the music coming  
from?)
- I don't know of any

Public Window Server -- allows/prohibits others from sending windows to your  
machine
+ allows remote processing (run an application on one machine and display it  
somewhere else)
- a security hole, but I don't fully understand how

+ Large File System -- don't know anything about this one.  Anyone care to  
comment?


Best regards,


Alex Duong Nghiem          Phone: (512) 343-1111
Pencom Software            Fax:   (512) 343-9650    
9050 Capital of TX Hwy N.  Mail:  alex@pencom.com
Suite 300                  Mail:  co-Xist_support@pencom.com
Austin, TX 78759           Mail:  co-Xist_info@pencom.com
USA
                           ****************************
                           * NeXTMail gladly accepted *
                           ****************************



In article <1992Jul26.050708.3985@nmsu.edu> rscott@spock.NMSU.Edu (Joseph Good)  
writes:
> 
> Could somebody please tell me what each of these do in Preferences?
> 
> Expert Preferences:
> 
> __  UNIX Expert          __  Public Sound Server
> __  Large File System    __  Public Window Server
> 
> What do each do, and what are the dangers/pro's/con's of using them???
> 
> Thanks!!!
> 
> -----
> 
> Joseph Good
> +-------------------+ - More than just a band....
> | Green Dot Brigade | - It's a whole damn army of dots...
> +-------------------+ - And we've declared war on the 7-Up dots...
> 
> rscott@nmsu.edu (NeXT mail welcome!!)
> 
> atlantis@acca.nmsu.edu  (Just plain ol' Unix)
From: ab@nova.cc.purdue.edu (Allen B)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.misc
Subject: Re: Dvorak keymapping for NeXT (type at twice the speed!)
Keywords: But not the Command keys
Date: 30 Jul 92 18:25:58 GMT

Can we (that is people using a NeXT) remap the letters (and
shifted, and probably Ctrl letters), but not Command
letters?  I'd really like to leave Undo, Cut, Copy, Paste
where they are and could live with the other Command keys
staying put to get that effect.

If so, I might try it (even with my vi fetish) for a while.  I
don't use vi for my NeXTmail, and I certainly get a lot of
it. :-) 

ab
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.misc
From: sanguish@digifix.com (Scott Anguish)
Subject: Re: Open letter to NextDevelopers (long)(Flamebait)
Reply-To: sanguish@digifix.com
Organization: Digital Fix Development
Date: Tue, 21 Jul 1992 18:25:28 GMT

Jess Anderson writes
> Since I have no direct experience with this particular
> product, I have no axe to grind, either way.  What I liked,
> however, was that you seem to be paying close attention and
> to have an open, flexible attitude towards addressing the
> actual concerns of actual people.  Though you're not the
> only developers who might do so, it's a refreshing change of
> attitude after the insistent "it's free so you get screwed"
> point of view Scott is trying to argue for.
> 
	No.. what I am saying is that, with respect to demos, it is  
unreasonable to expect them to work for an extended period of time.  Having a  
"demo" that runs for 10-20 hours straight without any restrictions is not a  
demo.  It is a full working piece of software with ZERO insentive to buy.

	And since you twisted my words around on me, I will repeat them...

> >And then he complains about Public Domain/Freeware authors who don't  
> >package the software they GIVE away in a way that he likes?
> 
> >Its FREE!  Quit complaining!  
> 
	This is the reality.  You haven't paid for the software.  You don't  
have the RIGHT to have full use of the software.

	Its interesting how this seems to have turned into a personal attack on  
your part.

-- 
- Scott Anguish -
sanguish@digifix.com (NextMail)

Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.misc
From: adrian@niagara.ucs.ualberta.ca (Adrian Smith)
Subject: Re: Direct Memory Mapped displays for NeXT 486 (besides Dell JAWS)
Organization: University Of Alberta, Edmonton Canada
Date: Thu, 23 Jul 1992 15:09:32 GMT

In article <1992Jul23.014214.14059@sfc.sony.com> berger@sfc.sony.com (Bob  
Berger) writes:
> The only one we have found so far is the Dell JAWS, does anyone know of  
other
> motherboard, VESA or EISA board display implementations that meet these
> requirements?

According to the release anouncements about NS486, the only colour spec  
the Intel port will support is JAWS. You *must* have video RAM on the  
system bus in order to run the colour OS. Nothing else is fast enough...
--
Adrian Smith
University of Alberta NeXT Campus Consultant
adrian@niagara.ucs.ualberta.ca
Audix: 5482
 
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.misc
From: marco@mora.usr.dsi.unimi.it (Marco Benini)
Subject: Re: User Group Newsletter
Organization: Computer Science Dep. - Milan University
Date: Thu, 23 Jul 1992 07:05:18 GMT

In article <1992Jul22.142247.27190@ghost.dsi.unimi.it>  
gpoc@cube.sm.dsi.unimi.it (Gianfranco Pocecai) writes:
> Hi 
> I would like to know which is the simplest way to start a newsletter in  
> the USA, what should one do? Are there any problems with the law??
> Any suggestion will be appreciated.
> Thank you
> Gianfranco
> 
> 
> --
> Gianfranco Pocecai
> Coordinator of "NeXT2You" The Italian NeXt User Group
> University of Milano - Computer Science Department
> Via Comelico, 39/41
> 20135 Milano - Italy
> E-mail : gpoc@cube.sm.dsi.unimi.it

Hello, Gianfranco,
I'm interested in this thing. Can you send me a summary of the answers to  
your question ? And, can you send me more details about the newsletter ?

Thank you

--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Marco Benini				       marco@mora.usr.dsi.unimi.it
     Computer Science Departement - State University of Milan - Italy
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.misc
From: nathan@laplace.biology.yale.edu (Nathan F. Janette)
Subject: Re: Direct Memory Mapped displays for NeXT 486 (besides Dell JAWS)
Reply-To: nathan@laplace.biology.yale.edu
Organization: Yale University, Department of Computer Science, New Haven, CT
Date: Thu, 23 Jul 1992 16:52:52 GMT

In article <1992Jul23.150932.1959@kakwa.ucs.ualberta.ca>  
adrian@niagara.ucs.ualberta.ca (Adrian Smith) writes:
> In article <1992Jul23.014214.14059@sfc.sony.com> berger@sfc.sony.com (Bob  
> Berger) writes:
> > The only one we have found so far is the Dell JAWS, does anyone know of  
> other
> > motherboard, VESA or EISA board display implementations that meet these
> > requirements?
> 
> According to the release anouncements about NS486, the only colour spec  
> the Intel port will support is JAWS. You *must* have video RAM on the  
> system bus in order to run the colour OS. Nothing else is fast enough...

That would seem to contradict previous information from NeXT
that described EISA color as the "mid-performance" option.

--
Nathan Janette		"I'm a NeXTstep man,
Dept MB&B, Yale Univ	 I'm a NeXTcube guy"
New Haven, CT
nathan@laplace.biology.yale.edu (NeXT)

Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.misc,comp.sys.next.advocacy
From: anderson@macc.wisc.edu (Jess Anderson)
Subject: Re: Open letter to NextDevelopers (long)(Flamebait)
Organization: Madison Academic Computing Center, UW-Madison
Date: Tue, 21 Jul 92 16:06:14 GMT


In article <1992Jul21.141401.27860@athena.mit.edu>
ray@mtl.mit.edu writes:

>This article was probably generated by a buggy news reader.

Well, *there's* a breakthrough!  I assume this is the first
mission-critical app for real people, and designed to run on
a 2.5-lb portable under NeXTstep 486, so that parents with
very small but cyber-gifted children can expose them to
Usenet at the earliest opportunity.

Oh, that wasn't the kind of buggy you meant?

-- 
Jess Anderson <> Madison Academic Computing Center <> University of Wisconsin
Internet: anderson@macc.wisc.edu <-best, UUCP:{}!uwvax!macc.wisc.edu!anderson
NeXTmail w/attachments: anderson@yak.macc.wisc.edu  Bitnet: anderson@wiscmacc
Room 3130 <> 1210 West Dayton Street / Madison WI 53706 <> Phone 608/262-5888
From: bwebster@pages.com (Bruce F. Webster)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.misc
Subject: Re: NeXT's vs. mainframes -- sales of 6000 machines
Date: 27 Jul 92 21:11:14 GMT
Reply-To: bwebster@pages.com
Organization: Banzai Research Institute

In article <1992Jul21.201713.22702@gordian.com> bruce@gordian.com (Bruce  
Hafford) writes:
> > I have a friend who is in a position to help make a 6,000 person
> > company (every person has a computer, thus 6,000 machines! big 
> > big deal!) switch from their IBM mainframes over to NeXTs.
> 
> Wait a minute - there's no way EVERYONE in the company
> needs a NeXT.  If you oversell them on it and it turns into a
> management and user mess, they'll be rather un-sold on
> NeXT's.  I'd look at what people really need their machines for
> first - if 3000 plain mono Xstations and 3000 NeXT's are the way to
> go, then that's a better solution than more power....

I dunno...everyone in _our_ company has a NeXT. Of course, there aren't 6,000  
of us (yet). ;-)  ..bruce..

Bruce F. Webster
Director, BRI
bwebster@pages.com
#import <pages/disclaimer.h>
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.misc
From: adrian@niagara.ucs.ualberta.ca (Adrian Smith)
Subject: Re: NeXTdimension -- what are the *official* specs?
Organization: University Of Alberta, Edmonton Canada
Date: Thu, 23 Jul 1992 15:07:23 GMT

In article <1992Jul22.205203.17283@cs.ubc.ca> sritchie@cs.ubc.ca (Stuart  
Ritchie) writes:
> the interactive renderman engine, as implemented in the 3DKit,
> does in fact use the i860 on the NeXTDimension board for
> rendering computations.  The implementor says that there is
> perhaps an order of magnitude better performance with the i860
> than the 040.  I don't know what sort of benchmark was used to
> make this comparison.
> 
> Has anyone outside of NeXT seen a 3DKit demo on a NeXTdimension
> system?  All the demos that I have seen and heard of are done
> using the slabs.

We had the opportunity to test 3DKit, albeit for a short period, on a  
Dimension. We only got a chance to use 3View, not the prman stuff, but  
there was a noticeable speed difference (maybe 30%) between the 25MHz slab  
and the Dimension system. I don't have any real numbers to throw out,  
since this was a brief intro to our User Group.

Also, we were only using PR1.

--
Adrian Smith
University of Alberta NeXT Campus Consultant
adrian@niagara.ucs.ualberta.ca
Audix: 5482
 
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.misc
From: barry@arnold.math.ucla.edu (Barry Merriman)
Subject: Mystery: NewsGrazer running really slow
Organization: UCLA, Mathematics Department
Date: Sun, 26 Jul 92 03:30:37 GMT

For the past few days, my NewsGrazer has been running really slow:
taking minutes to sort articles, retrieve an article etc, while this
used to take seconds. I get lots of wait cursor action, but no disk seeking
sounds.

Whats going on? Or more important, how to fix it?

Symptoms:

My nntp newserver and the network are fine;
if I do rn from 
another machine on the net, all responses are snappy, at the same
time NG is struggling. 

Also, my NeXT is running fine;
no other big programs running, and if I start some other app, like a 
terminal, it responds fine, while NG is struggling.

If I look at ps while this is going on, I find that NG 
is generally getting 0% CPU time, and is swapped out and
sleeping (SW state),  even though there is no apparent reason 
for it to be so. Once NG gets a few % CPU time, it generally gets 
the job done, but it may end up waiting a minute to get 1 sec of
CPU time, even though the machine is not busy with anything else.

Any idea whats going on here? Is this another NG bug?


--
Barry Merriman
UCLA Dept. of Math
UCLA Inst. for Fusion and Plasma Research
barry@math.ucla.edu (Internet; NeXTMail is welcome)
From: ssietz@dartagnan.rutgers.edu (Steven Sietz)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.misc
Subject: Re: Emacs app as default editor
Date: 28 Jul 92 12:31:09 GMT
Organization: Rutgers Univ., New Brunswick, N.J.

> > You need the last version of Emacs (2.1) that has an openFile method...
> > on the archives, or try spi.ens.fr in /pub/next/emacs

V2.1 is what I installed.  I find it a bit strange that the author
indicates this functionality but never verified it...

		-Steve-
-- 
Steven Sietz	        |  Internet:  ssietz@cs.rutgers.edu
77A West Bluebell Lane  |  uucp:      {backbone}!rutgers!cs.rutgers.edu!ssietz
Mount Laurel, NJ 08054  |
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.misc
From: eps@futon.SFSU.EDU (Eric P. Scott)
Subject: Re: Swapfile Question
Reply-To: eps@cs.sfsu.edu
Organization: San Francisco State University
Date: Wed, 22 Jul 1992 10:14:01 GMT

UNIX is perfectly happy with "holey" (sparse) files.  All that's
needed to satisfy the swapfile weenies is a mechanism to
deallocate arbitrary file blocks and return them to the free
space.  Clearly there are performance advantages to holding
onto unreferenced swapfile pages for a while, and there
should probably be something besides lowat governing swapfile
shrinking (and perhaps a way for a user to force minimize-NOW!).

					-=EPS=-
-- 
Why "modern" operating systems haven't caught up to what, say,
TOPS-20 offered in the 1970s(!) defies rational explanation.
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.misc