From: david@dynamix.com (David L Jarvis)
Subject: Re: Xenix considered harmful (was Re: SCO support - a success story)
Organization:  SOFTWARE / DYNAMIX
Date: Mon, 14 Sep 92 7:23:30 EDT
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> Excuse me?
> 
> 1.  You're not really likely to get "segmentation violation" (or "memory
> fault") unless the processor has *some* sort of hardware memory protection,
> which the '286 does.  (The '286 has segment-level protection:  read and
> write/execute bits on each segment, and a whole nest of other things I don't
> really want to get into without having my Intel manuals handy).

Sorry, should have said "brain-dead" protection scheme :-)   (note the :-)
for the humor-impaired :-) )
I'll admit my CPU architecture ignorance here ... all I know is
that from the day I watched the first 286 Xenix systems go out right to
today, I haven't seen many that are stable (if any) ... now that could be
due to the 286, or the OS, or the applications - but the point remains ...

> 2.  If anything, the '186 was a bastardised '286:  they both had the same
> base instruction set and features, except that the '286 added a "protected
> mode," four more bits of addressing (software and hardware), and, of course,
> instructions to deal with all of that.

Here I'll take you to task ... I worked for Tandy when the first 186 came
to the computing world in the form of the Tandy 2000 ... it was *well*
before *any* 286 box saw light of day ... I'd find it *very* difficult to
believe the 286 was out first ... lets take this to private mail; tell me
why you'd consider the 186 a bastardized 286
(btw: my point there was that the 386 was, or seems to be ;-), a completely
different architecture than the 8086, 80186, 80286)

> For what it was intended, and the time and market, the '286 was mostly
> adequate.  It does not use a C/UNIX memory model, however, being closer to
> something Pascal would have an eaiser time dealing with, but people have
> coped.  Intel did screw up in some areas on it, but not really the ones most
> people claim.

All I can base my opinions on is experience, which I have had plenty ... as
for technical reasons why the 286 was so unstable, while I am interested in
such things I'd have to say they are a moot issue at this stage ...

> But, then, most people don't seem to think about Intel when they flame it;
> they just seem to assume that, since everyone else *says* it, Intel *must*
> be horrible, evil, and drain-bamaged.

I would point out here that *much* of the technical information that was
available to me while at Tandy came *directly* from Intel ... were I to
flame Intel (which I have not, with my comments thus far), I would be more
likely to flame them for their BLATENT disregard for consumers when they do
things like disable the math-co in the 486 to create a market for the 487
(which is actually a fully-functional 486, disabling completely the first
486 chip) ... or any of the other various atrocities they've committed 

> 
> Kinda like the U.S. political system, actually.

It's not the system, it's the people running it, and the average joe-public
who eats this crap-slinging up on the news every day ... much like problems
in other countries I'd have to say ...



#----------------------------------------------------------------------#
#          David L. Jarvis                 SOFTWARE  /                 #
#          david@dynamix.com                       /  DYNAMIX          #
#----------------------------------------------------------------------#
Newsgroups: comp.unix.xenix.sco