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Driving Plan 9
Glenda_lives_on writes "OSnews has an alternative OS review on Plan 9. Plan 9 is a research OS produced by Bell Labs. It was open sourced a few years back, and has enjoyed a revival of sorts. Los Alamos National Labs is continuing to favor Plan 9 for their new generation of super computing because its the fastest thing out there. I have downloaded and ran Plan 9 before. In fact the Plan 9 live cd sits here on my desk. Its not an operating system for noobs however, and lacks some graphical refinement. Plan 9 is a very cool and a interesting test drive however. Its definitely worth the price of admission (free) for exploring, and education."
Were Plans 1-8 "not entirely successful?"
"You see! You see! Your stupid minds! STUPID! STUPID!"
If Nalgene water bottles are outlawed, only outlaws will have Nalgene water bottles.
... Ed Wood must be proud :)
I enjoy large posteriors and I cannot prevaricate.
Before y'all go pulling down the ISO to try it out, the mirrors are listed at http://netlib.bell-labs.com/wiki/plan9/Mirrors/ind ex.html .
Torrent?
Plan 9 is a reference to the Ed Wood movie, Plan 9 from Outer Space, often regarded as the worst movie of all time. Aliens raise the dead to finally prove to humans that they exist (because that's certainly the most obvious, effective way to do it).
... are cheesy 10 ft tall silver curtains.
"Win treats sysadmins better than users. Mac treats users better than sysadmins. Linux treats everyone like sysadmins."
I've never used it, but Plan 9 offers a radically different archival storage system called Venti.
Basically it never deletes old blocks of data from the server. Blocks are write-once, identified by a really large hash (collisions are so improbable that the possibility can be totally ignored). This allows you to copy lots of redundant data to the server (such as periodic backups) without worrying about the storage space. If the blocks were ever copied there before and they have not changed, they won't take up any space!
Does it provide easy portability of applications? How does it compare with Savaje OS? I know Savaje is a comletely Java based operating system with a low enough foot print for any space sensitive applications.
man page != implementation
http://cm.bell-labs.com/magic/man2html/1/emacs
NAME
emacs - editor macros
SYNOPSIS
emacs [ options ]
DESCRIPTION
This page intentionally left blank.
SOURCE
MIT
SEE ALSO
sam(1), vi(1)
BUGS
Yes.
Copyright © 2006 Lucent Technologies. All rights reserved.
and vi(1) isn't what you might think either
There are places where the networks are not touching,and there are places where they are-Boeing's Lori Gunter
What is this, digg?
"A week in the lab saves an hour in the library"
Said article is being mocked on the Plan 9 mailing list: http://lists.cse.psu.edu/archives/9fans/2006-July/ 048311.html
Or is it of Earthen origin?
The "everything is a file" metaphor of Unix was revolutionary at the time, and Plan 9 taking it a little further really does little to advance the state of the art.
What was good about the "everything is a file" metaphor was not the "file" part, but the "everything is a...." part.
What would really advance the state of the art is an "everything is an object" operating system. It would be something like a Lisp OS but with an object database type file system. I think some have existed in academia, but I've never looked into them.
Are there too many knowledgable Linux users out there?
Can't beat the best of BSD?
Use Plan 9 - we're so arcane we'll always be smug and superior! Read our email list and weep when we deconstruct with no mercy the writings of a newbie on a blog, without offering corrections, or help, or even writing a decent article ourselves to ensure that the information provided is correct, relevant and interesting.
Note: actually, now we've thought about it, please fuck off, we don't want more noobs.
Except maybe, here
here
here
here
and here
.
---- "XML is like violence. If it doesn't fix the problem, you aren't using enough."
Considering its not really intented as a desktop replacement OS, thats by design.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
The review is not so great in terms of accuracy i.e. there is no emacs (check out acme, sam, ed, and smacme instead) and the 640x480 resolution is nonsense. 9fans certainly isn't so grateful about this review.
Check out the Plan 9 documentation if you are interested in understanding Plan 9.
Plan 9 from Bell Labs.
"Plan 9 from Bell Labs" is the proper name of the OS.
/n/ftp
Plan 9 is now community driven, albiet from a small community, mostly the same people that have been there all along.
It has USB sound support and AC97 support is a new one on me.
I use it still because the user environment is the best one I have encountered for text editing and interecting with the shell. Most users use VNC to get to their X11/Windows desktops where their web browser lives.
Building a web browser from scratch is one of those never ending tasks that frankly, just isn't worth your while. That said there is Mothra - no tables, no css, no frames etc. that Tom Duff (yes that Tom Duff) wrote many moons ago and one of the community is beavering away at his project Abaco and has moderate success.
One of the main tenets to Plan 9 is "everything is a file" and the system is built around the notion of a distributed name space in the shape of a directory tree rather than being a reflection of the disk contents. The canonical example of this is ftps where the remote ftp site is presented as a directory tree at
Name spaces are process independent so you can build them per process which feels a bit like chrooting.
Exporting a name space is part of the deal, this presents many gifts that were not deliberately shoe-horned in such as remote step debugging across architectures, sending sound to a remote soundcard, importing a remote machine's network stack instead of using a gateway (including non-plan9 machines via ssh), importing remote filesystems (including non plan 9 machines). All this is facilitated by the 9p protocol.
As a micro/macro kernel hybrid all this is achieved in just 37 syscalls which is a source of amusement and a feeling of superiority when compared to Linux' 300+ (so many they are not even enumerated any more).
Linux is derided in the mailing list ("For amateurs, by amateurs") as well as the failings of the other braindead OSes we have to deal with ("If only they did it like us").
Linus has stopped by in 9fans to whine on about stuff and was seen off, Theo wanted our compilers when he didn't want the license (as imposed by Lucent lawyers) but since they have been dual licensed we've not seen him around.
Inferno isn't plan 9, it's another product built on similar principles that was sold off by Lucent.
Lucent's management of Plan 9 in hindsight could have prevented adoption when it was crucial - it was $300 per copy prior to v. 3 and once a free download had a "copies of all modifications must be sent to Lucent" clause and other annoying restrictions in it. These have been lifted now but they boat could already have sailed.
The notion of distributed computing has gained ground in recent times and Plan 9 could have been at the forefront with distributed computing being built in from the start.
All that said, Plan 9 was never intended as anything more than an experiment and some ideas have slowly crept into other products (or possibly independently invented) - notably Windows XP presenting their stuff as files/folders, ftpfs in Linux, single sign-on.
There are places where the networks are not touching,and there are places where they are-Boeing's Lori Gunter
OS 9 is old news! Really old!
http://plan9.bell-labs.com/plan9/
D'oh! I only now noticed mikewriter's .sig is a George Takei quote. Well played!
Exporting a name space is part of the deal, this presents many gifts that were not deliberately shoe-horned in such as remote step debugging across architectures, sending sound to a remote soundcard, importing a remote machine's network stack instead of using a gateway (including non-plan9 machines via ssh), importing remote filesystems (including non plan 9 machines). All this is facilitated by the 9p protocol [bell-labs.com].
This sounds remarkably similar to what Richard Stallman's The Hurd was supposed to be. [Speaking of which - Duke Nuke'em Forever ain't got nothing on The Hurd.]
In terms of languages that understand transparent network distribution - has anyone ported Erlang [or something similarly modern] to this platform?
Also, are there stripped-down versions of Plan 9 that can function in the RTOS space?
Thanks!
...has convinced me to never try Plan9. Like any number of snob elitist also-ran operating systems and programs (and meat space tangible products), when I see arrogance over *crap* I know to stay away from that product. How old is the operating system again? And that's all they have? And the project got abandoned by the parent company, who had more cash than most deities? I call those "clues" about the viability of it, and of the social resources of the users, hint "none". This is like collecting GI Joes past the age of 8.
No, there are a number of past operating system projects that are better candidates for future use. Even their snuggly wuggly space bunny won't help this project, but it will make the "users" more comfortable as they sit around and program in their spiderman skivvies and wait for mommy to bring them snacks.
First of all there is Charon from Inferno. It supports html, EMCAScript (1.1 IIRC), CSS, DOM (level 1 IIRC) and https. (See screenshot however this one is a bit outdated)
Abaco is the most actively developed Plan 9 web browser. It supports most of html. DOM level 3 development has been started. Mozilla's Javascript engine has been ported to Plan 9 and can be used today for a Javascript shell. This will provide abaco with Javascript in the future. Work on CSS has started but I do not know what has been done or where it is heading. Abaco has been ported to Linux and friends via Plan 9 from Userspace. Package managers are encouraged to make packages of abaco for their systems. (See screenshot)
Then there are webpage, links, mothra, and htmlfmt.
Finally there are text web browsers for acme (htmlfmt for Plan 9 and see this for Inferno)
In other news, SDL now works on Plan 9.
Plan 9 from Bell Labs.
Plan 9 is now available for free from Google Video.
I must warn you, however, that everything you will see is based on sworn testimony...
Really cool how _everything_ was a file.
To start a program on some machine, he would cd to some directory corresponding to the machine. I don't remember exactly, but this directory had files corresponding to "exe", "stdin", and "stdout" among others. To start a job, the program was just copied to the exe file. And then if you looked at the "stdout" file, the output from the running job was there. Now you can imagine how launching a job on thousands of machines and collecting the output becomes really trivial.
I got the impression that this was sort of like the Linux /proc filesystem, but expanded to work seamlessly across a cluster and with more functionality.
Plan9 runs on Xenopix DVD. Xenoppix runs Plan9 on anonymous PC.
h tml
http://unit.aist.go.jp/itri/knoppix/xen/index-en.
Xenoppix is a combination of Virtual Machine Monitor "Xen" and 1CD/DVD "KNOPPIX".
It runs Plan9 and NetBSD on Xen-DomU(GuestOS) and KNOPPIX on XenDom0(HostOS).
In addition to the Plan 9 papers, here's some nice reads:E ADYET.pdf
http://www.cs.unm.edu/~fastos/05meeting/PLAN9NOTD
http://www.collyer.net/who/geoff/9book.html
Great review guys!
Which is a polite way of saying that it's hideously ugly and designed as if the last 20 years of HCI research never happened. I mean, look at those scroll bars.
GCHQ Quantum Insert installed. If only our tongues were made of glass, how much more careful we would be when we speak
That connection to deep space is too slow. Bad wireless, I guess. They should upgrade.
If you wish to try out Plan 9 without burning a CD and rebooting, Free OS Zoo offers an image of Plan 9 (108M) that works fine with theQemu emulator.
Step-by-step instructions for a Debian-based distro:
Other tips:
Good luck!
I was wondering why my .iso was only coming in at 5kb/s... It turns out that the day I decide to check out some other OSes is the same day, that only happens once every few years, that someone links to plan9 on the front page of slashdot -_-;
I mod down anyone who says "I will be modded down for this", regardless of the rest of their comment
1) The live cd is the install cd. This isn't Linux... Installation is done by an interactive rc script ("everything is a file") in a running Plan 9 with or without rio. Try and imagine how simple it is to automate a Plan 9 installation. Unlike Linux we don't need Red Hat to develop some complex standard for doing something that should be simple.
/n/sources/extra/ or /n/sources/patches/. Or anything made or ported by anyone else that can be found in /n/sources/contrib/ and elsewhere. And it definitely is not missing anything that would be basic in any operating system.
/bin/ip/ like the rest of the IP tools (on x86 the actual location for IP's ping is /386/bin/ip/ping. /386/bin/ is bound to /bin/ during boot up on x86. Likewise /alpha/bin/ is bound to /bin/ during boot up on alpha. etc.). You use IP ping like this: ip/ping $ipadr. If you want skip the ip/ part then bind /bin/ip/ping to /bin/ping.
/bin/ip/ and http tools in /bin/http/) we don't just dump everything where ever we feel like it. What is the point of having a hierarchy without using it?
2) The cd comes with all the official software. Everything but the stuff that can be found in
3) It does include ping. Ping is not just limited to IP so you will find multiple ping programs for different things in their respected directories. The ping for IP is in
4) This all fits in 80MB. Plan 9's cd is small because it doesn't have bloat. (This includes: PDF/postscript reader, page; Word processor, troff; an advance shell, rc; a web server, httpd; plus thousands of other applications.)
5) Why didn't you ask any of your questions on 9fans before coming to your assumptions?
6) This isn't Linux there are rules (e.g. ip tools in
Plan 9 from Bell Labs.
Plan 9 installs and runs without any problem with Plan 9 GUI under under Microsoft Virtual Server 2005 R2 running on Windows XP SP2. I have created virtual machine with 128MB of RAM. It boots directly from the latest Plan 9 ISO image. I haven't tested with Microsoft Virtual PC 2004 but I guess result would be the same. Both virtualization software can be now downloaded for free.
As an alternative to Plan9, you may try also PlanB, a distributed operating system based on Plan9.
The developers intentionally moved away from an everything is an object model for VERY good reasons. Files have well defined interfaces (read, write, etc) that make controlling your entire system with them far easier. In an object-based system, every object implements its own, non-uniform interface. If you want objects, look into Corba. It is much more complicated and not really more functional.
Plan 9 isn't from Bell Labs, it's from Outer Space!
It's one of Ed Wood's finest pieces, featuring a strung-out Bela Lugosi.
Sent from my iPhone
Congregations on the worst post ever.
Plan 9 from Bell Labs.
does this still exist? When they "open sourced" it a few years ago I went to download it to give it a run through ... and it had a horrible EULA attached to downloading it. One of the most important terms (and forgive this as it's been a while so it's not verbatim) was that it was "not to be used to make weapons of mass destruction outside the US". Seemed to infer that it's ok in the US and in fact it is probably already being used thusly ...
I clicked I Don't Accept on the web page and have never gone back since.
Dr. Evil: Our early attempts at a tractor beam went through several preparations. Preparations A through G were a complete failure. But now, ladies and gentlemen, we finally have a working tractor beam, which we shall call... Preparation H.
[Scott snickers]
Dr. Evil: What?
Scott Evil: Why don't you just call it operation ass-cream, you ass.
Dr. Evil: I'm sorry, did you say you want some ice cream?
Scott Evil: Yes, I'd love some chocolate ass-cream.
Dr. Evil: Perhaps later.
Number 2: Dr. Evil, I love your plan.
Dr. Evil: You do?
Frau Farbissina: Yah. It's a really good plan.
Dr. Evil: Yes Frau, on the whole Preparation H feels good.
[Scott resumes snickering]
Dr. Evil: What is it now?
Scott Evil: No, I totally agree with you. Preparation H does feel good... on the hole.
I wasn't around when it was ported, or ever learned why it was chosen, but a Plan 9 based OS called "Transit" runs on the video servers made by our company. The machines started out as general-purpose supercomputers, but after various shake-outs the hardware evolved into something optimized for storage and streaming.
All the real fun work was done ages ago. All we see is a csh-like shell. Perl and Apache and other basic tools were ported to it, which is nice.
So that it can achieve critical mass. We need more competition in the OS business, especially by folks who want more than to create yet another marketer driven hack. If we had serious funding for just a few research driven OS alternatives it would make such a difference to the economy. I'd also like to see Franz at MIT get some big funding too. Maybe our next president will invest into R&D....
Ha!.. actually, I was thinking of trying it. I am always up for a test drive...until I read that listserv thread that is. Then I re-read this thread at slashdot and decided...nope, no interest whatsoever. They sound like those weenies at school who *deserved* to have their lunch money taken. If that is how they reward some poor guy who actually semi liked their stuff and tried it out and gave a whack at an article publicising them..then they crap on him...naw, no need to support those sorts of people. They can have fun with their "super duper advanced operating system" and egos.
And their spiderman skivvies.
In some sense, sure, but on the other hand, that is grossly unfair to Ed Wood's beneficial relationship to Lugosi. Consider the following (from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bela_Lugosi, but which agrees with similar details from some films on the subject, including one with Johnny Depp as Ed Wood, from some years back):
( [*] Plan 9 was a posthumous performance, and note that the death of Lugosi early in filming was precisely the reason that Plan 9 became "the worst film ever made" rather than merely the usual Ed Wood grade B movie.)
Yes, Wood was a hack (albeit a fun one with a cult following to this day), but he did his best to rescue Lugosi when the rest of the world had given up and no longer cared. Give credit where credit is due, rather than simply sneering at the charitable, no matter the flaws you see in the good samaritan. By all accounts, Wood seems to have done the best he could by Lugosi.
Professional Wild-Eyed Visionary
Fuck whoever modded my previous comment as troll.
If I could meet you in person I would feed you your own excrement. And you would say : "thank you sir, may I have another".
Shut up, both of you. But especially you and the Linux fans. The ones who bleat day and night on the superiority of their OS, how no design could be better, how it rivals the Apollo program in engineering effort and genius, blah blah. It's incessant and infuriating.
So yes, you've embittered quite a few people who relish the chance to make cheap jabs at Linux wherever they can. Some of the 9fans are petty little shits, but that's what a kid who grows upa around bullies turns into.
300+ syscalls, and their implementation, in every kernel. And I thought NT was bloated.
Incidentally, a lot of cable head ends run plan9. It serves up streaming video far better than Linux.
"Congregations" went over my head. Sleep deprivation, and a hangover contribute today.This is Rare for me now, thankfully. I am serious though. Re reading it, it seems I may have sounded sarcastic, or somehow negative. Not my intent, at all. I do not have the kinds of skills of the Bell Labs people,or the best of the posters here. Those were significant people, who did significant things, a historic assembly of great minds. I genuinely admire these folks. For me,/. is an opportunity to sit across the table to listen. I think there is a modern equivalent of the old Bell Labs.It is harder to see it at present, of course. Somewhere,though it is happening. Clues of it are likely to show up here.
This is just a history check. Think nothing of it. (-:
Got time? Spend some of it coding or testing
Why can't you just recompile Firefox for Plan 9?
If there's some reason you can't take pretty much any open source application, and recompile it for Plan 9, then Plan 9 would a pointless waste of time.
I do not for a moment believe that Plan 9's creators would make such a stupid mistake.