[Coco] [CoCo] NitrOS-9 on real CoCo (Was DriveWire 4)

[James Ross]

On Fri, 5 Jan 2018 15:58:29 -0700
William Astle <lost at l-w.ca> wrote:
>
> (Potential flamebait incoming.)
> 
> People keep saying that OS9 is a paired down subset of Unix. I 
> understand why, too. Superficially, they are very similar.

No flaming from me... very good points! And they sounded correct to me.

I am going from memory of back in the day and it has stuck w/ me to this day. I recall it being called UNIX-like and compared to UNIX in different publications (if memory serves me, perhaps it was just a single article even?). And this was before the days of Linux/BSD were available where a mere mortal could run a real UNIX clone. Could only read about it in Byte magazine. So, I think that was some of the owe-and-wonder of OS-9 in my mind and perhaps for many of us CoCo users. 

I get what you are saying that it was inspired by UNIX. However, am I mistaken to say the the I/O is very much UNIX based? Everything from a programming perspective (userland) is just another file at some level (so, to speak). I am not well versed enough to really say, but the standard I/O’s / pipes and shells and redirection and all seemed to be very UNIX-like.

Anyway, the very points you bring up is what would make a modern re-write of a NitrOS-9 interesting (even just as a hobby project), as apposed to another UNIX kernel.   

James
-- 
James Ross <JRossList at Outlook.com>