In article <1992Mar16.021652.11051@colorado.edu> drew@cs.colorado.edu (Drew Eckhardt) writes:
quoted text
>In article <1992Mar16.003027.2064@athena.mit.edu> jyelon@cs.uiuc.edu writes:
>
>>Also, about compression algorithms:
>>
>
>Kludge alert : 
>Why not, atleast for prototyping purposes, do a 
>pipe(2), fork(2), and exec  /<standard location>/uncomrpess? 
>The code isn't in the kernel.

For reference, the standard location (at least on the root floppy) for
compress is /bin.  This could arguably also be /usr/bin, but if you
follow the train of thought that tools necessary to the restoration of
a lost partition should be in /bin (since /usr is frequently a mounted
partition), compress should be in /bin, since backups will most likely
be compressed.

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>>PS: this might help alleviate some of the root-disk woes!
>
>PPS : root disk woes : 
>
>1.  Put a scaled down shell on.

That was how I got into this mess.  :)  0.95a will feature ash as it's
main shell.  It's still got a few small problems (sometimes backspace
doesn't work, because something isn't being initialized properly, and
job control is still absent 'cause I haven't had time to try and sort
it out), but it is more than adequate for bare-bones use.

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>2.  Loose init, etc.  I'd much rather have compress, tar on my root floppy
>       than init, login, getty, and their ilk. 

Tar, compress, init, login and getty are all on the root floppy.  I
may look at eliminating init/login/getty, but that may not prove
necessary.  There are some advantages to having init/login/getty
around.

I'll try and post a directory/file tree of the root floppy for
everyone's perusal and comments tomorrow.  It does not look like
mtools will make it in time for 0.95a, but I may end up doing another
root floppy release before the next kernel release.  (I don't really
want to do this, but....)
-- 
Jim Winstead Jr. (CSci '95)    | "Catch a fish!"
Harvey Mudd College            |  -Geddy Lee,
jwinstea@jarthur.Claremont.EDU |   San Diego Sports Arena
Disclaimer: Mine, not theirs!  |   January 20, 1992