Date: Tue, 27 May 1997 17:24:39 -0400 (EDT) From: Pierre Phaneuf Reply-To: pierre AT tycho DOT com To: OpenDOS Mailing List Subject: Re: BIG suggestion for Opendos Features In-Reply-To: Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Precedence: bulk On Tue, 27 May 1997, Mike A. Harris wrote: > > I don't think much will happen to OpenDOS/16, apart maybe VFAT and a few > > improvements. OpenDOS/32 though will get a slew of improvement (ext2 is a > > memory hog compared to FAT!) and will have its own protected mode API. > > Program that calls the kernel through the current 16-bit real mode API > > will get an emulation (like complex permissions systems parsed to a simple > > "doesn't exist" (for file for which the user has no permissions), > > "read-only" and "read/write", depending on the users rights. A bit like > > OS/2 native calls and it's INT 21h services... > > Well, ext2 *may* be such a memory hog, but that doesn't mean that > it shouldn't be supported. Rather it means that people who's > systems can't afford to dish out the resources that ext2 requires > - won't be able to use it, and will have to use VFAT or something > else instead. That doesn't mean that a 486 user with 16M of RAM > shouldn't be allowed to use it! I hope that you're not implying > that! Yes, exactly! That's why people who use 486 with 16M of RAM will use OpenDOS/32 with ext2 and all the cool things! The OpenDOS/16 probably won't have ext2 much used even if it is made available, since someone with a machine capable of using ext2 will probably run OpenDOS/32 anyway. > > OpenDOS/16 will probably get hardcoded FAT and optional VFAT driver (or > > maybe hardcoded too) and nothing else. OpenDOS/32, should get installable > > file systems without any problems... > > Well, I think that anything useful that shows up in OD/32 will be > also available or will be ported to OD/16 if enough people want > it. Yes, of course. If enough people want it and it is possible. But I think ext2 on a 8086 with 640k of RAM would be problematic to say the least! Pierre Phaneuf "The use of COBOL cripples the mind; its teaching should, therefore, be regarded as a criminal offense." - Edsger W. Dijkstra.