[kwlug-disc] UNIX in 1982

[Chris Frey]

On Fri, Oct 18, 2024 at 06:41:22PM -0700, Ronald Barnes via kwlug-disc wrote:
> paraphrased: "why do you think it was better in the olden days?"

I'll admit that pining for the past alone isn't that productive or wise.
I think there are lessons we can learn, but enjoying what we have today
is wise too.


> > It's a shortcut, which everyone else must pay for every day.
> So, developer time isn't a concern, and they should be mindful of your 4GB
> RAM device?  So you can run the software they give away for free?

If we're talking about someone giving code away for free, he can
do what he wants.  And thanks for the contribution!

Even if I give code away for free, if I write it wastefully, I am
potentially wasting more than just my own resources, but the resources
of others too.  Is it worth it?  Perhaps yes, depends.


> Are the two Apaches otherwise equivalent or is there perhaps added
> functionality?  Because I don't feel like this comparison is fair.

Hard to say... one is 32bit the other is 64bit (i.e. larger), one
might be caching much more, keeping code and data in memory just in
case.

I think the comparison is pretty fair, because it doesn't take much
code to serve files over TCP and HTTP.  Somewhere along the line,
choices were made that ended leaving a 60MB apache process on my
server.  I'm certainly not in pain over it, but it does make me
curious what those choices were. :-)


> > Then they have to go back and optimize things, like website download
> > speeds, which they would not have to do if they regularly tested
> > against .5Mbit, 1Mbit, 2Mbit, and 5Mbit download speeds.
> 
> Yes, sites should be tested against slower speeds and various input methods,
> screen sizes, etc.
> 
> In fact, modern web browsers support a whole bunch of tools for exactly
> that.
> 
> And someone out there is probably calling those support tools "bloat" right
> now.
> 
> One man's "bloat" is another's critical features.

Good example.  Yet there is an argument that such features don't belong
in the browser.  You could code this as an HTTP proxy, or a pluggable
module in apache or nginx as well.  It may even be smaller as a proxy
or module than it would be when coded as a browser feature + GUI interface.
Maybe.  Don't know.

Also, the proxy/module code only has to run when you run the test,
not all the time on every system that wants to browse Google.

Firefox for example comes by default with nearly a programmer's IDE full
of debug and analysis tools: console, network, profiler, debugger, etc.
That's a choice, and it's been made for you.  Not everyone needs that
in their browser, but it sure is handy if you do!  Yet it is possible
to write software so that the end user gets to decide whether to
install it or not, whether to store it or not, whether it's in RAM or not.
That's what Unix means by doing one thing and doing it well.  Firefox
does many things.  Even wget does many things, although it is closer to
the Unix way.

- Chris