Re: GPLv3 comedy unfolding -- raya's research on "The Four Freedoms"

[Stefaan A Eeckels]

On Sat, 07 Oct 2006 17:23:50 +0200
David Kastrup <dak@gnu.org> wrote:

> Well, I am the author of a CP/M 2.2 BIOS that has seen some moderate
> distribution, and I don't remember ever coming across either the term
> "kernel" or "nucleus" in connection with CP/M.

For which machine? 

> It would actually appear to me to be pretty preposterous, since CP/M
> does not manage any system _resource_ worth mentioning.  It provides
> access to the devices, but it does not manage memory, processing
> power, access, or even file ids (the caller has to allocate FCBs, the
> internal control structures for files, by itself, and pass the
> pointers into CP/M).  There is no heap, no kernel thread, not even a
> system stack IIRC (though the CCP calls applications from its own
> stack, and if the application _returns_ instead of calling the exit
> BDOS function, the CCP assumes that it has not been overwritten by the
> application and continues).

CP/M doesn't have the concept of a "process" either, or security, or
many of the basic functions we expect of an OS today. But it would be
churlish not to call it an operating system. It was written in days
when 32K was a lot of memory (four 8K S-100 boards!) and that somehow
limits what the OS can provide in terms of services and how they are
implemented.

I mentioned CP/M because we used to call the whole thing (BIOS/BDOS/CPP
plus utilities) the "CP/M operating system", even though PIP was "just
a program" and CPP could be replaced by another command processor. 

-- 
Stefaan A Eeckels
-- 
"We have gone from a world of concentrated knowledge and wisdom to one 
of distributed ignorance.  And we know and understand less while being 
increasingly capable."       Prof. Peter Cochrane, formerly of BT Labs
                                 (With thanks to Brian Hamilton Kelly)