mitch@well.UUCP (Mitchell Waite) (08/20/86)
A CALL FOR WIZARDS, WRITERS AND UNIX GURUS Aug 13, 1986
The Waite Group, a computer book packager, is creating an exciting contributed
book called THE UNIX PAPERS. The book contains articles written by a broad
range of Unix experts, gurus, wizards and spokespersons, collected together and
edited by the staff at The Waite Group.
The goal of THE UNIX PAPERS is to provide insightful information about the
cutting edge of the Unix operating system, and to reveal some of the broader
aspects of this powerful and elegant operating system.
This is the *SECOND* call for contributors to the UNIX PAPERS. An up-to-date
outline of the current contents of the UNIX PAPERS follows, with those topics
not yet filled by a writer marked with (OPEN).
The book consists of three types of contributions:
a. TUTORIALS on topics that have never been adequately discussed in the
literature (uucp, termcap, curses, etc) as well as new concepts arising in
Unix (Unix on RISC, Unix databases, etc)
b. ISSUE PAPERS by experts in a particular area of Unix (these discuss
controversy, the future of, etc)
c. CASE HISTORY papers which tell the bottom line about real Unix machines,
software, installations, etc.
DETAILS ABOUT THE UNIX PAPERS
The Unix Papers will be published by Howard W. Sams in the first quarter of
1987. It will contain 15 contributors. The average length article is 20
typeset pages. Authors are paid a fee, and their photograph and biography
appear at the beginning of their article.
ABOUT THE WAITE GROUP
The Waite Group is a collective of authors in the San Francisco Bay Area. The
Waite Group has produced 40 award winning computer titles over the last 10
years, and is known for its high quality titles on Unix, C and MS-DOS. Among
its most notable books are: C Primer Plus, UNIX Primer Plus (Berkeley Unix),
UNIX System V Primer, Advanced Unix, MS-DOS Bible, MS-DOS Developer's Guide,
Assembly Language Primer for the IBM PC & XT, and Bluebook of Assembly Language
Routines for the IBM PC & XT.
**********************************************************
THE UNIX PAPERS OUTLINE AS OF AUGUST 12, 1986
PART 1 - FUTURE UNIX
(OPEN)
1.1 The X Window System and MIT's Project Athena
This section is about the five year MIT Project Athena which attempts to bring
software coherence to a variety of hardware systems and the X windowing system
project at MIT.
PART 2 - UNIX IN THE REAL WORLD
2.1 Unix and Real Time Applications - Geoff Kuenning
This section will tell us the complete story about the Unix operating system
in real time (RT) processing. The author will present an introduction to data
collection systems, transaction processing and real time control, then explain
the requirements of real time applications: performance, predictability,
interprocess communications facilities, specialized libraries, and reliability.
Next he will show why Unix has traditionally been considered poor for real time
processing, then reveal where Unix makes the most sense for RT processing. The
author presents several approaches to using Unix in a real time applications.
Finally he ends by telling future directions of real time Unix, including the
P1003 standard and the ISA standard. Geoff Kuenning is Vice President of
Interrupt Technology Corporation, a software firm specializing in real time
systems.
PART 3 - UNIX COMMUNICATIONS
3.1 Unix Mailers - David Taylor
There is a trend towards organizations relying on electronic mail to
communicate. With the growth in popularity of the Unix system and the
introduction of low-cost machines that can run Unix, like the IBM PC-AT, it is
expected that many thousands of Unix mail users will be in need of information
what mailers are availabile, how to distinguish between them and how to use
them. This section will talk about five mailers that represent significantly
different approaches to the task of using electronic mail, specifically
bin/mail, Berkeley Mail, Elm, MH and AT&T mail. These mailers will be compared
in a standard format and a brief description of the use of each is given. A
complete tutorial on the use of the Berkeley Mail system is given. David Taylor
has written numerous articles on mail systems, is the moderator of the usenet
mod.social newsgroup and the author of the Elm public domain mailer.
PART 4 - UNIX AND ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE
4.1 Kyoto Common Lisp and Unix - Daniel Zigmond
This chapter presents one of the most powerful languages for working in AI
under Unix: Kyoto Common Lisp or KCL. The author shows the main applications of
Lisp, its structure and what its source code looks like. He details the
creation of Common Lisp over a three year period by representatives of DEC,
CMU, MIT, University of Utah, Stanford, Symbolics, Texas Instruments,
Rutgers, UC Berkeley, Lawrence Livermore National Lab, Perq Systems, Lisp
Machines Inc., Hewlett-Packard, Xerox, Yale and Tartan Labs. Kyoto Lisp is the
first 'complete' Common Lisp implementation, and its compiler generates C code.
This makes the performance of KCL close to that of C, and makes it very easy to
extend KCL in pure C. This chapter will present KCL for programmers who are C
literate. The author will give a Lisp tutorial, show how KCL extends Common
Lisp to interact nicely with the Unix operating system, and discuss how to
integrate Lisp and C code.
PART 5 - UNIX AND MS-DOS
5.1 A Unix Tutorial for MS-DOS Aficionados - Jim Rosenberg
The author performs a major benefit to Unix cognoscenti by once and for all
revealing to the (sigh) huge masses of MS-DOS users "the story of Unix
specifically for MS-DOS users". The author shows how simple it is to understand
Unix's structures and command operations if you already know MS-DOS. After all
MS-DOS version 2 is really a single tasking, single user cousin of Unix. Any
MS-DOS aficionado will find Unix much less of a mystery after reading this
tutorial.
PART 6 - UNIX and XENIX DEVICE DRIVERS
(OPEN)
6.1 Device Drivers for the Epson MX/RX/FX-80
This section describes how to get a printer peripheral to work with Xenix
running on an AT clone.
PART 7 - BLUE SKY UNIX
(OPEN)
7.1 Stargate
Stargate is an attempt to use the vertical retrace period of the television
network of satellites and transmission equipment to replace the telephone
system currently hosting uucp. Since the bandwidth of a Stargate based system
is huge, it would be possible to increase the traffic of usenet beyond what is
possible on the telephone system and for a lower cost.
PART 8 - MULTIPROCESSOR IMPLEMENTATIONS OF UNIX
(OPEN)
8.1 Why Multiprocessor Unix
This section describes the new breed of Multiprocessor based Unix computers
coming to market. Included are the new parallel processors, hypercubes and
array processors. The article discusses changes that have to be made to Unix to
allow it to parallel process and where performance will be most enhanced with a
Unix multiprocessor architecture.
PART 9 - UPCOMING UNIX PROGRAMMING LANGUAGES
9.1 The C++ Language - What For/How To/How Come - Keith Gorlen
The C++ programming language was designed and implemented by Bjarne Stroustrup
of AT&T Bell Laboratories as a successor to C. It retains compatibility with
existing C programs while adding many powerful new capabilities, making it
suitable for a wide range of pplications from device drivers to artificial
intelligence. In this section the authors discusses this exciting new language:
what it offers, why it's better, and how to use it. The paper begins with a
conventional C version of a dynamic string package and shows what the short
comings of the C version are and how to use the new features of C++ to remedy
them. The new features discussed fall into three catagories: those that can
prevent many common programming errors, such as strong typing and
encapsulation, those that enhance the power of the language, such as operator
and function overloading, and those that improve efficiency, such as inline
functions. The paper concludes with a C++ version of the dynamic string
package, illustrating how C++ enables the programmer to design custom data
types.
PART 10 - THE UNIX NETWORK
(OPEN)
10.1 UUCP, USENET AND WORLDNET
This section presents the best kept secret in the Unix art...the huge Unix
network, comprising both mail users and "usenet news" users and made up of
over 7.000 computer sites at major Universities and corporations, with roughly
200,000 subscribers world-wide. This Unix network is comprised of scientists,
engineers, students and wide ranging technical professionals.
10.2 Netnews in Ten Easy Steps - Harry Henderson
In this section Waite Group fellow and author Harry Henderson will explain in
a simple step-by-step lesson how to master the user of netnews, the usenet
daily news from the Unix community around the world. Harry will detail how to
use "rn" and "readnews", "postnews" and network netiquette. He will also
overview the value of the over 200 different newsgroups in a summary section.
This section will provide the knowledge to immediately begin tapping the
Worldnet resource.
PART 11 - THE UNIX ENVIRONMENT
11.1 Unix as a Research Tool - Peter Reiher
Why is Unix so popular as a research tool? This contribution reveals the good,
the bad and the ugly about Unix specifically when used as a research test bed
in a college or corporate lab environment. The author will show, for example,
how well Unix serves as a test bed for operating system study due to the
availability of the kernal source code from AT&T, how well the kernal is
organized from the sense of a software engineering methodology and its tools,
and so on. Also revealed are the disadvantages of Unix: the old fashion nature
of the OS, its limited extensibility, its constrictive nature, its sub-optimal
performance and its balky parts (such as terrible code in places and its
non-adherence to good software engineering practices). The author explains the
Unix applications available for researches: SCCS, Ingres, S Package, Eden,
Argus, LOCUS, MACH and the Virtue/Vice Andrew System. Future of directions of
Unix as a research tool are explored: distributed systems and new object
oriented systems.
(OPEN)
11.2 Unix Security
Most people are unaware that there are serious security flaws and weaknesses
in the Unix operating system. Unix was not built with privacy in mind and
consequently security is flawed at several levels. It is possible to "attack"
an unsuspecting Unix system and gain illegal entry into it. It is also possible
for legal users to snoop into other users files and violate their privacy. This
section provides a complete overview these flaws in Unix security and shows
both users and sysops how to understand these flaws and be able to describe
them to management. It will describe the various way crackers get into a Unix
system: * modems that don't detect carrier drop out and do not log you out if
you hang up, * network problems - the Berkeley implementation of TCP/IP network
logins uses a trusted host scheme, so if one host is cracked, all trusted hosts
can be cracked, * poorly set up UUCP systems that let any command be executed
remotely, * on-line password file authentication and aging problems, * unlocked
terminals, * dangerous setuid programs, * file protection schemes, and * Trojan
Horses.
MISCELLANEOUS TOPICS
The follow are miscellaneous topics that we still need contributors for.
(OPEN) UNIX ON 3M MACHINES
What is the future of Unix on the 3M machines being built by NeXT,
Atari and Apple? How will these machines work, what will they offer that
current 0.3M machines (Macintosh, etc) don't offer, what will they cost, what
kind of software will we see.
(OPEN) THE FUTURE OF BERKELEY UNIX
This contribution reveals where BSD4.3 is headed, how it is diverging
from System V, what that means in the market and in the university, and how
the
end user will be effected by these two diverging operating systems.
(OPEN) WHAT IS WRONG WITH UNIX - WHAT IS RIGHT WITH UNIX
Sprinkled throughout THE UNIX PAPERS are little one, two and three
paragraph quotes from our authors about the good and the bad of Unix.
(OPEN) UNIX ON RISC
What does it mean when Unix is running on a RISC machine, like the IBM
RT, or larger minis? MIPS tie in.
(OPEN) UNIX ON THE 68020
The 68020 offers VAX-like processing power in the microcomputer price
range, and are being found in large numbers of Unix based computers. This
chapter explores the reasons the 68000 line is a good choice for a Unix based
micro.
(OPEN) UNIX ON THE 80286/386
IBM has made a firm commitment to the 8086 line of microprocessors.
Therefore it is likely that Unix will be offered on the next generation of
microcomputers based on the 80286 and 80386. This chapter explores the
reasons
that the 80286 line is a good choice for a Unix based microcomputer.
(OPEN) BENCHMARKS AND UNIX
Here we show you how to understand what Unix benchmarks mean. Several
of the most popular Unix supermicros and minis are compared using different
benchmarks.
(OPEN) DATA BASE PROGRAMS UNDER UNIX
What is the equivalent Unix 1-2-3 clone? Is there a database program
as good as dBASE II that runs under Unix? Is it a memory hog? Learn these
things and more.
(OPEN) NETWORKING UNIX
Networking File System (NFS) is explained as is AT&T's Remote File
System and Streams.
(OPEN) GRAPHICS
Included here are NAPLPS and LU.G.
(OPEN) UNIX TEXT MANIPULATION AND DESKTOP PUBLISHING
Find about what Unix can do for text manipulation and desktop
publishing. Learn about TeX. Various Unix Word Processors are compared to the
popular MS-DOS versions of Word, WordStar and others.
(OPEN) EMERGING UNIX STANDARDS
AT&T is merging Berkeley Unix 4.2 features in to System V Release 3,
while Berkeley is headed off in another direction. What does this mean?
(OPEN) WHAT SHELL?
The new Korn shell has the best features of the c-shell and the Bourne
shell. The author of this section tells us what the major differences in the
numerous Unix shells are and how to decide which is right for you.
**********************************************************
If you are interested in writing any of the OPEN topics please let me know. An
author's style guide and terms letter will be sent if you are interested.
You can send me e-mail here on the Well (hplabs!well!mitch), or call me at
415-929-7088. The editor for this book is Jim Stockford, also on the Well
(hplabs!well!jim).
Thank you very much for your time,
Sincerely,
Mitchell Waite
President
The Waite Group
3220 Sacramento Street
San Francisco CA 94115
{hplabs, lll-crg, lll-lcc} !well!mitch