gorrie@utecfa.UUCP (Jack Gorrie) (05/25/86)
>With regards to BSD4.2 on the ICM-3216 board set one of the local NS >reps. told me that the U. of Toronto(?) had ported 4.2 but because >of their status as an educational institution they could not >distribute their 4.2 port. Can anyone confirm/deny this? We (Engineering Computing Facility at U of Toronto) have indeed ported 4.2+ to the ICM-3216. The work was done primarily by Steve Cooper, using an earlier port by Brian Thomson to another 32016 board. We have several systems running reliably, though testing is not complete yet. We have also built an Ethernet card and are working on a Hubnet (UofT 50Mb/sec fibre-optic LAN) card. The intent is to offer these as stand-alone boxes for researchers, as well as computing engines to hang on our DFS (Distibuted File System), which now uses (nearly diskless) MicroVaxes with 780's as fileservers. We'd like to distribute the port, but are concerned about the legalities. The hope is that the Innovations Foundation at UofT (who are equipped with lawyers) will work out something satisfactory to AT&T, Berkeley, and NS. We have just started this process, so I wouldn't even hazard a guess as to when we'd be ready to distribute. NS seems to think this can be done, and is supporting our efforts. It would be offered without support, at a price reflecting this, though we would offer advice to others as time permits. For further details on this, contact the undersigned (for details on port, mail "scoop" instead of "gorrie"; for DFS info, "larry"; for Hubnet, "thomson"). Jack Gorrie {decvax|ihnp4|linus}!utzoo!utcsri!utecfa!gorrie Engineering Computing Facility (416) 978-4250 University of Toronto Toronto, Ontario Canada M5S 1A4