ferg@opus.UUCP (David Ferguson) (07/31/84)
>> Rich Zellich <ZELLICH@SRI-NIC.ARPA> >> At the NCC last week, NBI was showing a nice system for $15,475, which >> was a 68010 running an apparently-total 4.2bsd port with a bit-mapped screen, >> . >> . >> . >From the TARDIS of Mark Callow >msc@qubix.UUCP, qubix!msc@decwrl.ARPA >It sounds suspiciously like a Sun-2 running SunTools. Anyone know the >real story? I sure do. I am a software engineer, who helped to keep the TWS (Technical WorkStation) going, even though it wasn't an official product. While building the IWS (Integrated WorkStation, a powerful, easy-to-use workstation that integrates the database with spreadsheet with graphics with word processing), we built a 68010-based, 4.2 Unix machine with a nice bitmapped display. We did our own port of the 4.2 kernel and commands. The windowing software and the user-interface were developed internally. Our philosophy while building the TWS was to keep the spirit of unix alive. The machine should feel like our vax when talking to a shell. We (hopefully) have resisted the urge to change unix (the windows are implemented as a series of devices which look like ttys with vt100s attached). In fact, I am typing this message into vi (running on a VAX 750), through tip running in a window. If I change to another window, and start up vi (locally), it looks, feels, and performs identically. Our goal was to be able to develop programs on either the TWS or VAX, and trivally port them to other unix machines. Since I am an engineer and software developer, that was the machine I wanted sitting on my desk, and we finally convinced top-level management that there was a market, and we could be competitative. If you need more techincal information, I will be glad to supply it. Well, I guess that's "the real story." David Ferguson NBI, Technical Products Division Boulder, Colorado {allegra|amd|hao|ucbvax}!nbires!ferg (303) 444-5710