Aahhh, I still have my set of floppies for MacMinix! I ran than on a Powerbook 140 back then, it was quite cool!
This predates Linux by quite a bit, having any way to have a shell on MacOS back then was incredible.
MacRelix – Unix-like features for classic Mac OS
31–40 of 83 posts
Re: MacRelix – Unix-like features for classic Mac OS
#32For a change of pace from the `68k` and `os9` flavors already shown, here's MacRelix's Carbon (`osx`) flavor running successfully in Mac OS X Public Beta: https://i.imgur.com/9S5lE2a.png
This is not something any reasonable user would ever do but I was impressed at its versatility. For the ultimate janky-Carbon-environment test I will have to try it in the Mac OS X Developer Previews, but PB was the earliest that would run on the hardware I was using. I do have all the necessary hardware since DP1 calls out wanting specifically either a Beige G3 or a Blue G3, and I ♡ PowerMac1,1 and have like three of them lol
Re: MacRelix – Unix-like features for classic Mac OS
#33Poking through it - it looks like it might include Perl, but no idea about what level of Perl-Unix-ism it might support. But I didn’t enjoy rereading ye old Perl implementation with Tolkien references [1] to give a feel for what the source file is about. [1] https://github.com/jjuran/metamage_1/blob/4d1a24875036fee128...
The Perl interpreter is v5.6.1, though strictly speaking it's miniperl, not perl — there's no support for XS (i.e. native-compiled) modules.
Unlike MacPerl, it supports system(), exec(), and backticks in the Unixy way you'd expect. In fact, the program that packages up a MacRelix archive is a Perl script running in MacRelix.
I guess we'll just have to disagree about the Tolkien references. :-)
Re: MacRelix – Unix-like features for classic Mac OS
#34Makes me wonder. What would it take for Mac the tech to have this sort of feel/appeal again? Would a full wintel+nvidia gpu daughterboard move any needles? Or something oddball and hardware like the lamp imac, idk. Basically, computing nowadays feels very well baked and staid at times. Stuff like a unixy subsystem feels experimental in ways computing hasn't in decades.
I don't think the last decade has been completely uninteresting.
ARM Macs with unified memory, and on the software side WSL on Windows (maybe even Proton, although Wine has been a thing for more than two decades now) felt experimental enough for a while.
Sure, nothing as crazy as running Unix on an Apple ][ (http://web.archive.org/web/20230122214955/http://www.gno.org...)
Re: MacRelix – Unix-like features for classic Mac OS
#35Reminds me of Idris from Whitesmiths. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Idris_(operating_system)
Re: MacRelix – Unix-like features for classic Mac OS
#36Makes me wonder. What would it take for Mac the tech to have this sort of feel/appeal again? Would a full wintel+nvidia gpu daughterboard move any needles? Or something oddball and hardware like the lamp imac, idk. Basically, computing nowadays feels very well baked and staid at times. Stuff like a unixy subsystem feels experimental in ways computing hasn't in decades.
> Makes me wonder. What would it take for Mac the tech to have this sort of feel/appeal again?
We tend to forget that, but Macs are the last standing members of the Unix workstation family, and quite good ones at that.
Re: MacRelix – Unix-like features for classic Mac OS
#37Why does it need an internet connection?
Re: MacRelix – Unix-like features for classic Mac OS
#38Gibram
Re: MacRelix – Unix-like features for classic Mac OS
#39This makes me wonder.. Are there any quirky whimsical or nostalgic but still functional desktop OS out there.. Like the fantasy console PICO-8, but for Desktop applications?
Maybe uxn[0]?
Re: MacRelix – Unix-like features for classic Mac OS
#40This makes me wonder.. Are there any quirky whimsical or nostalgic but still functional desktop OS out there.. Like the fantasy console PICO-8, but for Desktop applications?
9front, seemingly Plan 9's de-facto successor, is almost surely quirky, often whimsical, at times nostalgic. It might even be functional, depending on how you define that[1]. Is actively developed, has a vibrant community. Puts an interesting spin on how you lay out systems, but doesn't diverge much from the Bell Labs formula. I'd certainly recommend giving it a shot, for the UNIX-inclined. [1] I've daily driven it b…
I tried Plan9 as a minimalist desktop. I soon realised that three-button mouse chording isn't doable in this decade, and wish someone had written a Platinum-like window manager to replace rio.