How Linux got to be Linux: Test driving 1993-2003 distros (opensource.com)
Debian is now famous for its package management system, but there are mere hints of that in this early release. The dpkg command exists, but it's an interactive menu-based system—a sort of clunky aptitude, with several layers of menu selections and, unsurprisingly, a fraction of available packages. Even so, you can sense the convenience factor in the design concept. You download three floppy images and end up with a bootable system, and then use a simple text menu to install more goodies."
Posted Dec 20, 2016 18:27 UTC (Tue)
by edmonds42 (guest, #42670)
[Link] (5 responses)
The dpkg command exists, but it's an interactive menu-based system—a sort of clunky aptitude, with several layers of menu selections and, unsurprisingly, a fraction of available packages. That would be dselect, not dpkg. dselect is still available in the archive (and it hasn't changed much: https://screenshots.debian.net/package/dselect). dpkg has always been a command-line tool, not a menu-based system. Incidentally, there was a dselect acquisition method called dpkg-ftp that shipped in early Debian releases (I think it appeared in Debian 1.2 "rex" in 1996) which obtained packages to be installed from a remote FTP server. This might be the earliest example of a Linux distribution that could update itself from the Internet.
Posted Dec 21, 2016 1:56 UTC (Wed)
by BenHutchings (subscriber, #37955)
[Link] (4 responses)
Posted Dec 21, 2016 2:36 UTC (Wed)
by edmonds42 (guest, #42670)
[Link] (3 responses)
Posted Dec 21, 2016 8:58 UTC (Wed)
by ewx (subscriber, #103004)
[Link] (2 responses)
https://blog.quickmediasolutions.com/2016/08/23/running-d... has a screenshot of the menu-based mode (look for the 'Installing Packages' heading).
Posted Dec 21, 2016 18:47 UTC (Wed)
by guillemj (subscriber, #49706)
[Link] (1 responses)
Posted Dec 22, 2016 1:33 UTC (Thu)
by pabs (subscriber, #43278)
[Link]
Posted Dec 21, 2016 19:16 UTC (Wed)
by jzbiciak (guest, #5246)
[Link] (2 responses)
It's interesting how surprised the author is at the "modern UNIX feel" of a 1993 Linux distro. At the time I installed Linux originally—Nov. 1993—I also had access to an AT&T StarServer E w/ SVR4 and a SPARCstation 2 w/ SunOS 4.1.3. Both had GNU tools installed to "modernize" their environments. Not just GCC, but also the various fileutils and such. I remember finding the native tools on those OSes having far more limitations than the GNU versions. Linux came with the GNU versions as defaults. Even 23 years ago, Linux was starting ahead of the curve in some sense. I also remember playing with XFree86 and olvwm on that system. I stuck with olvwm for quite some time. It was a nice, lightweight and effective window manager. And from what I recall, it even worked reasonably on a 8MB RAM 486. (My standards for "reasonably" were likely a bit more forgiving than they are today.) That said, I still spent an awful lot of time at the Linux text console. It'd be a few more years before I could get a system that worked well enough to use in X 100% of the time. I still remember the big stacks of floppies too... the "A series" the "X series", etc...
Posted Dec 21, 2016 21:08 UTC (Wed)
by halla (subscriber, #14185)
[Link] (1 responses)
But I started using the system, and having fun exploring and enjoying it. Previously, I'd been using a PC with MS-DOS, and the manual that came with it was weird: it showed a file system laid out in /bin, /usr/bin, /usr/local/bin. From which I concluded that "bin" was the place to put stuff I didn't need anymore. When I started playing with Linux, using Linux, I discovered where that manual's conventions came from.
I got used to the GNU/Linux commandline utilities, and got reasonably good with them. The next year, 1994, when I had graduated and hadn't found a job in my line, I joined a course where I was retrained as an Oracle 3GL developer. All 30 or so students shared a single Sun server. I was happy -- I knew Linux, so I knew Unix!
The backwardness of that SunOS box without any GNU utility installed has scarred me to this day, and I still don't dare trust my shell's dialect whenever I login.
Then I got a job, and had to work on dynix, hpux, sequent, vax, sunos, aix, bull unix and whatever...
Posted Dec 25, 2016 2:07 UTC (Sun)
by flussence (guest, #85566)
[Link]
Android gives me the same bad vibes, but at least someone had the good taste to put toybox in CyanogenMod...
Posted Dec 23, 2016 2:14 UTC (Fri)
by landley (guest, #6789)
[Link]
How Linux got to be Linux: Test driving 1993-2003 distros (opensource.com)
How Linux got to be Linux: Test driving 1993-2003 distros (opensource.com)
How Linux got to be Linux: Test driving 1993-2003 distros (opensource.com)
How Linux got to be Linux: Test driving 1993-2003 distros (opensource.com)
How Linux got to be Linux: Test driving 1993-2003 distros (opensource.com)
How Linux got to be Linux: Test driving 1993-2003 distros (opensource.com)
How Linux got to be Linux: Test driving 1993-2003 distros (opensource.com)
How Linux got to be Linux: Test driving 1993-2003 distros (opensource.com)
How Linux got to be Linux: Test driving 1993-2003 distros (opensource.com)
The icing on the cake was when it didn't survive the first reboot because ZFS managed to corrupt itself. I didn't bother reinstalling it. :-)
How Linux got to be Linux: Test driving 1993-2003 distros (opensource.com)