KOSH [Kommunity Orientated Software Hardware]

Weekly Summary

Week Commencing: 8th May 1999

Number: 020

Mailing List: kosh-general

In the mailing list this week, the following items were discussed. Please do
not email the scribe regarding any of these topics, it is not his job to answer
these questions but merely to report  the topics of conversation. If you have
any queries about this summary, please email ben@kosh.net, stating the Summary
Number, and Mailing List Name, and he will try to answer your queries.

a)

Subject: The KOSH Application

Summary of debate: It will be helpful that KOSH can run as an application on
                   other operating systems (as well as native versions). This
                   will allow people to use it and see its benefits without
                   having to leave their used-to environments.


b)

Subject: x86, 68k and PPC Slim Binary generation

Summary of debate: Suggested KOSH could have a tool to uncompile binaries in
                   the above formats (and more) and spit out the slimbinaries.
                   Would this be feasible?


c)

Subject: API recording

Summary of debate: Suggested KOSH could have a tool that records each and every
                   API call under a current OS in order to provide a list of
                   what can at all be called. This would provide a basis to
                   offer the same API while being different underneath and thus
                   not breaking copyright.


d)

Subject: Information Landscapes

Summary of debate: http://www.newsmaps.com has some new idea of presenting
                   "Information Landscapes" instead of hierarchical trees as we
                   know them. Could this be used for KOSH?


e)

Subject: VMware

Summary of debate: A PC trick that allows you to hot-context-switch between PC
                   OSs may be VMware. See http://www.vmware.com

                   It was asked if we should make hot-context switching a
                   standard feature of KOSH?


f)

Subject: Mass market retail channels and KOSH availability

Summary of debate: It was suggested that there is no need for KOSH to show up
                   in any retail channels until there is a good chance at
                   impulse buying - this is only just starting to happen with
                   Linux.


g)

Subject: KOSH Clones

Summary of debate: Making it easy to clone KOSH machines (whether licenced or
                   reverse engineered) would help to greatly increase the
                   installed user base of KOSH.


h)

Subject: Plugin HALs

Summary of debate: Suggested we could have software processors and multiple
                   HALs as plugin objects relatively easily.