binary Mach distribution for 386

[Melinda Shore]

In article <1991Jan11.200913.15652 at ico.isc.com> rcd at ico.isc.com (Dick Dunn) writes:
>That's actually less surprising in the 386 world.  Context switches on the
>386 (assuming a full switch--a TSS change via call gate) are relatively
>expensive, and interrupts are even worse because of the MM of dealing with
>the PICs.  Open question (I suspect): Is Mach 3.0 a bad match to the 386
>(based on context-switch frequency and cost)?

Whether or not it's a bad match is somewhat moot - much of the 3.0
development is being done on 386 machines, and Rick has a Toshiba
laptop he seems always to have with him that's running 3.0.  One
advantage, I think, of this is that it encourages the folks at CMU
to pay particular attention to performance issues.

>When does OSF plan to move to the 3.0 kernel?

This is probably best left to the OSF to answer (their direction
shifts frequently, especially within the RI), but I haven't seen
any of them lurking in these parts.  The last official story I heard
was that they are not committed to moving to a 3.0 kernel,
and are looking at other interesting operating systems as well to
be used as a possible kernel for OSF/2.  They are, however, putting
significant effort into 3.0 development, and are driving some of the
design decisions.  In fact, they're sponsoring a 3.0 design review
meeting next month.
-- 
               Software longa, hardware brevis
Melinda Shore                                 shore at mtxinu.com
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