19990304: McIDAS on Windows NT running Interix (cont.)

>From: "Jennie L. Moody" <address@hidden>
>Organization: UVa
>Keywords: 199903041847.LAA11519 McIDAS NT

Jennie,

re: NT with Interix vs Solaris x86
>So the difference is that interix runs "inside" NT (as software), while 
>Solaris and Linux run "beside" NT (as an alternate operating system)?  
>(This is probably an oversimplification, but I am still at the 
>conceptual level here...) 

I think you have the concept, but the terminology is wrong.  When
you are running any of the operating systems on a multiboot machine,
it is as though there is _no_ other operating system on the machine
at all.  The comment about Interix running inside NT is correct except
that Interix code is not layered on top of NT code.  Interix code
makes its calls directly to the NT kernel, so it is faster than
something layered on top of all of the existing services.

re: running the OS and McIDAS
>Okay.  Do you know how big a partition is needed for the 
>operating system and would the mcidas software 
>have to sit on the same partition with it? One issue is
>the disks on these machines were already divided into fairly
>small chunks when they were setup (I think 1GB each), and the
>guy who set them up seems reluctant to want to completely
>start over (though most of the machines have very little
>on them at the moment as far as I know).  

I understand his reluctance about reformatting the disk and starting
from scratch since I had to do just this on my machine.  A full installation
of Solaris x86 will take up about 700 MB.  McIDAS will consume an additional
250 MB (high side), so I guess that one could put everything on a 1 GB
partition, but there would be no room left for adding anything.  It would
be better if there was a 2 GB partition for both or two 1 GB partitions,
but then you would have a bunch of empty disk (unless you transferred
data over to the machine).

re: Solaris x86 vs Linux
>Well, this other fellow who works with one of my colleagues want to
>put Linux on (because he has some experience with Linux on some
>NASA systems I guess), and we were interested in putting Solaris on
>since its what we are running otherwise....but the fact is, this
>other fellow is the one who is going to set things up, so we 
>are trying to figure out how to compromise on this (I don't think
>we want to mess with adding two unix variants).

Linux is not a big deal to get used to.  In fact, I kinda like it.
The big issue here is that someone there will have to keep on top of
security patches for Linux.  Since Linux is distributed with full
source code, there are a lot of hackers out there trying to break
into machines on the net.  This security issue is real.  It is most
likely a bigger deal than Y2K problems.  By the way, we are releasing
7.5 since it has the code that will make McIDAS Y2K capable.

re: setting up PPP
>Is this only because of the need for modem communication?  Because these 
>systems are all on our network here.

Right.  Setting up the ethernet networking on all three OSes was very
simple.  Solaris was in many ways easier than both NT and Linux, but
they were all so easy that it is hard to compare them.  For home, I
will have to dial in at 28.8 Kbps to the NCAR RAS (Remote Access System)
where I will then be "on the net" (albeit slowly).  From that point,
I can login to Unidata machines (they are supposed to be kept alive
during the construction) and use a web browser, etc.  It remains to
be seen how much a pain this will be at 28.8 after being used to NCAR/UCAR's
T3 connection to the Internet.

>Thanks again.

No problem.

>(Interesting aside, we are interviewing a candidate for the Atmospheric
>Sciences position here this week (3rd and final candidate), and turns
>out he lives in Sugarloaf in Boulder (works at NCAR)....)

Interesting.  What's his name?

Tom