Plan 9 did away with it entirely. There, a "host owner" is just a normal user who has access to the hardware resources of a given host, but
that's it: host owners can't bypass file permissions. If I log into a terminal, for example, then I "own" that machine. Per-process file namespaces are sort of like capabilities (I had a long discussion with
Ben Laurie about this at one point, and we agreed they were more or
less isomorphic to e.g. Capsicum-style capabilities), so you can
easily fence off what a program like a web browser sees and has access
to. It was a nice system; shame it never really caught on. Some of the good ideas made it into Linux, but are poor imitations of the original.

It's really sad that plan 9 never really took off. If someone were to start again, what feature(s) from plan 9 do you think would be essential to copy?

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On 02 Sep 2025 at 08:42a, scarface pondered and said...

It's really sad that plan 9 never really took off. If someone were to start again, what feature(s) from plan 9 do you think would be essential to copy?

Yeah. It was inevitable, but still a shame: Unix was too entrenched
with too big of a userbase by the time Plan 9 came on the scene, and
AT&T was determined not to "lose control" of it the way they did with
Unix, so they really messed up the licensing terms early on. Had they
released 1e with something like the BSD license back in 1992, the
world may well have been very different. Oh well.

The question of what features one would preserve in a new system is surprisingly difficult to answer. Plan 9 was, fundamentally, a research system, and research systems are designed and built to address specific questions that are of interest in the time and place where the research
is done. For Plan 9, what they were trying to do (in a nutshell) was see
if they could adopt the Unix ideas to a world where distributed networks
of computers were the norm, and everyone now had a high-resolution bitmapped graphics display, not an 80x24 serial terminal. Whereas the Unix world
was evolving so that networks consisted of lots of little city-state timesharing systems with bolt-ons like X11 for interaction ("a network
of Unixes", if you will) plan 9 was about building a unified "Unix" from
the network. But that time has passed and that place no longer exists,
so it's unclear what lessons are still applicable.

Regardless, if I were to build a new system from scratch tomorrow, some
of the things I might try to take away are:

1. A single unified network protocol for access resources in a
file-like manner,
2. Per-process(group) mutable namespaces for resources,
3. The security model.

That's probably it. The implementation itself isn't worth preserving.

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Re: Re: linux permissions issue
By: tenser to Digital Man on Tue Sep 02 2025 01:01 am

If I log into a terminal, for example, then I "own" that machine.

That doesn't sound like a very multi-user freindly OS.
--
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released 1e with something like the BSD license back in 1992, the
world may well have been very different. Oh well.

agree.

system, and research systems are designed and built to address specific questions that are of interest in the time and place where the research

heh, I'd never really thought about it that way. That makes a lot of sense!

"Unix" from the network. But that time has passed and that place no longer exists, so it's unclear what lessons are still applicable.

Yeh. I guess the current computing model of today is more that everyone has a high powered computer in their pocket these days. So many people I know don't have a desktop anymore. might have a laptop if working in tech. some still enjoy tinkering with all sorts of technology. I even work with someone whos only device is their work laptop, which they leave at work. some parts of me envy that as I sometimes think I'm _too_ attached to technology lol

1. A single unified network protocol for access resources in a
file-like manner,
2. Per-process(group) mutable namespaces for resources,
3. The security model.

Thank you very much. I too like the idea of everything is a file, and that the unix network model is kinda bolted on to act like a file, but with very different interfaces.
For context I have a hobby operating system, and I like hearing what others find good in less common systems.

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On 02 Sep 2025 at 10:27p, Digital Man pondered and said...

Re: Re: linux permissions issue
By: tenser to Digital Man on Tue Sep 02 2025 01:01 am

If I log into a terminal, for example, then I "own" that machine.

That doesn't sound like a very multi-user freindly OS.

It is, though. Kinda. Let me explain....

Plan 9 divided the network into three categories of machines:

1. Terminals, which were the computers you sit in front of and
interact with. These boot from the network, have middling CPU
and RAM profiles, usually no local disk, but excellent HCI
facilities (graphics, monitor, keyboard/3-button mouse, sound).
They tend to have a middle-of-the-road network interface.

2. CPU servers, which provide bulk compute, or specialized services
for the rest of the network (e.g., authentication service, network
boot services, etc). These also boot from the network (usually,
except for the CPU server(s) that runs the auth/boot services), have
lots of fast CPUs and RAM, no HCI facilities to speak of (usually
just a serial port) and a very fast connection to the file server.
If there's local storage attached to a CPU server, it's either to
hold e.g. the auth database, or to provide scratch space. There _is_
usually a small amount of NVRAM holding key data so that the CPU
server can authenticate itself to the file server.

3. File servers, which provide bulk storage. These are standalone,
have middling CPUs, lots of RAM to cache file data, and have lots of
very fast disks and a very fast network connection(s). Like CPU
servers, there are no real HCI facilities to speak of; just a serial
port. These interact with authentication servers to authenticate
incoming connections. The original file server ran a special kernel
that did nothing by serve files (in kernel mode; administration via
the serial port was provided by a built-in monitor), but it was
replaced by a user-space file service program running on a standard
CPU server a few decades ago.

Usually, users interact with the system by logging into a terminal;
when it boots, it asks for a user login name and a password, and
connects to the authentication server to authenticate the user. If
successful, the user becomes the host owner of the terminal, and
that's their interface to the rest of the network. Terminals tend
not to run services, so yeah, they are de-facto single-user machines,
but a user _could_ run something if they wanted that would allow another
user to connect. But terminals are mostly uninteresting so for all
intents and purposes, no one really does that.

Conventionally in Plan 9, resources are accessed via a file-like
abstraction, and users can mount any resources they have access to into
their local (mutable, per-process) filesystem namespace; `mount` is not
a privileged operation, since it only affects the local process-group.
There is a separate operation called "bind" that lets me assign a new
name to a file (or directory) in my namespace. Again, namespaces are process-private, so this is unprivileged: I can affect the namespace of
my process, but no one else's.

All of these "files" are served via a single, universal, file protocol
called "9p". 9p participates in the authentication protocol served by
the auth server mentioned above, and by default uses TLS for privacy.

The impact is that users tend to assemble the set of resources they find interesting or useful into a session on their terminal; those resources
may be served by machines elsewhere on the network, however.

When a user needs computational power beyond what their terminal provides, however, they can connect to a CPU server via a command (called `cpu`).
The effect is similar to logging into a remote system using something
like `ssh` or `rlogin` (or maybe `telnet`) in the Unix world, but it
works a bit differently: one brings one's namespace, which is imported
into the environment of the process that's started on the remote server (running as the local user). Conceptually, one might think of this less
as "logging into" a remote system, but more like importing CPU and RAM resources from the remote server.

The means by which a user starts a process on a remote system as themselves
is a bit interesting and deserves some mention. I said there was no
superuser, and that's true, and only a host owner, which is just an
ordinary user. And that's true, so how does a user start a program on
a CPU server that's owned by some random user? The answer is that the
kernel provides a cryptographic _capability_ facility that interacts
with a trusted software agent that authenticates users (against the authentication server) and grants them access to a capability that they
can present to the kernel that lets them change their user ID to that of
the user they authenticated as.

So yeah. It _is_ a multiuser system, but there's no root; host owners
are kinda sorta similar on CPU servers, but it's a much weaker concept.

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On 04 Sep 2025 at 07:49a, scarface pondered and said...

"Unix" from the network. But that time has passed and that place no longer exists, so it's unclear what lessons are still applicable.

Yeh. I guess the current computing model of today is more that everyone has a high powered computer in their pocket these days. So many people I know don't have a desktop anymore.

Yeah. I think that one of the things that's kind of interesting
about this, and perhaps it does tie back to the Plan 9 way of
thinking about things, is that you have a wildly different types
of machines fulfilling very different roles. Trying to run the
same system on all of those is, perhaps, not the best way to go
about things. We see Linux running on everything from watches and
small embedded devices to the largest supercomputers in the world;
maybe that's not the way we ought to be going about things.

1. A single unified network protocol for access resources in a
file-like manner,
2. Per-process(group) mutable namespaces for resources,
3. The security model.

Thank you very much. I too like the idea of everything is a file, and
that the unix network model is kinda bolted on to act like a file, but with very different interfaces.

Yeah. Sockets were a poor abstraction on top of the existing
Unix model.

For context I have a hobby operating system, and I like hearing what others find good in less common systems.

Cool!

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tenser wrote to Digital Man <=-

MIT used to write the root password for the Athena clusters on
the wall, because they got sick of precocious undergrads breaking
root all the time. It removed the incentive, and abuse went way
down

I remember a story about a University computer system with a
CRASH-SYSTEM command that crashed the system. Same idea, take the elite
aspect away from taking down the system (which apparently happened by
undergrads hoping for extensions on papers)

I thought it was in the New Hacker's Dictionary (great read, BTW) but
can't find it.



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scarface wrote to tenser <=-

"Unix" from the network. But that time has passed and that place no longer exists, so it's unclear what lessons are still applicable.

Yeh. I guess the current computing model of today is more that everyone has a high powered computer in their pocket these days. So many people
I know don't have a desktop anymore. might have a laptop if working in tech. some still enjoy tinkering with all sorts of technology. I even
work with someone whos only device is their work laptop, which they
leave at work. some parts of me envy that as I sometimes think I'm
_too_ attached to technology lol

Yeah, for years it went from mainframes to midrange computers, to client/server, to powerful desktop apps, to web apps, and now mobile.

I worked at a firm with a HUGE server room, probably 60 4-post racks if
not more. If you looked closely at the raised floor, you'd see outlines
where the AS/400s once stood. We had one AS/400 left, and a graveyard
shift of people who "managed" the AS/400 and the servers at night. I
think they mostly just checked to make sure the blinkenlightz was
blinken.

Don't look too closely, though - the server room floor hadn't been
cleaned in as many years, and the dust dinosaurs under floor were
impressive. I was trying to hire a firm to come in and vacuum under the
floor tiles, take the tiles out individually and scrub them.

Thankfully, my tenure there came to an end quickly after the directive
to clean the server room floors - the people that clean raised floors
seem to know their time has come, and bill like each job could be their
last.

Thank you very much. I too like the idea of everything is a file, and
that the unix network model is kinda bolted on to act like a file, but with very different interfaces. For context I have a hobby operating system, and I like hearing what others find good in less common
systems.

I loved the UNIX idea that everything is a file, like routing the output
of a tar command to /dev/tape. With BASH, you could kit together lots of
tools to get what you needed to get done.





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tenser wrote to Digital Man <=-

Plan 9 divided the network into three categories of machines:

1. Terminals, which were the computers you sit in front of and
2. CPU servers, which provide bulk compute, or specialized services
3. File servers, which provide bulk storage. These are standalone,

This take me back to diskless workstations, NFS/NIS, bootp and Sun
workstations...

During COVID, I got to see a lot of people's home computing
environments remotely. Mostly Mac, but one engineer we had was running
Plan9 at home. I should have taken a better look at his setup. I think
the idea of shareable CPU servers was what attracted him to it, he did
a lot of work with Big Data.



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On 04 Sep 2025 at 08:10a, poindexter FORTRAN pondered and said...

tenser wrote to Digital Man <=-

Plan 9 divided the network into three categories of machines:

1. Terminals, which were the computers you sit in front of and
2. CPU servers, which provide bulk compute, or specialized services 3. File servers, which provide bulk storage. These are standalone,

This take me back to diskless workstations, NFS/NIS, bootp and Sun
workstations...

During COVID, I got to see a lot of people's home computing
environments remotely. Mostly Mac, but one engineer we had was running
Plan9 at home. I should have taken a better look at his setup. I think
the idea of shareable CPU servers was what attracted him to it, he did
a lot of work with Big Data.

Oh really? Wow, that's extremely rare. His name isn't John, is it?

I still run it at home, but I'm the only user. It runs DNS+DHCP for
our little home network.

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Re: Re: linux permissions issue
By: poindexter FORTRAN to tenser on Thu Sep 04 2025 08:10 am

This take me back to diskless workstations, NFS/NIS, bootp and Sun workstations...

At first, I read that as "dickless" workstations, and I was wondering what a dickless workstation would be.. :P

Nightfox
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At first, I read that as "dickless" workstations, and I was wondering what dickless workstation would be.. :P

One with 3 open drive bays. :)

... North East Breakfast: A cuppa coffee and a cigarette.

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I loved the UNIX idea that everything is a file, like routing the output of a tar command to /dev/tape. With BASH, you could kit together lots of tools to get what you needed to get done.

I love the power of bash/readline. I also like the quick and dirty raw power but not quite as raw as C you get with scripting. definately aimed towards a certain style of application chaining. bash, like most other things, I always find new things out all the time. Sometimes I haven't even learnt it before then forgot :D

... Press SPACEBAR once to abort, or twice to save changes

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On 05 Sep 2025 at 02:40p, scarface pondered and said...

I loved the UNIX idea that everything is a file, like routing the out of a tar command to /dev/tape. With BASH, you could kit together lots tools to get what you needed to get done.

I love the power of bash/readline. I also like the quick and dirty raw power but not quite as raw as C you get with scripting. definately aimed towards a certain style of application chaining. bash, like most other things, I always find new things out all the time. Sometimes I haven't even learnt it before then forgot :D

The bash/readline thing does not come from Unix, though. That has
its roots in DEC systems on 36-bit machines; specifically, TENEX/TOPS-20
(I guess TENEX was BBN, not DEC, but the point remains) and ITS (MIT).
The original erase character was '#', and "line kill" was '@', as on
Multics over a teletype; DEL for erase came from DEC terminals, and ^U/^W
and word-kill came from TENEX.

Command-line editing was not seen as a useful feature at Bell Labs; it
went against the ethos of the system, which prized simplicity over that
kind of interactive functionality. Unix was almost simplistic, and
certainly seen as austere.

In Plan 9, this was retained; the shell (`rc`) does not support command
line editing. But, critically, the window system (which also provides
windows running the shell) _does_: all text is editable, and one can
easily highlight and copy ("snarf") and "paste" text; so to edit a command, simply type it and use the window system to edit it before sending it to
the shell.

The window system also provided a "Hold" mode in which the user could
enter multi-line text. In a pinch, `cat` and hold mode in a window
made a serviceable text editor.

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tenser wrote to poindexter FORTRAN <=-

Oh really? Wow, that's extremely rare. His name isn't John, is it?

No, but I'm imagining an OS with such a small user base that everyone's
on a first-name basis.

I suppose that's called OS/2. :)




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Nightfox wrote to poindexter FORTRAN <=-

At first, I read that as "dickless" workstations, and I was wondering
what a dickless workstation would be.. :P

That was the unofficial name back then, back in the "The Network is the Computer" days.



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The bash/readline thing does not come from Unix, though. That has
its roots in DEC systems on 36-bit machines; specifically, TENEX/TOPS-20 (I guess TENEX was BBN, not DEC, but the point remains) and ITS (MIT).
The original erase character was '#', and "line kill" was '@', as on Multics over a teletype; DEL for erase came from DEC terminals, and ^U/^W and word-kill came from TENEX.

Oh cool, TIL! I have glazed over the contents of termios(3) which may have similar roots, or atleast built ontop of similar abstractions.

easily highlight and copy ("snarf") and "paste" text; so to edit a command, simply type it and use the window system to edit it before sending it to the shell.

now that sounds interesting. I've only seen a few screnshots of plan9 and an old video or two but not much. My friend actually has it up and running on his system.
So this editing thing. Would you hit some key to bring up a text window dialog, then enter your text, edit it and whatevs (using sam?), then send it ... anywhere, your printer, your rc, your email, a file. Or would you be in that application and have to manually copy text and then edit (ala how i use tmux actually) then edit it, then paste it back?

enter multi-line text. In a pinch, `cat` and hold mode in a window
made a serviceable text editor.

Yeh i can see how you could still do a lot with that.

Cheers for the enlightenment!

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On 05 Sep 2025 at 09:12a, poindexter FORTRAN pondered and said...

tenser wrote to poindexter FORTRAN <=-

Oh really? Wow, that's extremely rare. His name isn't John, is it?

No, but I'm imagining an OS with such a small user base that everyone's
on a first-name basis.

I mean, pretty much. :-D

I suppose that's called OS/2. :)

Hahaha...

--- Mystic BBS v1.12 A48 (Linux/64)
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No, but I'm imagining an OS with such a small user base that everyone' on a first-name basis.

I mean, pretty much. :-D

I suppose that's called OS/2. :)

You leave me and Dale and Martha outta this!

Team OS/2!

Was still better than an OS that was out in the 90s. Used it for years.

... It's on that one, the 6th unlabeled floppy.

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Re: Re: linux permissions issue
By: Exodus to Tenser on Tue Sep 09 2025 03:46 pm

Team OS/2!

Was still better than an OS that was out in the 90s. Used it for years.

On my BBS machine, I have Linux Mint installed with the Xfce GUI environment. Currently I'm using an OS/2 style for the window manager for a retro vibe. :)

Nightfox
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Exodus wrote to Tenser <=-

Team OS/2!

Was still better than an OS that was out in the 90s. Used it for
years.

I jest so. I was a huge OS/2 fan in the '90s. Started out running 1.3
in an environment with AS/400s, a netware network and MS LAN MAN
servers. I had copies of Word and Excel for OS/2. Ran a dial-up WAN
with 16 modems on a 386. Later used OS/2 as my desktop when I managed
Novell networks and needed lots of DOS windows for administration
tools. A better DOS than DOS, indeed.

Inherited a LANTastic network from work that only worked on DOS, so I
ran the DOS drivers on the BBS, then created a MS-DOS VDM with the
LANtastic drivers for my first home network. Later, collapsed
everything (desktop and BBS) into a single box running OS/2 Warp.




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