[HN Gopher] The Hobbes OS/2 Archive logs off permanently in April
___________________________________________________________________
The Hobbes OS/2 Archive logs off permanently in April
Author : taubek
Score : 75 points
Date : 2024-01-31 06:37 UTC (2 days ago)
(HTM) web link (www.theregister.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.theregister.com)
| parasubvert wrote:
| That's a blast from the past. OS/2 and Hobbes were essential back
| in the 90s when you wanted to avoid Microsoft OSes, as Linux was
| still pretty raw until the late 90s. I guess some never really
| felt like it was worth migrating, and fair enough!
| h2odragon wrote:
| There's a subset of the finance world thats very fond of both
| "commercial support" and "security by obscurity." OS/2, Alpha
| servers, they kept hold of lots of stuff 2 decades past its
| peak.
| observer987 wrote:
| "if ain't broke, don't fix it" - unknown
| criddell wrote:
| See also:
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38929369
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39187744
| nsxwolf wrote:
| It's always sad to see stuff like this go. These simple,
| beautiful sites are like payphones. One day we'll all crowd
| around the last one as it too goes.
| lstodd wrote:
| OS/2 once ran the majority of russian fidonet.
|
| Is fondly remembered as half-axle, as OS in russian is same as
| 'Oc'' === axle.
| lolatmmachines wrote:
| lol what will happen to all the ATM machines that run OS/2?!
| II2II wrote:
| Assuming that some remain, I believe ArcaOS was licensed from
| IBM to provide support in such circumstances. Not to mention
| that you aren't going to use software from Hobbes on an ATM.
|
| For what it's worth, I have seen OS/2 used in banks within the
| past decade (though I believe those banks have since migrated
| to Windows).
| Osiris wrote:
| eComStation is/was licensed to continue OS/2 development and
| support.
| wolverine876 wrote:
| Has anyone started an alternative archive? Or has the Internet
| Archive or someone similar gathered the material?
| nantes wrote:
| Looks like it: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39232295
| LeoPanthera wrote:
| Already on the Internet Archive.
| https://archive.org/details/hobbes-os2-archive_202401
|
| Unlike Wikipedia, IA not well-funded. Why not consider a
| donation?
| ilamont wrote:
| For an organization that is not well-funded, it has taken some
| remarkably risky actions that few nonprofits or commercial
| ventures would attempt.
|
| I wonder if there's isn't some Silicon Valley connection
| waiting in the wings to bail IA out if operating costs, legal
| fees and financial penalties overwhelm its budget.
| drivers99 wrote:
| The archive is 18GB. Since it's probably mostly zip files, that's
| probably about the size of everything extracted. So a static
| version wouldn't be too bad to just put in S3 and CloudFront or
| something, and that wouldn't require much work. I used to know
| someone who helped run it at NMSU in the 90s. (Can't remember
| which of two acquaintances, or maybe it was both.)
| hmcq6 wrote:
| 18 GB is small enough you could slap it on a raspberry pi or an
| old cellphone and leave it running in a library/bus station.
|
| Disclaimer: Don't leave electronics in high traffic areas.
| ronsor wrote:
| Disclaimer: Do leave them, but hide them first.
| anthk wrote:
| Just use a torrent.
| rsync wrote:
| We have a copy of this.
|
| We gave someone a free account to archive this and when they
| finished we chflag -R schg'd the directory so it is immutable.
|
| We are not publishing this - there is no web or anonymous access
| to an rsync.net account - but if you're reading this in 2035,
| know that we have a copy of this.
|
| Related: If you are involved _in any way_ in preserving
| /archiving usenet, please be in touch. We will give you whatever
| (storage) resources you require.
___________________________________________________________________
(page generated 2024-02-02 23:01 UTC)