Re: Not numbered backups anymore - LISP OS instead?

Thanks much!

FWIW, I have some early Symbolics printed manuals - albeit not a full set (there were 10 volumes, as I recall). For ZetaLisp, not Genera though. Have to find where they are in my storage area ...

The disk on the Portable Genera system I just received should include the Genera docs, but it is good to have the ones from the site you linked, just in case.

Thanks again,

Z


Syed Zaeem Hosain | Founder, Chief Evangelist

Aeris Communications, Inc.<http://www.aeris.com/>

[email protected]

a: 1731 Technology Drive, Suite 800, San Jose, CA 95110-1360, USA.

o: +1 408 557-1905 | f: +1 408 557-1925 | twitter: @AerisCTO

________________________________
From: Marco Antoniotti <[email protected]>
Sent: Saturday, February 14, 2026 01:23 AM
To: Syed Zaeem Hosain <[email protected]>
Cc: [email protected] <[email protected]>; Uģis Lācis <[email protected]>
Subject: Re: Not numbered backups anymore - LISP OS instead?


CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the organization. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognize the sender and know the content is safe.


FYI

Here are the manuals for Symbolics, including the documentation for LMFS and FEPxx.

Neither symbolics-dks nor bitsavers have them.  Interestingly enough, bitsavers has a .tap file for Symbolics, which, I surmise, is a "tape".  Alas, I do not know how to open it.

Cheers

Marco


https://www.chai.uni-hamburg.de/~moeller/symbolics-info/documentation/index.html

On Sat, Feb 14, 2026 at 7:42 AM Syed Zaeem Hosain (as Syed dot Hosain at aeris dot net) <[email protected]<mailto:[email protected]>> wrote:
Ugis wrote:
> The term LMFS (Lisp Machine File System) intrigued me, and I did a bit of a Googling around ...

> Was amazed to find a whole OS based on LISP and still alive seemingly (not sure if sustainable or on life support though ... perhaps Windows applications keeps Symbolics afloat):
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genera_(operating_system)
> http://symbolics-dks.com/

> I wonder if there is any user of it here .. ?

Well, I programmed on a Symbolics 3600 Lisp Machine from 1983 to 1986 and loved it!

Sorry to reminisce too much (for those of you getting tired of this thread), but that system and environment was superior to "modern OS"s and languages today (that we are over-discussing in other threads).

Our small team of developers was easily ten+ times more productive using those systems than anything (OS, language, IDE, etc.) that I have programmed on since.

Unfortunately, it is not usable for anything today ... clearly! Since Symbolics doesn't exist anymore. :(

However, I literally just received a Dell laptop that has Portable Genera on it - will give it a look for nostalgia than anything else, frankly, since the license for Genera is for non-commercial use.

David Schmidt of Symbolics runs that second website, by the way. He occasionally puts up working Genera systems for sale if you are on his email distribution ... sometimes Symbolics units (old Apple hardware with MacIvory cards), and some are Portable Genera on Dell laptops (the one I just bought).

And, he sells/licenses a Macsyma version for Windows PCs that are running Windows up to Windows XP - check the site!

Regards,

Z


Syed Zaeem Hosain | Founder, Chief Evangelist

Aeris Communications, Inc.<http://www.aeris.com/>

[email protected]<mailto:[email protected]>

a: 1731 Technology Drive, Suite 800, San Jose, CA 95110-1360, USA.

o: +1 408 557-1905 | f: +1 408 557-1925 | twitter: @AerisCTO




This communication contains Aeris Confidential Information. If it has been sent to you in error, please reply to advise the sender of the error and then immediately delete this message.


--
Marco Antoniotti, Professor, Director         tel. +39 - 02 64 48 79 01
DISCo, University of Milan-Bicocca U14 2043   http://dcb.disco.unimib.it
Viale Sarca 336
I-20126 Milan (MI) ITALY

REGAINS: https://regains.disco.unimib.it/