>I'm not sure that I agree that one would expect that the "central
>developers" would consider ATAPI support important (depending
>on your interpretation of "central developers").  I can understand how
>'core' may not really care one way or another...  However, it does
>seem odd that those "respsonsible" for maintaining the i386 support
>don't seem to be doing much about it...

NetBSD has always seemed to be the OS of choice for those with
``real'' hardware.  I know I have had to tell people more than once
that their hardware is not supported.  I have told people why in some
cases -- that their scsi card isn't multitasking friendly since it
blocks or uses polling -- but the reply is always the same.  ``Linux
supports it.''

I am finally in something of a position to help out with a
documentation project.  I would like to get somethign written up which
will help people write drivers for NetBSD.  Something that explains
the do's and don'ts.  The problem here is I don't know much more than
the next person who wants to write a driver.  I can look at drivers
and understand what and how they do things, but the why part sometimes
eludes me.

I suppose what I am offering to be is an editor of sorts.  I can help
write a device driver hackers' guide or something, with hopes it will
become something in the future.

So, where to begin?  If there are enough people interested I can start
a mailing list here, and arrange for an ftp/www site for a
documentation project.

I DO believe that, if there is a FreeBSD effort underway, NetBSD and
FreeBSD should join forces and release a real live Waldenbook-buyable
book on *BSD.  Linux has managed to come this far, mostly because of
marketing.  We don't seem to market at all.  That needs to change.

Ok, enough ranting.  Let the flames (and hopefully a project or two)
begin!

--Michael

--
Michael Graff <explorer@flame.org>        NetBSD is the way to go!
PGP key on a key-server near you!         Rayshade the world!