Non-list responder: Absolutely not.
Mike Sharkey: Too hard, just use two computers and Ethernet.
Joerg Pommnitz: How would you share RAM?
Jake Messinger: No and WHY? Use multiple machines and NFS.
Robert G. Brown: Likes the concept, but suggests a Windows app precompiler.
Same non-list responder: Why would a Linux person possibly be interested in
Windows?
Phil Brutsche: Loves the idea. DOSEmu is too slow (on a '486).
==============
Thanks for your quick responses. First, I'm encouraged. I haven't yet
heard any show-stoppers.
Second, here's why I'm interested. There are a lot of people (e.g., in the
engineering community) who need Linux to do serious computing and Windows
to share the results. These are people who are pro-Linux (for its
capabilities) but not necessarily anti-Microsoft. Dual booting is a major
pain and having two separate computers is expensive. Emulation is a great
idea, but it's not easy either. (Through the beauty of freeware, however,
it's likely that a substantial amount of Wine could be recycled into a dual
processor, dual OS system, whether implemented via PCI or shared memory.)
My customers would be ecstatic if they could, as Robert G. Brown put it,
hot-key between Linux and Windows. Performance wouldn't be a major issue.
>From what I've read, the dual processor Pentium board provides only
marginally better performance anyway. What I would hope from this
configuration is super convenience at a small incremental cost.
How would RAM be shared? Run Windows in low memory, relocate Linux to a
higher region. I'm brand new to Linux myself, having been a Mac user for 5
years and a Lisp machine user for 12 years before that, so I have no idea
if this is possible.
Why not a Windows app precompiler, as Robert G. Brown suggests? This
sounds similar to interpreting Java byte-codes. This approach is
equivalent in complexity to emulation, though it has greater opportunities
to apply techniques of compiler optimization. Once Wine works, then
Robert's technique can be used to speed things up.
Yes, there is a lot of work to making such a system work, but if you know
of a technical reason that makes it impossible, please tell me.
===================================
Byron Davies, Ph.D.
VP and Chief Technologist
Savant Computation Instruments, Inc.
Washington, D.C., U.S.A.
davies@pobox.com
(602) 759-8228