FAQ about Minix FAQs modified: 28 Jun 2006

For MINIX 3 go to http://www.minix3.org. (Minix 3 released Oct 2005)

Q: Is there a FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions document) for comp.os.minix?

A1: Minix 3 was released in October 2005, and Minix 3 has an official website, http://www.minix3.org. The Minix 3 FAQ is available there in multiple languages, and there are also links to other Minix 3 documentation.

... but this website is supposed to be about Minix 2. Please continue reading ...

FAQ for Minix 2

The Minix 2 FAQ on this site is the official FAQ for PC Minix 2. The FAQ attempts to answer a few general questions that really are frequently asked. It also has a section devoted to questions specifically about this website. It is supplemented by the Minix 2 Hints page which covers a wide range of technical topics. Some documents may not be indexed on the main Hints page. ... if you are a real masochist, you can look at the raw index of the directory. Some of these files are preliminary notes, some (especially in the nonhtml directory) are nothing more than text versions of e-mail messages, but there may be information here that isn't referenced by links elsewhere on the site.

Previously there were two "official" Minix documents, an Information Sheet and a FAQ. Their status is a bit confusing:

• The old Minix 2.0 Information Sheet is now available at the Minix on the Net website. In some places this document is also referred to as the Minix 2.0 FAQ, but Minix Information Sheet is a more accurate title.
• The last official FAQ in conventional FAQ form was posted at http://harmless.rrnet.com/Minix/FAQ-17.html. That site could not be found as of November 2002, but a slightly modified version is available, also on Minix on the Net. The document is somewhat out of date. It is basically the old Minix 1.5 FAQ updated shortly before the final release of Minix 2.0.

Other Minix 2 versions:

This site is primarily concerned with standard Minix 2 for the PC (Intel i86 and i386) platform. There is also a "super-Minix" called Minix-vmd. There are versions of Minix 2.0 for other hardware, such as Sun Solaris, and Minix 2.0 can run on other Unix systems using the Bochs emulator. Older versions of Minix run on Apple MacIntosh, various Atari machines, and other platforms. There have also been projects to port Minix to PDAs and miscellaneous other specialized Minix projects. Information about some of these can be found on this site in various places, and on the Links page can be found references to other sites, some of which have FAQ documents.

Archives:

There are several archive sites for the comp.os.minix newsgroup and the Minix-l mailing list. See the Minix Archives on WWW page on this site for more information. In the past, many items posted to the newgroup were also forwarded to the mailing list, but the site that used to provide that service is no longer available. For anything after about 1996 searches of both the newsgroup and the mailing list archives are advisable.

There are quite a few sites around the world with Minix information. One that specifically tries to maintain links to other known Minix sites is Minix on the Net.

Search engines can also help you find Minix information. I've found Google seems to return a lot of good links when I look for Minix info.