From:	smueller AT microsoft DOT com (Stephan Mueller)
Subject:	RE: using cat on binary files (CTRL-Z trauma)
29 Oct 1996 18:05:56 -0800 :
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I have my suspicions about which direction that class-action suit might
be aimed, so I'd like to point out that MS-DOS inherited the in-band EOF
indicator from CP/M.  Backwards compatibility, while backwards, is
fortunately, compatible.

But before the suit changes direction towards Digital Research (which
will be hard to find :-/) I'll mention that the reason CP/M has an
in-band EOF is because its file system was more primitive than those we
have now, maintaining only a count of disk blocks for a file, and not a
count of bytes.  An application then, needed to itself know when the
actual file data ended, and this was done using the inband ^Z.  At the
time, it was a clever solution.

When it's time to get actual work done, one often finds that real users
would gladly live with the 'backward' than give up the 'compatible.'

stephan();

>-----Original Message-----
>From:	jqb AT netcom DOT com [SMTP:jqb AT netcom DOT com]
>Sent:	Tuesday, October 29, 1996 1:35 PM
>To:	dj AT delorie DOT com
>Cc:	kerr AT wizard DOT net; noer AT cygnus DOT com; gnu-win32 AT cygnus DOT com
>Subject:	Re: using cat on binary files (CTRL-Z trauma)
>
>Maybe we can file a class action suit for a few billion against the turkey
>who
>unleashed on the world a system with such fundamentally bad design decisions
>as a two-character EOL indicator and an in-band EOF indicator.
>
>-- 
><J Q B>
>
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