Mail Archives: opendos/1997/05/07/14:12:02
I can't let this go unchallenged.
"Nicholas R LeRoy" <nleroy AT norland DOT com> wrote:
> > "We mustn't forget to carefully study what has been done before.
> > The UNIX guys didn't, and look what they ended up with" :-)
>
> The most powerful and open operating system available.
Most powerful? Nope. For some jobs, VMS is more useful (I assume
that's what you mean by powerful?) For some, Win95 is more useful,
for some DOS is more useful, ...
The most open? Please, Mr. AT&T, let me have the sourcecode! I
can't? Oh well, I guess it's not that open then. Even OpenDOS is
more open!
Seriously, having sourcecode is not wonderful in itself. Only a few
developers need it (even if the hordes _want_ it for the perceived
cool factor). My job would not be simplified if I had the sourcecode
for the operating systems I use.
> The OS for which
> C was created. The OS which gave us pipes and I/O redirection. The OS
> which gave us a choice in shells. The OS that gave us the "device looks
> like a file" concept. The OS which gave us all this and more....
Yes, it has a wonderful history. So did the Holy Roman Empire. Your
point is?
Plan 9 takes the 'everything is a file' concept much further. Having
pipes and redirection is no longer a unique selling point either -
they're supported by all the other major OSes, including all those
from the House of Bill.
> Now, with Linux, the OS which gives us a choice.
What choice? The choice between Dos/Windoze and Yet Another Unix
Clone? Wow! What a choice!
> I'll be honest here -- I run Linux 24/7. The only time I run DOS (indeed,
> OpenDOS) is for apps that don't have a Linux counterpart (YET!). And, many
> of those I run under DosEMU.
I'll say it again. There is no reason for me to use Linux. There's
no reason for me to use ANY Unix. Either at home or at work. Don't
get me wrong - I recognise that Linux is a wonderful product, but it
would NOT help me in my computing tasks.
> Sorry about the ranting, but it pains me to hear unsupported crap like that,
> most of which comes from people who have never actually USED Unix. The
> M$ FUD engine at work.
I _have_ used Unix, whilst working for a major defence manufacturer.
Yes, it does have its place. So does NT, so does Win95 - so does
Atari TOS. Unix is not The One True Operating System. Some people
seem to have a rather unhealthy religious fervour about Unix (fools!)
> OpenDOS is an exciting new alternative to the M$ monopoly. That's exactly
> why Ray Norada created it from Novel DOS. Let's all stick together in the
> battle against the Evil Empire. Let's cast the M$ monopoly into Mt
> Doom from whence it came and free the world.
Gosh, yes. I can really see OpenDOS smashing MS into the ground.
Whatever Noorda says, OpenDOS is not an 'exciting new alternative' to
MS. It is a PC operating system for those who don't need the extra
features of Win95 or NT or Linux or VMS. There's nothing
particularly exciting (or even original) about it.
> Now, back to the original point. ext2 is a very good file system. Source
> is available. Works quite well. Fast. Flexible. Let's not create
> another VFAT or other such abomination.
I have yet to hear a convincing argument that VFAT or NTFS are so
evil. VFAT exists for a damned good reason (compatibility) and does
not give problems to most users. NTFS only lacks links, and is
streets ahead of ext2 when it comes to security features.
> Let's take something that works
> and leverage off it. Anything else (IMHO) would be a complete waste of
> time.
ext2 is good - for a Unix filesystem. For DOS, though, it has some
undesirable features (such as thisfile!=ThisFile) and is lacking some
of the features which may be desirable (such as custom sort-orders
and a more flexible security model).
ext2 would be a good place to start, but as it is right now, I
wouldn't use it. It needs many changes before it would meet the
requirements which have already been discussed.
> Microsoft isn't the answer. Microsoft is the question. The answer is No.
I paraphrase:
"it pains me to hear unsupported crap like that, most of which
comes from people who have never actually USED Win95/NT for a real
task. The Unix FUD engine at work."
/~~^~~\ David Cantrell
/~~\ /~~\ part-time NT/SQL Server/Web techie
/~~\ /~~\ full-time chef, musician, homebrewer
( )
(____/ \____) phone 0171 817 9694 if you really want
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