Message-Id: <9703121646.AA06340@gnu.sdsp.mc.xerox.com>
To: "Mike A. Harris" <mharris AT blackwidow DOT saultc DOT on DOT ca>
Cc: Paul W Brannan <brannanp AT musc DOT edu>,
        "Jonathan E. Brickman" <brickman AT cjnetworks DOT com>,
        opendos AT mail DOT tacoma DOT net
Subject: Re: [opendos] FSSTND 
In-Reply-To: Your message of "Tue, 11 Mar 1997 21:05:25 PST."
             <Pine DOT LNX DOT 3 DOT 95 DOT 970312000342 DOT 385L-100000 AT capslock DOT com> 
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Date: Wed, 12 Mar 1997 08:46:03 PST
From: "Marty Leisner" <leisner AT sdsp DOT mc DOT xerox DOT com>
Sender: owner-opendos AT mail DOT tacoma DOT net
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Mike Harris sez:

> DOS doesn't have symlinks yet.  Also, if we're going to have a
> standard, a symlink is kindof pointless.  symlinks could be used
> for legacy apps, which mostly would work under the new system
> anyway.  Most DOS apps don't have their directories hard coded
> into them.
> 
>

What?  How long have you been using DOS?

I used join many, many moons ago.

I joined a: to /a.

I broke just about every install program I have saw.


On windows, everything seems to install support files into
<windows>/
and
<windows>/system

without any control.  Which is why whenever something breaks big time,
the answer is:
	reinstall your system.

Some vendor applications have hard coded path names on Unix -- very
few applications insists on installing into /etc or /usr/bin or 
such...

I think a DOS file system standard would be useful, one of the advantages
of unix over dos was I can sit at a foreign unix machine and often
understand where things were in 2 minutes.  Dos was just a hodgepodge of 
customized paths.

-- 
marty
leisner AT sdsp DOT mc DOT xerox DOT com  
The Feynman problem solving Algorithm
        1) Write down the problem
        2) Think real hard
        3) Write down the answer
                Murray Gel-mann in the NY Times