Path: utzoo!attcan!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!cs.utexas.edu!uunet!crdgw1!crdos1!davidsen
From: davidsen@crdos1.crd.ge.COM (Wm E Davidsen Jr)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.ibm.pc
Subject: Re: 2 users on a 386
Keywords: ignorant, I'm afraid
Message-ID: <964@crdos1.crd.ge.COM>
Date: 10 Oct 89 15:02:49 GMT
References: <2344@hydra.gatech.EDU>
Reply-To: davidsen@crdos1.UUCP (bill davidsen)
Organization: GE Corp R&D Center
Lines: 35

In article <2344@hydra.gatech.EDU>, russ@prism.gatech.EDU (Russell Shackelford) writes:
|  2 questions:
|  
|  1. HOW does one go about hanging a terminal off a 386 box, allowing
|  2 concurrent DOS users.  What are the options?  Pro's and con's?

  There are two ways to do this. You can run a DOS splitter like
Desqview, start a 2nd session and do "CTTY COM1" to allow the 2nd user.
Going that way will only allow you to run a limited number of
applications. The other way is to get UNIX software and run DOS under
UNIX. This will probably be more reliable and allows you to use the
UNIX system administration software.

  I would suggest Xenix from SCO because it uses a little less memory
than other flavors of UNIX, it is older and more mature, and I have had
better luck teaching non-programmers to use the administration tools for
backup, etc.
|  
|  2. Is this smart or dumb?

  You have tradeoffs of complexity and reliability. With two machines
you have a better chance that at least one will be up at any given time,
but you also have twice the chance that one will be down. With two
machines you always have the chance that the files will get out of sync,
or that you will move files in the wrong direction and copy the older
version on top of the new.

  You will need a terminal to operate for the 2nd user. You can have
anything from quite dumb to a full emulation of a PC running at fiber
optic speeds. Speed co$ts. 
-- 
bill davidsen	(davidsen@crdos1.crd.GE.COM -or- uunet!crdgw1!crdos1!davidsen)
"The world is filled with fools. They blindly follow their so-called
'reason' in the face of the church and common sense. Any fool can see
that the world is flat!" - anon