Xref: utzoo alt.religion.computers:1782 comp.sys.cdc:146 Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!bu.edu!transfer!lectroid!saturn.ucc.umass.edu!cabbagehead From: cabbagehead@saturn.ucc.umass.edu Newsgroups: alt.religion.computers,comp.sys.cdc Subject: Re: NOS/VE Summary: yea, well, maybe you ought to use it a little more ... Message-ID: <2430@lectroid.sw.stratus.com> Date: 24 Sep 90 15:13:34 GMT References: <2410@lectroid.sw.stratus.com> <1990Sep22.041629.4634@robobar.co.uk> <9595@ur-cc.UUCP> Sender: usenet@lectroid.sw.stratus.com Followup-To: alt.religion.computers Lines: 81 In article <9595@ur-cc.UUCP>, steve@bat.lle.rochester.edu (Steve Swales) writes: > In article <1990Sep22.041629.4634@robobar.co.uk> ronald@robobar.co.uk (Ronald S H Khoo) writes: > >cabbagehead@saturn.ucc.umass.edu (Chris Lloyd) writes: > > > >> Hey, anyone out there ever used NOS/VE? Ive been using and programming > >> on it for the last year and a half and have found it totally awesome. > > > >You mean *awesomely slow* surely ? > > > >> Any comments? > > BAD THINGS: > 1) It is (as pointed out) 'awesomely' slow when used interactively. I dunno, I use it on a Cyber 870 and can't complain a bit, and thats with 50 other people on.. The 830 gets pretty slow I have to admit, I've heard older versions of the OS were notoriously slow, but 1.5.1 is plenty quick. > 2) The file naming scheme prevents using dots (e.g. for extensions) > so virtually NOTHING is portable to/from other systems. ... Yea, well, all the worlds not a Unix system, but there is VX, a full Unix System V.3 subsystem that me and others have ported games (omega, hack etc..) to and can run them under NOS/VE with a little hacking. If you like porting stuff. > 3) No wildcards... the local CYBERMEN tell me this is not strictly .. The newer versions of SCL have wildcard support which I find very adequate. You just have to know how to use them. > 4) All I/O seems to be geared exclusively for half duplex terminals > or something. Specifically, nothing is accepted without ... Well, thats due to the fact all terminal IO is done by Device Interfaces (DI's) which offload the main cpu. Single character IO is Entirely possible, Ive written several programs that use it, you just have to know how. > 5) No 'SHOW USERS' or 'finger/who/w' type command that regular .. It's pretty easy to write such things, and have those who want to use it use it. I am constantly being pestered by bozo's on our Vax system because they see me on, I wish I could take myself out of the show users A LOT of the time. I have peace and quiet on the Cyber. > GOOD THINGS: > 1) It DOES have a fairly straightforward hierarchical directory > structure... > 2) It DOES have a really full command language... quite Algol-ish. > But even this is a mixed blessing. Since you have to 'compile' > it to do anything very interesting, you might as well have > a 'dumber' command language, and use [insert favorite high- > level language... C, in my case] for the more complex > stuff, rather than inventing a whole new 'high-level' > compiled language. Compile??? what the hell are you talking about..obviously you dont know what your talking about, there are several ways to run procs, attach them, put the catalog your using in you command list (Path), put them in object libraries (they get tokenized so they run faster), exetcute them as a task...all pretty easy. > 3) I rather like the editor, now that i've figured out how to make > the thing work... those carriage returns I mentioned above > had me really confused for a while. Still, I like EMACS > better.... and that runs everywhere but on the Cyber. The editor is really nice, I don't like emacs better. Utilities under NOS/VE are extremely nice. The common command language (SCL) is extremely integrated with utilities and the OS in general, the consistency in everything is *extremely*. Ive found that with new users the learning curve goes straight up then levels flat. Once you know how to get around it's a dream to use. > Steve Swales (716) 275-0265,-3857,-5101| he cried. "The game is If learn NOS/VE with an open mind you'll be a lot better off. Chris Lloyd - cabbagehead@saturn.ucc.umass.edu