Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!uunet!unisoft!rembo
From: rembo@unisoft.UUCP (Tony Rems)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.att
Subject: Re: SV R3.2.2 vs. R4.0
Message-ID: <3162@unisoft.UUCP>
Date: 12 Oct 90 23:29:27 GMT
References: <2152@megadon.UUCP>
Reply-To: rembo@unisoft.UUCP (Tony Rems)
Lines: 34

In article <2152@megadon.UUCP> holsberg@pilot.njin.net (Peter J. Holsberg) writes:
>In the docs for SV/386 R3.2.2, I have read about the inclusion of
>stuff from Xenix and (I believe) BSD.  In the ads for R4.0, I have
>read of the same things.  Is this true?  Does it mean that R4.0 is not
>much of an advance over 3.2.2?  
>
>Thanks,
>Pete
>-- 
>Pete Holsberg	Mercer County College  Trenton, NJ
>The College on the Other Side of Route 1

No, that's not what it means.  It just means that, while AT&T has
made it's kernel large and unwieldy, it has attempted to include
all the features that both BSD and System V users are used to. 
Notable features are the vfs (virtual file system) which allows
you to use S5fs, ufs, or bfs yet write your code independently of
what file system you're using.  It includes system calls like 
statvfs which return a *generic* superblock so that you don't
have to dig around on the disk yourself.  Also, you have all
the BSD and S5 IPC mechanisms, and all the S5 and BSD commands.
So, no matter what you're used to, most of the features should
be there.  Now, before you start calling AT&T for your copy,
remember that, to include all this, as you can imagine, you 
end up with a huge kernel and a huge system.  Also, AT&T didn't
include support for multiprocessing.  So, the deal is, you can
get most of the things you want, but you'll have to pay for them.

Oh, also, AT&T, in it's effort to contribute to ease of use has
decided not to include on-line man pages in this release either.

Ah, the joys of Ma Bell...

-Tony