Xref: utzoo comp.sys.amiga:73949 alt.religion.computers:2166 Path: utzoo!utgpu!cs.utexas.edu!swrinde!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!uakari.primate.wisc.edu!dali.cs.montana.edu!decwrl!fernwood!portal!cup.portal.com!thad From: thad@cup.portal.com (Thad P Floryan) Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga,alt.religion.computers Subject: Re: A3000UX competition Message-ID: <36762@cup.portal.com> Date: 10 Dec 90 11:21:43 GMT References: <36488@cup.portal.com> <24221:Dec400:05:0790@kramden.acf.nyu.edu> <4271:Dec1003:29:5790@kramden.acf.nyu.edu> Organization: The Portal System (TM) Lines: 113 brnstnd@kramden.acf.nyu.edu (Dan Bernstein) in <4271:Dec1003:29:5790@kramden.acf.nyu.edu> writes: In article bzs@world.std.com (Barry Shein) writes: > Look at the manual page (I'll send it to you if you like.) I think > you'll quickly see it's impossible to support the view that SYSV > curses is only trivially improved over BSD curses. I didn't say that. System V curses/terminfo does indeed have lots more features than BSD curses/termcap. But that System V fanatic was accusing BSD of missing basic features which have been around for years. Somehow I don't really care about the infinite pile of frills in System V. Oh? How quickly some forget; sigh. I clearly stated there are some parts of BSD which are DEFICIENT (not "missing") when compared to SysV, and, as ONE example, cited the curses issue which recently caused me much grief. "System V Fanatic"? Gee, as previously posted, I even tested curses/termcap on my own BSD machine, and there are several more available to me. A true "SysV Fanatic" wouldn't have a BSD box in the same room as a SysV box. Personally, I consider myself more an Amiga-fanatic! :-) The point of my continued participation in this thread was to elicit some informed statements as to why some think BSD is so much greater than SysV. To date, none have surfaced. Not in this thread nor in the years I've been asking the same question elsewhere. The ONLY comments I'm getting from BSD-fanatics is "BSD is better!" without any supporting evidence. Consider Kent Paul Dolan's recent posting as just another example (my original comments preceded by "> "): You had to pay a BSD license on top of a SYSV license. [...] BSD's open source policy meant that user developed software could be ported among platforms, which meant their customers saw a much more cost effective, leading edge capability combined hardware and software platform. [...] > {Re: AT&T's license fees} Gee, I just saw it as corporate greed, bureacratic stupidity, development incompetence, idea infertility, and hostility to their customer base. [...] Every time I've been stuck on a SYSV system, I felt like I was trying to work with my hands tied behind my back. [...] > Kent, it appears to me you haven't studied any recent SysV system, Bingo! Could it be that's why I asked for a comparision to find out how much of BSD I'd be losing? Any gains are gravy. [...] My opinions of SYSV have been formed on SYSV, but not the newer releases. The ones I've worked on were just half a step above being a direct insult to the user. My opinions of open software systems to go along with open hardware systems are based on common sense and the success of those who won't take no for an answer and disassemble the code anyway, to find out just what vendor supplied bug is keeping them from writing the software miracle that will double hardware sales. BSD is so good that lots of software houses develop code for completely different machines under BSD just to have the great _programmers_ development environment available. [...] > My only REAL gripe with pre-SVR4 systems has been the 14-character > filename limit ... that has been REALLY a hassle for me. But with > SVR4 you just bring up the BSD FFS and no sweat. I rest my case. ;-) Opinions, opinions, opinions. BSD's "open sources"? Sure, if you already had the SysV source. Then comments about "hands tied" WRT SysV, and SysV being an "insult to user"; more opinions without examples. Then the "undefined" ``programmer development environment'' of BSD. And what might THAT be? If it's just a collection of progams and utilities, then that is NOT BSD-specific since such programs can be ported to or installed upon any system of one's choosing (as I previously stated, and have demonstrated to my satisfaction re: emacs, bison, HDB uucp, smail3.1.19, networking utils, etc.). The fact that such "programmer development environment" utilities may have been first developed on an BSD system is irrelevant. Back in the early '60s such programs were developed on SDS-930 and PDP-10 systems because, then, THOSE machines were readibly available to university students and researchers. You'd be surprised to learn how many good programs from back then I've since ported to TOPS-20 and again to the UNIX (and other) boxes I use today. And I was using ftp, telnet, network sockets, etc. LONG before BSD UNIX even existed, on the ARPAnet host systems such as Tenex, ITS, SAIL, &c back in 1970; that year is significant, because that's the "birth" year of UNIX at AT&T, 20 years ago. Those ARPA networking capabilities and protocols were ported to BSD UNIX from those other systems much later (but NO earlier than 1977 when 1.0BSD surfaced). Point is, you use what machine(s) are available at the time. The fact that a given program runs on machine A does not automatically make machine B an inferior, substandard system simply because a given program hasn't been ported to it. Again, when comparing SYSTEMS, one must restrict the discussion to the kernel and its intrinsic support libraries. Ancillary support programs can be ported to (practically) ANY system. I've been stating facts; most everyone else has been stating opinion and getting emotional about the issue. I suppose this is not the time nor place to discuss the superiority of SysV's ksh to BSD's csh, or .... :-) :-) Thad Floryan [ thad@cup.portal.com (OR) ..!sun!portal!cup.portal.com!thad ]