Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!sdd.hp.com!uakari.primate.wisc.edu!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!rpi!uupsi!cmcl2!lanl!crs From: crs@lanl.gov (Charlie Sorsby) Newsgroups: comp.os.msdos.misc Subject: Re: Where is the long awaited MS DOS 5.0 ? Summary: DOS is no easier to learn than Unix for the same functionality. Message-ID: <10110@lanl.gov> Date: 2 Jan 91 20:04:56 GMT References: <8550@tekgvs.LABS.TEK.COM> <13523@milton.u.washington.edu> Organization: Los Alamos Natl Lab, Los Alamos, N.M. Lines: 118 In article <13523@milton.u.washington.edu>, dittrich@milton.u.washington.edu (Dave Dittrich) writes: > In article ghenniga@nmsu.edu (Gary Hennigan) writes: >> 2. The ease with which a non-experienced user can learn DOS far >> outpaces the same user attempting to learn the sometimes cryptic UNIX. ^^^^^^^ Could you be specific? If you take a subset of Unix commands that is equivalent to those available under ??-DOS (there are many "DOS's" other than MS-DOS and PC-DOS), which of them are so cryptic as to make them so difficult to learn? I believe the public believes this because that is what they've been told to believe. That many who have tried both believe it because they learned DOS first and they don't want to bother learning something different--that's probably why I find ??-DOS *more* difficult--I learned Unix first. I've never understood why people claim that Unix is so hard to learn. I thought it was the *easiest* OS to learn (of those I've encountered). Nor do I think that ??-DOS is particularly easy to learn. I find Unix easier to *use* than either ??-DOS or VMS. > The ease of learning is not THAT much better (OK, DOS has TENS of commands, > rather than HUNDREDS, like UNIX. How many people use all of them though? Exactly. If you are going to compare, compare learning to use an equivalent number of commands. Or, better yet, the commands necessary to do an equivalent number of things. I believe that it is as easy (or easier) to learn to use an equivalent subset of Unix commands and to learn to navigate the Unix file system. For one thing, you don't need to worry about what disk you are on (e.g. C:\SUBDIR) and if you don't want to worry about a hierarchical directory structure, put all of your files in your home directory. Is it the long (in some cases) command names that are supposed to make DOS easier to learn? I'm afraid that I find that hard to believe. Indeed, many use the same name (e.g. mkdir). And, is it really *that* hard to remember that "ls" means "LiSt directory"? That "cp" means "CoPy"? Perhaps it is the infamous :) "cat" command that makes Unix so "difficult." But even that difficulty disappears (at least it did for me) once one learns that it means "conCATenate a list of files and send the result to the standard output." I'd really like to learn what is "easier to learn" about ??-DOS. >> By and large I prefer VMS anyway! I believe that much of operating system preference is more of a case of personality conflict/compatibility than anything else. I believe that operating systems have a kind of a "personality" that may either be compatible with or conflict with that of the user. I seem to have a personality conflict with DOS and VMS while Unix and I seem to be compatible. I probably shouldn't go into this in this group but my impression of ??-DOS is that, in some respects, it is very VMS-like. Some things that I don't like about VMS (and, to a lesser exent, DOS) are: VERBOSITY: I'd much rather, for example, type "mv" than "RENAME." And, trying to remember how much I must type to get a valid abbreviation is more trouble than it's worth. The "english-like" command flags of VMS are another example. (Yes, I know; they too can be abbreviated.) BAROQUENESS: (Is that a word? :) The most obvious example of this is the VMS path specification scheme. As I recall (it's been a while since I've used VMS) it uses various combinations of :, [, ], ., $, and perhaps other characters in addition to file and directory names. What does that buy us? Unix uses exactly one character, "/", as a separator. That allows specification of the path to any file on the system. I *hate* typing VMS paths. I'm a mere user and don't know if there are any real (as opposed to imagined) reasons for requiring all these characters to specify the location of a file but *as* a user, it's a real pain. Clearly, the designers of Unix didn't think they were necessary. At least ??-DOS only requires the disk specification in addition to a path specification analogous to its Unix counterpart. OBSTACLES: I realize that some of the items that fit this category are for the sake of security. Nevertheless, every time I've ever used a VMS system, I've *felt* that its designers had placed every possible obstacle in my way. This category actually includes the previous two. Remember, these are *my* impressions. I know many who swear by VMS (and at Unix). That's what I mean by personality conflicts and compatibilities. Such compatibilities and conflicts are probably magnified by having learned one system before the other, although I'd begun to learn something about VMS before I encountered Unix. I've a question about DOS: Is there a real reason for the choice of switch character ("/") and path-element separator ("\")? Or was the choice made gratuitously (or, worse, just to be different from Unix)? I've always assumed that, since in some cases it's possible to use the Unix counterparts, that the choice was arbitrary. In some ways, I find that more of a pain than the baroque paths of VMS--the ??-DOS paths are enough like those of Unix that I tend to type them as Unix paths--those of VMS are enough different that I don't do that, I just hate to type them. Well, just a few thoughts. I really don't mean to start an OS war. I'd really like to know what about DOS is perceived as being easier to learn than it's Unix counterpart. Best, Charlie Sorsby "I'm the NRA!" crs@lanl.gov sorsby@pprg.unm.edu