Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!uunet!bria!mike
Newsgroups: comp.unix.admin
Subject: Re: Who's in charge here: Oracle or Unix?
Message-ID: <432@bria>
Date: 14 Feb 91 04:40:46 GMT
References: <635@uswnvg.UUCP> <237@raysnec.UUCP> <9686@jjmhome.UUCP>
Reply-To: uunet!bria!mike
Organization: MGI Group International, Los Angeles, CA
Lines: 23

In an article, jjmhome.UUCP!rmwise (Robert M. Wise) writes:
>Well, I do too! People who want to hear about the disaster that the
>DB approach can be should read comp.unix.aix.  IBM decided to create
>this monster from heck called SMIT that uses the database approach.
>It's rather appalling.  I won't summarize here.  Go read the group and
>weep (or laugh).

'Tis a rarity for me to leap to IBM's defense, but in this case, you're
not quite correct.  What you are refering to is _not_ SMIT, but rather
ODM.  SMIT (System Management Interface Tool) is quite the slick little
program that does _absolutely nothing to the system_ itself.  It simply
invokes tools like mkdev, rmuser, etc.  It is quite the boon to those
who don't want to read through 3 thick command references, or spend
half the day having fun with InfoExplorer. :-)

And insofar as /etc/passwd, /etc/group, etc. they are not part of the ODM;
they are traditional flat files.
-- 
Michael Stefanik                       | Opinions stated are not even my own.
Systems Engineer, Briareus Corporation | UUCP: ...!uunet!bria!mike
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technoignorami (tek'no-ig'no-ram`i) a group of individuals that are constantly
found to be saying things like "Well, it works on my DOS machine ..."