Xref: utzoo comp.protocols.nfs:1978 comp.windows.ms:10348 comp.protocols.tcp-ip.ibmpc:5182 Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!rice!uw-beaver!ubc-cs!fs1!twix.ee.ubc.ca!jmorriso From: jmorriso@twix.ee.ubc.ca (John Paul Morrison) Newsgroups: comp.protocols.nfs,comp.windows.ms,comp.protocols.tcp-ip.ibmpc Subject: Re: Sun PC-NFS deficiencies Message-ID: <1541@fs1.ee.ubc.ca> Date: 15 Mar 91 01:08:14 GMT References: <1991Mar9.120940.23851@ukpoit.co.uk> <1991Mar11.232450.5556@amd.com> <1991Mar13.180625.14540@amd.com> Sender: root@fs1.ee.ubc.ca Reply-To: jmorriso@twix.ee.ubc.ca (John Paul Morrison) Organization: Dept. of Electrical Engineering University of B.C. Lines: 69 In article <1991Mar13.180625.14540@amd.com> phil@brahms.amd.com (Phil Ngai) writes: >In article kv56962@tut.fi (V{{r{nen Kari) writes: >You can print to an HP Laserjet IIIsi over the Ethernet directly, >something Sun PC-NFS could never do, since the LJIIISi talks Novell. > >You can also print to the Intel Netport devices. Again, they speak >Novell only. > I'd really like to see this. What on earth do you mean by speaking NOvell? Novell is software. It uses certain hardware standards to shuffle files around. Why do you say an HP printer only supports ONE network, when there are at least half a dozen PC networks out in PC land?? >Doesn't Sun talk about being standards based? Novell is THE standard >in PC networks. > Correction: THE standard in _IBM COMPPATIBLE_ Networks. I really don't think many MAC or other users have any higher opinion of Novell than they do of NFS, >With regard to Windows, a real PC network lets you inspect the >print queues, pause, resume, and delete jobs FROM A MENU. You can >configure the printers, select servers, and server queues >FROM A MENU. A crippled network like PC-NFS requires you to >manipulate configuration files so cryptic most users never figure >it out. User-hostile. I agree that NFS should live up to the hopes and desires of most Windows users. As for crippled, I really beg to differ! I can speak from the (relatively) unique position of having used IBM PC's and Sun workstations almost equally. Since we are at a poor humble university, we don't have fancy word-processors and spreadsheets. What we get has been site-licensed to us. So I find myself whith a strong dislike of: vi, troff, emacs, TeX, etc. So called "hacker friendly" software. On the other hand, what we do get would be ridiculous on a PC. Things like Maple 5, or MAthematica. Basically anything that needs a STABLE network with REAL multitasking and REAL virtual memory. It's funny to observe Unix hacks who think that anything non-unix is a toy (although they are often right). It's funny to observe PC hacks who think they know evrything and that they are "gurus". These are people with 20 000 "utility" programs cluttering their disks to compensate for what MS-DOS can't handle! It all ends up being what you use your macine for, and how you wan't to do it. I'll give Windows infinitely more credit than MIT X windows for being an easy, consistent, and fairly well thought out interface. (MIT X has never heard of printers. EVery program just figures out how to print any old way). Although a NeXT with X features would be something amazing. It seems like certain PC users are incredibly bitter about Unix people, which I could understand if it were DEC, or IBM they were bitter about. But here this leads me to believe they have never used Unix. At best their experience has been an inconvenience with non-WYSIWIG ways of doing things. Basically cosmetic, which is NOT to say trivial: Unix could use a really slick, coherent face-lift. But I'll give unix the upper hand for most things anyway, because MS-DOS is not an operating system; it is a glorified program loader, one step better than a ROM bootstrap loader. In two years of heavy Sun use, and light PC use, I HAVE NEVER LOST A FILE on a Sun network (that I didn't nuke myself), whereas I have lost and corrupted more files on IBMs.(we have around 2-3 Giga bytes of disk space shared by about 100 users, on distributed servers, and on not one but TWO radically different computer architectures. Try THAT on Novell!!!)