Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!dali.cs.montana.edu!caen!sdd.hp.com!elroy.jpl.nasa.gov!ncar!ico!rcd From: rcd@ico.isc.com (Dick Dunn) Newsgroups: comp.unix.wizards Subject: Re: Dual Universes Summary: it would have been an interesting idea... Message-ID: <1991Apr29.222849.7981@ico.isc.com> Date: 29 Apr 91 22:28:49 GMT References: <130311@uunet.UU.NET> <14673@ulysses.att.com> Organization: Interactive Systems Corporation, Boulder, CO Lines: 29 andys@ulysses.att.com (Andy Sherman) writes: > richard@locus.com (Richard M. Mathews) writes: > |>Let's merge BSD and SysV now, resolve the conflicts, then start over > |>inventing new features to create the next generation of splitting. > |>At least that split will have started from just one place. > Pardon my naivete, but isn't that what SVr4 is supposed to do? (OK, your naivete is duly pardoned.:-) Yes, there was a time when it appeared that SVR4 was intended to be a merge of BSD and SysV...at least, many of us were led to believe that. It turned out not to be the case, if you understand "merge" in the sense Richard is using it. V.4 is a combination of the two systems. It contains all of the facilities of both systems, as one might expect. However, where BSD and V.3 implemented the same idea in different ways, or provided different options, etc., V.4 provides *both* mechanisms, plus a way to choose one or the other. Thus, for example, you've got both sockets and streams (one imple- mented in terms of the other, but both still present). You've got both types of file system. You've got two versions of any command which is significantly different under V.3 and BSD. In this sense it's not a merge. Granted, the plethora of features and the "upward compatibility" from either BSD or V.3 will probably help make it a Commercial Success, but it's distressing to folks who thought V.4 might help simplify things. -- Dick Dunn rcd@ico.isc.com -or- ico!rcd Boulder, CO (303)449-2870 ...If you plant ice, you're gonna harvest wind.