Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!mips!apple!uokmax!munnari.oz.au!goanna!ok
From: ok@goanna.cs.rmit.oz.au (Richard A. O'Keefe)
Newsgroups: comp.os.misc
Subject: Re: UNIX vs. the world (again) (was: Compilation listing from Sun ...)
Message-ID: <6373@goanna.cs.rmit.oz.au>
Date: 17 Jun 91 12:52:27 GMT
References: <1991Jun15.143436.5574@cunixf.cc.columbia.edu> <25791@lanl.gov>
Organization: Comp Sci, RMIT, Melbourne, Australia
Lines: 49

In article <25791@lanl.gov>, jlg@cochiti.lanl.gov (Jim Giles) writes:
> So why do we have to stick with the _first_ one that became portable? 

Same reason we stick with c**p like the internal combustion and Fortran.
Too expensive to re-tool.

> Why not insist on a truly well designed, efficient, easy to use system
> - and then insist that _it_ be made portable.

Portability, like quality, is not something you can bolt on afterwards.

There are N teams out there trying to design better operating systems.
(The NeXT doesn't run UNIX, although it looks as if it did.
DEC were talking about providing a POSIX *interface* on top of VMS.
DEC have an experimental OS called TOPAZ, which sounds interesting.
And so it goes.)
The most convincing way for you to INSIST on a truly well designed
apple pie is with your MONEY.  Tell people what would make you evaluate
an operating system as "truly well designed and efficient and easy to
use", and tell them what you will PAY for it, and how many others feel
likewise.

> If you 
> "administer" your own machine, it takes a higher percentage of your 
> time than any other micro system I've seen (or, so I understand from
> friends of mine that do so).

I'm sure your friends are wonderful people, but I ran SunOS 3.5 on a
Sun-3/50 at home for a year, and never did *anything* to it except
switch it on and off (ok, so I made backups).  There's a charity I'm
in touch with that have an 80386 box running UNIX V.3.  System
administration?  They can't even spell it.  They can switch it on and
off, they can make backups on the floppy drive, and that's _it_.  I'm
still waiting for them to call me for help, and it has been 18 months.

This all started with a complaint about compiler listings.
It was observed that this is not an OS issue, it is a COMPILER issue.
It was further observed that there are UNIX Fortran compilers available
which DO make listing files.

As for me, what I want is a compiler which dumps the information into
a few relations so that I can extract precisely the information I want.
If it comes with a tool for generating listings from this, fine, as long
as I can turn the wall-paper machine OFF.  I had a gutful of listings
that went 10 times around the house 12 years ago.  Never again!
Give me Masterscope, I say!
-- 
Q:  What should I know about quicksort?   A:  That it is *slow*.
Q:  When should I use it?  A:  When you have only 256 words of main storage.