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From: mwm@eris.BERKELEY.EDU (Mike (No one lives forever.) Meyer)
Newsgroups: net.sources
Subject: Re: shell printf - a sensible solution
Message-ID: <2839@jade.BERKELEY.EDU>
Date: Wed, 18-Mar-87 04:59:31 EST
Article-I.D.: jade.2839
Posted: Wed Mar 18 04:59:31 1987
Date-Received: Thu, 19-Mar-87 07:23:58 EST
References: <5008@brl-adm.ARPA>
Sender: usenet@jade.BERKELEY.EDU
Reply-To: mwm@eris.BERKELEY.EDU (Mike (No one lives forever.) Meyer)
Organization: Missionaria Phonibalonica
Lines: 19

In article <5008@brl-adm.ARPA> dm@bfly-vax.bbn.com writes:
>Look, ``the UNIX philosophy'' does NOT mean bending existing utilities
>to do poorly what a simple C program can do well.  It is perfectly
>fine to prototype the function one wants using the suite of tools that
>UNIX comes packaged with.  However, once you've done that prototype,
>if you're going to make extensive use of it, translating a shell-file
>into C is a perfectly acceptable optimization.

Quite correct. This is the path Berkeley took to get the ls they've
got now. Other tools have gone that route. It should be noted that
things that are really heavily used get moved into the kernel, but not
at Berkeley (well, not very often).

	<mike
--
But I'll survive, no you won't catch me,		Mike Meyer
I'll resist the urge that is tempting me,		ucbvax!mwm
I'll avert my eyes, keep you off my knee,		mwm@berkeley.edu
But it feels so good when you talk to me.		mwm@ucbjade.BITNET