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From: mkhaw@teknowledge-vaxc.UUCP
Newsgroups: comp.sys.apollo
Subject: Re: Is Apollo a Unix box
Message-ID: <13170@teknowledge-vaxc.ARPA>
Date: Thu, 28-May-87 21:16:28 EDT
Article-I.D.: teknowle.13170
Posted: Thu May 28 21:16:28 1987
Date-Received: Sat, 30-May-87 05:42:05 EDT
References: <8705282057.AA03390@EDDIE.MIT.EDU>
Reply-To: mkhaw@teknowledge-vaxc.UUCP (Michael Khaw)
Distribution: world
Organization: Teknowledge, Inc., Palo Alto CA
Lines: 26

I think Apollos are fine machines for running Aegis, and I have few quibbles
with Aegis:  the commands are just enough like Unix to be irritating to learn
and confusing when I switch between an Aegis pad and a Domain/IX pad; "pst"
doesn't identify Domain/IX processes in useful ways (shows some unusable uid
number something or other); commands like "dlf" don't work well with
certain Unix filenames like ".cshrc" (i.e., ":.cshrc" in Aegis); and if you
telnet to a Domain/IX machine on a terminal and then try to "/com/login" you
get silly things like the message "Not any password!", after which Aegis
merrily echoes your password on the screen as you type it in.

With regard to the original question as to whether or not an Apollo is a Unix
box:  I don't think Domain/IX, so far, is real Unix in the sense that
you have to know both Unix and Aegis to administer a Domain/IX system, and
you can't have Unix on an Apollo without Aegis.

Aegis and the Apollo Domain ring may be technically superior to Unix and
tcp/ip ethernet, but getting locked into a proprietary OS and networking
hardware, and learning a user-environment (i.e., a set of commands) that you
can't use on other machines is a lose.  Now, if Domain/IX were a "native"
Apollo Unix with extensions like acls, etc., *that* would be something!

Mike Khaw
-- 
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