Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP
Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!clyde!cbosgd!ihnp4!ptsfa!ames!oliveb!pyramid!prls!weaver
From: weaver@prls.UUCP
Newsgroups: comp.sys.apollo
Subject: Re: Why Aegis looks like Unix.
Message-ID: <4085@prls.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 4-Jun-87 17:15:12 EDT
Article-I.D.: prls.4085
Posted: Thu Jun  4 17:15:12 1987
Date-Received: Sat, 6-Jun-87 10:59:17 EDT
References: <8706041341.AA01972@hi-csc.uucp>
Organization: Signetics Microprocessor Division
Lines: 42
Summary: Aegis commands based on Software Tools


Postings from people at Apollo have mentioned Aegis's
debt to Multics. However, early versions of the Aegis shell (sh) 
were derived from the 'Software Tools' programs, from the book of 
the same name by Kernighan and Plauger (1976), possibly with additions from
the Software Tools' Users Group.

If you are not familiar with this work, it is a programming text with 
enough Ratfor programs to make a shell plus a good basic set of commands.
I presume the authors, both of Bell Labs and familiar with Unix, wanted a set 
of programs to give any operating system that 'Unix-like' feel.

The Aegis command names seem more consistant than Unix commands, but they 
are longer and still not English, a combination I do not appreciate. Also,
for the seasoned Unix user, commands with the same function but only 
slightly different names (catf/cat, ld/ls, etc.)  can be annoying. My
guess is they changed the names for fear that AT&T (who, after all, 
owns Unix) might someday decide they owned the names 'cat', 'ls', and
so on and sue their socks off. Having done so (again guessing), the 
did do a fair to good job in making the command names easier to learn
(at least for those starting from scratch).

I do like the attempt to have the same switches have the same meaning 
wherever possible, and especially the greater availability of 
regular expressions in command lines, e.g., 

     $ chn {?*}.pas @1.p
     
will change all files ending in '.pas' to end in '.p'. I will keep an
Aegis shell around when using csh just to take advantage of this sort 
of thing.


Michael Gordon Weaver                   Usenet: ...pyramid!prls!weaver
Signetics Microprocessor Division
811 East Arques Avenue
Sunnyvale, CA 94088-3409 (408) 991-3450
-- 
Michael Gordon Weaver                   Usenet: ...pyramid!prls!weaver
Signetics Microprocessor Division
811 East Arques Avenue
Sunnyvale, CA 94088-3409 (408) 991-3450