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From: rcw@qetzal.UUCP
Newsgroups: comp.sys.ibm.pc
Subject: Re: A different View of the value of OS/2 - it's better than UNIX
Message-ID: <177@qetzal.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 29-Sep-87 02:55:50 EDT
Article-I.D.: qetzal.177
Posted: Tue Sep 29 02:55:50 1987
Date-Received: Sat, 3-Oct-87 00:54:57 EDT
References: <161@splut.UUCP>
Organization: Graphics Information, Inc., Denver, CO.
Lines: 43
Summary: Are we finished yet?

In article <161@splut.UUCP>, jay@splut.UUCP (Jay Maynard) writes:
> 
> I have a bad sector now on my second hard drive, and I'll have to reformat
> it to lock it out - and it's exclusively for Unix (worse - it's exclusively
> for news! :-)

Jay refers to Microport SysV/AT. It is not necessary to reformat
the disk. Simply :-)  use the fdisk utility, the "scan and assign"
bad tracks option to fix a sector on the fly. 

I agree that badsector handling is clumsy under unix, and different
on every unix machine I've seen. How about a consistent badsector
handling interface for the user?

> A single bad sector in the root directory of a filesystem will do the same
> thing... [trash the file system]

Or, God forbid, the free list.

> At lease I can fly 'chkdsk -f' and ....

Ever try to use one of the files that this command recovers?

> [Unix] Better by whose definition? If you think in terms of a strictly program
> development environment, then you're probably right in thinking of Unix -
> for it's a superior system for people who are willing to take the time and
> effort to learn incredibly cryptic commands, multiuser system administration

It'd be nice to close the case on this meta-dos vs. unix discussion. 
I think that most would agree that DOS is suitable for single-user
applications like Joe Blow's financial database, and that Unix is
more appropriate for multi-user applications/software development/
graphic workstations/University environments. The key difference is
*multi-user*, and one would be naive to think that a multi-user
os is going to be trivial to maintain. (They are also naive to
even *think* about purchasing OS/2 before release 3.2)


-- 
Robert C. White, Jr. Mentor Software, Inc.    
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