Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!clyde!att!osu-cis!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!bloom-beacon!apple!bionet!ig!agate!ucbvax!CORY.BERKELEY.EDU!dillon
From: dillon@CORY.BERKELEY.EDU (Matt Dillon)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga
Subject: Re: Enviroment (was Re: Yea, but can an Amiga Shell do this....)
Message-ID: <8808232121.AA28517@cory.Berkeley.EDU>
Date: 23 Aug 88 21:21:23 GMT
Sender: daemon@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU
Lines: 46

:One example is the file name system.  Using ":" too indicate root is
:in no way superior to "/".  Using "//" to indicate previous directory
:is in no way superior to "../".  Yet these differences make

	Just a single slash '/' indicates the parent directory, and although
I agree with you that this is not compatible with UNIX, I LIKE it *much*
better than having to type '../'.

:transporting software (and brainware) more difficult.  In fact,
:Amigados has a clear inferiority in that it cannot refer to current
:directory which Unix does with ".".  So why was AmigaDos done this
:way?  Well, just because...

	Just becuase it ISN'T UNIX.  Nobody said UNIX is the only way to
do it.  I have had more problems transporting files between UNIX machines
than I ever had porting them to the Amiga.  Little things like many UNIXs
support only 14 character file names.  Oops.

	And anyway, I never liked that fact that one had to specifically
check for and ignore '.' and '..' when scanning UNIX directories.  I like
the fact that the parent specifier is NOT in the directory ("/"), and the
fact that the current directory specifier is NOT in the directory ("").  Thus,
one does not have any special cases within the directory itself.

:If Amiga is going to change the paradigm for envariables, how about
:something that IS superior?  Define a global default set of
:envariables (like ENV:).  Each parent can define any number of
:envariables which will then be inherited by its children.  If the
:child accesses an envariable the parent did not define, it gets the
:global default.  If the child modifies and envariable, the new value

	Of course, we have already discussed this to death but...  The general
answer is YES it can be done, but must be implemented in the programming
of the software rather than in the system UNLESS we agree on a creating a
new 'user' library which contains the appropriate functions (and does all
of this automatically).

>when it does not provide significant advantage in the deviation) the
>more the Amiga will be ignored by commercial software developers, and
>the more the Amiga will become "just a niche computer".

	Oh bull shit.  The Amiga might very well remain "just a niche 
computer" to the majority of the CS world, but it isn't going to be because
it isn't UNIX.

					-Matt