Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!seismo!sundc!pitstop!sun!quintus!arisia!tow From: tow@arisia.Xerox.COM (Rob Tow) Newsgroups: comp.sys.ibm.pc Subject: Re: More John Dvorak comments Summary: Please stop Keywords: useless flamage Message-ID: <423@arisia.Xerox.COM> Date: 7 Sep 88 23:31:25 GMT References: <6414@chinet.UUCP> <45900148@uxe.cso.uiuc.edu> Reply-To: tow@arisia.UUCP (Rob Tow) Followup-To: alt.flame Organization: Xerox PARC Lines: 57 In article <45900148@uxe.cso.uiuc.edu> mcdonald@uxe.cso.uiuc.edu writes: > > >> OK everyone, how about we stop Mac Bashing. I am a programmer who works >>with both machines, and I think that the comments made above are pretty >>biased. On the Mac, you dont need a command line. If you want to open document >>Y created with program x, you point to the icon of the document and open it. >>The program that created it is automatically invoked. You dont need a command >>line; the operating system takes care of it. >But you DO need a command line if you want to do what YOU want to do, rather >than what the brain-damaged Finder wants to do! I often want to create >a file Y with program x (an editor) and then compile it with program >Z (the compiler) and maybe even give it to program K (Kermit) to send >off to the Usenet as an example. I tried using a Mac and found it >EXTREMELY frustrating. On rare occasions, point and click is nice- >on MS-DOS you just invoke a point and click shell (many are available). >Is there a full Unix or MS-DOS style shell for the Mac, that allows >you to throw the finder in the trash (oh saying that about a Mac is >really fun!). There wasn't when I tried it about two years ago. > >Doug McDonald This subject has been bashed to death. The True Believers on both sides will never budge. Speaking as one who has done extensive programming on both machines - *this year*, not two or n years ago - I must say that both machines/environments have *infelicities*. So does the Dorado I am writing this on. So does the room full of SUN-4 workstations down the hallway. All of these are tools. In some ways they compete. In others they are complementary. Why do you think we have *all* of them in our lab? Lets resolve to keep this newsgroup true to its purpose of sharing *useful* information! I have long noticed that the signal-to-noise ratio for this newsgroup is one of the highest of all the groups - lets not change now. By the way, the example given above is bogus - I do interprogram file exchange of exactly that sort all the time on Macintosh computers. Of course, these are running Multifinder with multiple megabytes of memory... But consider the limitations of the original small memory PC (with a cassette tape interface, yet!). Enough said. Sigh. --- Rob Tow Member Research Staff Electronic Document Lab Xerox PARC 3333 Coyote Hill Drive Palo Alto, CA 94304 (415)-494-4087