Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!ames!lll-winken!uunet!tektronix!orca!pogo!rickc
From: rickc@pogo.WV.TEK.COM (Rick Clements)
Newsgroups: comp.software-eng
Subject: Re: VMS vs. UNIX s/w development tools - query
Keywords: VMS UNIX tools
Message-ID: <7036@pogo.WV.TEK.COM>
Date: 4 Apr 89 00:33:15 GMT
References: <600@mitisft.Convergent.COM>
Reply-To: rickc@pogo.WV.TEK.COM (Rick Clements)
Organization: Tektronix, Inc., Wilsonville,  OR.
Lines: 34

In article <600@mitisft.Convergent.COM> gm@mitisft.Convergent.COM (G.M. Harding) writes:
}     * Unix thinks that a program which returns zero to the invocation
}       environment executed successfully, and that a program which
}       returns nonzero to the invocation environment executed with an
}       error of some kind. The VMS convention is almost exactly the
}       opposite of this. At least the VMS preprocessor has the string
}       "VMS" as a built-in, so you can write:

}       #ifndef VMS
}       #define GOODEXIT 0
}       #define BADEXIT 1
}       #else
}       #define GOODEXIT 1
}       #define BADEXIT 0
}       #endif

It has been a few years since I have worked on VMS.  But, doesn't 0 indicate
not finished to VMS?  A value greater than one indicates an error.
Passing a 0 back from a VMS driver will crash your program (80% of the
time), work ok (15%) and crash the system (5%).  These are estimates
based on the experience of my self on others at a previous company.

}     * VMS text files typically use CR/LF as a line delimiter, and
}       the standard library routines deal with this fact in various
}       non-Unix ways.
    
File types are a problem in VMS.  There are a lot of them.  The default
type for a C program is different than the default type for FORTRAN.

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All opinions are my fault.
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-- 
Rick Clements (RickC@pogo.WV.TEK.COM)