Path: utzoo!utgpu!watmath!watcgl!watmum!smvorkoetter
From: smvorkoetter@watmum.waterloo.edu (Stefan M. Vorkoetter)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.ibm.pc
Subject: Re: Can't get DOS to see new SWITCHAR
Keywords: MS-DOS 4.01, CompuAdd 286, Award BIOS
Message-ID: <9194@watcgl.waterloo.edu>
Date: 12 Apr 89 17:49:09 GMT
References: <1738@leah.Albany.Edu> <763@mks.UUCP>
Sender: daemon@watcgl.waterloo.edu
Reply-To: smvorkoetter@watmum.waterloo.edu (Stefan M. Vorkoetter)
Distribution: na
Organization: U. of Waterloo, Ontario
Lines: 49

In article <763@mks.UUCP> wheels@mks.UUCP (Gerry Wheeler) writes:
>In article <1738@leah.Albany.Edu>, jem97@leah.Albany.Edu (Jim Mower) writes:
>> I am unable to get DOS [version 4] commands (cd, dir, etc.) to recognize
>> that the switch character has been changed. 
>
>Since the MKS Toolkit also has a command to alter the switch character,
>we were also rather dismayed to see this behaviour.  Our only
>conclusions are that 1) the (undocumented) system call is still in
>place, and 2) the new DOS commands do not use the call to determine the
>current setting. Pity.

What we really need now is a new operating system.  Before you all
cry UNIX(tm) or, heaven forbid, OS/2, hear me out.  Personally I would
prefer UNIX over DOS, but what we need is an operating system with
reasonable requirements.  They say the hardware technology is expanding
so rapidly that the software can't keep up.  I think it is the other
way around.  People are writing programs with no regard for the poor
user who has only 640K and a 20M hard drive.  Believe me, I know; I am
guilty myself.

Before I bought my Turbo XT with 640K and a 20M hard drive, I had a
PCjr (no laughs please).  It had 512K and two floppy drives.  I got
very good at writing small programs.  On one floppy, I had all of the
following:

	An enhanced (by me) version of Small-C   30K
	A C preprocessor (by me)                 10K
	Make (also by me)                        10K
	Eric Isaacson's A86 assembler            20K
				 D86 debugger             15K
	A super neato text editor (by me)        30K
	Turbo Pascal 4.0 and library             80K ?
	A terminal emulator (VT52, by me)        11K
	Grep (by me)                             10K
	Touch (by Borland)                        4K
	The usual DOS utilties (format etc.)     50K

	FREE SPACE (yes, that's right)     about 80K

So, if it is possible to do all this in this little bit of space, 
why can't we write a DOS like operating system, with a UNIX like
shell, really fast execution (so DOS calls are worthwhile), that
does not take up any more space than say DOS 2.10?  Why do we need
4Mb just to say "Hello, world!" these days?

Just my opinion (and probably someone else's as well).

Stefan Vorkoetter
smvorkoetter@watmum.waterloo.edu