ronald@ibmpcug.co.uk (Ronald Khoo) (10/14/89)
[about reading/writing messDOS floppies formatted under Xenix] In article <3717@ast.cs.vu.nl> ast@cs.vu.nl (Andy Tanenbaum) writes: > Here is a (hopefully) improved version of dos/read/write.dir. Could DOS > users please try it on floppies, HD, 12-bit FAT, 16-bit FAT etc and post > the findings. The idea is to get a version of this program that works > on all current versions of DOS. Hi Andy... I'm not a messDOS user, but since Xenix is another macrohard product, I thought that would almost count :-) So here are my results running your dosdir under SCO Xenix 2.3.1 with a floppy formatted under the same OS. After linking /dev/dsk/f0q15dt to /dev/dosX, I get: /tmp/dosdir X OEM = SCO BOOT Bytes/sector = 512 Sectors/cluster = 1 Number of Reserved Clusters = 1 Number of FAT's = 2 Number of root-directory entries = 224 Total sectors in logical volume = 2400 Media descriptor = 0xf9 Number of sectors/FAT = 7 Sectors/track = 15 Number of heads = 2 Number of hidden sectors = 0 Bootblock magic number = 0x0000 magic != 0xAA55 Can't handle disk Interesting that this has never stopped me using floppies formatted under SCO Xenix before. Is dos{read,write,dir) the only program in the world that checks the magic number? Interessant.... The rest of the stuff looks approximately reasonable to me, let me take out the sanity check, hang on.. OK it's got no files, let me put a couple on.. hmmm.. seems to work. Does your /dev/dos? do something that my /dev/dsk/f0q15dt doesnt? Seems unlikely somehow... Does this prove anything ? -- Ronald.Khoo@ibmpcug.CO.UK (The IBM PC User Group, PO Box 360, Harrow HA1 4LQ) Path: ...!ukc!slxsys!ibmpcug!ronald Phone: +44-1-863 1191 Fax: +44-1-863 6095 $Header: /users/ronald/.signature,v 1.1 89/09/03 23:36:16 ronald Exp $ :-)
ast@cs.vu.nl (Andy Tanenbaum) (10/15/89)
In article <3a18.2536ede8@ibmpcug.co.uk> ronald@ibmpcug.co.uk (Ronald Khoo) writes: >Does this prove anything ? Not to me. My knowledge of DOS is zilch, and will stay that way. Thus I leave the debugging of dosread.c to the net. Since I never use DOS and do not own any DOS files, I don't care much whether it works or not, but if there is someone who does care, by all means try it and if there are problems, try to fix them. Andy Tanenbaum
evans@ditsyda.oz (Bruce Evans) (10/16/89)
In article <3a18.2536ede8@ibmpcug.co.uk> ronald@ibmpcug.co.uk (Ronald Khoo) writes: >magic != 0xAA55 >Can't handle disk > >Interesting that this has never stopped me using floppies formatted under >SCO Xenix before. Is dos{read,write,dir) the only program in the world Sorry about that. Even DOS doesn't check this particular magic number. It probably only belongs on *bootable* disks. DOS 3.3 requires it for bootable hard disk partitions at least. Sun 386i's are reported to require it for bootable floppies. So you can delete the test, and the program should be changed to check some other magic numbers (probably just the consistency of the parameter block). -- Bruce Evans evans@ditsyda.oz.au
cramer@optilink.UUCP (Clayton Cramer) (10/17/89)
In article <3721@ast.cs.vu.nl>, ast@cs.vu.nl (Andy Tanenbaum) writes: > In article <3a18.2536ede8@ibmpcug.co.uk> ronald@ibmpcug.co.uk (Ronald Khoo) writes: > >Does this prove anything ? > > Not to me. My knowledge of DOS is zilch, and will stay that way. Thus I > leave the debugging of dosread.c to the net. Since I never use DOS and do > not own any DOS files, I don't care much whether it works or not, but if > there is someone who does care, by all means try it and if there are problems, > try to fix them. > > Andy Tanenbaum This posting is really the definitive statement of disdain for DOS. "My knowledge of DOS is zilch, and will stay that way." For anyone to make such a statement, along with the contempt shown in the rest of the posting, provides all the evidence needed that elitism has a lot more to do with DOS-hatred than anything else. I'm sure that if DOS weren't used by COMMON PEOPLE, the DOS-haters would make appropriate criticisms of the many very real deficiencies of DOS, and leave it at that. But as long as someone can learn to use a computer without devoting years of their life to it, the DOS-haters will remain filled with irrational hatred. -- Clayton E. Cramer {pyramid,pixar,tekbspa}!optilink!cramer Human rights are non-negotiable -- respect the Bill of Rights, or you'll soon find out why the Second Amendment guarantees the right to keep and bear arms. Disclaimer? You must be kidding! No company would hold opinions like mine!
ok@cs.mu.oz.au (Richard O'Keefe) (10/20/89)
In article <2501@optilink.UUCP>, cramer@optilink.UUCP (Clayton Cramer) writes: > I'm sure that if DOS weren't used by COMMON PEOPLE, the DOS-haters > would make appropriate criticisms of the many very real deficiencies > of DOS, and leave it at that. But as long as someone can learn to > use a computer without devoting years of their life to it, the > DOS-haters will remain filled with irrational hatred. Learn to use a computer without devoting years to it? He must be talking about Macintoshes. DOS-hatred has a heck of a lot to do with DOS and nothing at all to do with who uses it. Common people can be taught how to use UNIX (or MINIX) quite effectively, as long as you tell them how to do what _they_ want to do and don't try to make hackers of them. I just read a review of the Norton Utilities in New Scientist; the author of the review doesn't appear to be a hacker, but he was raving about being able to attach meaningful strings to files so that he could tell which of NSREVA, NSREVB and so on held which review. "Irrational" hatred?
ast@cs.vu.nl (Andy Tanenbaum) (10/20/89)
>> My knowledge of DOS is zilch, and will stay that way. >> My knowledge of Tiny BASIC is zilch, and will stay that way. >> My knowledge of VMS is zilch, and will stay that way. >> My knowledge of OS/360 is zilch, and will stay that way. >> My knowledge of FORTRAN 9x is zilch, and will stay that way. The worst part of it is that I am not even ashamed at all. Andy Tanenbaum (ast@cs.vu.nl)
henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer) (10/21/89)
In article <2501@optilink.UUCP> cramer@optilink.UUCP (Clayton Cramer) writes: >I'm sure that if DOS weren't used by COMMON PEOPLE, the DOS-haters >would make appropriate criticisms of the many very real deficiencies >of DOS, and leave it at that. But as long as someone can learn to >use a computer without devoting years of their life to it, the >DOS-haters will remain filled with irrational hatred. The common people make essentially no use of DOS; they just use it to load programs that take over the whole machine and largely ignore DOS. Learning to use DOS itself -- especially the fine points of the file system, which is what this discussion was about -- *does* take lots of work. And it's not worth the trouble for most people, which is exactly what Andy was getting at. Hatred of DOS is entirely rational, and has nothing to do with who else uses it. There are ample reasons to despise that feeble excuse for an operating system. -- A bit of tolerance is worth a | Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology megabyte of flaming. | uunet!attcan!utzoo!henry henry@zoo.toronto.edu
peter@ficc.uu.net (Peter da Silva) (10/21/89)
In article <2501@optilink.UUCP> cramer@optilink.UUCP (Clayton Cramer) writes: > I'm sure that if DOS weren't used by COMMON PEOPLE, the DOS-haters > would make appropriate criticisms of the many very real deficiencies > of DOS, and leave it at that. But as long as someone can learn to > use a computer without devoting years of their life to it, the > DOS-haters will remain filled with irrational hatred. Oh, fiddlesticks. If this was the case then the Macintosh would be the computer everyone feels disdain for. Making effective use of a DOS machine is much, much harder than making effective use of a Mac. But us slimey elitists merely point out the fery real deficiencies of the Mac and leave it at that. Why? Largely because where the Mac is limited by its origins, DOS is limited by deliberate malice on the part of IBM and Microsoft. (yes, I know that a corporation can't feel malice, but if you trust the Turing test there is no better phrase for the behaviour of these companies) -- Peter da Silva, *NIX support guy @ Ferranti International Controls Corporation. Biz: peter@ficc.uu.net, +1 713 274 5180. Fun: peter@sugar.hackercorp.com. `-_-' "ERROR: trust not in UUCP routing tables" 'U` -- MAILER-DAEMON@mcsun.EU.net
webb@uhccux.uhcc.hawaii.edu (Thomas Webb) (10/21/89)
In article <1989Oct20.170447.19573@utzoo.uucp> henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer) writes: >In article <2501@optilink.UUCP> cramer@optilink.UUCP (Clayton Cramer) writes: >>I'm sure that if DOS weren't used by COMMON PEOPLE, the DOS-haters >>would make appropriate criticisms of the many very real deficiencies >>of DOS, and leave it at that. But as long as someone can learn to >>use a computer without devoting years of their life to it, the >>DOS-haters will remain filled with irrational hatred. > >The common people make essentially no use of DOS; they just use it to load >programs that take over the whole machine and largely ignore DOS. Learning >to use DOS itself -- especially the fine points of the file system, which >is what this discussion was about -- *does* take lots of work. And it's not >worth the trouble for most people, which is exactly what Andy was getting at. > >Hatred of DOS is entirely rational, and has nothing to do with who else >uses it. There are ample reasons to despise that feeble excuse for an >operating system. Hey folks, this isn't a class strugle. I program at the DOS level nearly every day and Henry is right, it does take a bit of work to learn about 80x86 assembly language and DOS, and a lot of times you end-up by-passing the operating system to get decent results anyway. So, in a sence, DOS isn't much of an operating system. On the other hand, it does do a pretty good job of organising files and loding programs. It is fast and small. For those of us who still have to put-up with slow 8088 PC' speed is the bottom line. Also, those of us on tight personal budgets can get a complete DOS development system for about $1500, $1000 for the machine and $500 for a very complete set of development software. It costs more than that just to get a unix development package, plus the hardware needed to run unix is far more expensive. The moral here is that while DOS is undeniably feeble, it works very well in a low cost, low power environment. BTW, it isn't easy to learn to program in DOS, but it is even harder to program in 'real' operating systems at the OS level. At least you can get a good book on DOS programing, God help you if you need a quick function reference and programing primer for unix. Anyway, my feeling is that people who hate DOS are comparing it to OSes that cost a lot more and run on more expensive platforms. This is an apples and oranges type problem, not a class struggle. PS Henry, I teach 'common people' about unix as part of my job, and most of them don't want to know anthing more then how to load SPSS or whatever anyway. Maybe DOS has all they need? -tom -- =============================================================================== webb@uhccux.uhcc.Hawaii.edu ===============================================================================
jca@pnet01.cts.com (John C. Archambeau) (10/22/89)
cramer@optilink.UUCP (Clayton Cramer) writes: >This posting is really the definitive statement of disdain for DOS. >"My knowledge of DOS is zilch, and will stay that way." For anyone >to make such a statement, along with the contempt shown in the rest >of the posting, provides all the evidence needed that elitism has >a lot more to do with DOS-hatred than anything else. AST isn't the only one that hates MeSs-DOS. Meet another 'DOS hater' here and most of our claims for hatred of MeSs-DOS are very well justified considering its fatal flaws. It took how long for Micro$haft to break the 32 Mb problem with DOS? And I'm not even sure that 4.x does it all that well either. Now everybody is trying to break the 640K memory problem, well, it ain't going to happen because of the fact DOS was designed around an 8086 address space. Big bucks are in it for ANY company that makes a 100% (not 80%, 90%, or 95%) compatable 386 protect mode implementation of DOS. They are close with things such as VP/ix, but it's not close enough. I personally think that DOS will be chucked eventually since it doesn't even utilitize the power of a 386. >I'm sure that if DOS weren't used by COMMON PEOPLE, the DOS-haters >would make appropriate criticisms of the many very real deficiencies >of DOS, and leave it at that. But as long as someone can learn to >use a computer without devoting years of their life to it, the >DOS-haters will remain filled with irrational hatred. I know a lot of common people who will use *nix before even turning on an IBM clone/compatable. My boss only uses his IBM AT with a 40 Mb hard drive as a rolodex under SideKick. My boss' partner doesn't even like the letters IBM and is about as technically minded as Dan Quayle is informed of the state of the union and he prefers *nix based systems. Hell, I have to kick him off the SPARCstation 1 just for routine file system maintainance. DOS for common people? Maybe in the past and possibly the present, but now we have chips out there that DOS can't even push to the limit because of its design flaws. If I ever manage to get Bill Gates' business card, it's going on my dart board. ;) /*--------------------------------------------------------------------------* * Flames: /dev/null (on my Minix partition) *--------------------------------------------------------------------------* * ARPA : crash!pnet01!jca@nosc.mil * INET : jca@pnet01.cts.com * UUCP : {nosc ucsd hplabs!hd-sdd}!crash!pnet01!jca *--------------------------------------------------------------------------* * Note : My opinions are that...mine. My boss doesn't pay me enough to * speak in the best interests of the company (yet). *--------------------------------------------------------------------------*/
henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer) (10/22/89)
In article <5182@uhccux.uhcc.hawaii.edu> webb@uhccux.UUCP (Thomas Webb) writes: >... The moral here is that while DOS is undeniably >feeble, it works very well in a low cost, low power environment. Actually, Unix used to work pretty well in equally low-power environments. (Similarly slow CPUs, slightly better disks, far less memory, poorer I/O.) >PS >Henry, I teach 'common people' about unix as part of my job, and most >of them don't want to know anthing more then how to load SPSS or >whatever anyway. Maybe DOS has all they need? Until they want to know why their DOS programs can't use any more than 640K of memory even though their 386 box has 2MB, that is. DOS's mistakes have very little impact on canned-program users directly, but it gets its licks in indirectly, by making life harder for the application programs. -- A bit of tolerance is worth a | Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology megabyte of flaming. | uunet!attcan!utzoo!henry henry@zoo.toronto.edu
peter@ficc.uu.net (Peter da Silva) (10/22/89)
In article <5182@uhccux.uhcc.hawaii.edu> webb@uhccux.UUCP (Thomas Webb) writes: > Also, those > of us on tight personal budgets can get a complete DOS development > system for about $1500, $1000 for the machine and $500 for a very > complete set of development software. Fiddlesticks. (I'm saying that a lot lately. It's a lot more polite than what I'm thinking) You can get an Amiga development system for about that, and you get a real operating system with a message-based kernel, multitasking, windowing, and a decent base of commercial programs (yes, only a couple of the spreadsheets are 1-2-3 compatible. Shucks). Or of you don't care whether you can run commercial software, you can get your IBM-PC or an Atari ST with MINIX (have a look at the first group on the newsgroups line again). You will soon be able to get MINIX for the Amiga, though why you'd want to I don't know. For a little more money you can get a Macintosh, with a vast array of commercial software. The system software is pretty psychotic, but it's a hell of a lot better than DOS. > BTW, it isn't easy to learn to program in DOS, but it is even harder > to program in 'real' operating systems at the OS level. No, it's not. The DOS system calls are a proper subset of the UNIX system calls. The names and calling arguments are, in most cases, the same within two decimal places. Just about everyone (Microsoft included) has discovered the UNIX programming model by now. > Anyway, my feeling is that people who hate DOS are comparing it to > OSes that cost a lot more and run on more expensive platforms. This > is an apples and oranges type problem, not a class struggle. No, it's an apples-and-apples comparison. There are plenty of low-cost alternatives to DOS, even on 8088-based machines. -- Peter da Silva, *NIX support guy @ Ferranti International Controls Corporation. Biz: peter@ficc.uu.net, +1 713 274 5180. Fun: peter@sugar.hackercorp.com. `-_-' "ERROR: trust not in UUCP routing tables" 'U` -- MAILER-DAEMON@mcsun.EU.net
chasm@attctc.Dallas.TX.US (Charles Marslett) (10/23/89)
In article <1989Oct20.170447.19573@utzoo.uucp>, henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer) writes: > In article <2501@optilink.UUCP> cramer@optilink.UUCP (Clayton Cramer) writes: > >I'm sure that if DOS weren't used by COMMON PEOPLE, the DOS-haters > >would make appropriate criticisms of the many very real deficiencies > >of DOS, and leave it at that. But as long as someone can learn to > >use a computer without devoting years of their life to it, the > >DOS-haters will remain filled with irrational hatred. > > The common people make essentially no use of DOS; they just use it to load > programs that take over the whole machine and largely ignore DOS. Learning > to use DOS itself -- especially the fine points of the file system, which > is what this discussion was about -- *does* take lots of work. And it's not > worth the trouble for most people, which is exactly what Andy was getting at. I might point out that perhaps 1% of all users of the Unix operating system and its various imitators probably have any interest at all in the fine points of that file system. And I believe it was Dennis Ritchie himself who noted that Unix was a nice file system with a rudimentary OS attached (pardon the paraphrase). And neither point keeps people from using it. So the fact that DOS is a nice file system (and I disagree with anyone who says otherwise -- it is well suited for the tasks most of its users put it to) with virtually no OS attached is not to say it is inadequate. > Hatred of DOS is entirely rational, and has nothing to do with who else > uses it. There are ample reasons to despise that feeble excuse for an > operating system. > -- > A bit of tolerance is worth a | Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology > megabyte of flaming. | uunet!attcan!utzoo!henry henry@zoo.toronto.edu Henry, please read your little note here. Some might take your comments to be a bit of fire from the north! Charles Marslett (author of two DOSes somewhat more primative than Microsoft's) chasm@attctc.dallas.tx.us
chasm@attctc.Dallas.TX.US (Charles Marslett) (10/23/89)
In article <1989Oct22.003554.24199@utzoo.uucp>, henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer) writes: > In article <5182@uhccux.uhcc.hawaii.edu> webb@uhccux.UUCP (Thomas Webb) writes: > >... The moral here is that while DOS is undeniably > >feeble, it works very well in a low cost, low power environment. > > Actually, Unix used to work pretty well in equally low-power environments. > (Similarly slow CPUs, slightly better disks, far less memory, poorer I/O.) Come on, I used to work on such machines (PDP-11s, even the older VAXen) and they were dogs under Unix. Why do you think so many people used (use?) VMS? It is still around, isn't it? Unix on a fast 11 might support a compile and two edits. And the total clock time was comparable to that of a 10 MHz 286 with Xenix. For that matter, I think Turbo C would do the whole thing twice as fast with the same hardware. AND YOU SEEM TO HAVE MISSED THE PHRASE: low cost. > >PS > >Henry, I teach 'common people' about unix as part of my job, and most > >of them don't want to know anthing more then how to load SPSS or > >whatever anyway. Maybe DOS has all they need? > > Until they want to know why their DOS programs can't use any more than > 640K of memory even though their 386 box has 2MB, that is. DOS's mistakes > have very little impact on canned-program users directly, but it gets its > licks in indirectly, by making life harder for the application programs. Yes, and try to explain why AutoCAD takes 2 MB under DOS, 4 MB under OS/2 and 7 MB under Xenix to get the same performance. Again, life can be easier (as in the Mac world), but you pay for it. > -- > A bit of tolerance is worth a | Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology > megabyte of flaming. | uunet!attcan!utzoo!henry henry@zoo.toronto.edu Charles chasm@attctc.dallas.tx.us
chasm@attctc.Dallas.TX.US (Charles Marslett) (10/23/89)
In article <6627@ficc.uu.net>, peter@ficc.uu.net (Peter da Silva) writes: > [wrt Mac vs. DOS] The system software is pretty psychotic, but it's a hell of a lot > better than DOS. I don't know what you are refering to here, but having used MANY operating systems, and programmed them, the Mac OS (Finder, et al.) is only marginally better than DOS. In fact I find DOS+MS/Windows to be not only comparable, but more flexible (it does have a command line interpreter), and more intuitive. So what if it came along two or three years later -- it is an improvement. If you are referring to programming, the Mac is the only machine I have surrendered to (I have never successfully written a program from scratch for it. They all get bogged down in trying to do some trivial little thing that both DOS and Unix do make easy). > No, it's not. The DOS system calls are a proper subset of the UNIX system > calls. The names and calling arguments are, in most cases, the same within > two decimal places. Just about everyone (Microsoft included) has discovered > the UNIX programming model by now. Except Apple. > No, it's an apples-and-apples comparison. There are plenty of low-cost > alternatives to DOS, even on 8088-based machines. WHAT?????????????????? Be real, If you can mention a single real alternative to DOS on an 80x86 machine that qualifies (even being rather liberal and ignoring the cost of application programs) as low cost, I'll shut up and go along with this (%censored%). Minix is hardly useful as a programming environment (for example, it is not even on my hard disk now, Xenix has displaced it, but DOS is always there, because I cannot work without it -- My MINIX kernel is, of course, compiled under DOS). DRDOS has most of the drawbacks of MSDOS, and a few extra. Xenix costs more than the machine I run it on (and more than all but two or three of the programs on the disk put togather). Interactive Unix is even more (and runs only on a 386). VM/386 is likewise nice, but not cheap and not supported universally among software vendors ;^). And I cannot waste the netwidth for a complete list, so I'll just ask: what is a worthwhile alternative?? > -- > Peter da Silva, *NIX support guy @ Ferranti International Controls Corporation. > Biz: peter@ficc.uu.net, +1 713 274 5180. Fun: peter@sugar.hackercorp.com. `-_-' > "ERROR: trust not in UUCP routing tables" 'U` > -- MAILER-DAEMON@mcsun.EU.net Charles Marslett chasm@attctc.dallas.tx.us [Speaking purely personally, since I have lots of personality to speak from.]
peter@ficc.uu.net (Peter da Silva) (10/23/89)
I said [wrt Mac vs. DOS] The system software is pretty psychotic, but it's a hell of a lot better than DOS. In article <9830@attctc.Dallas.TX.US> chasm@attctc.Dallas.TX.US (Charles Marslett) writes: > I don't know what you are refering to here, but having used MANY operating > systems, and programmed them, the Mac OS (Finder, et al.) is only marginally > better than DOS. From a programming standpoint, it's psychotic. From a users standpoint, it's light years ahead. > In fact I find DOS+MS/Windows to be not only comparable, but > more flexible (it does have a command line interpreter), and more intuitive. I agree. MS-Windows has avoided many of the stupidities of MacOS (which makes Apple's lawsuit all the more ludicrous). But only a small fraction of DOS programs are written for MS-Windows, and all too many take over the screen because they're not well-behaved. And writing software for Windows is just as hard as writing software for the Mac. The programming model is the all-too-common event loop with callbacks. > If you are referring to programming, the Mac is the only machine I have > surrendered to (I have never successfully written a program from scratch > for it. They all get bogged down in trying to do some trivial little thing > that both DOS and Unix do make easy). Yeppers. And Windows is just the same. [low-cost alternatives to DOS] > If you can mention a single real alternative to DOS on an 80x86 machine > that qualifies (even being rather liberal and ignoring the cost of application > programs) as low cost, I'll shut up and go along with this (%censored%). Minix is getting there. But you may be right, so dump that 80*86 and get yourself a 68000 (no, not a Mac). -- Peter da Silva, *NIX support guy @ Ferranti International Controls Corporation. Biz: peter@ficc.uu.net, +1 713 274 5180. Fun: peter@sugar.hackercorp.com. `-_-' "I feared that the committee would decide to go with their previous 'U` decision unless I credibly pulled a full tantrum." -- dmr@alice.UUCP
cramer@optilink.UUCP (Clayton Cramer) (10/24/89)
In article <6615@ficc.uu.net>, peter@ficc.uu.net (Peter da Silva) writes: > In article <2501@optilink.UUCP> cramer@optilink.UUCP (Clayton Cramer) writes: # # I'm sure that if DOS weren't used by COMMON PEOPLE, the DOS-haters # # would make appropriate criticisms of the many very real deficiencies # # of DOS, and leave it at that. But as long as someone can learn to # # use a computer without devoting years of their life to it, the # # DOS-haters will remain filled with irrational hatred. # # Oh, fiddlesticks. # # If this was the case then the Macintosh would be the computer everyone # feels disdain for. Making effective use of a DOS machine is much, much Missed all the nasty remarks about the "Macintoy" a while back? # harder than making effective use of a Mac. But us slimey elitists merely # point out the fery real deficiencies of the Mac and leave it at that. Why? # Largely because where the Mac is limited by its origins, DOS is limited # by deliberate malice on the part of IBM and Microsoft. # # (yes, I know that a corporation can't feel malice, but if you trust the # Turing test there is no better phrase for the behaviour of these companies) # -- # Peter da Silva, *NIX support guy @ Ferranti International Controls Corporation. I think a more accurate statement is that DOS is limited by its age. (Of course, Microsoft's approach to software doesn't excite me much either, but comparing DOS -- still largely limited by hardware compatibility problems from 1979 design requirements) to the Mac (five very fast years later) isn't particularly fair. I'm not particularly a DOS partisan, either. I have an AT at home, I use a Mac regularly, and a Sun 3, but this arrogant contempt that is continually being shown by academics for the PC AND the Mac annoys me. -- Clayton E. Cramer {pyramid,pixar,tekbspa}!optilink!cramer Drugs are destroying the moral fiber of America...Another beer, please. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Disclaimer? You must be kidding! No company would hold opinions like mine!
gary@dvnspc1.Dev.Unisys.COM (Gary Barrett) (10/24/89)
> I'm sure that if DOS weren't used by COMMON PEOPLE, the DOS-haters > would make appropriate criticisms of the many very real deficiencies > of DOS, and leave it at that. But as long as someone can learn to > use a computer without devoting years of their life to it, the > DOS-haters will remain filled with irrational hatred. Wow, some fairly strong words here! Might I even say ... irrational hatred? Don't get me wrong, I believe that DOS has proven itself a very useful tool. But there is a heck of lot of difference between being a DOS PC **user** and a DOS developer. DOS-based programmers have often fought long and hard to get their applications to work DESPITE DOS. And THAT is what makes DOS PCs so special, my opinion: the applications that run over the DOS base, not DOS per se. But let's face it, DOS needs to enter the world of protected-mode and multi-tasking to handle the kinds of sophisticated applications now being demanded of desktop devices. Does that mean OS/2 is inevitable? Not necessarily. OS/2 seems to be overkill. Seems to me that if something like the Amiga OS can exist, for a reasonable cost, we could develop something like it (super DOS) for the PC. Of course, I'm not sure that fits well into IBM's plans, who targets the moneyed corporate user. (The same may be true of Microsoft anymore, who seems to have forgotten its roots with the "little guy".) I suspect that Mr. Tannenbaum's disdain for DOS comes from a developer's (craftman's) critical eye, not from an elitist perspective. -- ======================================================================== Gary L. Barrett My employer may or may not agree with my opinions. And I may or may not agree with my employer's opinions. ========================================================================
shawn@marilyn.UUCP (Shawn P. Stanley) (10/25/89)
I don't think contempt for DOS should be realised as contempt for a DOS user, who is only trying to get a task done no matter what anyone's opinion of their environment. Let's try to help each other instead of withholding information indiscriminantly.
madd@world.std.com (jim frost) (10/25/89)
In article <6660@ficc.uu.net> peter@ficc.uu.net (Peter da Silva) writes: |And how about standard library calls like "popen"? |How do you do that on an IBM? I did an off-the-cuff implementation a couple of years ago. If it's a write pipe, open a tmp file on popen, dump the stuff to it, and spawn the other process on pclose. If it's a read pipe, spawn the process immediately with output to a tmp file and start reading on its completion. Perfect semantics is a little more difficult but it does work fairly well. Someone actually turned my implementation into a real thing, so I guess there was demand for it :-). Personally I'd just put UNIX on the machine and solve the whole problem. Followups redirected to comp.sys.ibm.pc. jim frost software tool & die madd@std.com
paula@bcsaic.UUCP (Paul Allen) (10/26/89)
In article <9830@attctc.Dallas.TX.US> chasm@attctc.Dallas.TX.US (Charles Marslett) writes: > >Minix is hardly useful as a programming environment (for example, it is not >even on my hard disk now, Xenix has displaced it, but DOS is always there, >because I cannot work without it -- My MINIX kernel is, of course, compiled >under DOS). At last! Something in this thread that applies to Minix! Minix is a cheap alternative for hackers who have always wanted a Unix source license. It was intended to be instructive, rather than 'useful' in the sense that I think Charles means. It is most certainly useful enough to compile itself! What more do you want? :-) I invite everyone to choose the machine/OS that fits their own personal definition of 'useful' and then take this "my OS is better than yours" discussion someplace else. Please? Thanks! Paul -- ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Paul L. Allen | pallen@atc.boeing.com Boeing Advanced Technology Center | ...!uw-beaver!bcsaic!pallen
mcdonald@uxe.cso.uiuc.edu (10/26/89)
>Right. Single-tasking was forced by a hardware design requirement. The >lack of ANY support for serial I/O was a hardware design requirement. >Peter da Silva, *NIX support guy @ Ferranti International Controls Corporation. Above qoute taken out of context. The context shows that Mr. de Silva thinks that single-tasking was NOT forced by the hardware. I contend that attempting a fully functional multitasking system without hardware memory management is a mistake. I am familiar with two attempts: Microsoft Windows and the present Mac. They both suffer mightily because the try to move things around in memory without relocation hardware. A disaster of the first magnitude. Doug McDonald
cs304pal@rata.vuw.ac.nz (Lloyd Parkes) (10/27/89)
In article <6627@ficc.uu.net> peter@ficc.uu.net (Peter da Silva) writes: >In article <5182@uhccux.uhcc.hawaii.edu> webb@uhccux.UUCP (Thomas Webb) writes: >> Also, those >> of us on tight personal budgets can get a complete DOS development >> system for about $1500, $1000 for the machine and $500 for a very >> complete set of development software. > >Fiddlesticks. (I'm saying that a lot lately. It's a lot more polite than >what I'm thinking) I would just like to add my fiddlesticks as well, I have a 12Mhz AT, with two (small) hard drives, with an excellent VGA card, with VGA monitor. All for $NZ2700 + $NZ700 + $NZ900. This is about $US2600 max (exchange rates are a bit dodgy). All this paid for by a part time job, while I study here at University. It really isn't that hard to get a very nice AT based development system. I would actually like to see more work done on using VGAs as graphics terminals, with windows etc. :-) Fun for someone. Lloyd Quick, send your money to cs304pal@rata.vuw.ac.nz now! If you think anyone believes what I have just said, then you must be daft in the head!
cs304pal@rata.vuw.ac.nz (Lloyd Parkes) (10/27/89)
In article <9830@attctc.Dallas.TX.US> chasm@attctc.Dallas.TX.US (Charles Marslett) writes: >In article <6627@ficc.uu.net>, peter@ficc.uu.net (Peter da Silva) writes: >Minix is hardly useful as a programming environment (for example, it is not >even on my hard disk now, Xenix has displaced it, but DOS is always there, >because I cannot work without it -- My MINIX kernel is, of course, compiled >under DOS). DRDOS has most of the drawbacks of MSDOS, and a few extra. Minix, is my only development environment, DOS is marginally useful for writing small assembler programs, but for a real program, I would write it under Minix. I have 2-3 (sometimes 4) minix partitions on my hard drives, and my boot sector asks me which OS to boot, needles to say I choose minix. Minix is a God send, now I can write hardware intensive code in C, under DOS you are stuck with assembler. Unless of course, you are brave enough to fix the commercial C compiler's libraries, and even then, you don't have the source for those. In short, as far as my computer is concerned Minix is the best thing since sliced bread. Lloyd (DOS gets up my nose) Quick, send your money to cs304pal@rata.vuw.ac.nz now! If you think anyone believes what I have just said, then you must be daft in the head!
dhesi@sun505.UUCP (Rahul Dhesi) (10/27/89)
In article <1989Oct20.170447.19573@utzoo.uucp> henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer) writes: >Hatred of DOS is entirely rational, and has nothing to do with who else >uses it. There are ample reasons to despise that feeble excuse for an >operating system. That depends on the particular DOS, you know. UNIX, for example, is a pretty decent DOS. Rahul Dhesi <dhesi%cirrusl@oliveb.ATC.olivetti.com> UUCP: oliveb!cirrusl!dhesi Use above addresses--email sent here via Sun.com will probably bounce.
chasm@attctc.Dallas.TX.US (Charles Marslett) (10/29/89)
In article <1989Oct27.000935.8342@comp.vuw.ac.nz>, cs304pal@rata.vuw.ac.nz (Lloyd Parkes) writes: > In article <9830@attctc.Dallas.TX.US> chasm@attctc.Dallas.TX.US (Charles Marslett) writes: > >In article <6627@ficc.uu.net>, peter@ficc.uu.net (Peter da Silva) writes: > > >Minix is hardly useful as a programming environment (for example, it is not > >even on my hard disk now, Xenix has displaced it, but DOS is always there, > >because I cannot work without it -- My MINIX kernel is, of course, compiled > >under DOS). DRDOS has most of the drawbacks of MSDOS, and a few extra. > > Minix, is my only development environment, DOS is marginally useful for > writing small assembler programs, but for a real program, I would write it > under Minix. I have 2-3 (sometimes 4) minix partitions on my hard drives, > and my boot sector asks me which OS to boot, needles to say I choose minix. Actually I find exactly the reverse to be true: the atrocious syntax of the Intel/Microsoft assembly language make minix's assembly language a breath of fresh air (I even prefer the archaic AT&T syntax used by Interactive Unix). But real programs (those that are modification of other people's code or that have taken me more than 6 months to write) nearly always take more resources than minix provides. Minix C is not really very close to ANSI (and is not really K&R either), and will not compile about 1/3 of the code I throw at it. Further it doesn't even accept 64K code + 64K data. I am looking forward to bringing up the 286-protected mode kernel, but I am still limited by the size of the program units it permits. > Minix is a God send, now I can write hardware intensive code in C, under > DOS you are stuck with assembler. Unless of course, you are brave enough to > fix the commercial C compiler's libraries, and even then, you don't have > the source for those. Either I do not understand what you are saying, or you are treading very thin ice: under any multitasking environment hardware code is almost certain to crash the file system regularly (unless, of course you never write buggy code ;^). DOS is characterized by a single thread of execution, so even disk I/O is reasonably likely to damage only the partition being written to or read from. Neither "real" Unix or minix has that blessing (or curse, if you happen to like multitasking every once in a while!). Or you can force minix (but probably not AT&T's Unix) to run in a mode very similar to MSDOS -- but why? DOS really does a very effective job of allowing real work to be done, and still absolutely prohibiting even a near semblance of multitasking (even Desqview and Windows are rather remote semblances of multitasking). > In short, as far as my computer is concerned Minix is the best thing since > sliced bread. I won't disagree, but except for a few small programs I still have to compile my code under DOS (even diff -- gnu version -- will not compile in 64K). I once did a lot of programming of Z80s, and the need to do useful work resulted in lots of assembly code tied togather by C mainline code. Minix, today, still has the same constraints (unless you buy an ST). > Lloyd (DOS gets up my nose) > Quick, send your money to cs304pal@rata.vuw.ac.nz now! > > If you think anyone believes what I have just said, > then you must be daft in the head! (Funny, my mother said I was a bit daft thirty years ago, and that was before I fell in love with minix, C or graphics . . .) =============================================================================== "Those who would sacrifice ** Charles Marslett liberty for security, ** STB Systems, Inc. <-- apply all std. disclaimers deserve neither." ** Wordmark Systems <-- that's just me -- Benjamin Franklin ** chasm\@attctc.dallas.tx.us ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Note: the disclaimer has nothing to do with this discussion: I just like pithy quotes!
news@bbn.COM (News system owner ID) (10/31/89)
cramer@optilink.UUCP (Clayton Cramer): < Missed all the nasty remarks about the "Macintoy" a while back? Well, no, actually. Programming the Mac is a very "a ha" sort of thing -- the learning curve is rather long, but after a few months it all makes sense, and is relatively elegant. If you don't "get it", then you havn't thought long enough about it yet -- go and meditate some more... Most of the people who have been saying otherwize have been doing MeSsy-DOS for so long that it seems to have rotted their brains... (only 1/2 :-); flames to /dev/null, NUL:, Trashcan (your choice)). The basic bit of uglyness is that you have to start up all the handlers by hand because the Mac doesn't have a real OS. Neither does the PC, for that matter. Also, you *do* have to pay attention to *all* the result codes (but that's true for everything anyway), and you have to poll for events rather than getting interupts (but this is true for most window systems). As for command line interfaces, Apple loves them _for_development_ -- MPW is command line based, and works Just Fine, Thanks. Plus you get the added bonus of consistancy: all applications look basically the same, so it takes about 1/10 the time to learn to use a Mac than for a PC (this tidbit from one of the PC rags' surveys). Look at it this way: MSDOS is an overgrown program loader; the MacOS is an overgrown user interface. Neither is an operating system, but the second is better for running applications. -- Paul Placeway
schanck@harmonica.cis.ohio-state.edu (Christopher Schanck) (10/31/89)
In article <47522@bbn.COM> pplacewa@algedi.bbn.com (Paul W. Placeway) writes: >Look at it this way: MSDOS is an overgrown program loader; the MacOS >is an overgrown user interface. Neither is an operating system, but >the second is better for running applications. Possibly the most succinct description I have heard in years. However, I would argue that the MacOS is inherently better at running applications; I've known some neophytes who loathed the MacOS after prolonged exposure. Chris -=- "Ever pop the clutch?" --- Geordi, ST:TNG Christopher Schanck (schanck@cis.ohio-state.edu)