taylor@limbo.Intuitive.Com (Dave Taylor) (05/03/90)
Earlier in this group, David Barts commented: > When is HP-UX going to get a halfway decent version of pathalias > (one that understands angle brackets and the FAST symbolic cost)? No offense, David, but I wouldn't expect HP to supply or support the pathalias program at all. Think about it; while you (and I) might be stuck in the UUCP only universe, we're really more typical of the PC Unix shops than the larger installations. HP-UX is not at all aimed at our needs. So why should HP supply/support pathalias? It's true that HP has a mutually beneficial agreement to offer SCO Xenix on their Vectra line, but having the continuing misfortune of having to work within Xenix, it has a LOT bigger problems than whether or not pathalias is included. Frankly, last I heard, pathalias was a public domain-ish software package that you could glean from just about any common FTP site (or even from the Interex 9000/CSL perhaps?). If it really has the limitations you refer to, perhaps the solution is as simple as you obtaining a more recent version and re-installing it on your machine?? As an informative caveat, I am priviledged enough to have a very smart network hub as my primary UUCP connection, so not only do I have high speed and high quality connectivity with email (I have experienced trans-continental responses of under ten minutes!) but I don't have to worry about resolving complex UUCP addresses; instead I just hand them all to my resolver site. While the connection being via UUCP might be a bit unusual, note that HP *does* strongly support the "dumb client/smart server" model with their networking and connectivity tools... Perhaps fundamentally the problem you face is that you need to improve your own UUCP connectivity? > BTW, if you haven't replied to my posting on the screen saver in > X11, DON'T. (For some odd reason, I thought the man page for `X' > would describe the program `X' [now why would I think that? :-)], > instead of the `xserver' page documenting `X'). Well, if we're going to start looking at how horribly the Unix man pages are organized, then we really can get off the ground complaining! :-) The downside is that it is widely believed in the industry that the HP-UX man pages are among the best that you can get. Indeed, I have heard of people using other versions of Unix and having their HP-UX documentation adjacent to the machine due to its dramatically higher quality and more intelligent layout. Kind of hard to believe given that it's all so confusing and awkward, but that's just another part of the fun of Unix. -- Dave Taylor Intuitive Systems Mountain View, California taylor@limbo.intuitive.com or {uunet!}{decwrl,apple}!limbo!taylor
davidb@Pacer.UUCP (David Barts) (05/08/90)
In article <728@limbo.Intuitive.Com>, taylor@limbo.Intuitive.Com (Dave Taylor) writes: > Earlier in this group, David Barts commented: > > > When is HP-UX going to get a halfway decent version of pathalias > > (one that understands angle brackets and the FAST symbolic cost)? > [ justifications for HP not supporting pathalias edited out] . . . Well, they *do* supply it, and I think it's pretty dumb to send out a version of pathalias that can't correctly parse the UUCP maps currently being sent out over Usenet (especially when the most recent pathalias compiles with no problems on HP-UX). Kinda like shipping a free EBCDIC terminal with each HP-UX system and saying "Well, silly, *of course* you can't use it on an ASCII system." :-) > : > : > Perhaps fundamentally the problem you face is that you need to > improve your own UUCP connectivity? Hardly. I haven't had 10-minute transcontinential E-mail, but I can send messages to the East Coast and have them arrive in 20-25 minutes (which is the best UUCP connections I've ever had). > ... [ discussion related to docs for `X' being under `xserver' > and DT's opinion that HP docs are still the best ] ... Well, Solbourne (and presumably Sun, too) have beat HP on the `X' manual page -- by a little. The OS/MP X docs. have an X(1) which is the same as HP's X(1), but the server program (X) is under X(8C) instead of Xserver(1). It's still slightly sleazy, but at least I can find what I want on the second try. What would probably be best is to place all X windows commands in a new section of the manual (section 9? 1x?), then what was X(9) could be made into intro(9) and X(9) would document the server. This would be consistent with the rest of the manual. On a related note, why does HP place the maintenance commands and daemons in section 1m while BSD and Sun use section 8? Is Section 8 a BSD-ism, or did it exist in the V7 UNIX docs? If section 8 existed in the V7 manual, then is 1m a Sys{3,5}-ism or an HP-ism, and what was the rationale behind changing 8 to 1m? Which brings us to the reason for the strange "Summary" line. Back in my early days with UNIX in college (1982 or so) I was snooping about the /etc directory (VAX running BSD 3.9 or 4.something) and hit upon an interesting little executable called comsat. Neither the man pages not "man comsat" turned up any information, so since it is world-executable, I try running it to see what happens. Nothing... Hmmm, let's try feeding it the name of a text file. Still nothing? How about comsat -v (perhaps a verbose flag?)... Five minutes later I give up trying to figure out what comsat does (it is Friday afternoon). Monday morning, I walk into the terminal room and the sysop comes out and loudly dumps a 5" thick pile of fanfold on my desk, saying "Here's your output from comsat, David." 1000's of errors because the dozen or so comsat daemons with my UID didn't have enough permission to do their work. The (300 baud!) printing console had long since run out paper and worn through the printer ribbon. Turns out comsat was documented briefly in a paragraph at the end of the biff(1) page. So the moral of the story is that more documentation may save paper in the short run, but it costs in the long run. However, less documentation can make it easier to tell who's snooping about in the system files! BTW, I can't claim credit for it, but the next release of BSD did come with a separate comsat(8) page! But I digress. Probably the one thing that would improve HP-UX documentation most of all would be to have all the commands for each section in one place instead of scattered amongst the "HP-UX Reference", "Networking Reference", and "Using the X Window System" volumes. I really enjoy the bound (as opposed to loose-leaf) "HP-UX Reference" volumes, but I'd be willing to go back to loose-leaf tomorrow if HP would ship binders of a size (and the correct Permuted Index) so that I could assemble a documentation set with all of section N in the same place. Despite my criticisms, I'd have to say HP does a good job with documentation (but finding what you want can be a pain). Definitely better than the unspeakable barbarisms that have been committed to the Xenix docs! -- David Barts Pacer Corporation davidb@pacer.uucp ...!uunet!pilchuck!pacer!davidb
guy@auspex.auspex.com (Guy Harris) (05/09/90)
>On a related note, why does HP place the maintenance commands and >daemons in section 1m while BSD and Sun use section 8? Is Section 8 a >BSD-ism, or did it exist in the V7 UNIX docs? If section 8 existed in >the V7 manual, then is 1m a Sys{3,5}-ism or an HP-ism, System III-ism or System V-ism; I no longer remember when AT&T decided to change it. >and what was the rationale behind changing 8 to 1m? Dunno. "Rationale" includes the substring "rational"; I'm not sure there was any reasoning involved. (Consider the fact that in AT&T's documentation, "termio" is in the *Administrator's* manual, not the *Programmer's* manual, which is completely stupid.)
jewett@hpl-opus.HP.COM (Bob Jewett) (06/12/90)
> When is HP-UX going to get a halfway decent version of pathalias > (one that understands angle brackets and the FAST symbolic cost)? [Basenote dated 30 Apr 90.] Well, I just got a DTS [Defect Tracking System] report on the enhancement request I submitted some time ago for an update to pathalias 9.0. It seems that 9.0 will be in a future release of HP-UX. If that is not what you want, speak up soon, and I will pass on your comments. Bob [Not an official statement, etc.]