byron@archone.tamu.EDU (Byron Rakitzis) (03/06/91)
Archive-name: unix/shell/rc/1991-03-04 Archive-directory: archone.tamu.edu:/pub/rc/ [128.194.5.240] Original-posting-by: byron@archone.tamu.EDU (Byron Rakitzis) Original-subject: rc, a new shell Reposted-by: emv@ox.com (Edward Vielmetti) I'm announcing the availability of my own implementation of rc, the AT&T plan 9 and Unix v10 shell in use at Bell Labs. I'm releasing "version 0.9", which means that rc has seen a lot of testing by a few people, but that now it's time to freeze any development completely and let a larger number of users shake the remaining bugs out. When this happens, I will (with hope, in the near future) release "version 1.0". What is rc? rc is a small shell, similar to the Bourne shell. It has powerful variable manipulation primitives, however, which makes it a very useful shell language. It is *not* another bash/ksh/tcsh which tries to do everything but fetch your slippers. You can use it interactively (as I have been doing for the last several months) or you can use it to write fast-starting and easy-to-read shell scripts; rc's syntax is based on C, much more so than the so-called C-shell. Where can I get rc? The shell is available by anonymous ftp from archone.tamu.edu, in ~ftp/pub/rc. I also honor personal email requests for an email copy. How do I find out more about rc? I've enclosed here an introduction to rc which comes with the rc source distribution. It is an outline of its main features; some experience with Unix shells is assumed. You can also read about AT&T's rc in the Unix Research 10th edition manuals. These are available in bookstores in two volumes, published by Saunders College Publishing. Enjoy. Byron Rakitzis. [600 lines of "introduction to rc" deleted. --Ed.]