tlonski@corvus.cel.scg.hac.com (Thomas Lonski) (01/26/91)
Hello all. I've been a silent reader of the various 3b1/unix-pc newsgroups (off and on) for the past 3 years. This site just got the new comp.sys.3b1 newsgroup and I couldn't resist posting a response. Please pardon any first-time "net etiquette" blunders. Hope I didn't waste too much bandwidth with my compulsion to introduce myself. KSH-88 is available for the 3B1, believe it or not. A company by the name of Aspen Technologies, Inc. paid AT&T's $3,000 price tag for the source code and they sell the KSH-88 executable for several machines, one of which is the 3b1. After getting spoiled on the new version of ksh at work, I broke down and bought a copy. It cost me $145 + $5 s/h. For my money, I got a 5 1/4" floppy and documentation in a three ring binder. Documentation consisted of installation/release notes, korn shell intro/overview, man pages and index which added up to about 75 pages. (OK, so it's a small 3 ring binder. :-)) I bought my copy in June 1990, so it should still be available. I had no problems installing it and have been using it since June. While I haven't gotten to do as much as I want with it, I have gotten addicted to file name completion. I definitely prefer it over the 3b1's original ksh. For anyone interested, their address/phone number is: Aspen Technologies, Inc. P.O. Box 5727 Parsippany, NJ 07054 (201) 316-0866 (201) 306-5781 (FAX) The person at Aspen who helped me was Eva Arndt. As far as I know (and from what I gather from the discussion on the net) there is no other full implementation of KSH-88 available for the 3b1. If I'm wrong and I've wasted my money, please feel free to inform me (privately). It's always nice to learn from one's mistakes. Before I sign off, I'd like to say thanks to those who have contributed to the unix-pc newsgroups. I've always been highly impressed with the technical level of the contributions/discussions. I'd particularly like to thank the "unix-pc workhorses" whose efforts have been above and beyond the call of duty in breathing new life into our orphaned 3b1. You know who you are. I confess that the only names I can remember off the top of my head are Thad's and Lenny's. Tom Lonski P.S. I've just moved to the Denver area. If anyone knows of any local 3b1 user's groups, I'd appreciate getting e-mailed any info.