From: utzoo!decvax!wivax!linus!genradbo!mitccc!zrm Newsgroups: net.unix-wizards Title: Re: Is Unix Really This Bad? Article-I.D.: mitccc.419 Posted: Thu Mar 3 09:57:01 1983 Received: Tue Mar 8 02:15:30 1983 References: rlgvax.1132 What has kept Unix responsive to real, important needs is the fact that is was never responsive to niggling details. Throughout a long and unsupported developement only things that were interesting and worthwhile were done to Unix. Hence no "real time" support in an operating system meant to run on non-distributed minicomputers, whereas DEC's operating systems have always been subject to pressure from their user community to be all things to all people. So VMS is not "Software for the 80's", but "Software for the 60's" when all the grotty little real time systems that VMS has to be compatible with were designed. "You mean I can't hook up my U200 RJE station to my UNIX?" Sorry. The do-it-all philosophy sells machines, up to a point, and it provides much ammunition for the creeping featurists. But now that hardware is cheap enough so that any task requiring guarenteed response can have a machine dedicated to it, there is no need to have your 11/780 be able to ignore the 25 people using it to turn a valve off RIGHT NOW. Similarly, if you want to run a very full blown LISP, buy a LISP Machine and don't waste your time with a machine that can't support the most fundamental LISP constructs anywhere near as efficiently. UNIX is a system for a niche, and that niche happens to be quite broad. It is not all encompassing however and I think you will see an explosion of real time systems written in C to let a UNIX centered environment deal with real time needs and you will also see, e.g., LISP Machines and other specialized workstations harmonizing batter with UNIX. Cheers, Zig