Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!husc6!rutgers!ucsd!ucbvax!FHCRCVAX.BITNET!JOE
From: JOE@FHCRCVAX.BITNET (Joe Meadows)
Newsgroups: comp.os.vms
Subject: RE: Re: Has anyone written their own CLI?
Message-ID: 
Date: 1 Jul 88 16:58:00 GMT
Sender: daemon@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU
Organization: The Internet
Lines: 48

Craig Leres  writes:
>Michael Dorl (dorl@vms.macc.wisc.edu) writes:
>> I'd like to talk to anyone who has written their own command language
>> interpreter for VMS.  Better yet, I'd like to see an example.  What
>> I need to do is to provide a highly efficient platform to restrict
>> certain users to a subset of available programs and commands so I
>> need a CLI that accepts and parses user commands, loads the required
>> programs, and provides whatever interfaces the VMS CLI would otherwise
>> provide.
>Why not just use DCL? Armed with the verb program that has been posted
>several times and the command definition utility that comes with VMS,
>it should be very easy to write a .cld file that does exactly what you
>want and is "safe."

        I can think of some reasons not to use DCL. You can't restrict the
user all that much. Sure, you can remove many commands, but the foreign
command interface isn't removable, so many things can't be restricted.
If you leave in the SET COMMAND command they can rebuild their tables.
The only way to completely restrict an account is to have a captive
account and some kind of a shell procedure, but then you don't really
need to modify DCLTABLES at all. Not to discourage you from using
verb or anything (I did write it for a reason)...

        I'd like to see an example command language interpreter. It would
be quite interesting to try alternate interfaces. Surely anyone who has
had to work much with the command definition utility wishes that it were
more capable. Doesn't everyone have a few pet peeves with DCL? Imagine
being able to rewrite SPAWN, and getting rid of the need to send all symbols,
key definitions, and logical names through a mailbox to the newly created
process, spawns could be as fast as sys$creprc.. Imagine multiple subprocesses
sharing exactly the same CLI (i.e. one copy in memory, shared key definitions,
shared symbols, etc...).

        Tell ya' what, if people send me their pet peeves (with DCL/VMS),
I'll collect a list and summarize it to the net..

        Well, enough of this random rambling, I'll let y'all get
back to work now...

  Cheers,
  Joe Meadows Jr.
  VAX/VMS System Manager / guru in training
  Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center
  1124 Columbia St.
  Seattle Wa. 98104
     bitnet - JOE@FHCRCVAX
     arpa   - JOE%FHCRCVAX.BITNET@OLY.ACS.WASHINGTON.EDU
     voice  - (206) 467-4970