Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!ncc!alberta!access!edm!rroot
From: rroot@edm.UUCP (uucp)
Newsgroups: comp.misc
Subject: Re: OS/2 is the result of anticompetitive practices by IBM and Microsoft
Message-ID: <3112@edm.UUCP>
Date: 12 May 88 10:21:55 GMT
References: <1623@looking.UUCP>
Organization: Unexsys Systems, Edmonton,AB.
Lines: 48

From article <1623@looking.UUCP>, by brad@looking.UUCP (Brad Templeton):
: In article <3094@edm.UUCP> rroot@edm.UUCP (uucp) writes:
:>> 	a) Administration - this has been discussed a lot, so I won't
: 
: You must get a better understanding of the typical DOS user -- the kind who
: 
: If you know Unix, you can have an easy enough time running your system if
: you don't try to do very much with it, but it's still quite a step over
: DOS.  OS/2 probably is, too.
Most of the difficult stuff with a UNIX box comes from things like usenet
(4Meg a day can cause headaches for almost ANYBODY). If you assume that
a system isn't gonna be getting something like usenet traffic, there is
very little that needs to be done by the user. I have seen, for example, 
an old sun 1 (upgraded to a 68010) that got NIL administration for a 
couple of years of use. If you have your CRON scripts set up right,
The system will even tell you which tape to put in for tonight's backup
in your login message - Worry free usage.
 If you don't give the user reason to become super-user, then you can even
protect 'important' programs from indescrete removal (thank god for file protection).
: 
:>> 		Unix fragments file systems heavily, and that means you
:>Use the BSD file system: It handles (prevents) fragmentation reasonably well.
:>(normal MS-DOS/OS-2 has the same problems as the bell FS anyways)
: 
: No, there's a big difference.  DOS breaks files into extents, but
: the extents are large if they can be.  Regular unix often grabs blocks one at a
: time as they come in the free list.  This can be fixed, of course.
The BSD system uses an extent type system. The nice thing is that, it even
seems resiliant to fragmentation over time (something which can't be said for
the MS-DOS FS). The new AT&T bitmap system also allows for 'extents' (I don't
know, though, if it actually tries to take advantage of this ability),
but probably (like the MS FS) still fragments over time.
: 
:>> 	h) Convenient floppy disk use
:>See my answer to b): The same answer applies here.
: No.  Sync on quiet is not enough, unless it's of the level of sync before
: spin-down, and expect the disk to be removed.
Yep: that's almost precisely what I'm talking about (for floppies, anyways).
For HD's things are a bit different (since they never 'spin down', but I see
NO REASON why a file system that's been quiescent for more than a second or
so should have ANY dirty blocks in the system cache. As far as I'm
concerned, this is just lazy programming on the part of the device driver
writers. If you can 'spin down' a floppy, then you should be able to SYNC it.
-- 
-------------
 Stephen Samuel 
  {ihnp4,ubc-vision,vax135}!alberta!edm!steve
  or userzxcv@uqv-mts.bitnet