Re: [9fans] mv vs cp

[William Josephson <wkj-despam@eecs.harvard.edu>]

On Mon, Oct 08, 2001 at 08:37:59AM -0700, Richard wrote:
> I do it all the time (at least 5, 10 times a month) on Linux, because
> I'm kind of compulsive about maintaining just the right names for data
> files I care about.
> 
> The point is not that it is necessary, but rather that millions are
> already used to being able to do it, and letting them do it on Plan 9
> (provided of course it is implemented cleanly) will lower the obstacle
> to their become Plan 9 users.

But Plan 9 is not Unix and the more one tries to make it look like
Unix, feel like Unix, or quack like Unix, the more grief one comes to.
Under Unix I use mv to move trees around fairly frequently (as often
as once or twice a day), although at least half the time it is across
partitions so the point is moot anyway.  The urge to do this
disappeared pretty quickly when I started using Plan 9 to the
exclusion of Unix this summer.  I'm more of a neat-freak when it comes
to directory structure than most and I still didn't feel the loss.
Perhaps having a real fileserver makes the difference, but I'd suggest
living for a while with Plan 9 as Plan 9 and not Unix and see if you
still find it intolerable.  I think the biggest obstacle to using Plan
9 is knowing that it was built in the same room as Unix.

  -WJ