From mboxrd@z Thu Jan  1 00:00:00 1970
From: dmr@plan9.bell-labs.com
To: 9fans@cse.psu.edu
Subject: Re: [9fans] Getting started in Plan9 - help
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Date: Mon, 21 Jan 2002 21:54:38 -0500
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Murdie observed,

 > If you put the command history editor in the shell, then you can only
 > use it in the shell; if you use another shell from time to time, then
 > you have to learn to use that shell's (different) history mechanism.
 > It's far better to use a single, general, command history mechanism
 > provided by your terminal emulator or Acme (which is so more than a
 > terminal emulator). There is a slight loss from the shell and the
 > command history editor being separated, I know.

True enough; that said, I retain considerable fondness for
the history mechanism of later research Unix systems. It
was adapted from earlier U of Toronto versions, I believe,
revived by Rob, and later put away again.

The shell appended each executed command (not in a script)
to a $HISTORY file.

The '=' command (not builtin) searched backwards in the
file for a last matching pattern, and reissued it.
E.g.

	=

redoes the previous command.

	= ls

finds the last shell command beginning with ls.
Text substitution could be accomplished with further
arguments.

The == variant allowed interactive editing.

	Dennis