[TUHS] Re: CB-UNIX dsw(1l) Page from PDP-7?

[TUHS] Re: CB-UNIX dsw(1l) Page from PDP-7?

[Norman Wilson]

Rather an aside, but the alt.sysadmin.recovery message referenced
in https://www.tuhs.org/pipermail/tuhs/1999-November/001203.html
chimes interesting chords for me.

If you care only about technical stuff, you should skip to
your next e-mail message now.

On one hand, the doubly-embedded net.unix-wizards message
from Dennis, dated 1984-12-08, containing the original dsw.s:
that was posted a few months after I joined Bell Labs, and
may even have been partly my fault.  1984 was the nominal
15th anniversary of UNIX; as a member of the steering committee
of the recently-formed UNIX* Special Interest Group in US DECUS,
I convinced Dennis to attend the Fall 1984 Symposium, in Anaheim
in early December, as part of a celebration.  As another part, I
made copies of the V1-V7 manuals in the UNIX Room and had them
shipped out so people could leaf through the history.  I think
Dennis dug out the PDP-7 source-code books as a contribution to
that effort; I am all but certain we brought copies of those too.

Of course I had the copies returned not to the Labs but to my
home address.  I still have them, now on a shelf in my home office.
A good friend offered to take care of shipping them back to New
Jersey, of course making her own copies in return.

I also recall that the conference hotel happened to give me
room 127.  I offered to swap with Dennis, since he deserved
that number more than I did (the extra digit had already been
prepended before I joined) but he cheerfully declined.

On the other hand--not as historic except to me--the author
of the singly-embedded 1999-11-23 alt.sysadmin.recovery message
is now (and has for some years been) a co-worker and a good
friend.

So this single 1999 TUHS posting touches points near both
the beginning and the end (so far) of my career, and two
different groups of smart people who are fun to work with.

Norman Wilson
Toronto ON

[TUHS] Re: CB-UNIX dsw(1l) Page from PDP-7?

[Random832]

On Fri, Jun 2, 2023, at 19:04, segaloco via TUHS wrote:
> Finally, this page plainly spells out the history of the command in the 
> bugs section:
>
> "This command was written in 2 minutes to delete a particular file that 
> managed to get an 0200 bit in its name.  It should work by printing the 
> name of each file in a specified directory and requestion a 'y' or 'n' 
> answer.  Better, it should be an option of rm(1).  The name is 
> mnemonic, but likely to cause trouble in the future."

One thing this makes me wonder is why the solution chosen wasn't to make a command that could *rename* the offending directory entry [which, then, with problematic characters removed, could be examined before deleting normally].

[TUHS] Re: CB-UNIX dsw(1l) Page from PDP-7?

[Ron Natalie]

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Might have been a ditto or mimeograh at some point.   We had such 
section 1 manuals at JHU when I was a student there in 1977.

------ Original Message ------
From "Marc Donner" <marc.donner@gmail.com>
To "segaloco" <segaloco@protonmail.com>
Cc "The Eunuchs Hysterical Society" <tuhs@tuhs.org>
Date 6/3/23, 8:59:35 AM
Subject [TUHS] Re: CB-UNIX dsw(1l) Page from PDP-7?

>Wow.  I’m impressed … that pdf is clearly of an nth generation 
>photocopy.  What contrast ratio?
>
>More seriously, this is a delightful proof point that some cruft is 
>really cruft.
>
>Your document archaeology work is entertaining and instructive.  Thank 
>you!
>
>Best,
>
>Marc
>=====
>On Fri, Jun 2, 2023 at 7:04 PM segaloco via TUHS <tuhs@tuhs.org> wrote:
>>While performing my CB-UNIX 2.3 manual separation, among the many 
>>curious things I came across was this manual page: 
>>https://www.tuhs.org/Archive/Distributions/USDL/CB_Unix/man/man1/dsw.1l.pdf
>>
>>The dsw(I) pages I've seen in the various UNIX manuals are all for the 
>>interactive delete utility, but make brief mention of the history of 
>>the command being amusing.  I've seen some communication on the matter 
>>of the years here, but had never come across a manual page for the 
>>former version of dsw.
>>
>>In the linked page up there is the actual "delete from switches" 
>>version of dsw.  What I find particularly interesting is that the 
>>footer indicates this was printed 8/11/81, but likewise indicates the 
>>command is "PDP-7 local".
>>
>>This raises a couple of questions:
>>
>>- Did Columbus ever touch PDP-7 UNIX?
>>- Did dsw(I) as "delete from switches" ever make it to PDP-11 UNIX?  
>>Even the V1 manual lists the "delete interactively" utility, not this.
>>- If neither are true, that begs the question of where this page came 
>>from, if there was ever a formalized PDP-7 manual that it would've 
>>descended from or not, etc.
>>
>>Finally, this page plainly spells out the history of the command in 
>>the bugs section:
>>
>>"This command was written in 2 minutes to delete a particular file 
>>that managed to get an 0200 bit in its name.  It should work by 
>>printing the name of each file in a specified directory and requestion 
>>a 'y' or 'n' answer.  Better, it should be an option of rm(1).  The 
>>name is mnemonic, but likely to cause trouble in the future."
>>
>>So the first bug is eventually mitigated by transforming this into the 
>>more familiar dsw.  I can't say what the latter means, whether it's a 
>>concern of "dsw" colliding with some reserved word eventually or is 
>>more poking fun at the other folk etymology of "delete s__t work".
>>
>>In any case, I hadn't seen the etymology explained to this degree in 
>>the mailing list references I found while searching around, so figured 
>>I'd share this analysis.
>>
>>- Matt G.
>>
>>P.S. There is mention here that Dennis Ritchie shared the original dsw 
>>manpage at some point 
>>https://www.tuhs.org/pipermail/tuhs/1999-November/001203.html however 
>>the link in question appears to be dead.  In any case, the source for 
>>the PDP-7 version is in that email if anyone wants to look at it, 
>>although looks to be the same as what is in the archive.
>--
>=====
>nygeek.net
>mindthegapdialogs.com/home <https://www.mindthegapdialogs.com/home>

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[TUHS] Re: CB-UNIX dsw(1l) Page from PDP-7?

[Marc Donner]

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Wow.  I’m impressed … that pdf is clearly of an nth generation photocopy.
What contrast ratio?

More seriously, this is a delightful proof point that some cruft is really
cruft.

Your document archaeology work is entertaining and instructive.  Thank you!

Best,

Marc
=====
On Fri, Jun 2, 2023 at 7:04 PM segaloco via TUHS <tuhs@tuhs.org> wrote:

> While performing my CB-UNIX 2.3 manual separation, among the many curious
> things I came across was this manual page:
> https://www.tuhs.org/Archive/Distributions/USDL/CB_Unix/man/man1/dsw.1l.pdf
>
> The dsw(I) pages I've seen in the various UNIX manuals are all for the
> interactive delete utility, but make brief mention of the history of the
> command being amusing.  I've seen some communication on the matter of the
> years here, but had never come across a manual page for the former version
> of dsw.
>
> In the linked page up there is the actual "delete from switches" version
> of dsw.  What I find particularly interesting is that the footer indicates
> this was printed 8/11/81, but likewise indicates the command is "PDP-7
> local".
>
> This raises a couple of questions:
>
> - Did Columbus ever touch PDP-7 UNIX?
> - Did dsw(I) as "delete from switches" ever make it to PDP-11 UNIX?  Even
> the V1 manual lists the "delete interactively" utility, not this.
> - If neither are true, that begs the question of where this page came
> from, if there was ever a formalized PDP-7 manual that it would've
> descended from or not, etc.
>
> Finally, this page plainly spells out the history of the command in the
> bugs section:
>
> "This command was written in 2 minutes to delete a particular file that
> managed to get an 0200 bit in its name.  It should work by printing the
> name of each file in a specified directory and requestion a 'y' or 'n'
> answer.  Better, it should be an option of rm(1).  The name is mnemonic,
> but likely to cause trouble in the future."
>
> So the first bug is eventually mitigated by transforming this into the
> more familiar dsw.  I can't say what the latter means, whether it's a
> concern of "dsw" colliding with some reserved word eventually or is more
> poking fun at the other folk etymology of "delete s__t work".
>
> In any case, I hadn't seen the etymology explained to this degree in the
> mailing list references I found while searching around, so figured I'd
> share this analysis.
>
> - Matt G.
>
> P.S. There is mention here that Dennis Ritchie shared the original dsw
> manpage at some point
> https://www.tuhs.org/pipermail/tuhs/1999-November/001203.html however the
> link in question appears to be dead.  In any case, the source for the PDP-7
> version is in that email if anyone wants to look at it, although looks to
> be the same as what is in the archive.
>
-- 
=====
nygeek.net
mindthegapdialogs.com/home <https://www.mindthegapdialogs.com/home>

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