From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.4.4 (2020-01-24) on inbox.vuxu.org X-Spam-Level: X-Spam-Status: No, score=-1.1 required=5.0 tests=DKIM_SIGNED,DKIM_VALID, DKIM_VALID_AU,MAILING_LIST_MULTI autolearn=ham autolearn_force=no version=3.4.4 Received: (qmail 26749 invoked from network); 2 Jan 2023 22:55:11 -0000 Received: from minnie.tuhs.org (50.116.15.146) by inbox.vuxu.org with ESMTPUTF8; 2 Jan 2023 22:55:11 -0000 Received: from minnie.tuhs.org (localhost [IPv6:::1]) by minnie.tuhs.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id D5847424DA; Tue, 3 Jan 2023 08:54:35 +1000 (AEST) DKIM-Signature: v=1; a=rsa-sha256; c=relaxed/relaxed; d=tuhs.org; s=dkim; t=1672700076; h=from:from:reply-to:reply-to:subject:subject:date:date: message-id:message-id:to:to:cc:cc:mime-version:mime-version: content-type:content-type: content-transfer-encoding:content-transfer-encoding: in-reply-to:in-reply-to:references:references:list-id:list-help: list-owner:list-unsubscribe:list-subscribe:list-post; bh=25fcygRckt/ooowcBAQnWMYS5M3MZImAMZgZ8LN2FmY=; b=BMBCKRtxii9kD2AfmyugADEFpHqR3S/82odxiV8eWYCAVSbvFu83KBFXUNHfNIGhZo+6oR Lr8ZSwje21Vo14meRqbA1ts1fuG/arHWyXeNh5dXLbYi7/O5vGmYGyznyKhDjCg2VZ+4KO yRkgIfcURWD0BKsG1CCgLuOhmw+x17c= Received: from mail-4324.protonmail.ch (mail-4324.protonmail.ch [185.70.43.24]) by minnie.tuhs.org (Postfix) with ESMTPS id F05C7424D9 for ; Tue, 3 Jan 2023 08:54:28 +1000 (AEST) Date: Mon, 02 Jan 2023 22:54:22 +0000 DKIM-Signature: v=1; a=rsa-sha256; c=relaxed/relaxed; d=protonmail.com; s=protonmail3; t=1672700066; x=1672959266; bh=25fcygRckt/ooowcBAQnWMYS5M3MZImAMZgZ8LN2FmY=; h=Date:To:From:Cc:Subject:Message-ID:In-Reply-To:References: Feedback-ID:From:To:Cc:Date:Subject:Reply-To:Feedback-ID: Message-ID:BIMI-Selector; b=Ob1HJjxhioyxOBCP5n+cpDEbRuqgfJXbxD21FfJ5JwoAJeG+qQVRUgrmiviHoVL8E rbyZSwZLQ6GdKgfQc0HLVraTtNvsSop0x7gG8j+xIYdQSFsLN3bvm/oi/LZk2H+ZmQ +412Gk9TQ0U6o0bHlku5mqnop7NMNbdjpoXgoauX7Fj8HHKUPf9AgxZMHvrED4Q7md 7KaQv+fBez0tDiU818OUY9MFmQW1U1ZVLQ9c+DUzge+mNm8j3STydvcjG3qHPzQvxG zklDkF0EVzQoXvSFHiTPGCp7+ej4h0Gbl0YO2rFuburMHHrypJhccdnCyMddnAa4Gh 1N1ebeRhRGzNQ== To: Dan Cross Message-ID: In-Reply-To: References: <20230102181242.GO25547@mcvoy.com> <20230102192114.2uu7f4ap55e6xtby@illithid> <20230102202422.qychfa24tnjuok4p@illithid> <20230102204103.GU25547@mcvoy.com> Feedback-ID: 35591162:user:proton MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=utf-8 Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Message-ID-Hash: HCJZ3X2C6U7BK3ZEA26ZW5AIZPMRQWUN X-Message-ID-Hash: HCJZ3X2C6U7BK3ZEA26ZW5AIZPMRQWUN X-MailFrom: segaloco@protonmail.com X-Mailman-Rule-Misses: dmarc-mitigation; no-senders; approved; emergency; loop; banned-address; member-moderation; header-match-tuhs.tuhs.org-0; nonmember-moderation; administrivia; implicit-dest; max-recipients; max-size; news-moderation; no-subject; digests; suspicious-header CC: tuhs@tuhs.org X-Mailman-Version: 3.3.6b1 Precedence: list Subject: [TUHS] Re: A few comments on porting the Bourne shell List-Id: The Unix Heritage Society mailing list Archived-At: List-Archive: List-Help: List-Owner: List-Post: List-Subscribe: List-Unsubscribe: From: segaloco via TUHS Reply-To: segaloco A shell is only as powerful as the constructs it can interact with. One ca= n do logic all day and night but if that logic isn't being put to work, it'= s just an exercise in vanity. I think that's a good point that scripting p= roblems may be a symptom of the nature of the tools being used in them. So the day job is pretty much an all Microsoft shop, from .NET code to IIS = servers, not a '$' prompt in sight usually. However, being a scientific op= eration, we have quite a diverse crew of UNIX machines floating around out = there resigned to their fates sitting in the corner running the oldest equi= pment at their respective labs. Any time I've had to interact with any of = these I've been grateful for not taking various post-Bourne shell quirks fo= r granted. Not that these interactions are frequent, but I find myself tap= ped often being "that UNIX guy" on the team. A couple examples come to min= d. One facility is running two pieces of equipment the software for which runs= on Digital UNIX circa mid 90s. The data transfer mechanism was some FTP t= hing their previous technical director had cooked up and one morning we had= found it went down. The resident IT guy there knew the basics of how to g= et in there, but hadn't really put the process down anywhere. Luckily (sec= urity may think otherwise...) I was able to connect over rsh with the passw= ord he provided and was able to modify the script for that exporter to self= -heal. I don't know what shell it was running beyond it spitting a '$' out= at me, but luckily didn't have to know. The other is a lab using a data analysis system for, among others, HP-UX. = I don't recall the age of the version they were running on, but the system = is called Target and was eventually forked in a few directions when the ori= ginal company closed up shop, our group inheriting one of the forks. It's = one of those things I hope I can archive publicly someday, but not there ye= t. In any case, the technicians all had Windows PCs with an X11 server set= up for accessing the HP-UX machine, and it was running CDE if that helps da= te it (unless that's still default). That system is in archive now as we'v= e replaced it with the current version of our fork which is now .NET. I wa= s surprised they didn't have more UNIX going on, but they had managed to ge= t a lot of their older equipment to work with some sort of Windows based so= lution one way or another. Life finds a way... I'm not sure where it stands as far as the sea of shells these days, but on= e I've opted towards in system builds the past few years is dash. It's pre= tty small and seems to hit all the marks as far as basic Bourne-ish behavio= r and POSIX stuff. When I'm tinkering on a board and just need to toss a s= hell on top of a kernel, I go for dash. - Matt G. ------- Original Message ------- On Monday, January 2nd, 2023 at 1:19 PM, Dan Cross wrote= : > On Mon, Jan 2, 2023 at 4:07 PM Clem Cole clemc@ccc.com wrote: >=20 > > On Mon, Jan 2, 2023 at 4:03 PM Dan Cross crossd@gmail.com wrote: > >=20 > > > Couldn't you also ship a shell? That kinda seems like the simplest so= lution. > >=20 > > Sure the problem is -- where do you stop? >=20 >=20 > Good question. But this sort of suggests that maybe it's not the shell > that's really the problem, but the entire milieu of all the tools that > we use when we write "shell scripts." >=20 > > The result is the fork/mess called Gnu. >=20 >=20 > BUGS: Yes. >=20 > - Dan C.