[Info-vax] Whither VMS?

[Bob Koehler]

In article <7h7bcqF2s72n0U14 at mid.individual.net>, Bob Eager <rde42 at spamcop.net> writes:
> 
> You fall into the trap of thinking that all 'UNIX' is UNIX. Which 
> particular UNIX were you thinking of?

   "UNIX is the portable operating system that's different on
   every platform."  I'm sure someone will claim to know who said
   that first.

   However, 16 bit and 32 bit UNIX are two mode OS with the habit of
   forking all over the place.  These are just two examples of kernel
   design that haven't changed since the late 60s, when such were popular
   in timesharing OS design.

> Lots has changed - more than VMS has. I would dispute the kernel and file 
> system statements, for a start.

   UNIX file system internals have been re-implemented for a large number 
   of reasons that the end user can't see.  Externals remain the same, as
   does the on-size-fits-all file-as-a-stream-of-bytes.

   VMS, on the other hand, has changed file name sizes from 9.3 to just
   about any length, from uppercase storing case insensitive to case
   preserving with a choice between case sensitive and case insensitive,
   added ACLs to the protection implementation, and added stream (crlf),
   stream-lf, stream-cr file formats, added hard links, and added mount
   points.

   And that's a pretty short list of what's changed, and only reflects
   some of the file system changes visible to the user.