[Info-vax] Whither VMS?

[Bill Gunshannon]

In article <HcednTKQvIhBiCzXnZ2dnUVZ_rWdnZ2d at giganews.com>,
	"Richard B. Gilbert" <rgilbert88 at comcast.net> writes:
> Bill Gunshannon wrote:
>> In article <V49+bpWWDtyc at eisner.encompasserve.org>,
>> 	koehler at eisner.nospam.encompasserve.org (Bob Koehler) writes:
>>> In article <7haqjjF2ssv04U1 at mid.individual.net>, billg999 at cs.uofs.edu (Bill Gunshannon) writes:
>>>> You just won't accept that there are other ways tio us Unix than a shell,
>>>> will you.  At least there has been since the TTY went away.  :-)
>>>    I have, and I do, but the application's interface is not the OS
>>>    interface.
>>  
>> So, now we are back to arguing what is OS and what is an application
>> on top of the OS.  Is BASH part of the OS?  Is DCL?  I really don't
>> think any "OS" has a "user" inteface.  They all have an API for which
>> various user interfaces get written.  Under Unix, a "shell" is just a
>> user level program.  One is not even necessary in order for the OS to
>> be functional for regular users.  Kind of like menu driven captive
>> accounts on VMS that offer no access to DCL for the user.
>> 
> 
> I think you could make a very reasonable case that DCL is part of the O/S.
> 
> 1. DCL is part of system startup.

So is the UNix Shell.

> 2. DCL is part of system shutdown.

So is the UNix Shell.

> 3. DCL ships with the VMS binaries.

So is the UNix Shell.


And yet, not part of the OS.  Simple question.  Forget about the
inability to configure anything, would the VMS kernel run if DCL.EXE
were not present on the system?  If the answer is yes, you make the
call.

Aren't there "embedded" VMS boxes?  Honest question, because I really
thought there were.

bill

-- 
Bill Gunshannon          |  de-moc-ra-cy (di mok' ra see) n.  Three wolves
billg999 at cs.scranton.edu |  and a sheep voting on what's for dinner.
University of Scranton   |
Scranton, Pennsylvania   |         #include <std.disclaimer.h>