Date: Mon, 26 Feb 1996 16:45:22 -0800 (PST) From: Jake Hamby <jehamby@lightside.com> To: Terry Lambert <terry@lambert.org> Cc: hackers@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: FreeBSD ports to NT (was Win32...) Message-ID: <Pine.AUX.3.91.960226162805.108A-100000@covina.lightside.com> In-Reply-To: <199602262336.QAA03092@phaeton.artisoft.com>
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On Mon, 26 Feb 1996, Terry Lambert wrote:
> The FS call themselves don't care about / vs \ and the directory
> lookup is case insensitive, so I don't know what you are seeing.
Apparently, you haven't seen the POSIX subsystem of Windows NT. These are
NOT Win32 programs, they run in a separate protected subsystem which has
its own limited API (basically a subset of "libc") that enforces case
sensitivity and / for directory pathnames. It also has no provision for
graphics or network calls. The particular POSIX utilities I'm referring
to are on the NT 3.51 Resource Kit CD-ROM in a POSIX subdirectory.
> > Oh, and of course, these programs don't work under Windows 95...
>
> Compliant Win32 programs will run on both systems.
As I said above, I was referring to POSIX subsystem programs which are
NOT Win32. I hope Microsoft realized their mistake with the whole
subsystem idea since neither the OS/2 1.x nor POSIX subsystems are very
useful, and Win16 and DOS are included inside the Win32 subsystem, so
in retrospect, they didn't need subsystems after all! Now, if somebody
were to make a MacOS or FreeBSD-binary-emulation subsystem, that would
be a different story! :-)
> CVS is already ported. There is a Windows95 (WIN32) client, and a
> Windows NT server.
Good, one less thing for me to do! I'd like to accumulate pointers to
existing ports on my Web page, so ideally it'd be a repository of
information on integrating Unix utilities into Win32 and vice versa.
> Actually, I'd like to see a help file compiler and X and command line
> readers for BSD. 8-).
>
> Something like the SDK's HCW.EXE ("Help Workshop"). 8-).
TWIN has its own WinHelp viewer, and Bristol sells a commercial version.
Personally, I like the SGML/HTML format for help the best, but it is too
inconvenient (not to mention slow!) to start up Netscape within your
application just to view online help. That's one of the problems with
programming for Unix, there is no standardization for help, even though
Motif says every program must have it, they don't say how! :-(
> > Shells: I'd like to see tcsh (primarily for interactive use) and bash
> > (for interactive use and shell scripts). They should be able to spawn
> > Win32, Win16, and DOS programs just like CMD.EXE..
>
> Shells are hard; specifically, the interface to the DOS virtual machine
> is a pain. All I can say is "good luck". 8-(.
I figured as much. If there is source code for any of the CMD.EXE
alternatives floating around, I would like to see it. Also, I understand
there is the Hamilton csh for Win32, but the demo version is very
restricted.
By the way, my plan is for these utilities to be free during the Beta
test period (possibly they will have a time bomb to encourage people to
get the latest version, a la Netscape), then the final version will be
non-crippled, reasonably priced, shareware. Of course if you run FreeBSD
on your PC, I will be kind enough to waive the shareware fee! :-)
---Jake
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