From: ewright@convex.com (Edward V. Wright)
Subject: Re: More Defense of CLI (there, I changed the subject ... )
Date: Thu, 8 Oct 1992 19:26:08 GMT
Organization: Engineering, CONVEX Computer Corp., Richardson, Tx., USA
X-Disclaimer: This message was written by a user at CONVEX Computer
              Corp. The opinions expressed are those of the user and
              not necessarily those of CONVEX.

In <1992Oct8.021111.17968@qdpii.comp.qdpi.oz.au> davidme@qdpii.comp.qdpi.oz.au (David Meiklejohn) writes:

>I suggest you take your own advice and at least look in a Unix manual 
>before you want to say that those of us who use and run Unix systems 
>are making things up.  FYI, the command in question is "file", and here's 
>the start of its man entry:

>|FILE(1)                  USER COMMANDS                    FILE(1)
>|
>|
>|
>|NAME
>|     file - determine the type of a file by  examining  its  con-
>|     tents


And here's the *end* of the man entry, which you conveniently omitted:

>BUGS
>     It often makes mistakes.  In particular it often suggests
>     that command files are C programs.


>>The find utility knows whether a C file contains syntax errors? 

>No, but being flexible in the usual Unix way, it's possible to make it call
>lint to check the syntax of each file found.

Well, that's a bit better than someone else's suggestion of calling
the c compiler for each and every file.


>>That's funny, the man page doesn't mention that.

>No, Unix doesn't hold your hand and point out all possibilities.  It relies
>on the ability of the user to generalise and think of useful combinations
>of commands.  Once you can do that, you have considerable power at your
>disposal.

Once you can do it, you can write your own C programs, too.  Why should
you bother paying $500 for Pagemaker, when, in a few short years, you
can write your own.... unless, of course, your time is worth something.


>>However, you
>>forgot one thing about find.  "The syntax is cumbersome."  That 
>>isn't just my opinion, it's listed as a bug on the man page!

>That's a consequence of it's inherent flexibility.  I don't find it a problem.

Rubbish.  It's a *bug*, dammit.  It says so right in the scriptu... er,
man pages:

>BUGS
>     The syntax is cumbersome.


>>>I've often written scripts which execute a command, take
>>>the output of that command and generate more commands from it, and  
>>>then execute those commands.  For example, before archie came along,
>>>I had a script which would ftp to a site, get a list of ftp sites,  
>>>generate a script to ftp to all of those sites, get lists of the    
>>>files at those sites, and put the lists into a tab-delimited form   
>>>that I could import into a database. And I know relatively little   
>>>about UNIX scripting!  

>I'm suprised to hear that such a thing is possible through Hypercard.  I'm
>not saying it's not, though - I don't make that sort of bald statement about
>things I don't know enough about.

Considering that DEC uses Hypercard to create front ends for its
database systems, it certainly is possible.  However, I doubt that
anyone who knew "relatively little" about Hypercard -- or UNIX --
scripting could do it.  Of course, you can do a lot on the Mac
without ever needing to write a script.  Can you say the same
thing about UNIX?  


>As for needing to be a quasi-expert in Unix, I agree.  Novices can't
>generally do much with scripts, and generally don't think of piping commands
>into sed, etc.  The great thing about Unix, though, that attracts a lot of us,
>is that, as you become more expert, you can make more and more effective use
>of the system, seemingly without limit.  

But while you're learning a hundred arcane commands that you need
just to keep your system running, the Macintosh user is learning
*applications* that allow him to do things.  While you're learning
"find", he's learning (and using) Pagemaker.  While you're learning
"file", he's learning and using MacDraw.  While you're learning "sed", 
he's learning and using Word.  While you're learning "ls", he's learning
and using Morph.  

Yes, you can make more and more efficient use of your system...
though your CLUNK will never be as efficient as what you
disparagingly call a "GUI." 

>Most other systems seem to only let you go so far as your 
>experise increases.  Unix lets you grow.

Yep, and when you've spent hundreds of hours "growing," 
what have you produced?  Nothing but a bunch of UNIX
shell scripts.  Unless your goal in life is to become
a UNIX system manager, what has this new knowledge qualified
you to do?  

>By the way, I'm actually typing into a CLI (shell) window within the OpenLook
>GUI running on an X terminal.  I don't really see the point of this CLI vs
>GUI stuff when it's so easy to use both approaches at once.  I often browse
>through files using the file manager on the Sun, complete with icons, etc.,
>then type a command into an open shell window, and possibly cutting and
>pasting filenames from another shell or application.  I do the same on my
>Amiga at home.  It only seems to be the Mac users who don't want to use a CLI
>as an integral part of their GUI environment.

It seems to be only non-Mac users who want crank starters on their cars.

Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac.advocacy