Sun's OS 3.2 `finger' (was Re: why learn UNIX)

[earle at smeagol.UUCP]

In article <12057 at sun.uucp>, guy%gorodish at Sun.COM (Guy Harris) writes:
> >  But I do wish DEC would give it a go along the same lines, with Ultrix.
> >  Maybe the day will come when the following line disappears from finger(1) :
> >
> >   "The encoding of the gcos field is UCB dependent - it knows
> >    that an office '197MC' is '197M Cory Hall', and that '529BE'
> >    is '529B Evans Hall' "
> 
> The problem here is not with the manual, the problem is with the
> program; the correct fix is to take that silly localism out of the
> program if it's to be distributed as part of anything more formal
> than a BSD release.  The code, and the comment in the manual page,
> are certainly gone from *our* release.

Unfortunately, whomever removed the code did it via the "slash-and-burn"
method.  *All* usage of the GECOS field got wiped out!  Personally, every
one that I have talked to can't understand why Sun changed the last field
of the finger output to `Where', and only uses it to display remote hostnames
for users logged in remotely.  We don't care about the Berkeley localisms, 
either, but having the last field be `Office', displaying office location
and office phone (like BSD) seems much more useful, in our opinion.  (I don't
consider office phone/location to be useless, even in an Internet environment;
one could still get an area code easily, and a main number for an organization
after which one could use the office extension given by `finger')

Slash-and-burn probably explains why there is no `chfn' in Sun OS 3.2, since
the info isn't used.


-- 
	Greg Earle	UUCP: sdcrdcf!smeagol!earle; attmail!earle
	JPL		ARPA: elroy!smeagol!earle at csvax.caltech.edu
AT&T: +1 818 354 4034	      earle at jplpub1.jpl.nasa.gov (For the daring)
Should I start with the time I SWITCHED personalities with a BEATNIK hair       stylist or my failure to refer five TEENAGERS to a good OCULIST?