VMS shell under Unix (was: Re: why learn UNIX)

[Dick Dramstad]

Robert,

>I was not aware anywone had written a VMS shell (or would want to) for UNIX.

	Someone has.  At the Fall DEXPO in San Francisco, Convex (the
makers of a Unix mini-supercomputer) showed their VMS environment
running on their C-1 machine.  (It looked like all it consisted of was
a bunch of aliases and shell scripts.)  It complements their VAX/VMS
FORTRAN (source-code) compatible extended compiler.  I'm sure their
reason for doing this was to attract the FORTRAN-coding engineers who
have grown used to VMS and its compiler but could really use the extra
speed the C-1 could give them.

	Comment:  It may not be ideologically pure, but the
combination of an inexpensive fast machine, a familiar-feeling FORTRAN
development environment, as well as access to all those nice Unix
software development aids *must* be commercially attractive in some
quarters.

Dick Dramstad
rad at mitre-bedford.arpa