21st Century UN*X - Bugs??

[John Sloan,8292,X1243,ML44E]

>From article <2198 at syma.sussex.ac.uk>, by stevedc at syma.sussex.ac.uk (Stephen D Carter):
	:
> the following appeared in an *editorial* column of 'Computer Weekly'
	:
>    As currently programmed not a single system using Unix
>    will be able to come to grips with the 21st Century.
	:

So, what else is new? This is one of those statements that is both
completely true and patently false.

UNIX is like George Washington's Ax (you know the old story: "We
replaced the handle back in 19xx when it rotted away... and we replaced
the head in 19yy when it rusted to pieces"). UNIX will survive, albeit
perhaps under other names, because it is not an operating system but
rather an approach, a philosophy. The kernel can be replaced, the file
system can be replaced, shells can be replaced, and still be
recognizable as UNIX. UNIX has been around since 1969, yet hasn't much
or even most of its code has been replaced or at least heavily modified
at one time or another?

Heck, look at OS/360... I was a systems programmer on IBM mainframes
in a previous reincarnation, and worked on OS/MFT, OS/MVT, OS/SVS and
OS/MVS, and despite the fact that most of the subsystems in OS/360 have
been replaced, it's still recognizable.

I assert that the statement above is true for ANY current production
operating system, particular those that have been in use since the
1960's, like OS/360 and UNIX (1969?).

The question is not whether UNIX will survive _in its current form_,
but whether it's placed to evolve more easily into something that
_does_ survive, more so than other current operating systems.

"As currently programmed" is the key phrase. Since I can go to
Radio Shack and buy for under a grand a computer that will
outperform the first IBM 360/65 I ever worked on, I don't find
this statement that radical.

	The ability to advance the leading edge of technology is
	constrained by the ability to prune the trailing edge.
	-- Charles Dickens (Stanford)

	Throughout the centuries there were men who took first steps
	down new roads armed with nothing but their own vision.
	-- Ayn Rand

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John Sloan          NCAR/SCD               NSFnet: jsloan at ncar.ucar.edu
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