Misunderstanding about Unix.....

[utzoo!decvax!ucbvax!unix-wizards]

>From Nowicki at PARC-MAXC Wed Aug 12 11:35:03 1981
I would like to make a few comments on Donald Norman paper on "The Truth
About Unix".  The arguments for Consistency, Simple Models, and Mnemonic
Aids should all be Motherhood, even though many system designers continue to
ignore them. (If you want consistent abbreviations you can use RSX-11M for a
while where all commands are three letters; then you'll appreciate Unix.)

The major mistake that is made, however, is failing to consider the possible
multiple levels of abstraction.  For example, the title says "The user interface is
horrid", but in reality every level of abstraction has a "user interface," namely
its interface to the next higher level.  The motto of the Unix was not "let the
user beware," but rather, "make the primitives simple but powerful, so as much
as possible can be done at higher levels".  With his arguments, you could say
that all man-computer communication is doomed to failure because it uses only
ones and zeros, which are not very mnemonic.  The real problem is that an
appropriate level for a systems programmer is not appropriate for casual end
users.  This conclusion is hinted at near the end of the paper, but it means that
the paper should not be a criticism of Unix itself, but rather a criticism of how
people use Unix. 

The point that someone reading only the first few paragraphs of the paper can
miss is that the primitives in Unix CAN be either easily replaced or encapsulated,
while almost no other systems provide this capability.  As an example, two
Stanford students have implemented a TOPS-20 style command interpreter for
Unix.  It has arbitrary  abbreviations, <escape> command completion, the
question-mark help facility, and a delete-undelete-expunge facility.  Version
numbers for backup files are implemented with a simple suffix to the file name.

The real shame is that the Unix users themselves are forced to make the system
as distributed from Western more humane, and thus every wheel gets reinvented
many times.  Luckily groups like Berkeley and Usenix are trying to help this
situation, but as indicated progress is very slow.

	-- Bill