4 Aug
2019
4 Aug
'19
10:29 p.m.
On Sun, Aug 4, 2019 at 4:18 PM Noel Chiappa <jnc(a)mercury.lcs.mit.edu> wrote:
Part of the problem is having the kernel involved in
starting shell
scripts; convenient in some ways, but V6 etc worked fine without that
'feature'.
That's a tough call. I have mixed opinions about it as a feature. I kind
of like the user/kernel interface really, really thin and unadorned.
Adding, it certainly made allowing multiple interpreters to be supported
much easier; but as you say it opens a new can of worms. Given the later
proliferation of what bwk or Jon Bently once referred too as 'little
languages' (awk, perl, tcl, and sigh eventually python), it was probably a
good feature.
But as you said, v6 worked fairly well without it.
Clem