Mail Archives: djgpp/1998/04/10/19:30:58
Eli Zaretskii <eliz AT is DOT elta DOT co DOT il> wrote:
: On Thu, 9 Apr 1998, Edward F. Sowell wrote:
: > See my earlier remarks. Perhaps I am wrong, but I don't believe that
: > that porting software to another platform means converting that platform
: > to Unix.
: I just suggested it as an easier solution, which will surely work. If you
: have grave reasons not to do that, it is quite possible that you won't
: need to, eventually.
Hello, there.
Just to express another point of view, please let me say that as a user of
MS-DOS for seven years before I discovered DJGPP, I _love_ the way that
Eli and others have made it possible for DOS to emulate many of the great
features of UNIX.
Originally I got the GNU File Utilities (not back then quite yet a part of
DJGPP itself) in order to compile GNU Emacs, but soon I discovered how
useful they were for lots of things besides making makefiles run
correctly.
Other achievements include a 32-bit AT&T syntax assembler for DOS (DJGPP
GAS) and GNU less -- one of the neatest improvements in the look, feel,
and performance of a system that I have seen. There are also neat tools
like djtar and the port of GNU tar, very helpful for accessing
tar-format archives of various kinds available on the Internet.
BTW, I wonder if the term "Wintel" applies to an Intel system running DOS
but not Windows, or should that maybe be called a "Dostel" system <grin>.
This doesn't, of course, mean that DJGPP is an ideal solution for every
application of every user. However, for some DOS users, a "UNIX look and
feel" is one of the big pluses of DJGPP.
If DJGPP stimulates alternative approaches and solutions for users and
applications which may work better under some less "Unixy" model, that
would also be an achievement.
Most respectfully,
Margo Schulter
mschulter AT value DOT net
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