Files as files

From: Doug Yowza <yowza_at_yowza.com>
Date: Thu Jun 11 21:58:44 1998

On Thu, 11 Jun 1998, Jack Peacock wrote:

> As for the RMS file attributes and versioning, they are a dream for
> programmers, compared to PC or Unix systems. We have NT or W95
> workstations at every desk, but we still keep a VMScluster running,
> partly for financial apps, and partly for coding. When you start
> dealing with larger apps (i.e 3K-5K users per week, 300-500 at any one
> time in a 24 hour day, all accessing the same files) you start to
> appreciate what VMS can do.

It depends on your philosophy, I guess. Both DEC and Microsoft are in the
"everything belongs in the OS" camp, whereas Unix came from the "simple is
beautiful" school. The latter assumes that database vendors are probably
better at building database engines than OS vendors are.

Have you ever used a product called ClearCase? It basically maps a
database engine / version control system to a Unix filesystem. It's very
powerful, but I wouldn't want to use it or have the overhead associated
with it if I didn't actually need it. Most people don't need it.

-- Doug
Received on Thu Jun 11 1998 - 21:58:44 BST