Subj : Re: Copy to file or directory? Help? Calling MS-Dos? To : E.S.Fabian From : Charles Dye Date : Sun Feb 03 2002 11:40 pm From: Charles.Dye@f3.n342.z1.cereal.mv.com (Charles Dye) Subject: Re: Copy to file or directory? Help? Calling MS-Dos? From: raster@highfiber.com (Charles Dye) On Sun, 03 Feb 2002 20:59:11 GMT, "E.S.Fabian" wrote: >How about a straw vote: who thinks Microsoft's own documentation >as quoted in my earlier correspondence correctly excludes command >processors from being part of the Operating System proper, and who >thinks that Outsider's contrary opinion is correct, i.e., if it >is included in the distribution, such as GORILLA.BAS, NIBBLES.BAS, >it is part of the OS? A straw vote of people with CS degrees, or people who have actually studied OS design, or people who have written command shells (or operating systems!) would be more meaningful IMHO. If 55% of Americans believe that the sun goes around the earth, that doesn't overturn Copernicus; it just demonstrates a serious problem in American education. Poll the people who have earned the right to an opinion. I would agree with your interpretation of the documentation. E.g. from the IBM DOS 2.00 manual: "The command processor supplied with DOS (file COMMAND.COM) consists of four distinctly separate parts...." Still, this is just the argument from authority. Microsoft's documentation is neither infallible nor perfectly consistent. You're better off asking Tom, Rex, and Mike; or the FreeDOS /FreeCOM folks; or the authors of bash, csh, zsh, and so forth. -- Charles Dye raster@highfiber.com -- |Fidonet: Charles Dye 1:342/3 | | Origin: The Cereal Port BBS (603)899-3335 199.125.78.133 (1:132/152) --- # Origin: (1:132/152.4) * Origin: Baddog BBS (1:218/903) .