Re: Learning from history - The UNIX-Hater's Handbook

Could you tell us which school that is so that we may send our kids
there?  It sounds like a great school!  The reason that Universities
have traditionally used Unix for their computer science programs is that
you get the source code.  Now that most proprietary Unixes don't allow
that anymore, Linux and the *BSDs have become the OS of choice.

If you are trying to learn Computer Science, the best way is to learn
from the code.  It's just like in any other field.  If you are studying
English literature, you read the best Shakespeare.  It's not enough to
just use an OS, you have to understand how it works.  If you don't know
how compilers and OSs work, you will not be able to write good code.

If your son only learns how to write C# and .NET at his University, he
will have been poorly served.  If that's all he wants, he can go to a
bookstore and buy C# for dummies and .NET for dummies and in a couple of
months he'll be ready to go to work.

or .NOT :-)

On Sun, 2003-09-14 at 14:30, Peter Quirk wrote:
> As the old adage goes, "Those who ignore history are doomed to repeat it."
> Since Linux was initially just an attempt to create a copyright-free version
> of UNIX, we need to look to UNIX for the source of the many of its
> annoyances. You will find a wealth of material in the UNIX-Hater's Handbook
> at http://web.mit.edu/~simsong/www/ugh.pdf. This work was published in 1994,
> just as Dee-Ann was getting interested in computers. Little has been done to
> correct the deficiencies described therein except POSIX standardization of
> the shell and some APIs.
> 
> Sadly, the lessons of this text are seldom taught in Universities. On a
> recent tour of colleges with my son to select a computer science school, I
> had a conversation with the Dean of Undergraduate CS studies at a
> prestigious school. The Dean told us that the school focused on Linux,
> Solaris and Java. I asked what my son might learn about new technologies
> like C# and .NET during his four years at the school. "Nothing, if we can
> help it!" was the answer.
> 
>     
> 
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-- 
    Lawrence MacIntyre     865.574.8696     [email protected]
               Oak Ridge National Laboratory
High Performance Information Infrastructure Technology Group

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