Asri-unix.1170 net.works utzoo!decvax!cca!sri-unix!REM@MIT-MC Tue Apr 6 20:54:53 1982 Re: WORKS Digest V2 #37 From: Robert Elton Maas It shouldn't be too hard to add an extra level of software at the point where the user program itself interfaces to UNIX. Having done so, for example having all OPENs of files/pipes go thru a single user-written procedure, which is moved to a separate source file and shared among all user programs that are written in the same source language, it should then be possible to modify the interface source file to run on a non-unix system, at which point all those user programs should work without significant modifications on the other system. Thus systems needn't be standardized to have UNIX as their user-program/system interface, in order to acquire the UNIX application-program "library". (Quotes around "library" because I don't mean library in the usual computer-jargon sense of a "library of assembly-language subroutines editable by FUDGE2".) To some extent, SAIL and LISP already do this sort of thing, as does PCNET software. ----------------------------------------------------------------- gopher://quux.org/ conversion by John Goerzen of http://communication.ucsd.edu/A-News/ This Usenet Oldnews Archive article may be copied and distributed freely, provided: 1. There is no money collected for the text(s) of the articles. 2. The following notice remains appended to each copy: The Usenet Oldnews Archive: Compilation Copyright (C) 1981, 1996 Bruce Jones, Henry Spencer, David Wiseman.