Alan Coopersmith writes:
> I. Szczesniak wrote:
> >> A suggestion from a PSARC member was to keep /bin/ksh
> >
> > This is a suspicious suggestion. First PSARC suggested a transition
> > period and now they want a 'all or nothing' solution? Is PSARC
> > actually WILLING to allow the integration of ksh93 as /bin/ksh?
>
> PSARC is a committee with a number of members - as is normal for any
> collection of humans, they don't all agree on every topic and different
> members will give you different suggestions. Until a formal proposal
> is brought to PSARC for discussion and vote, you cannot and will not know
> what "PSARC's opinion" is, and what they are willing to allow.
Even when that's done, PSARC isn't a person and won't have an opinion.
There'll be a written opinion, though, that reflects the opinions of
the ARC members.
So, as long as you ask just one member, all you'll get is his (in this
case, my) opinion. It won't necessarily match what the rest of the
members will say.
I'd rather see a single ksh, based on this reasoning: if ksh93 is
compatible enough that we're comfortable with inserting it as
/usr/bin/ksh, then this means to me that there's no further purpose to
the old Sun ksh except as a museum piece. If there is _any_ purpose
to having access to the old Sun ksh, then I'd question whether we're
all quite so confident that we're ready to do the replacement at all.
Moreover, if there are any "failure cases" that require switching back
to oksh, then that's a disaster. Those failing scripts already refer
directly to /usr/bin/ksh, and thus will be unfixable without changes.
And if you're going to make changes, you might as well port the script
to ksh93. Thus, keeping /usr/bin/oksh around doesn't even serve to
mitigate problems.
In other words, the solutions that make sense to me are:
1. /usr/bin/ksh stays the same, and /usr/bin/ksh93 is shipped as
the new ksh93. Perhaps someday the two converge again, but not
now.
2. /usr/bin/ksh is replaced by a suitably modified (to be
compatible) variant of ksh93. The old Sun ksh is sent to the
great bit-bucket in the sky.
I don't see a self-consistent case where we're both confident enough
to replace /usr/bin/ksh but not so confident that we can't let go of
oksh.
I'd prefer (2), as I'd like to see us get rid of the old stuff as soon
as possible.
--
James Carlson, KISS Network <james.d.carlson at sun.com>
Sun Microsystems / 1 Network Drive 71.232W Vox +1 781 442 2084
MS UBUR02-212 / Burlington MA 01803-2757 42.496N Fax +1 781 442 1677
