From: mutazilah@gmail.com   
      
   "Dan Cross"  wrote in message   
   news:vqit96$1kh$1@reader1.panix.com...   
      
   > Further,   
   > the system interface is inexorably tied to the hardware; it's   
   > defined in terms of synchronous software traps and specific   
   > register values.   
      
   I don't believe the word "inexorably" is appropriate.   
      
   If you look at the MSDOS 4 source code, you can   
   see that Microsoft created wrappers for these things   
   for their own use. There is a DosOpen() function for   
   example.   
      
   The fact that they apparently didn't publish that - and   
   then went and repurposed that same name for 16-bit   
   OS/2 with a (at least nominally) different interface, is   
   not a technical issue.   
      
   I created my own wrappers (since I didn't have access   
   to the MSDOS 4 source code at the time), but even   
   without that, there are existing wrappers (like "open"),   
   provided by Microsoft's C compiler.   
      
   I don't see any reason why Unix's open() is considered   
   to be "proper" but Microsoft's open() isn't. That's more   
   of a documentation issue. But which documentation   
   anyway? The INT 80H used by Linux is documented too.   
   So MSDOS is illegitmate because Microsoft didn't move   
   the open() function from one bit of documentation to   
   another bit of (unspecified) documentation?   
      
   I don't like the name open() in either MSDOS or Unix.   
   I like the name DosOpen(). But I don't like what OS/2   
   did for types. I like what MSDOS 4 did. I may switch   
   my own Pos* wrappers to Dos* wrappers one day,   
   now that the reference exists.   
      
   BTW, I now have a standalone mainframe, depending   
   on definition. No Windows or Linux involved. No ASCII   
   seen. No Intel or AMD either.   
      
   https://groups.io/g/hercules-380/message/3143   
      
   BFN. Paul.   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)