I can remember when we just called it “slash”, not “forward slash”.
Now all we have to do is to get people to properly distinguish
between brackets and parentheses.
It would be nice if they also distinguished between dash and hyphen,
but that's probably a lost cause.
/~\ Charlie Gibbs | Growth for the sake of
\ / <cgibbs@kltpzyxm.invalid> | growth is the ideology
X I'm really at ac.dekanfrus | of the cancer cell.
/ \ if you read it the right way. | -- Edward Abbey
Charlie Gibbs <cgibbs@kltpzyxm.invalid> writes:
Now all we have to do is to get people to properly distinguish
between brackets and parentheses.
[Brackets], <brokets>, {braces} and (parentheses). I don't have those German/European things that look a little like << and >> on my keyboard.
It would be nice if they also distinguished between dash and hyphen,
but that's probably a lost cause.
I only have "-" on my keyboard but -- typography quibbles aside -- I
cope adequately without the dash.
On 2025-01-28, Lawrence D'Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> wrote:
I can remember when we just called it “slash”, not “forward slash”.
That was because of a certain company in Redmond, who promoted the
use of backslashes that became so widespread that for a while many
people thought that the default "slash" was a backslash.
I don't have those German/European things that look a little like << and
on my keyboard.
Growing popularity of UTF punctuation is a fulminating annoyance.
Guillemets
... MS-DOS was written by people who were familiar with PDP-10 TOPS-10
which used a slash for command line switches.
So when he added hierarchical directories to DOS 2.0, what was a guy
gonna do?
On 2025-01-28, Lawrence D'Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> wrote:
I can remember when we just called it “slash”, not “forward slash”. >>That was because of a certain company in Redmond, who promoted the
use of backslashes that became so widespread that for a while many
people thought that the default "slash" was a backslash.
Yeah, I know the guy who did it. In his defense, MS-DOS was written by >people who were familiar with PDP-10 TOPS-10 which used a slash for
command line switches. So when he added hierarchical directories
to DOS 2.0, what was a guy gonna do?
That was because of a certain company in Redmond, who promoted the use
of backslashes that became so widespread that for a while many people
thought that the default "slash" was a backslash.
It would be nice if they also distinguished between dash and hyphen,
but that's probably a lost cause.
In article <vndtv3$29pt$1@gal.iecc.com>, John Levine <johnl@taugh.com> wrote:
It appears that Charlie Gibbs <cgibbs@kltpzyxm.invalid> said:
On 2025-01-28, Lawrence D'Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> wrote:
I can remember when we just called it “slash”, not “forward slash”.
That was because of a certain company in Redmond, who promoted the
use of backslashes that became so widespread that for a while many
people thought that the default "slash" was a backslash.
Yeah, I know the guy who did it. In his defense, MS-DOS was written by
people who were familiar with PDP-10 TOPS-10 which used a slash for
command line switches. So when he added hierarchical directories
to DOS 2.0, what was a guy gonna do?
Didn't MS-DOS 2.0 have a kinda-hidden command to switch
into "Unix" mode, using `-` for command line options and
`/` for pathname seperator? `switchar`, I believe. For
some reason, it was removed from later DOS versions.
In article <vndtv3$29pt$1@gal.iecc.com>, John Levine <johnl@taugh.com> wrote:
It appears that Charlie Gibbs <cgibbs@kltpzyxm.invalid> said:
On 2025-01-28, Lawrence D'Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> wrote:
I can remember when we just called it “slash”, not “forward slash”.
That was because of a certain company in Redmond, who promoted the use
of backslashes that became so widespread that for a while many people >>>thought that the default "slash" was a backslash.
Yeah, I know the guy who did it. In his defense, MS-DOS was written by >>people who were familiar with PDP-10 TOPS-10 which used a slash for
command line switches. So when he added hierarchical directories to DOS >>2.0, what was a guy gonna do?
Didn't MS-DOS 2.0 have a kinda-hidden command to switch into "Unix"
mode, using `-` for command line options and `/` for pathname seperator?
`switchar`, I believe. For some reason, it was removed from later DOS versions.
Didn't MS-DOS 2.0 have a kinda-hidden command to switch into "Unix"
mode, using `-` for command line options and `/` for pathname
seperator?
`switchar`, I believe. For some reason, it was removed from later DOS
versions.
Yes, SWITCHAR=- (for example).
But, as I recall, programs processed switches themselves, so it relied
on programs retrieving that value via a system call, and using it. Few
did.
On Thu, 30 Jan 2025 01:04:05 +0000, Bob Eager wrote:
Didn't MS-DOS 2.0 have a kinda-hidden command to switch into "Unix"
mode, using `-` for command line options and `/` for pathname
seperator?
`switchar`, I believe. For some reason, it was removed from later DOS >>> versions.
Yes, SWITCHAR=- (for example).
But, as I recall, programs processed switches themselves, so it relied
on programs retrieving that value via a system call, and using it. Few
did.
Ah yes. A call to INT 21H with AX=3700H would get the switch character to
DL, and AX=3701H would set the switch character from DL.
On Thu, 30 Jan 2025 01:04:05 +0000, Bob Eager wrote:
Didn't MS-DOS 2.0 have a kinda-hidden command to switch into "Unix"
mode, using `-` for command line options and `/` for pathname
seperator?
`switchar`, I believe. For some reason, it was removed from later DOS
versions.
Yes, SWITCHAR=- (for example).
But, as I recall, programs processed switches themselves, so it relied
on programs retrieving that value via a system call, and using it. Few
did.
Ah yes. A call to INT 21H with AX=3700H would get the switch character to >DL, and AX=3701H would set the switch character from DL.
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