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Date:      Fri, 19 Jan 2001 11:23:56 -0500 (EST)
From:      Tim McMillen <timcm@umich.edu>
To:        Bill Moran <wmoran@mail.iowna.com>
Cc:        Cliff Sarginson <cliff@raggedclown.net>, questions@FreeBSD.ORG
Subject:   Re: This is not a re-opening of the shell wars.. :)
Message-ID:  <Pine.SOL.4.10.10101191112480.7762-100000@breakout.gpcc.itd.umich.edu>
In-Reply-To: <3A6854F2.56FAD573@mail.iowna.com>

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On Fri, 19 Jan 2001, Bill Moran wrote:

> Cliff Sarginson wrote:
> > It occurred to me that everyone uses the shell to a greater
> > or lesser extent and since it is such a fundamental tool maybe
> > it is worth saying in the front page blurb on FreeBSD that it supports
> > all popular shells, sh,ksh,csh,tcsh,bash..even zsh.
> 
> Wouldn't hurt.

I think putting it on the main page would.  That's precious space!  :)

> > The first thing I did when I loaded BSD was to find "bash", I just
> > assumed it would have it. People with a Linux background will certainly
> > miss it; and maybe not have the investigative zeal to find it.
> 
> That's amazing to me. Because:
> 1. Anyone with any UN*X experience whatsoever would know that you can
> install other shells.
> 2. Anyone who wouldn't know they could install other shells wouldn't
> know they were missing anything.
> 
> Apparently there are a few people in the middle. I would suppose that
> there's very few. 

	I would have to agree here.  I can't believe that there are more
than 2-3 people a month that know enough about their favorite shell to
need it, but not to know how to install or run it on whatever system they
are on.  Or many that would even know or be able to tell the
differences between the shells, and not know that or be able to find it.
	I think there is especially too few people in that situation to
warrant putting something on the main page.  Besides it's in the FAQ at:
http://www.freebsd.org/FAQ/book.html#MINIMAL-SH
Now that could certainly be improved with instructions for how to install
bash (or any other shell in /usr/port/shells).   And maybe there could be
a FAQ entry for how to run other shells.
	Cliff, since you have expressed an interest, you may just be the
person to write that FAQ entry.  :-)  I think a FAQ entry would be the
perfect place to explain this.

						Tim


I'd be more inclined to assume that he was making up
> an excuse not to like FreeBSD. I've seen people do this a lot, it's just
> an excuse to cover up the fact that they didn't want to like it to begin
> with 

agreed.

> - somebody probably pushed him into trying it when he didn't want
> to, and he used it just long enough to find an excuse to report back to
> the pusher.
> If I'm right, the solution is to not push people into things they don't
> want to try. If I'm wrong, then just ignore my babbling.
> 
> just my $.02
> 
> -Bill
> 
> 
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