why Unix?

[Joel C. Salomon]

Yigal Chripun wrote:
>>> Windows has a different design than Unix's "everything is a file"
>>> which IMO is a stupid legacy design from the 70's.
<snip>
> I agree that a uniform and consistent API is important and I'm sure that
> MS managed to mess that up :) but that's besides the point. "Everything
> is a file" does not provide a uniform API but rather provides no API.
> Each unix tool has its own mini-syntax and its own set of command-line
> arguments and you need to learn how to use each tool separately beyond
> trivial use cases.

You need Plan 9 to really show the power of “everything is a file”. And
they’ve removed all the extra option from the little tools, so there
aren’t ten trillion languages. Just one language—the shell rc is much
more regular than any *sh—with easy-to-read commands.

And the terminal window program is *much* better than just about
anything else. Line wrap, copy-paste, filename expansion (*not* embedded
into individual programs), &c.

—Joel Salomon