©1987 - Richard A. Bilancia - All Rights Reserved
to be published first in the January 1988 issue of UNIX®/World
It hards to believe, but it's been over a year since I started writing the first "/xenix:" column for Unix/World magazine. Looking back at that first column, which was about the alternative user interfaces then available in the !!xenix!! environment, I thought that it might be appropriate to update you with some of the additional interfaces that have since become available.
That first January 1987 column took a look at the various well known shells, the Bourne shell(**sh**), the restricted Bourne shell (**rsh**), the Berkeley C shell (**csh**), and the Korn shell (**ksh**) as well as the Microsoft visual shell (**vsh**) and the Tandy 6000 shell (**tsh**). I also investigated a few menuing interfaces such as the !!xenix!! **/etc/sysadmin** utility and the Lyrix word processing menu interface, as well as the SCO virtual console and the Tandy **deskmate** interfaces.
In the year that has followed, there have been several new, different and exciting user interfaces for !!xenix!! users developed and released. These include MultiView from The Santa Cruz Operation (SCO, Santa Cruz, CA), the Directory Shell from American Management Systems, Inc. (AMS, Arlington, VA), and the ATvanced Office System from Technology Research Group, Inc. (TRG, Atlanta, GA). Additionally, the system administration shell (**sysadmsh**) is now distributed with SCO !!xenix!! System V.
This month I'd like to discuss and describe these four different and alternative interfaces.
SCO's MultiView
MultiView is the first commercially available, true
windowing environment available for !!xenix!! users. While there
are several products that use bordered windows as part of their
user interface, only MultiView allows a user to begin more than
one program concurrently and provide the user with a facility to
alternatively choose the application with which to interact. The
facility is somewhat like SCO's MultiScreen, but is different in
that it is not restricted to being run on a console (it can be
run from almost any dumb terminal), it includes user controlled
bordered (or borderless) windows, and provides a windowing
interface to several !!xenix!! programs (such as **mail**, as
well as windowing capabilities that such things as cutting and
pasting between windows and altering the size of windows.
When first invoked (with **mview**) MultiView presents the user with selection line of actions that includes "Run, Pick, Shape, Move, Control, Transfer [and] Quit," as well as the first pull down menu for "Run" already selected. While fully customizable, the "Run" menu initially contains three further menu selections including: "Main Applications," "Desk Accessories," and "!!xenix!! Utilities." The first and third of the selections on this menu are what you'd expect them to be, but the "Desk Accessories" selection includes some new and interesting applications such as both company wide and personal "Phone Book," "Filing System," and "Address Book."
The other top line selection line choices have the following options: the "Pick" selection allows users to select among the several windows already initiated; the "Shape" selection controls the window size through zooming, reducing and reshaping; the "Move" selection allows not only the movement of windows around the screen, but also the ability to scroll or pan within a window; the "Control" selection allows such things as screen redrawing, context sensitive key help and printing capabilities; while the "Transfer" selection implements the cutting and pasting between files and windows.
All in all the MultiView product is an extremely powerful and
easy to use and implement windowing environment.
It is suited for both novice and expert users alike that need to
have immediate access to more than one running application on a
system. While the documentation for the MultiView is extensive,
complete, and very well done, the real facilities of this kind of
interface can only be fully exploited with experimentation and
experience.
AMS's Directory Shell
When you first invoke the Directory Shell (with
**dsh**), you'll see a full screen window that very much reminded
me of the Microsoft Visual Shell (**vsh**) interface. A display
of files and/or directories immediately presents itself, but
unlike the Visual Shell the files and directories are separated
into two different parts of the screen. A user selects an entry
in one of the windows using the arrow keys to move from one
directory to another, select programs to execute, and select
files to view and/or edit. Control keys are used to select
alternative options within the Directory Shell, the most
significant of which is the control-C, which invokes a pop-up
window of further selections.
Of all the products discussed in this month's column, the Directory Shell includes the most volumnous and complete documentation. While such documentation is certainly desirable, it often brings along a significant negative: people often conclude that they need to completely read and fully understand all the documentation before they begin using the product. So, they put off trying to start using and learning the application. You don't need to do that with the Directory Shell, because while just about everything in the interface seems to be tailorable to each user's individual preferences and desires, as distributed the shell is both easy to use and quite intuitive. When you do get stuck, all you need to do is depress the "Help" key and context sensitive assistance is immediately available.
For experienced software developers, the Directory Shell comes with a hidden surprise: an editor for non-ASCII files called **hexed**. This editor allows a user to view and modify files in either ASCII or hexadecimal mode with a presentation that is similar to the !!xenix!! hex dump utility (**hd**).
So who is the Directory Shell for? It's for anyone that wants (or needs) an alternative interface to the standard !!xenix!! shells that is easier to learn, yet more visually reflects what the user is doing. I'd say that the interface is probably best suited for individuals that are fearful of a simple !!xenix!! prompt, yet need to easily learn and confidently execute a wide variety of !!xenix!! based utilities and applications.
The SCO **sysadmsh**
Of all the products discussed in this month's
column, the SCO System Administration shell is the only one that
does not cost additional money. It is included with the standard
!!xenix!! version 2.2+ runtime. However, don't let that mislead
you as to it's power and versatility. The user has a friendly
access to utilities that support 57 separate operations, ranging
from adding and removing users all the way to setting up **uucp**
and editing the system startup file (**/etc/rc**).
The SCO **sysadmsh** has been designed primarily to assist new !!xenix!! system administrators get started administering and learning all about their system. Unlike the MultiView and Directory Shell products above, the **sysadmsh** is not another windowing interface, but simply a menuing, and fill in the form, system to help a user use some of the power of the !!xenix!! environment.
Don't overlook the **sysadmsh**. It's a powerful, friendly, easy to use interface.
TRG's ATvanced Office System
Lastly is the ATvanced Office System interface.
When I initially loaded ATvanced for the time I thought that I
had made a mistake, because the initial screen appeared almost
identical to the **sysadmsh**. The menuing interface behaves
identically, and even the overall layout appears nearly the same.
But, they are not the same and they don't do the same things!
They do, however, work very well together.
What I suspect is that both TRG and SCO developed the products with some communication with each other, or even perhaps jointly developed **sysadmsh**. In any event, therefore, since they are both similar menuing systems, what do you get additionally with ATvanced? You get a user friendly interface to **mail** and a desktop organizer that includes calendaring, memos, a rolodex system, and things such as a desktop calculator. Additionally you get a complete set of System Administration capabilities that are only available when you are logged in as user **admin**. Once again, these capabilities are very similar in appearance (but not identical) to those included with **sysadmsh**.
I particularly liked the calculator as it supports a scrolling paper tape along side the simulated calculator keyboard. A long time ago I learned to use the !!xenix!! utility **bc** interactively, but could never scroll back to entries that had rolled off the screen. With ATvanced you can!
If you like the **sysadmsh** you'll really like the ATvanced product. The interface is similar, but the capabilities and features are far superior.
Conclusion
A lot of new software has been developed in the
last twelve months that is designed to make !!xenix!! easier to
use in the business arena than ever before. End users typically
don't care what operating system their running, nor do they
typically want to become software development experts.
With the availability of sophisticated--yet easy to implement, modify and use-- user interfaces like MultiView, the Directory Shell, **sysadmsh** and the ATvanced Office System, !!xenix!! will become the mainstay business multiuser operating of choice. We don't need to wait for a !!xenix!! based multiuser version of Microsoft Windows.