Some Questions about personal prefer

[Guy Harris]

> There are two reasons I wouldn't consider windows to be equivalent to job
> control:
> 
> 	1) If you have windows, and not job control, you have not the freedom
> 		to change your mind about forground/background once you have
> 		started.  You have committed yourself to using the resources
> 		required by a window (which in most cases is not insignificant
> 		e.g. bitmap memory, additional tty ports, perhaps a server
> 		process or shell for the window, display real estate)...

The tty ports (or pseudo-tty ports), shell, and possibly bitmap memory will
still be required by new windows, but I would hope the window package would
at least let you cover the "uninteresting" window with another window.
(Which doesn't affect the point much, as the critical resource is probably
likely to be pseudo-tty ports; f'rinstance, the System V Release 2 "job
control" facility has only 8 "layers", which I presume is not too far
off from the number of real layers offered by the Blit/5620 software.)

> 	2) Job control gives you the opportunity to make a running program
> 		"pause", so you can check intermediate results (particularly
> 		helpful if debugging)....

That's why it's called "job control", and why I always put references to
it in quotes when referring to the System V pseudo-window scheme.  The
S5 scheme doesn't allow you to control jobs (stop them, restart them, etc.);
it's just a window manager without windows and without the benefits thereof.

> I believe both have their place, and enjoy using systems that have the
> flexibility to provide both.

I agree 100%; they solve two different (but not disjoint) sets of problems.

	Guy Harris
	{seismo,ihnp4,allegra}!rlgvax!guy