textfiles/uploads/ppprodos.txt

Why ProDOS Sucks Sewer Backwash
By the Silver Ghost
Written between sneezes on March 22, 1987.

 Dedicated to some cracker who put "PATHNAME + PREFIX = BULLSHIT" on one 
of his wares.  I can't remember what or who, but I can sympathize.

 Everyone is using ProDOS now--including me.  This is not from my personal 
choice, but merely because everyone is using ProDOS now.  Apple Computer, 
Inc. has refused to support DOS 3.3 anymore.  I, however, felt that my use 
of the newer Disk Operating System was somewhat hypocritical, considering 
I didn't like it, so I figured I'd clear my conscience and write a text 
file about it.

 The following arguments are presented in no particular order.  You can 
agree or disagree, and decide on the winning DOS in the end.

-:- ProDOS involves huge amounts of typing.

 Here's an example that should suffice.  If you want to access a program 
like FID (with some added features), one that will allow you to copy 
programs from one volume to another, or other miscellaneous tasks, you 
must type the following:

 ]-/SYSTEM.DISK/SYS.UTILS/SYSUTIL.SYSTEM

 Looks harmless enough, but I spent about five minutes one day trying to 
get the frickin' names right. If you type

"-/SYSTEM.DISK/SYS.UTILS/SYSUTILS.SYSTEM"

you get "Path not found" and you get to type the whole name over.  What 
fun. And let's hear it for redundancy.  The word "System" is named or 
implied four times in one pathname, which is three times more than it 
should be.  "Disk" is used, perhaps, by Apple technicians to distinguish 
their System Disk from their System Waffle.

-:- MONICO is no longer supported under ProDOS.

 For experienced Apple users, this should be self-explanatory.  For other 
users, imagine having no way to see what your BATch file is doing.  Why 
was it taken out?  The only reason I can see is to frustrate programmers.  
Right on.

-:- TRACE is always internally on under ProDOS.

 The command TRACE shows which line number you're on, but ProDOS always 
keeps TRACE running, with the small mod that it doesn't output to the 
screen.  (TRACE is still usable.)  This slows all BASIC programs down by 
about 4%.  This I could handle.  Except: when you execute a PR#n from a 
BASIC progam, without going through ProDOS (a PRINT CHR$(4)"PR#n"), ProDOS 
decides to teach you a lesson by outputting the line numbers to that 
device.  It's bad enough doing that to a printer; imagine doing it to a 
timecard...or a RAMdisk...

-:- ProDOS doesn't recognize identical volumes as being the same.

 The ONLY reason I would want volume names is if I could say "LOAD 
/FOO/BAR" and have it look for a volume FOO, file BAR.  Then I could put 
two disks, both named "FOO", in my two drives, and have them be treated as 
ONE disk.  It doesn't work that way.  It searches only the /FOO that has 
been last-accessed. Professional DOS?  Try Amateur DOS.

-:- DOS 3.3 has been improved on.

 I never use the actual, Apple-approved 3.3 anymore--I always use 
ProntoDOS. ProntoDOS gives you faster access, the TYPE command, and 
changeable features (you choose CATALOG pauses, etc.).  ProDOS has been 
out since 1983.  Do you see any independent programmers' efforts to give 
it extra features? None that I know of.

-:- ProDOS 16 takes forever to boot.

 I haven't timed it, but it must be a minute.  I don't really WANT mouse 
interfaces in the first place, and they COULD have done it with //c 
MouseText. Of course they didn't...they do it in high-res, so to show off 
colors.  It takes longer to draw, but they can show off colors.  It's like 
a Mac, except the mouse movement is jerkier, and it takes longer to 
highlight boxes.

 ProntoDOS takes about four seconds to boot.

-:- ProDOS searches an empty Disk II drive for 10 seconds before realizing
  there's nothing there.

 DOS 3.3 recalibrates once and reports "I/O error" immediately.

-:- ProDOS doesn't even have TYPE built-in.

 ProntoDOS has had it since 1982 (I think), and it still took Beagle Bros. 
to come out with a TYPE utility for ProDOS.

-:- ProDOS is either user-unfriendly or user-patronizing.

 I'm beginning to think that "No Buffers Available" is the only error 
message ProDOS knows.  It's supposed to mean that memory is full, and that 
a file cannot, therefore, be opened.  The IIgs has told me that I have 
hundreds of K free, and I've still gotten that error under ProDOS 16--the 
IIgs ProDOS.  And so, I didn't change the RAMdisk size without rebooting 
the machine afterwards. Real intelligent software.  See the former comment 
about sending line-numbers to peripherals--if you don't play by ProDOS's 
rules, it'll getcha.

 I have trashed ProDOS 16 from every disk I own, and replaced it with 
either version 8 or version 1.1.1.  I don't like to be shown little disk 
icons on the screen in double hi-res.  I like the plain-text file finder, 
by Andy I think. It's faster, cleaner, and I don't have to plug in my 
mouse.

-:- ProDOS stores files first at track 0, last at track 35.

 DOS 3.3 stores them symmetrically around track 17 to make disk-arm 
movement as limited as possible.  Just try to DELETE a ProDOS file and 
listen to the four to seven track movements, instead of 3.3's two or 
three.

-:- ProDOS is a memory hog.

 From "Inside Apple's ProDOS", p. 242:  "The only safe area in memory is 
the $0400 through $03CF.  There are no other safe memory areas."

 ProDOS uses 1024 bytes per open file, instead of DOS 3.3's 595 bytes.  
Under ProDOS, the memory available with NO open files is equivalent to 
that of DOS with three files open.

-:- ProDOS doesn't support Integer BASIC.

-:- ProDOS supports eight sumultaneously open files, instead of sixteen.

-:- ProDOS requires the startup program to be named "STARTUP".

 Under 3.3, you can INIT MARSHMALLOWS if you really want to.

-:- ProDOS is SOS-compatible, but who cares?

 The Apple /// was about as popular as the IBM PCjr.

-:- ProDOS file names are restrictive.

  Fifteen characters, start with a letter, only A-Z, 0-9, and "." allowed. 
That's half the space of 3.3.  And pathnames can't be longer than 64 
chars.

-:- ProDOS inspires people to use sub-directories they don't need.

 Anyone that goes beyond two nested directories on a floppy disk is 
wasteful. People name disks, directories, and subdirectories things like 
"DISKETTE.2" or "KAMSC.WORKDISK.3" instead of "D2" or "KW3".  They learn, 
though, after about ten minutes of typing those names in.

-:- In ProDOS, practically everything is stored in the directory.

 So if the directory's destroyed, you CANNOT recover the files.  There's 
no way unless you memorize your disk layout.  Under DOS, it's so easy it's 
almost cheating.

-:- ProDOS is the next step toward MS-DOS communism.

 You read it here first.  When ProDOS 64 (or whatever) comes out, with 
8-char file names and 3-char extensions, don't blame me.

-:- A few words about subdirectories.

 I can get along without them on floppy drives, even 3 1/2" floppies.
 Volumes are essentially the same thing, on hard drives.
 So why bother?

 A CATALOG displays length "1" for all subdirectories, instead of telling 
you how many blocks each contains.  Useful information, that "1".  Saved 
MY life.

-:- ProDOS is popular.

 Converting all programs to ProDOS must have created the largest flag day 
in history.  It did for me.

--