From Newsgroup: comp.os.linux.advocacy

On 6/30/2026 8:03 PM, Charlie Gibbs wrote:

On 2026-06-30, rbowman <bowman@montana.com> wrote:

On Tue, 30 Jun 2026 21:52:32 -0000 (UTC), Lawrence D’Oliveiro wrote:

Much of that “jarring” comes from the fact that the whole Windows
environment is inherently unsuited to command-line operation, and
Microsoft can’t seem to do anything about that.

Funny, I've been mostly using cmd on Windows for years with gVim as my
primary editor. I will admit the relatively new Windows Terminal is nice.
I can have a couple of Windows tabs and a tab for the WSL instance. About
all I do in PowerShell is copypasta stuff I usually don't understand.

I found a collection of Unix-style utilities (ls, grep, cut, uniq,
etc.) years ago. The .EXEs' date stamps range from 1999 to 2003.
They're enough for me to sort of pretend I'm using real tools,
rather than CMD.EXE's brain-damaged not-quite-equivalents.

Maybe this is what you're alluding to, but the idea of UNIX utilities on Windows is not a new thing with WSL; it's been around for a quarter
century via the UNIX Subsystem for Windows, which was built in to
premium editions of Windows (e.g. Windows 7 Enterprise/Ultimate, which
is what I still use).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_Services_for_UNIX

Then, you can run tools like grep, sed, etc. from Command Prompt. No
emulators, virtualization, etc. is being used:

C:\Users\interlinked>grep
usage: grep [-abcEFGHhIiLlnoPqRrSsUvwx] [-A num] [-B num [-C[num]]
[-e pattern] [-f file] [--binary-files=value] [--context[=num]]
[--line-buffered] [pattern] [file ...]

The subsystem is part of Windows but the tools are a separate download
from Microsoft - or at least they were, like everything else historical, Microsoft has nuked them from their website, but they can still be found
here: The actual utilities are available in an installer from Microsoft
here (this one for Windows 7 x64): https://web.archive.org/web/20201015000000*/https://download.microsoft.com/download/6/2/1/6214608E-1A46-43DA-BEF4-B1A575F7CD26/Utilities%20and%20SDK%20for%20Subsystem%20for%20UNIX-based%20Applications_AMD64.exe

Kind of basic, maybe, but anything too complex and I just SSH into a
Linux server anyways. Windows isn't Linux and they serve different purposes. --- Synchronet 3.22a-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: comp.os.linux.advocacy

On 2026-07-07, InterLinked <usenet@phreaknet.org> wrote:

On 6/30/2026 8:03 PM, Charlie Gibbs wrote:

I found a collection of Unix-style utilities (ls, grep, cut, uniq,
etc.) years ago. The .EXEs' date stamps range from 1999 to 2003.
They're enough for me to sort of pretend I'm using real tools,
rather than CMD.EXE's brain-damaged not-quite-equivalents.

Maybe this is what you're alluding to, but the idea of UNIX utilities on Windows is not a new thing with WSL; it's been around for a quarter
century via the UNIX Subsystem for Windows, which was built in to
premium editions of Windows (e.g. Windows 7 Enterprise/Ultimate, which
is what I still use).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_Services_for_UNIX

Then, you can run tools like grep, sed, etc. from Command Prompt. No emulators, virtualization, etc. is being used:

C:\Users\interlinked>grep
usage: grep [-abcEFGHhIiLlnoPqRrSsUvwx] [-A num] [-B num [-C[num]]
[-e pattern] [-f file] [--binary-files=value] [--context[=num]]
[--line-buffered] [pattern] [file ...]

No, that's definitely not the package I have. For instance:

grep

Usage: grep [OPTION]... PATTERN [FILE]...
Try `grep --help' for more information.

grep --help

Usage: grep [OPTION]... PATTERN [FILE] ...
Search for PATTERN in each FILE or standard input.
Example: grep -i 'hello world' menu.h main.c

Regexp selection and interpretation:
-E, --extended-regexp PATTERN is an extended regular expression
-F, --fixed-strings PATTERN is a set of newline-separated strings
-G, --basic-regexp PATTERN is a basic regular expression
-e, --regexp=PATTERN use PATTERN as a regular expression
-f, --file=FILE obtain PATTERN from FILE
-i, --ignore-case ignore case distinctions
-w, --word-regexp force PATTERN to match only whole words
-x, --line-regexp force PATTERN to match only whole lines
-z, --null-data a data line ends in 0 byte, not newline

Miscellaneous:
-s, --no-messages suppress error messages
-v, --invert-match select non-matching lines
-V, --version print version information and exit
--help display this help and exit
--mmap use memory-mapped input if possible

Output control:
-b, --byte-offset print the byte offset with output lines
-n, --line-number print line number with output lines
-H, --with-filename print the filename for each match
-h, --no-filename suppress the prefixing filename on output
-q, --quiet, --silent suppress all normal output
--binary-files=TYPE assume that binary files are TYPE
TYPE is 'binary', 'text', or 'without-match'.
-a, --text equivalent to --binary-files=text
-I equivalent to --binary-files=without-match
-d, --directories=ACTION how to handle directories
ACTION is 'read', 'recurse', or 'skip'.
-r, --recursive equivalent to --directories=recurse.
-L, --files-without-match only print FILE names containing no match
-l, --files-with-matches only print FILE names containing matches
-c, --count only print a count of matching lines per FILE
-Z, --null print 0 byte after FILE name

Context control:
-B, --before-context=NUM print NUM lines of leading context
-A, --after-context=NUM print NUM lines of trailing context
-C, --context[=NUM] print NUM (default 2) lines of output context
unless overridden by -A or -B
-NUM same as --context=NUM
-U, --binary do not strip CR characters at EOL (MSDOS)
-u, --unix-byte-offsets report offsets as if CRs were not there (MSDOS)

`egrep' means `grep -E'. `fgrep' means `grep -F'.
With no FILE, or when FILE is -, read standard input. If less than
two FILEs given, assume -h. Exit status is 0 if match, 1 if no match,
and 2 if trouble.

Report bugs to <bug-gnu-utils@gnu.org>.

---------------------------------------

There are lots of other utilities as well, and they've been
enabling me to make a Windows command prompt act sufficiently
Unixy to take some of the pain out of it.
--
/~\ Charlie Gibbs | No artificial
\ / <cgibbs@kltpzyxm.invalid> | intelligence was
X I'm really at ac.dekanfrus | used in the creation
/ \ if you read it the right way. | of this post.
--- Synchronet 3.22a-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: comp.os.linux.advocacy

On 2026-06-30 2:51 p.m., Charlie Gibbs wrote:

On 2026-06-30, Jan Panteltje <alien@comet.invalid> wrote:

Leroy H <lh@somewhere.net>wrote:

Micro$oft is such a great OS that they've always needed sabotage
and bribery to succeed:

<https://www.makeuseof.com/microsofts-windows-fake-error-ended-in-a-280-million-settlement/>

GNU/Linux, in sharp contrast, blazes forever forward ahead with superior
quality.

In my Amiga days I got hold of an Amiga port of Samba, which
enabled me to access files on a Windows machine. Part of a
software update for Windows 2000 was a patch which made Windows
boxes send an invalid command to SMB boxes to which it was
connecting, and checking the response. If it wasn't exactly
what a Windows box would return, it would refuse to connect.
It took the Amiga gurus only two or three days to come up
with a fix for that one.

I have read that these days Microsoft has shares in hardware
companies and making ever more bloated software forces people
to buy ever more powerful hardware...

All about dollars..

Just the other day a friend threw out a perfectly functioning
HP LaserJet printer because Windows declared it to be too old.

Mac users are about to face the same issue when the Intel drivers for a
lot of printers don't cross over to the Mx-only MacOS versions. I
already checked mine, a Laserjet Pro M130nw, and it seems to already be
using an AirPrint driver, ensuring that I won't need to throw it out.

Who needs Microsoft? I do not need it, and with US listening
in / having a say in it, it is probably a security risk.

Yup. Ditto for Apple, Google...

To paraphrase Ted Nelson in _Computer Lib_:

Microsoft is not a necessary evil.
Microsoft is not necessary.

Using Linux alone is certainly quite feasible nowadays, especially if
you're not looking to change hardware every five to seven years the way
you would with an Apple.
--
CrudeSausage
M4 MacBook Air
--- Synchronet 3.22a-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: comp.os.linux.advocacy

On 2026-07-01 3:41 p.m., chrisv wrote:

Charlie Gibbs wrote:

In my Amiga days I got hold of an Amiga port of Samba, which
enabled me to access files on a Windows machine. Part of a
software update for Windows 2000 was a patch which made Windows
boxes send an invalid command to SMB boxes to which it was
connecting, and checking the response. If it wasn't exactly
what a Windows box would return, it would refuse to connect.

A nice example of Microshaft's immoral "business tactics" that have
been defended by Wintrolls, in here.

While Microsoft is not obligated to allow for software not made by the
company to work with it, it seems very counterproductive for them to
lock their adversaries out. I don't know how this kind of behaviour can
be defended.

< snip >
--
CrudeSausage
M4 MacBook Air
--- Synchronet 3.22a-Linux NewsLink 1.2