The Unix-Haters Handbook (1994) [pdf]

When I read this 20 years ago I would never have believed I'd be typing this on a Mac laptop running yet another Unix variant. This line is now so funny... As for me? I switched to the Mac. No more grep, no more piping, no more SED scripts. Just a simple, elegant life: “Your application has unexpectedly quit due to error number –1. OK?”

I founded the mailing list the book was based on. These days I say, Unix went from being the worst operating system available, to being the best operating system available, without getting appreciably better. (which may not be entirely accurate, but don't flame me). And still miss my Lisp Machine. It's not that Unix is really that bad, it's that it has a certain model of computer use which has crowded out the more ambitious visions which were still alive…

I've always liked the end of the anti-foreword: > Here is my metaphor: your book is a pudding stuffed with apposite observations, many well-conceived. Like excrement, it contains enough undigested nuggets of nutrition to sustain life for some. But it is not a tasty pie: it reeks too much of contempt and of envy.

Being among the most zealous to worship at the altar of Kernighan and Ritchie, I, nevertheless, over the years, have come to appreciate the positions expressed in this fine, albeit often humdrum, collection. Concrete examples of the insanity of Unix might by now be largely obsolete (none of the csh- or symlink-related showcases work anymore), but the basic, deep annoyance of the Haters seems to me ever-valid: "Unix evolved; it was not designed". This holds true even in the age…