more on POSIX [FW: The FoRK firehose]

Joe Barrera (joebar@MICROSOFT.com)
Wed, 12 Aug 1998 08:37:34 -0700


From: Mark Baker <mailto:[mailto:mark@conveyor.com]>
[mailto:mark@conveyor.com]
Sent: Wednesday, August 12, 1998 7:43 AM
To: Joe Barrera
Cc: <mailto:bodo@cs.caltech.edu> bodo@cs.caltech.edu
Subject: Re: The FoRK firehose

>> As somebody who was deep into Posix IPC and threads as it was happening,
>> and did his designs to specific drafts of said specs, I can guarantee you
>> that Posix-1g supported both poll() and select().
>>
> > That URL you specified Joe, says that both poll() and select() are not
> > specified, so something's gotta be wrong there.
>
> Bizarre. I'd love to know what's really going on here.

You and me both. You think a resource at the Open Group could be counted on
to
be authoritative. Sheesh. If only the IEEE would put the specs on-line,
but
noooooo, they've gotta charge for hardcopies and assert copyright (or at
least
they did 4 years ago).

A little more investigation has turned up this, from the Unix Programmers
FAQ @
<http://www.erlenstar.demon.co.uk/unix/faq_3.html#SEC28>
http://www.erlenstar.demon.co.uk/unix/faq_3.html#SEC28

"Note: select() was introduced in BSD, whereas poll() is an artifact of SysV
STREAMS. As such, there are portability issues; pure BSD systems may still
lack
poll(), whereas some older SVR3 systems may not have select(). SVR4 added
select(), and the Posix.1g standard defines both."

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