CompuServe Messages

Rick, this thread is too good to pass up. You are correct that the system does maintain the necessary lists and tables for you to write resource management routines that will supplement the os. There are also times when I wish we had an os that had some of the features of RSX or VMS. BUT, as it says in the system manuals 10^n times, it is left to the various tasks to manage their system resources in an orderly and efficient manner. Why do we have so many programs that fragment memory by grabbing little hunks of memory and then releasing them outof-sequence? Why not let the user configure the task for an acceptable amount of working memory, or at least have the task do some intelligent auto-sizing and then don't keep playing with allocations? Why don't more task overlay their initialization code with buffer space? Why don't more tasks use intelligent disk paging, especially if you tell them task you have a fast hard disk? Your idea of using ram to buffer downloads is great. A fixed allocation to cover the download maximum size would be sensible. A system that has expansion ram (1 meg or more) could configure for 256K buffering as a permanent option. A tighter system could configure for 64K, split in two parts as a permanent option. Again, some intelligent task auto-sizing would assist the user in making the decision. It's interesting that both you and Larry are making some thoughtful suggestions and at the same time, some really spaced-out comments. Now if Ben would just fix the parity and stop-bit menu options in CoComm, we could bring him back into this thread. <waiting for fan to point in my direction with semi-solid objects> Ted