For purposes of this User's Guide, a shell is the interface
between HP-UX and you, the user. The shell interprets the text you
type, and the keys you press, in order to direct the HP-UX operating
system to take an appropriate action. A shell can also serve as
a programming language.
What is Bourne Shell? |
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Bourne Shell is the oldest shell. It was written by Stephen
Bourne at Bell Laboratories. The Bourne Shell has been the default
shell for HP-UX users, and has been a de facto standard in the industry.
The Bourne Shell has neither the interactive features, nor the complex
programming constructs, of the C and Korn shells.
What is C Shell? |
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C Shell is a shell developed by Bill Joy at the University
of California at Berkeley. The C Shell syntax resembles that of
the C programming language. It has powerful interactive features
like command history and file name completion.
What is Korn Shell? |
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Korn Shell is a newer shell developed by David Korn at Bell
Laboratories, and is upwardly compatible with most Bourne shell
features. It has interactive features like C Shell, but executes
faster and has extended inline command editing capability.
What is POSIX Shell? |
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POSIX Shell is based on the standard defined in Portable
Operating System Interface (POSIX) - IEEE P1003.2. This
standard is designed to be used by both application programmers
and system administrators. This standard is intended to describe
language interfaces and utilities in sufficient detail so an application
developer can understand the required interfaces without access
to the source code of existing implementations on which they are
based.
Most of the POSIX Shell features are similar to the Korn Shell.
This guide covers both shells in the same Part. In addition to the
common features, this guide also covers the differences between
the POSIX and Korn Shells and the new features introduced in the
POSIX Shell.
The POSIX Shell (sh) is named
the same as the Bourne Shell but is put in the /bin/posix
directory. The Bourne Shell is put in the /bin
directory.
What is Key Shell? |
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Key Shell is a softkey interface for the Korn Shell. It was
developed by Hewlett-Packard Company. It provides menus and online
help to assist you in building commands to perform such tasks as
viewing files, printing files, and listing contents of directories.
It is also user-extensible, in that you can create your own softkeys
and online help.
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