File Names:
DEC-VMS is case-insensitive. In other words it does not matter whether you use upper or lower case letters.
UNIX is case sensitive - it does matter for both commands and file names. Both upper and lower case characters appear the same to the VAX. Under VMS for example, both dir, Dir and DIR will run the same command, while TEMPFILE.TXT and TempFile.txt are recognized as the same filename. On the other hand, UNIX is case sensitive, so ls is not the same as LS.
VMS appends a version number to files (filename;1). Unix does not append version numbers. As a result, for SeqLab to correctly see sequence files, you most rename your files so as to remove the version suffix information.
mv filename.seq;1 filename.seq
Unix File and Directory Naming rules
Arguments (parameters) to Commands
Arguments to a command (the optional parameters listed on the command line after typing the command name) are separated from each other and the command by a forward slash (/) on VMS and by a hyphen (-) on UNIX. This is true in all cases - not only operating system commands, but also GCG commands.
Although the main commands in the other operating systems are recognized by the VAX, the optional parameters are not. For example, the UNIX command ls -l filename would not be recognized by the VAX. Only the VMS optional parameters would be recognized, ls filename /size/date/pro.
GCG Commands on Unix and VMS
GCG commands are the same in VMS and UNIX. However, while VMS will recognize most GCG commands typing the first few characters, in UNIX it is necessary to type the entire command name. All of the command arguments between Unix and VMS are the same.
Command Equivalents - VMS and Unix
| VMS | DOS | UNIX | Result |
| dir | dir | ls | display directory contents |
| create/directory | md | mkdir | create new directory |
| delete | del | rm | delete a file |
| type > lpt1 | lp | Print a file | |
| type | type | cat, more, less | display a file |
| type/page | more | |more, less | show file page-by-page |
| copy | copy | cp | copy a file |
| show users/full | who | show users | |
| show system | ps | show processes | |
| show devices/mounted | chkdsk | df -k, du -kl,
quota -v |
show disk space |
| show queue/all_entries | lpq | show printer queue | |
| help | man | calls help | |
| show def | pwd | shows current directory | |
| set def | cd | cd | changes directory |
| edit | edit | vi, pico, emacs | text editors |