FREE ESSAY ON ROLE OF WOMEN IN THE ODYSSEY

ROLE OF WOMEN IN THE ODYSSEY

The Role of Women in The Odyssey 
Women form an important part of the folk epic, written by Homer, The Odyssey. Within the
story there are three basic types of women: the goddess, the seductress, and the good
hostess/wife. Each role adds a different element and is essential to the telling of the
story.
The role of the goddess is one of a supernatural being, but more importantly one in a
position to pity and help mortals. Athena, the goddess of wisdom, is the most prominent
example of the role; in the very beginning of the story she is seen making a plea for
Odysseus' return home, and throughout the first half of the book she assists him in his
journey. She is the driving force behind arranging Odysseus' return home from getting
Kalypso to release him to making sure Nausikaa found him on Skheria. In books 1-4 she
helps Telemakhos, Odysseus' son, gather the courage to go out and get news about his
father. Other than Athena, there are many examples of goddesses taking pity on a mortal,
usually Odysseus, and helping him out. When Odysseus is suffering in a storm that
Poseidon sent for him, Ino, a 
Nereid, gives him an immortal veil that saves his life. Even Kirke and Kalypso help
Odysseus tremendously with information and supplies. It is the 
Role of the woman goddess and not the male god to pity and proffer help to the suffering
mortal.
The next and less benevolent role is that of the seductress. Two stories about such women
referred to in The Odyssey are those of the half-sisters Helen and Klytaimnestra. The
entire Trojan War was caused by Helen's unfaithfulness to Menelaos; her affair caused
many deaths and Odysseus would not have had to leave home if she had not run away with
Paris. The other sister also caused pain and suffering by having an affair and then
killing her husband, Agamemnon, with her lover on his homecoming day. The seductress is
always looked upon as dangerous and harmful to mankind. The Seirenes symbolize this role;
their song seduces and compels anyone listening to linger until death. Kirke tries to
seduce Odysseus before she helps him, and the beautiful Kalypso entices him with sex and
immortality and will not release him to go home. It is the hero's job to resist the
temptation of the seductress or it will lead to his downfall. 
In direct contrast with the seductress is the good hostess or wife. Penelope, Odysseus'
wife, is the most important of these characters. She is the image of steadfastness,
waiting and hoping for years for Odysseus' 
return. Even the intimidating suitors do not bend her from her constancy. Along with
Penelope is Eurykleia who matches Penelope in steadfastness to her job as Telemakhos'
nurse. Nausikaa is a good example of a girl who is an excellent hostess to Odysseus (she
provides him a bath, clothing, food, and advice), and also cares about her image as a
virtuous woman. Her mother, Queen Arete, is good hostess as well, and it was said that
her favor would assure Odysseus a ship ride home. The role of the hostess is similar to
that of goddess because they are both assisting those in need, Odysseus. More
significantly the role of the good woman is to provide a model that makes up for the
seductresses. They are there to show that Agamemnon's statement about his women, that
woman (Klytaimnestra) plotting a thing so low, defiled herself and all her sex, all women
yet to come, even those few who may be virtuous, is untrue. 
The women in all three of these roles embody an essential part of the events of the
story. The hero is helped by the goddess and the good woman, and must overcome her
opposite, the seductress. The relationship between the hero and the women, in fact, forms
the majority of the story. Thus the role of women in Homers The Odyssey plays an
important part to making this epic poem such a wondrous tale and is essential to making
this a wonderfully written epic. 


  
    
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Compare And Contrast Microsoft Dos With Unix
Compare and Contrast Microsoft DOS with UNIX Arthur Bennis Microcomputer Operating
Systems CGS 1560 INTRODUCTION As is suggestive of its name, an operating system (OS) is a
collection of programs that operate the personal computer (PC). Its primary purpose is to
support programs that actually do the work one is interested in, and to allow competing
programs to share the resources of the computer. However, the OS also controls the inner
workings of the computer, acting as a traffic manager which controls the flow of data
through the system and initiates the starting and stopping processes, and as a means
through which software can access the hardware and system software. In addition, it
provides routines for device control, provides for the management, scheduling and
interaction of tasks, and maintains system integrity. It also provides a facility called
the user interface which issues commands to the system software. Utilities are provided
for managing files and documents created by users, development of programs and software,
communicating between users with other computer systems and managing user requirements
for programs, storage space and priority. There are a number of different types of
operating systems with varying degrees of complexity. A system such as DOS can be
relatively simple and minimalistic, while others, like UNIX, can be somewhat more
complicated. Some systems run only a single process at a time (DOS), while other systems
run multiple processes at once (UNIX). In reality, it is not possible for a single
processor to run multiple processes simultaneously. The processor of the computer runs
one process for a short period of time, then is switched to the next process and so on.
As the processor executes millions of instructions per second, this gives the appearance
of many processes running at once. User programs are usually stored on a hard disk and
need to be loaded into memory before being executed. This presents the need for memory
management, as the memory of the computer would need to be searched for a free area in
which to load a users program. When the user was finished running the program, the memory
consumed by it would need to be freed up and made available for another user when
required (CIT). Process scheduling and management is also necessary, so that all programs
can be executed and run without conflict. Some programs might need to be executed more
frequently than others, for example, printing. Conversely, some programs may need to be
temporarily halted, then restarted again, so this introduces the need for inter-program
communication. In modern operating systems, we speak more of a process (a portion of a
program in some stage of execution (CIT, 3)) than a program. This is because only a
portion of the program is loaded at any one time. The rest of the program sits waiting on
the disk until it is needed, thereby saving memory space. UNIX users speak of the
operating system as having three main parts: the kernel, the shell and the file system.
While DOS users tend not to use the term kernel and only sometimes use the term shell,
the terms remain relevant. The kernel, also known as the "Real Time Executive", is the
low-level core of the OS and is loaded into memory right after the loading of the BIOS
whenever the system is started. The kernel handles the transfer of data among the various
parts of the system, such as from hard disk to RAM to CPU. It also assigns memory to the
various system-level processes that occur whenever the computer does anything. The kernel
is also responsible for scheduling the CPU's operations and for letting the shell access
the CPU (PC Mag, 1). The shell is the visible user interface to the OS and is a program
that loads on top of the operating system and offers users commands that lets them access
the OS. Strictly speaking, the shell is an input utility that offers access to the
operating system. Technically speaking, the shell, being a separate program, is not a
part of the OS at all. In the UNIX world a number of shells are available, among them the
Korn shell, the C-shell, the Bourne shell and the Bourne Again shell (yes, really). In
DOS, the standard shell is COMMAND.COM, again nothing more than a program. As different
versions of command.com came with different versions of DOS, each added new commands and
new things that could be done by the user. For example, DOS 4's COMMAND.COM added the /P
switch to DEL to verify each deletion, and DOS 5's COMMAND.COM provided the ability to
sort the output of the DIR command. HISTORY An acronym for disk operating system, the
term DOS can refer to any operating system, but is most often used as shorthand for
MS-DOS. Originally developed by Microsoft for IBM, MS-DOS was the standard operating
system for IBM-compatible computers. The initial version of DOS was somewhat
uncomplicated and resembled another operating system called CP/M. Subsequent versions
have become increasingly sophisticated, however DOS remains a 16-bit operating system
without support for multiple users or multitasking. The earliest forms of DOS were crude
and utilized only a few commands, but as computers became more advanced, so did DOS. By
keeping up with technology, DOS was implemented into more "user friendly" operating
systems. However, as more sophisticated operating systems were released, DOS became less
important. "Today, cyberpunks involved with the latest OS trends joke that DOS stands for
'Dad's Operating System'" (Comerford, 23). In 1980, IBM asked the Microsoft Corporation
to produce the operating system for its first personal computer, the IBM PC. Prior to
this, a company called Seattle Computer Products had sold an operating system called
86-DOS to Microsoft. Microsoft hired the author of 86-DOS, Tim Paterson, in April of 1981
to modify the system, and renaming it MS-DOS (Microsoft Disk Operating System), it was
released with the IBM PC. Thereafter, most manufacturers of personal computers licensed
MS-DOS as their operating system (Brittanica, 1). Limitations of the early PC's hardware
were a big influence on MS-DOS. Although the 8088 model computer had a 1Mb address space,
IBM decided to allocate the first 640K of this to RAM, and the rest to ROMs, video boards
and other things. Consequently, MS-DOS was set up to support programs whose maximum size
was 640K. Version 1.0 of DOS was released along with the IBM PC in August 1981. It
occupied 12K of the systems 640K of memory, was somewhat compatible with CP/M and, much
like CP/M, supported only a single directory. By contrast, even the first version of UNIX
had a full hierarchical file system. In addition, Version 1.0 supported only a 160K
single sided 51/4-inch floppy diskette. Version 1.1 was released by Microsoft in October
1982 and supported double sided 320K diskettes. Aside from fixing some bugs, this release
was similar to Version 1.0. Releases such as 1.1, in which the number to the left of the
decimal point is the same as the previous version depict relatively minor changes from
the previous release. By contrast, Version 2.0 was largely a new system. In March 1983,
IBM introduced the PC/XT, its first personal computer with a hard disk. It came with a
new variant of MS-DOS, Version 2.0. In this version, Microsoft incorporated many ideas
from the UNIX system for which it was also a vendor. For example, incorporating minor
changes, the MS-DOS file system was taken largely from UNIX. In addition, the shell was
improved, and Version 2.0 supported a new floppy diskette format, the 360K as well as
user installable device drivers, print spooling, system configuration and memory
management. At this point, MS-DOS was established as the dominant operating system in PC
market. In August 1984, IBM released its first 286 chip based PC, the PC/AT. The PC/AT
supported memory up to 16 Mb and had the ability to run multiple programs at once.
However, the version of MS-DOS that shipped with the PC/AT was 3.0, which supported
neither of these. Rather, it ran the PC/AT in a mode that simulated the 8088, only
faster. Since the PC/AT came with a 1.2Mb disk drive, battery backup clock, and
configuration information in the CMOS, support for these devices was added. What's more,
hard disks larger that 10Mb were now supported. In addition, the command processor
(shell) was removed from the operating system and made into a separate program. In
November 1984, 3.0 was replace by 3.1 which provided the first support for networking. In
1987, IBM came out with the PS/2 line of PC which shipped with MS-DOS 3.3, providing
support for both 720K and 1.44Mb 31/3 floppy disk drives. With Version 4.0, Microsoft
added the DOS shell, a menu driven shell rather than the previous keyboard driven ones.
In addition, it now provided support for hard drives larger than 32 Mb. A major new
release, MS-DOS Version 5.0 was shipped in April 1991. Although this was the first
version that made any serious use of the extended memory, it still had the restrictions
that programs could not exceed 640K. However, it had the ability to locate most of MS-DOS
itself in extended memory, so about 600K of the lower 640K was now available for user
programs. Version 5.0 also came with a useful HELP utility, to aid new users. For the
first time, MS-DOS was sold in stores to the public (previous versions were only sold to
computer vendors who delivered them with their machines) (CIT, 1-3). The MS-DOS 6 family
provided more memory management for applications such as Microsoft Windows. In addition,
newer utilities were provided for disk-defragmentation, file compression, file backups
and anti-virus checking. Other variations of MS-DOS exist, such as PC-DOS by IBM, DOS-V,
Dr. DOS and others. There is even a FREE DOS available on the Internet as an MS-DOS
clone. Although it can still be found on many computers, MS-DOS is technically an
obsolete operating system, being replaced by Microsoft Windows. For personal computers,
MS-DOS is a single user, single tasking operating system. Single user means only one
person uses the computer at a time. Single tasking means that it essentially runs one
application program at a time, and has no inherent support for running more than one
application program simultaneously (CIT, 2). If we want to look at the basic DOS
operating system itself, there is no need to look further than three system files,
command.com, Io.sys and (in DOS6.x and earlier) Msdos.sys. These files are crucial in DOS
versions up to 6.22. Io.sys represents the lowest level of the interface and contains the
routines necessary for interfacing the OS with the system's BIOS. It implements MS-DOS as
seen by the hardware and has default drivers for console display and keyboard, printer,
serial communications, clock, and a boot disk drive. Msdos.sys handles the higher-level
routines such as converting commands from applications into instructions for Io.sys. It
implements MS-DOS as seen by application programs. It supports file and record
management, memory management, character device input and output, execution of other
programs, and access to a real-time clock (CIT, 3). Both of these files are in the root
directory, and both are hidden from view by default. The idea is that you are not suppose
to see them, so that you don't do anything destructive to them (such as deleting them).
They are also read-only so that they can't be deleted accidentally. Command.com is the
shell program which interprets user commands, presents the shell prompt, and contains a
set of internal commands. The rest of MS-DOS consists of a number of utility programs.
Although DOS had cornered the PC market, UNIX was still dominant on the larger
workstations. The birth of UNIX in 1969 provided the world with its first modern
operating system. An interactive multi-user operating system, UNIX was initially
developed by programmers for their own use. Working for Bell Laboratories, Ken Thompson
and Dennis Ritchie created UNIX as an operating system for the PDP-7 computer. Designed
as a simplification of an operating system named Multics, UNIX was developed in Assembly
language, a primitive computer language specific to one type of machine (Osiris, 1).
However, Thompson developed a new programming language "B" which Ritchie enhanced to "C",
and in 1973 this was used to rewrite UNIX which lended the OS portability (Linux Intl.,
1). The original design philosophy for UNIX was to distribute functionality into small
parts, the programs (Theochem, 1). In this way, functionality could be achieved by
combining the small parts (programs) in new ways. Moreover, if a new program were to
appear, it could be integrated into the system. UNIX was slow to catch on outside of
academic institutions but soon was popular with businesses as well. The first five
versions were part of an internal research effort of Bell Labs, and it was not until the
sixth version, called UNIX Timesharing Sixth Edition V, that UNIX was widely distributed
(Osiris, 1). Relatively recent developments are graphical interfaces (GUI) such as MOTIF,
X Windows and Open View. UNIX has two major versions. One, jointly developed by UNIX
Systems Laboratories (USL) and by AT&T researchers together with Bell Labs, generically
known as System V, is the commercial version and is the most widely distributed by major
manufacturers. The second, developed by the University of Berkley and Berkley Software
Distribution (BSD), is the educational version and is completely focused on research. The
USL version is now on its fourth release, or SVR4, while BSD's latest version is 4.4.
However, there are many different versions of UNIX besides these two. The operating
system has been licensed to several manufacturers who in turn developed their own
versions of UNIX, based on System V or BSD, but adding new characteristics. Most versions
of UNIX developed by software companies are derived from one of the two groupings and,
recent versions of UNIX actually incorporate features from both of them. However, UNIX
has had an unregulated history with over 200 versions (Berson, 16) existing today. The
UNIX system is made up of three primary components, the kernel, the shell, and the
utilities (which includes the file system). The central part of the OS, the kernel is the
first program to start when the system is turned on and the last program to do anything
when the system is halted. In addition to scheduling tasks, it manages data/file access
and storage, enforces security mechanisms and performs all hardware access. The name
"KERNEL" represents the fact that it is a program designed as a central nucleus, around
which other functions of the system were added. The heart of the operating system, it not
only interacts directly with the system's hardware, but presents each user with a prompt,
interprets commands typed by a user, executes user commands and supports a custom
environment for each user. The two most common shells are the Bourne shell, default for
the System V, and the C-shell used mainly with the BSD version (Osiris, 1). The utilities
consist of file management (rm, cat, ls, rmdir, mkdir), user management (passwd, chmod,
chgrp), process management (kill, ps) and printing (lp, troff, pr). In order to obtain a
basic understanding of the UNIX operating system, it is necessary to touch upon several
of the principal characteristics that have permitted it to remain competitive through the
years. 1. Advanced Administration of Processes UNIX has a process manager known as
Process Scheduler, which handles the allotment of time to each of the processes according
to the priority it was assigned. 2. Multiprocessing Many UNIX variants allow the use of
various processors to execute user tasks. This means that UNIX has support for symmetric
processing, with which it can take advantage of the fact that there are two or more CPUs
in the machine. 3. File Management The hierarchical files system that UNIX runs, as well
as file access control and directory control have served as models for the majority of
modern operating systems such as MS-DOS, OS/2 and even Windows NT. 4. Utilities Access
For the UNIX operating system, each of the machines devices, whether it be a hard drive,
printer, modem, etc. is seen as a file. Thus, access to any device is carried out as
access to a file. This is possible through the fact that UNIX differentiates between
kinds of files. In fact, the processes themselves are seen as files, which permits the
establishment of another important UNIX characteristic, interprocess communication. 5.
Virtual Memory The fact that UNIX has virtual memory allows the number of processes being
executed to require more memory than exists in the machine. 6. Graphic Interface Although
not exactly a novel characteristic of UNIX, most versions now have a graphic interface.
7. Interplatform Support This is another characteristic that was added to UNIX which
lends the capability to execute programs from other platforms (DOS and Windows), within
the UNIX environment. 8. Networks The usual UNIX communications protocol is TCP/IP. This
allows variants of UNIX based operating systems to communicate between themselves or with
other platforms (Osiris, 1-2). CONTRAST Both DOS and UNIX present a number of
similarities, several of which shall be addressed here. First, both systems are
interactive, meaning that the shell presents a prompt and waits for the user to enter a
command. After the return or enter key is pressed, the shell processes the command and
when the command is finished, the shell re-displays the prompt. Second, DOS batch files
and UNIX script files can be used which can store commonly used commands in a file, which
when executed, runs each command as though it has been typed from the command line. A
sequence of commands can be executed by executing the file which contains the command(s).
Third, the handling of files in both DOS and UNIX is simplified by using wild-card
characters to match files which match particular patterns. Also, with both operating
systems, users can customize and control the behavior of the shell by using special
variables that the shell supports, such as the prompt (20,1). In addition, both systems
make use of "pipes" whose symbol is a vertical bar ( | ). With this convention, the
output from one command becomes the input for another command. Several dissimilarities
are worth noting. As was previously mentioned, DOS is a single user, single task
operating system. Its user interface is not case sensitive, which means that commands may
be typed in either upper case, lower case or a combination of the two. UNIX however, is a
multi-user, multi-task OS. Non-interactive tasks which do not require keyboard input can
be run in the background as a separate task while the user continues working with other
interactive programs (20,1). Differing from DOS, its user interface is case sensitive,
meaning that only upper or lower case commands must be used. APPLICATIONS & COMPUTER
TYPES Whereas DOS has been used primarily on PCs and standalone computers, UNIX can be
run on single- or multi-user computers of all sizes with a wide range of microprocessors
(Flynn & McHoes 319). UNIX is the widely supported operating system in the field of
computer science, used extensively in business as well as educational institutions.
Conversely, DOS is used mainly in businesses with older computer systems. BENEFITS &
DISADVANTAGES The major advantage that DOS has over UNIX is its basic simplicity. Between
this and the uncomplicated commands presented by the user interface, it is a relatively
simple OS to learn. DOS also has the advantage of allowing the user to create an
environment tailored strictly for the particular task they wish to accomplish. In
addition, one can customize DOS to suit the current hardware. This can be accomplished
with commands such as date, time, prompt, path, set, assign and subst. Unlike DOS, UNIX's
main feature is that it is a multi-user system, meaning more than one user can use the
machine at a time when supported via terminals provided by a serial or network
connection. Offering true preemptive multi-tasking, UNIX can run more than one program at
a time with a CPU that services all applications equally. In addition, it has a
hierarchical directory structure which supports the organization and maintenance of
files. Other advantages are that it has been in the market for a number of years, and is
therefore considered a stable product. Also, due to the fact that the kernel is in "C",
UNIX works in just about every machine in the market, once again, making it a portable
system with a collection of very powerful utilities. Also, there are many applications
developed for DOS and UNIX which fall into the category of "shareware" available via the
Internet (8,1). As with advantages, both DOS and UNIX have their share of disadvantages.
It can be said that DOS has two main drawbacks. Since MS-DOS was originally written for a
particular family of microprocessors, it displays an incredible lack of flexibility and
limited ability to meet the needs of programmers and experienced users (Flynn & McHoes,
265). UNIX also has several very distinct disadvantages. First, novice users find its
commands are almost cryptic which is interpreted as being non-"user-friendly". Second,
the fact that there exist so many versions of the operating system means that software
producers must make several versions of their applications to cover the greatest number
of potential users. Third, UNIX is a large operating system, and depending on the number
of services installed and the functions used, space used on a hard drive may vary from 20
Mb to 300 Mb (Osiris, 1). Works Cited Benson, Alex. Client/Server Architecture.
Gainesville: U P of Florida, 1992. Comelford, Richard. "Operating Systems go Head to
Head", IEEE Spectrum. Dec 1993, pp 23-25. Flynn, Ida M., and Ann M. McHoes. Understanding
Operating Systems. Second ed. Boston: PWS, 1997. Greenfield, Larry. UNIX: The User's
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Theochem.uni-duesseldorf.de/docu/user-guide* Introduction to UNIX. University of
Guadalajara. [Accessed 3 September 1998].
http://osiris.staff.udg.mx/man/ingles/introduccion.html " Microsoft Corporation"
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*http://www.cit.ac.nz/smac/os100/unix01.html* Randall,