NOSs

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Y'all,

≪Or are you saying that networks _are_ OSes of a sort?≫ Precisely. And
Novell is one of them. They manage hardware and software resources, as
local OSs do. They happen to be distributed, rather than local to a
single machine. Rather than managing hits on a single local harddisk,
they manage hits on storage area servers (groups of harddisks on
multiple frames), for example; rather than printing to a local LPT port,
they print to a remote print manager which is responsible for locating
the next free printer, for example.

In a large corporation or govt dept, you cannot store enough information
on a single harddisk to be of any use (nor would it be advisable to do
so, if it were possible); neither can you afford to buy a printer for
each work station; so these (and other) resources are distributed across
the network, and a network OS (such as Novell or Cisco) is responsible
for managing them and securing them from unauthorized use.

The customary abbreviation for network OS is 'NOS' (unless you collect
old-timer automobiles, in which case it means 'new old stock'). End of
lecture.