mwm@ucbopal.BERKELEY.EDU (Mike (I'll be mellow when I'm dead) Meyer) (03/10/86)
In article <47@gilbbs.UUCP> mc68020@gilbbs.UUCP (Tom Keller) writes: > ***SHIT*** Mike, what I *SHOULD* have done, it appears, is spend $50K or >more on a bigger, better system! There are 2 (count them two) versions of >UNIX (XENIX) available for the hardware I can *AFFORD*: 2.3a (an unGhodly >meld of V7 and SysIII), and SYS III. There is 1 (count it, one!) C compiler >available for this system/OS combination. "Afford" is a nasty word, and how much you pay for your hardware/software has very little to do with the quality you get. For example, the $150 Lattice C compiler for the Amiga is, in some respects, better than the 4.3BSD C compiler. As for what runs on cheap hardware, buying a cheap Unix box is probably a mistake. Unix is a pig, and expecting to get a reasonable Unix system for under $7K or so is unreal (as far as I know. If you've got one, let me know). If you spent that much on a Unix system, then you could have gotten either a 4.2 or V.2 system, both of which have flexnames. I also seriously doubt that there's only C compiler for your system. Given your username, I'd suggest you call Oasys (617/491-4180) and ask them about a C compiler. [Disclaimer: I don't work for Oasys. I don't know anything about them. I just happened to have seen one of their ads recently.] I didn't ask you to spend more money than you did, I asked you not to bitch at people who giving you software because you have an inadequate C compiler. Bitch at your vendor, instead. If porting the software is a real problem for you, send me email stating what you want ported and how much you're willing to pay for it. Of course, if the code isn't readable (someone broke readability in the name of portability, say), then it's going to be expensive. <mike
mwm@ucbopal.BERKELEY.EDU (Mike (I'll be mellow when I'm dead) Meyer) (03/10/86)
In article <171@desint.UUCP> geoff@desint.UUCP (Geoff Kuenning) writes: >Gee, that's awfully generous of you, Mike. So it's all my fault the >compiler doesn't support flexnames now? I should go change vendors, >huh? (Are you offering to buy my existing equipment at a price high >enough to let me afford the latest and greatest?) > >Oh, you don't want me to replace my still-functional obsolete >equipment? I should just go "shout" at the vendor to supply me with V.2. >Let's see, the president of that defunct company works in Irvine; >that's driving distance for me. Maybe I could go shout at him. Or are >you offering to buy me a ticket to Paris so I can go shout at the V.P. >of Engineering? Ok, you're stuck between a rock and a hard place. You bought hardware, and the company died. This could happen to anyone who doesn't buy from IBM, so you're not to blame. That's the break you asked for. >Give me a break, Mike. Even if I had a live vendor like MicroSoft, do >you really think that Bill Gates is going to change his release >schedules just because I yelled at one of his support persons? No, but if a large part of their customer base started complaining about it, they might. Then again, unless there's any truth to the rumor about Microsoft having changed there support policy, all customer complaints will be ignored. One thing is certain - complaining because people post software that you're obsolete compiler doesn't accept will *NOT* get you a better compiler. >Oh, I understand now. I blew it when I picked vendors. All I can say >is that it sure must be nice to be able to see into the future and see >which vendors are not going to make it. Care to recommend any stocks >for me? Unfortunately, that ability doesn't extend to picking companies with reasonble software support et. al. Solution: complain, and if they don't change, ignore them. That's why I don't know if MicroShaft actually has a better support policy these days. For stock, buy Commodore-Amiga. They have a great machine, respectable software, a reasonable dealer network, and competent tech support people. None of which insures that they will survive. :-) <mike
ron@dsi1.UUCP (Ron Flax) (03/11/86)
In article <412@ucbjade.BERKELEY.EDU> mwm@ucbopal.UUCP (Mike (I'll be mellow when I'm dead) Meyer) writes: > >As for what runs on cheap hardware, buying a cheap Unix box is probably a >mistake. Unix is a pig, and expecting to get a reasonable Unix system for >under $7K or so is unreal (as far as I know. If you've got one, let me know). >If you spent that much on a Unix system, then you could have gotten either a >4.2 or V.2 system, both of which have flexnames. > Mike please don't keep us in suspense any longer, tell us what non-cheap ( that is good quality ) Unix box can one buy for around $7K that runs 4.2BSD Unix? -- Ron Flax (ron@dsi1.UUCP) ARPA: dsi1!ron@seismo.arpa UUCP: ..!{seismo, rlgvax, prometheus}!dsi1!ron
geoff@desint.UUCP (Geoff Kuenning) (03/12/86)
In article <413@ucbjade.BERKELEY.EDU> mwm@ucbopal.UUCP (Mike Meyer) writes: > One thing is certain - complaining because people post software that you're > obsolete compiler doesn't accept will *NOT* get you a better compiler. How about that. Of course, nobody ever complained about the existence of the posting. The complaint was that software was being advertised as 'portable', despite the fact that it had long identifiers. In fact, this was not the only problem; the software that prompted the original posting also dereferenced NULL pointers with great abandon and was a royal *pain* to port; I only finished it because I wanted it very badly. People post 4BSD-specific stuff all the time; I don't have a problem with that. I *do* ask that they mark system dependencies as such so that those of use who have older systems won't waste valuable time and disk space trying to port something that won't come across. That's all the original posting on this subject asked, too. > For stock, buy Commodore-Amiga. They have a great machine, respectable > software, a reasonable dealer network, and competent tech support people. > None of which insures that they will survive. :-) Indeed. For starters, you have completely overlooked their financial condition, not to mention the qualifications of their critical management and engineering people. Back to the Ouija board. :-) -- Geoff Kuenning {hplabs,ihnp4}!trwrb!desint!geoff
chris@umcp-cs.UUCP (Chris Torek) (03/13/86)
In article <181@srs.UUCP> forrest@srs.UUCP writes: > ... I think that Mr. Keller is forgetting a very important >point. He is getting this software free. It is written at the >EXPENSE of the author only. This is not entirely true. There is a cost incurred in each article and each transmission, at each site. But it is important to remember that one's presence on Usenet is voluntary. If you do not like what you see, you may always withdraw. Change for the better is a noble goal, but abuse and insults are unlikely to acheive it. (Please note that I am not speaking of Forrest's article, but rather some of those that preceded it.) As long as I am standing on my soapbox here (well, a virtual soapbox, if you will), I shall state my own opinions about long identifiers. I use them. I will continue to use them. I have in the past used, and probably will (on occasion) use in the future, systems with rather strict limits on identifier length---often six characters, single case, or even two characters, single case. (What was the last system? Microsoft BASIC for the TRS-80. I wrote a complete Z80 assembler on that beast*; it handled arbitrarily long programs by keeping its symbol table in a disk file, and incidentally had eight significant characters, upper and lower case.) When using such a system I will put up with its restrictions as long as I must. But as I am not now restricted, I will not concern myself with significant lengths. Why? Because I feel that the names themselves are more important to me than the potential lack of portability. It is not my intent to write unportable programs; but I have dealt with name length restrictions; I know the effect of short names, and I do not like it. Now this is all well and good as long as I am writing code for local use. But what if I post it? Is it not unfair to some? Probably---but I am not posting it for them; I am posting it for those who *can* use it. ---And even if your compiler will not handle my program as it stands, you may be able to fix that, in less time than it would take to write your own version. And if you cannot use it at all, then please pass over it in silence, or at the most, simply state that you would like to have been able to use it, but were not, and would coders please remember that some systems have stricter limits, and that if they want their programs to be useful to all, they should keep this in mind. I think all involved will benefit more from this than from flames to the effect that `it does not work on Widget Inc's compiler'. ----- *Probably the world's slowest assembler, it ran at the tremendous rate of 30 line a minute---per pass. -- In-Real-Life: Chris Torek, Univ of MD Comp Sci Dept (+1 301 454 1415) UUCP: seismo!umcp-cs!chris CSNet: chris@umcp-cs ARPA: chris@mimsy.umd.edu
mwm@ucbopal.BERKELEY.EDU (Mike (I'll be mellow when I'm dead) Meyer) (03/14/86)
In article <174@desint.UUCP> geoff@desint.UUCP (Geoff Kuenning) writes: >People post 4BSD-specific stuff all the time; I don't have a problem >with that. I *do* ask that they mark system dependencies as such so >that those of use who have older systems won't waste valuable time and >disk space trying to port something that won't come across. That's all >the original posting on this subject asked, too. The original poster asked (well, flamed is more like it) that people tag BSD stuff if it used long variable names. My answering flame was to point out (Grab, shake, force face into...) that BSD wasn't the only system that supported long variable names - most everybody does, nowdays. Also, there are lots of *other* things you can do that people's compilers may or may not accept (I think there are people out there that still have v6 systems. Using the photo-7 compilers, guys?), such as: bitfield, void, unsigned <some type other than int>, structure passing/returning/assigning, and nowdays the XJ311 constructs like union initialization and function prototyping. What do we do about those? Proposed solution: For each posting, state which systems it has been tested and is known to run on. Of course, people post code that doesn't compile (for worse reasons than the long character name problem), so I don't expect any such thing to happen. >> For stock, buy Commodore-Amiga. They have a great machine, respectable >> software, a reasonable dealer network, and competent tech support people. >> None of which insures that they will survive. :-) > >Indeed. For starters, you have completely overlooked their financial >condition, not to mention the qualifications of their critical >management and engineering people. Back to the Ouija board. :-) [Time to move to net.micro. Maybe next time...] The talked the bank into giving them another year to pay things off. They are in the middle of a management shakeup, but the person who left them in this state (Pappa Jack) is gone. The engineering people are the ones who did the Amiga, bought when they bought Amiga. If they can make the loan payoff, those who bought now are gonna be in good shape. I think they will, but don't claim any better accuracy than either the Ouija board or the entrails of a hacker. <mike
doug@ides.UUCP (Douglas J. Wait) (03/14/86)
> In article <412@ucbjade.BERKELEY.EDU> mwm@ucbopal.UUCP (Mike (I'll be mellow when I'm dead) Meyer) writes: > > > >As for what runs on cheap hardware, buying a cheap Unix box is probably a > >mistake. Unix is a pig, and expecting to get a reasonable Unix system for > >under $7K or so is unreal (as far as I know. If you've got one, let me know). > >If you spent that much on a Unix system, then you could have gotten either a > >4.2 or V.2 system, both of which have flexnames. > > UUCum.. Uah... PLEASE.. PLEASE.. Don't forget the AT&T UNIX PC. I'm not in sales. I'm in software! The AT&T UNIX PC is a VERY GOOD "cheap Unix box" running "V.2"! -- Doug Wait AT&T Information Systems 200 Lincon Maitland, FL 32751 (305)660-6460 ..!{akgua,ihnp4,abcom}!abfli!doug "Is anyBODY OUT there..."
geoff@desint.UUCP (Geoff Kuenning) (03/16/86)
In article <433@ucbjade.BERKELEY.EDU> mwm@ucbopal.UUCP (Mike Meyer) writes: > ...BSD [isn't] the only system that > supported long variable names - most everybody does, nowdays. Wrong again. Nearly every C compiler currently being *offered for sale* supports long names. That is very much different from "most everybody", which I take to mean the installed base of UNIX systems. As has already been pointed out in this group, there are over 100,000 TRS-16's running XENIX; since XENIX was still III-based as little as a year ago, it is reasonable to assume that the great majority of the installed base (counting by number of machines, not users) has 7-character names or shorter. -- Geoff Kuenning {hplabs,ihnp4}!trwrb!desint!geoff
jay@ethos.UUCP (Jay Denebeim) (03/19/86)
In article <178@desint.UUCP> geoff@desint.UUCP (Geoff Kuenning) writes: >In article <433@ucbjade.BERKELEY.EDU> mwm@ucbopal.UUCP (Mike Meyer) writes: > >> ...BSD [isn't] the only system that >> supported long variable names - most everybody does, nowdays. > >Wrong again. Nearly every C compiler currently being *offered for sale* >supports long names. That is very much different from "most >everybody", which I take to mean the installed base of UNIX systems. Ditto for Sys V on the UNIX PC (ATT 7300). Looks to me like it's about all of the inexpensive UNIX systems. How 'bout a variable name shortener program? Anyone wanna try their hands at it? -- Jay Denebeim "One world, one egg, one basket." {seismo,decvax,ihnp4}!mcnc!rti-sel!ethos!jay Deep Thought, ZNode #42 300/1200/2400 919-471-6436