olson@endor.harvard.edu (Eric Olson) (01/01/70)
Could all the people who are actually participating in this discussion please leave the Subject line unaltered so that the people that don't want to read it can kill it more easily? Thanks. -Eric Eric K. Olson olson@endor.harvard.edu harvard!endor!olson
elwell%tut.cis.ohio-state.edu@osu-eddie.UUCP (Clayton Elwell) (01/01/70)
In article <1714@cadovax.UUCP> keithd@cadovax.UUCP (Keith Doyle) writes: >Yeah, but is your download so fast that you don't have time to fire up >your C compiler while it's downloading? > >Keith Doyle ># {ucbvax,decvax}!trwrb!cadovax!keithd ># cadovax!keithd@ucla-locus.arpa Contel Business Systems 213-323-8170 Most of the time. The AppleTalk Personal Network, while slow for a network, is quite fast as a communications line :-). It looks like it's getting time for another subject. -=- Clayton Elwell Arpa/CSNet: Elwell@Ohio-State.ARPA UUCP: ...!cbosgd!osu-eddie!elwell Voice: (614) 292-6546
mwm@eris.BERKELEY.EDU (Mike (My watch has windows) Meyer) (08/23/87)
In article <2731@husc6.UUCP> fry@huma1.UUCP (David Fry) writes:
<significant. I envy Amiga's multi-tasking, but Amiga owners
<cannot truthfully say they don't envy the Mac's enormous
<toolbox that allows for fantastic control and a standardized
<user interface. They must envy its fonts, its desk
<accessories, its clipboard, and its large application base.
Let's see about this. Accessories. Not needed on the Amiga;
multitasking covers for them. The clipboard is there; applications
just don't use it (silly them). Large applications base; I've bought
as much software for my Amiga as I have for any system (and I haven't
stolen any), and as I probably would for the Mac. I envy the IBM-PC
people that more than the Mac people. Toolbox: can't say - I'm not
familiar with it. Wanna loan me a manual so I can do an improved
implementaiton for the Amiga :-)?
<They must envy the seamless (from the user's perspective)
<interaction between the computer and printers, which has now
<been extended to the Fax modem.
Not much. For high-quality work I go to things that blow the Mac out
of the water. 300 dpi just doesn't cut it for camera-ready text.
<They must envy the
<fantastically generalized system design which allows the
<computer to use kanji scripts as easily as Roman, and have kanji
<appear effortlessly in menus, dialog boxes, everywhere.
Not as much as I (as a Unix systems hacker) appreciate the
fantastically generalized system on the Amiga, which lets me do FM to
just about anything in the system.
The one thing I do envy is resources, which lets the user control more
than they can on the Amiga (but not a lot more - resetting menu
entries, etc can be done on the Amiga, too). Then I look at the code
that you have to write to deal with them, and get ill.
<And starting this month they're going to envy Hypercard.
I've seen HyperCard. It's about 90% of what I want in a hypertext
system. Then again, infominder is about 90% of what I want in a
hypertext system, too. Just different 90%s. I envy that it's being
bundled with Macs. I shudder at watching it run on an 8 bit plane Mac
][. If it were available for an Amiga at $50, I'd buy one. At $100, I
wouldn't. Finally, the question of whether HyperCard can properly do a
hypertext system is still open. The answer apperas to be "yes," but I
want to see it done.
<Amiga owners, that's why we like the Macintosh: we have
<respect for a job well done.
Odd; that's why I like the Amiga.
<The Mac had a lot of problems when it started out, and Apple has taken
<great strides to get rid of them with elegant solutions.
The Amiga doesn't have a lot of problems, it's only got a couple. I
expect them to be solved well before the Amiga has been out for 5
years.
<Of course we wish would could multi-task now, but we're willing
<to wait rather than sacrifice the other tangible benefits of our
<machine, which are much more important in the long run.
I get tangible benefits from multitasking *now*. I don't have a lot of
use for what you claim are the tangible benefits of the Mac.
<Real people have real problems and they don't care or know
<about the technical internals of their computer.
Very true. And before saying "computer X is better than computer Y,"
you need to decide what you're going to do with them.
I use my Amiga primarily to develop code for the Amiga and as a
terminal to the Unix boxes I have to maintain. Other things I do on
the Amiga can be done on the Unix boxes without much problem; none of
the things I use a computer for would noticably benefit from having a
Mac around. On the other hand, the ability to do more than one of
these things at a time is a mondo win.
Show me a Multifinder box with a compile running in one window, and a
vt100 emulator doing a download in another, and then I'll be willing
to consider swapping my Amiga for a Mac.
For other people, other criteria are more important. Each person
buying a computer needs to consider what they are going to use it for.
I've recommended people buy IBM PCs, Ataris, Macs and Radio Shack
boxes. It depended on what they wanted them for. Blindly pushing one
computer for all applications is a disservice to those who expect
expert advice from you.
<mike
--
All around my hat, I will wear the green willow. Mike Meyer
And all around my hat, for a twelve-month and a day. mwm@berkeley.edu
And if anyone should ask me, the reason why I'm wearing it, ucbvax!mwm
It's all for my true love, who's far far away. mwm@ucbjade.BITNETelwell%tut.cis.ohio-state.edu@osu-eddie.UUCP (Clayton Elwell) (08/24/87)
In article <4854@jade.BERKELEY.EDU> mwm@eris.BERKELEY.EDU (Mike (My watch has windows) Meyer) writes: ><They must envy the seamless (from the user's perspective) ><interaction between the computer and printers, which has now ><been extended to the Fax modem. > >Not much. For high-quality work I go to things that blow the Mac out >of the water. 300 dpi just doesn't cut it for camera-ready text. But Mike, this is what he means. I don't know about you, but MY high-quality output device is a Linotron 300 (2540 dpi). All I do is choose "Print" from the menu. I can even do color seps and other fun stuff just as simply. How exactly do you "blow this out of the water?" :-) ><They must envy the ><fantastically generalized system design which allows the ><computer to use kanji scripts as easily as Roman, and have kanji ><appear effortlessly in menus, dialog boxes, everywhere. > >Not as much as I (as a Unix systems hacker) appreciate the >fantastically generalized system on the Amiga, which lets me do FM to >just about anything in the system. FM? Field Maintenance? Frequency Modulation? Please to explain... >The one thing I do envy is resources, which lets the user control more >than they can on the Amiga (but not a lot more - resetting menu >entries, etc can be done on the Amiga, too). Then I look at the code >that you have to write to deal with them, and get ill. This has more to do with who's writing the code (and in what language) than anything else. I'll give the Amiga one thing--it's easier to understand at first than the Mac is. Then again, I think this is because it's an improvement over the glass-tty-with-bells-and-whistles approach :-). ><And starting this month they're going to envy Hypercard. > >I've seen HyperCard. It's about 90% of what I want in a hypertext >system. Then again, infominder is about 90% of what I want in a >hypertext system, too. Just different 90%s. I envy that it's being >bundled with Macs. I shudder at watching it run on an 8 bit plane Mac >][. If it were available for an Amiga at $50, I'd buy one. At $100, I >wouldn't. Finally, the question of whether HyperCard can properly do a >hypertext system is still open. The answer apperas to be "yes," but I >want to see it done. HyperCard is not hypertext. HyperCard has some concepts that were introduced by the hypertext folks, but it isn't any more than Apple claims it to be: a personal tool for organizing information. There are people working on dropping hooks into it to connect it to real hypertext systems (you know, gigabytes of data on big, fast computers), since it makes the user interface half of things much easier. Even so, it's not hypertext, any more than an Amiga is a Cray just because they can both do ray tracing... ><Amiga owners, that's why we like the Macintosh: we have ><respect for a job well done. > >Odd; that's why I like the Amiga. I like the Amiga too. Aside from the Mac II, it's one of the nicest pieces of hardware out there. Too bad the software doesn't do it justice. ><The Mac had a lot of problems when it started out, and Apple has taken ><great strides to get rid of them with elegant solutions. > >The Amiga doesn't have a lot of problems, it's only got a couple. I >expect them to be solved well before the Amiga has been out for 5 >years. What about the new problems that arise in the meantime? Apple has shown an excellent track record in keeping up with (and forseeing) new problems. This is due in a large part to the flexible and generalized software architecture. Can most vanilla programs on the Amiga work in Arabic without recompilation, and with precious little resource editing? ><Of course we wish would could multi-task now, but we're willing ><to wait rather than sacrifice the other tangible benefits of our ><machine, which are much more important in the long run. > >I get tangible benefits from multitasking *now*. I don't have a lot of >use for what you claim are the tangible benefits of the Mac. Most of the time, I get more tangible benefits from the thought that went into the design of the Mac (and its software) than I do out of the multitasking that's present on every other machine I use. To pick an example out of a hat, my C compiler is so fast that I don't have time to fire up a terminal emulator and download a file while it's compiling. >... none of >the things I use a computer for would noticably benefit from having a >Mac around. What about things you don't use a computer for right now? > On the other hand, the ability to do more than one of >these things at a time is a mondo win. > >Show me a Multifinder box with a compile running in one window, and a >vt100 emulator doing a download in another, and then I'll be willing >to consider swapping my Amiga for a Mac. You don't need MultiFinder to see this. On the other hand, you do need a slow compiler :-). >For other people, other criteria are more important. Each person >buying a computer needs to consider what they are going to use it for. >I've recommended people buy IBM PCs, Ataris, Macs and Radio Shack >boxes. It depended on what they wanted them for. Blindly pushing one >computer for all applications is a disservice to those who expect >expert advice from you. Funny, now we seem to be agreeing... How'd that happen :-)? > <mike > > >-- >All around my hat, I will wear the green willow. Mike Meyer >And all around my hat, for a twelve-month and a day. mwm@berkeley.edu >And if anyone should ask me, the reason why I'm wearing it, ucbvax!mwm >It's all for my true love, who's far far away. mwm@ucbjade.BITNET [Good taste in music, too.] -=- Clayton Elwell Arpa/CSNet: Elwell@Ohio-State.ARPA UUCP: ...!cbosgd!osu-eddie!elwell Voice: (614) 292-6546
dillon@CORY.BERKELEY.EDU (Matt Dillon) (08/25/87)
>>I get tangible benefits from multitasking *now*. I don't have a lot of >>use for what you claim are the tangible benefits of the Mac. > >Most of the time, I get more tangible benefits from the thought that >went into the design of the Mac (and its software) than I do out of >the multitasking that's present on every other machine I use. To pick >an example out of a hat, my C compiler is so fast that I don't have >time to fire up a terminal emulator and download a file while it's >compiling. This is a very minor point relative to multitasking in general and a bad example to boot (as anybody who has ever had experience on a multi- tasking machine such as a Sun can tell you). I think what you meant to say was something along the lines "The Mac was designed well enough that Multitasking doesn't seem to be as much of a benefit as one might think"... at least, that's how I read it. I, for one, find some sort of multitasking a neccesity. The Mac has this in its DA's and other clever interrupt driven tricks. Even when I still had my old Commodore Pet (can you say 7167 bytes free?) I wrote programs which semi-multitasked so I could debug them while they were running. -Matt
elwell%tut.cis.ohio-state.edu@osu-eddie.UUCP (Clayton Elwell) (08/25/87)
In article <8708242340.AA10671@cory.Berkeley.EDU> dillon@CORY.BERKELEY.EDU (Matt Dillon) writes: { >> = me, > = Matt} >>Most of the time, I get more tangible benefits from the thought that >>went into the design of the Mac (and its software) than I do out of >>the multitasking that's present on every other machine I use. To pick >>an example out of a hat, my C compiler is so fast that I don't have >>time to fire up a terminal emulator and download a file while it's >>compiling. > > This is a very minor point relative to multitasking in general and >a bad example to boot (as anybody who has ever had experience on a multi- >tasking machine such as a Sun can tell you). I think what you meant to >say was something along the lines "The Mac was designed well enough that >Multitasking doesn't seem to be as much of a benefit as one might think"... >at least, that's how I read it. That might be a better way to say it. I use (and support) Suns everyday. They're great for a lot of things, but I end up spending a lot more of my time in front of my Mac, simply because it makes me more productive. If Lightspeed C, Adobe Illustrator, etc. ran on a Sun (at the same price), then I might switch my base of operations. As it is, the Mac is a much better environment, even without having preemptive multitasking. > I, for one, find some sort of multitasking a neccesity. The Mac has >this in its DA's and other clever interrupt driven tricks. Even when I still >had my old Commodore Pet (can you say 7167 bytes free?) I wrote programs which >semi-multitasked so I could debug them while they were running. > > -Matt It's this kind of thing that lets MultiFinder work. If I can have more multitasking without giving up the Mac architecture, I'll be very happy. MultiFinder is one approach. A/UX running a layer manager is another. I'm patient. -=- Clayton Elwell Arpa/CSNet: Elwell@Ohio-State.ARPA UUCP: ...!cbosgd!osu-eddie!elwell Voice: (614) 292-6546
keithd@cadovax.UUCP (Keith Doyle) (08/26/87)
In article <4026@osu-eddie.UUCP> elwell%tut.cis.ohio-state.edu@osu-eddie.UUCP (Clayton Elwell) writes:
.Most of the time, I get more tangible benefits from the thought that
.went into the design of the Mac (and its software) than I do out of
.the multitasking that's present on every other machine I use. To pick
.an example out of a hat, my C compiler is so fast that I don't have
.time to fire up a terminal emulator and download a file while it's
.compiling.
Yeah, but is your download so fast that you don't have time to fire up
your C compiler while it's downloading?
Keith Doyle
# {ucbvax,decvax}!trwrb!cadovax!keithd
# cadovax!keithd@ucla-locus.arpa Contel Business Systems 213-323-8170