atai@sdcc13.ucsd.edu (10/19/90)
PageStream V 1.8 for sale. The best DTP program for ST. Brand new, still unregistered with original regisration card. Ask $100 or best offer. (Retail price is $160 or so) Send e-mail if interested.
dgb@unislc.uucp (Douglas Barrett) (10/25/90)
From article <13352@sdcc6.ucsd.edu>, by atai@sdcc13.ucsd.edu: > > > PageStream V 1.8 for sale. The best DTP program for ST. I am a PageStream owner. I got the stuff home and unwrapped it. The documentation is useless. Not only can you not find what your looking for in many cases it is just wrong. But, hey no one *really* reads documentation do they? After playing with it for a couple of weeks, I think I got a handle on the thing; and some questions - and comments. So I call Soft.logik (the name should have been enough to warn me). I finally got through to support. This took 2 days. I said hey did you know you spell check doesn't work? They said gee it works just fine here. I said gee that is interesting but it defentely panics my machine. You get address errors. They said oh no not us. I said did you know that you dialog boxes are all wrong? They said hug? I said yea - really. Are you at a machine now? Well export some text. Now what does that box say. hugh? THE ******* BIG BOX IN THE MIDDLE OF THE SCREAN THAT SAYS MODIFY ALL TEXT ? That is a dialog box, and it is wrong. Well may be, but there is nothing I can do about it. So, hey I can't use the spell checker *at all*, the documentation should have gone in the trash along with the registration for all the good they did me. Sooo, I export my document in ascii and run a MW C speller. I hobble a long. Now I am trying to prepare notes for a UNIX internals class. Now I need multiple files open and these files get to 30+ pages each. Now *everything* panics. You got it. Your working along cutting and pasting - and the next thing you know three bombs. Soooo. Finally I figure that maybe just maybe the GEEKS have wised up. I give them a call. This time I get straight through to support. Hey I have your stuff and it doesn't work. Do you have any fixes? Yea, we got a *brand new* version! Why haven't you upgraded. I don't particularly want to through good money after bad. Look I gave you guys a fist full of money already - for shit that don't work. What bugs did you fix between releases. I would consider upgrading if it fixes my problems. The bugs are too numerous to mention. Thats odd when I called you a few month ago you told me you had no problems. That I must be doing something wrong. Well I can't do anything about that. Well, look have you fixed you panics and the spell checker? We did a lot of work on the spell checker. What is a panic. You know bombs - BOOM, ALL WORK LOST. Well, our code doesn't do that. That would make it useless. I have written literaly hundreds of memos with this and never had a problem. Gosh, a *whole* memo hugh? I am having the strangest feeling that I have been here before. I called you a few months ago and you told me you had no problems. Now you tell me that well your problems are too numberous to mention, refuse to give me a bug list - so I at least have a clue what you think you fixed and tell me that any problems I am seeing are an illusion. So the bottom line is this. I got no problems - and even if I did you are not going to do anything about them. I can buy your new stuff if I want it. But even then if I still have problems you aren't going to do anything. That a fair summary? Well I would not have said it like that. So hey good luck with Soft.Logik. If you got a lot of money for upgrades - a lot of patients - and want a DTP system to write *MEMOS* this is just the package for you. --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Douglas Barrett I speak for myself UNIX Systems Programmer Unisys SLC Utah
steve@thelake.mn.org (Steve Yelvington) (10/29/90)
[In article <1990Oct25.151840.26876@unislc.uucp>,
dgb@unislc.uucp (Douglas Barrett) writes ... ]
> Now I am trying to prepare notes for a UNIX internals class. Now
> I need multiple files open and these files get to 30+ pages each.
> Now *everything* panics. You got it. Your working along cutting
> and pasting - and the next thing you know three bombs.
(1) Do you have enough memory to keep multiple 30-page documents open,
plus the spelling checker, fonts, etc.?
(2) Are you using the right tool? PageStream is not a text editor. Don't
use a chisel to drive screws.
I've been using PageStream to lay out newsletters for a couple of months.
I've crashed it. But then, I've also crashed Aldus Pagemaker and locked up
Microsoft Windows. Come to think of it, I've blown up something on every
computer system I've used, so I'm not in a hurry to condemn Soft Logik as
a bunch of incompetent geeks.
Bugs are a fact of life. The question is whether the bugs are sufficiently
serious and widespread as to render the product useless. That has not been
true in my experience.
I write and edit with a text editor (MicroEMACS). (If I used a spelling
checker, I'd run it while editing, not while formatting.)
I filter the MicroEMACS text into a format compatible with PageStream,
plan the document layout, and then begin importing and placing the page
elements. When I'm done, I write out PostScript files. That much of the
program appears to work reliably.
I have some disagreements with Soft Logik's user interface and the
inability of PageStream to accept embedded markup commands, but those are
design questions and not bugs.
Since I don't use the spelling checker or color separation facilities, I
don't encounter any bugs that may be lurking there. Keep in mind that
those are fairly recent additions to the program. If there are bugs,
that's where they're likely to be.
--
Steve Yelvington
Internet/domain mail: steve@thelake.mn.org
UUCP path: plains!umn-cs!thelake!steve
Snail: Box 38, Marine on St. Croix, MN 55047 USA