covertr@force.UUCP (Richard E. Covert) (01/18/90)
I have proposed this idea to John Townsend on GEnie
and both he and an Atari employee named Elizabeth Shook have
responded to it. But I thought that I would like to bounce it across
the USENET hoping that someone might pick it up and run with it.
Anyway, there is a lot of interest in UNIX and C at most colleges and
univeristies today. Most schools which teach Computer Science (comp sci)
also teach UNIX and C. And what is really needed is a Cheap, Hackable
UNIX machine. I have asked John Townsend @ Atari why Atari doesn't
bundle a Mega ST2 with a 65 meg drive, a monochrome monitor, and MINIX.
This package could be sold to college students across the USA at under
$2500. this would be the cheapest UNIX development system available.
MINIX has been ported to the ST, and you get full source code to MINIX.
Most, if not all, of GNU programs have been ported to the ST, and you get
full source code to them. So, for under $2500 the students would get an
excellent computer to do UNIX and C development, with one of the best
monochrome monitors ever made, and an adequate harddrive.
Atari would get name recognition in an important market. And would get to sell
a lot of Mega ST computers (before the STes make them obsolete :-) ).
John Townsend replied that Atari doesn't have a sales force to handle
sells to colleges and universities. John also said that GNU software can
not be SOLD with a computer. But, I thought that if Atari *GAVE* the GNU
packages, with complete source code and instructions on how to contact
the Free Software Foundation, that GNU could be packaged with the MINIX/Mega
package.
John Townsend did say that Atari would work with any VAR who would like to
start such a program.
So, what is the general USENET concensus on this idea?? Would it fly??
Would it allow poor ($$) college student to buy a UNIX development
system cheaply?? Could GNU be bundled with such a system?? Does GNU
work under MINIX?
I think that the Mega ST would make an excellent UNIX hacking tool for
college students.
--
Richard E. Covert, Lead Engineer of Software Tools Group
AG Communications Systems, Phoenix AZ (602) - 581-4652
TCP/IP: covertr@gtephx
UUCP: {ncar!noao!asuvax | uunet!zardoz!hrc | att}!gtephx!covertrhyc@math.lsa.umich.edu (Howard Chu) (01/18/90)
In article <481784b3.14a1f@force.UUCP> covertr@force.UUCP (Richard E. Covert) writes: > > I have proposed this idea to John Townsend on GEnie >and both he and an Atari employee named Elizabeth Shook have >responded to it. But I thought that I would like to bounce it across >the USENET hoping that someone might pick it up and run with it. > >Anyway, there is a lot of interest in UNIX and C at most colleges and >univeristies today. Most schools which teach Computer Science (comp sci) >also teach UNIX and C. And what is really needed is a Cheap, Hackable >UNIX machine. I have asked John Townsend @ Atari why Atari doesn't >bundle a Mega ST2 with a 65 meg drive, a monochrome monitor, and MINIX. >This package could be sold to college students across the USA at under >$2500. this would be the cheapest UNIX development system available. I think this is an *excellent* idea. There are some problems, though. I'd love to see a big Atari presence here in Ann Arbor, but I doubt it can ever happen, the IBMs and Macs have been here too long and are literally everywhere. Since most students have free access to the Mac labs, very few actually need to buy their own systems, even though indulging parents tend to buy them anyway. The real problem I see here is that we've already got Apollos and PCs and such up the wazoo. I don't know about other universities, but I'd figure any other place with a comp sci/comp eng program is already in the same position as well, i.e., they've sunk their money into other hardware already. Not to dampen the idea, it may still work. After all, the operating systems classes here recently switched to using Minix on PCs. I think the system you describe sounds ideal. Get programmers working on a machine with a real architecture, as opposed to the silly 64K segments you're bound to on PCs... [Geeze, I guess I should get onto GEnie some more to catch this sort of discussion... Sigh.] So Atari doesn't have a sales force to do it, but would support someone else's efforts, eh? Hm. It seems to me that you'd have to be at least as large as Atari Inc. already, to be able to field all the support staff that you're inevitably going to be called upon to supply. [The folks around here bought into Macs big-time, sight unseen, because they were reputed to be so user-friendly and intuitive. They figured they'd save zillions by not needing to provide consulting/support services. They learned otherwise, the hard way...] Even if you present it as a hacker's system, you're going to get dubious responses unless you can demonstrate sufficient competent support. Dunno how you'll get that. It seems it'd take a big organization to even get a U to start talking to you. -- -=- PrayerMail: Send 100Mbits to holyghost@father.son[127.0.0.1] and You Too can have a Personal Electronic Relationship with God!
squibby@eleazar.dartmouth.edu (Clark L. Breyman) (01/18/90)
A couple comment on the ST as a college machine: - I have been using a 520 for the last four years ( last summer mine un-GLUEd so I did the trade in) - The ST is acceptably cheap and public domain/ shareware make it a very useable computer. I found I was able to do my lower division work on it quite easily. - The majority of college users will probably spend most of their micro-computer time doing wordprocessing. A simple user interface such as the Macinto$h has real advantages over vi/emacs and TeX. - The university I go to (UC San Diego) relies on Unix environments for the majority of its teaching, so an at-home UNIX box makes things nice, but the processing and resources neccessary for the assignments would severely tax any machine 1)running a 16bit bus 2)at <12MHz 3)without transparent virtual memory or extremely large memory. e.g.: A Data Structures Class uses C++ exclusively. The G++ ST port document states that running with less than 2 meg is right out and less than 4 meg is silly. The assignment programs require gigantic memory pools such that virtual memory was a must. - The College I am visiting (Dartmouth) does reccomment the Macintosh and has instituted a gigantic Appletalk netowork to support students using Macs. From an outsider's point of view, learning programming on a mac seems like it would unduly painfull ( and possible leave the programmer with misconceptions about programming larger systems). Yet this is not an issue here, as most folks use their macs for wordprocessing, spreadsheet work, macintosh mail and terminals. The basic problem I see in this proposed package is that it artificially tries to blur the distinction between a workstation and a powerful personal computer. For a college or university to endorse a computer, it would be necessary that that computer could be painlessly included in a campus medium or high speed network (>100Kbaud) and be a good, well-supported application box. For a college or university to endorse a workstation, it would be necessary that that computer met the above criterion and provide sufficient computing power to do school assignments. The ST fall short because: support is tough, GDOS is not as transparent as the equivalent function om the mac and there is little information on networking ST's. One last note THEN I STOP RAMBLING: The price issue is a strange one. Spending $2K for a mac makes sense at a school that provides good support for mac users and that is going to set you back $60-$80K in tuition over four years anyway. Telling students at a public university (~$2K /year in tuition) that whether or not they can afford a $3K computer will make a difference in their academic success has more ramifications that simply the which-brand question. Yours in (unneccessary) verbosity, Clark
stephen@oahu.cs.ucla.edu (Steve Whitney) (01/18/90)
In article <481784b3.14a1f@force.UUCP> covertr@force.UUCP (Richard E. Covert) writes: > > I have proposed this idea to John Townsend on GEnie >and both he and an Atari employee named Elizabeth Shook have >responded to it. But I thought that I would like to bounce it across >the USENET hoping that someone might pick it up and run with it. > >Anyway, there is a lot of interest in UNIX and C at most colleges and >univeristies today. Most schools which teach Computer Science (comp sci) >also teach UNIX and C. And what is really needed is a Cheap, Hackable >UNIX machine. I have asked John Townsend @ Atari why Atari doesn't >bundle a Mega ST2 with a 65 meg drive, a monochrome monitor, and MINIX. >This package could be sold to college students across the USA at under >$2500. this would be the cheapest UNIX development system available. > Richard has a good idea here, but there are a couple of other things students look for in a computer system. The most important is word processing. I figure that this system will probably be the only Atari product the schools will carry so it's important to include word processing software. The ST can use a standard parallel printer so that's not really a concern, but ST software can be tough to find, especially for students without cars. The other thing people tell me when I recommend STs is that they can go to the library and print out their Mac stuff. Although this will probably not be acceptable to atari, the best way to get around that might be to donate a Mega 4 with a laser printer to each school you want to sell through. When I was at Stanford until last year, they said that they would have been happy to have STs in the library if Atari donated them as Apple had. Finally, Atari will have to print a nice glossy brochure which illustrates why the Mega is the machine to buy. It should highlight emulation so students see tyhat even if the ST can't do everything they need, they can buy a Spectre GCR or PC Ditto and get one of "those other machines" even though they did choose an ST. If the Tramiels ever saw how many Macintoshes people cart out of Stanford and UCLA's computer stores _alone_, they'd jump on this one! It just keeps gathering momentum too! If they have doubts, they can try it at a few schools and watch the success. The time to go for it is at the beginning of the academic year, though, I suspect. >-- > Richard E. Covert, Lead Engineer of Software Tools Group > AG Communications Systems, Phoenix AZ (602) - 581-4652 > TCP/IP: covertr@gtephx > UUCP: {ncar!noao!asuvax | uunet!zardoz!hrc | att}!gtephx!covertr Steve Whitney "It's never _really_ the last minute" (())_-_(()) UCLA Comp. Sci. Grad. Student | (* *) | Internet: stephen@cs.ucla.edu UCLA Bruin--> { \_@_/ } GEnie: S.WHITNEY `-----'
pritchaj@thor.acc.stolaf.edu (John Pritchard) (01/18/90)
As a college (like most) that spends time every year trying to guess what platform to place out on campus, I can tell you that the proposal could not fly here. I like my ST. The price//performance ratio is great and I can amaze people here at Carleton with some of the things it can do, at the price it can do it for. Right now, the Atari is a hackers company and the ST is a hacker's machine. One of the major criteria here is company support and reputation. Atari's troubles in both areas would be enough to throw out any proposal. Another area that the ST would have trouble in is networking. Most colleges consider a machines ability to fit into future networking (ethernet, primarily). Yes, the Atari can be 'made' to do a lot of things, but I would not think there would be very many computer center staffs willing to support that type of environment. If Atari were to concentrate on the Educational Market and prove that it would support the colleges, then OK. But right now, IBM, Apple, and HP are the major players in the market, with Commodore beginning to show more interest (and support). Atari is making business decisions that may be good for the company, but it just happens that they are un- fortunate for educational institutions. Like Richard, I am always looking. The longer it takes for Atari to move on from the ST in the US, the more USers they will lose to others. John Pritchard jpritcha@carleton.edu (internet)
rick@jhunix.HCF.JHU.EDU (Eric Ruck) (01/18/90)
I think we should sell ST's to college students as just plain word processors. I am a creative writing major, and I know that dozens of writing majors buy Macintosh computers every year because they like the easy mouse interface. I suppose that they think the ridiculously long time it takes for the Imagewriters the buy to print is normal, as well as the price they pay. If they had ever seen an Atari ST, and were informed of the student price of WordPerfect, I think it would be dozens of easy sales over the course of a month. Eric
econadm5@watserv1.waterloo.edu (BENTLEY BH - ECONOMICS) (01/19/90)
>Right now, the Atari is a hackers company and the ST is a hacker's machine. >One of the major criteria here is company support and reputation. Atari's >troubles in both areas would be enough to throw out any proposal. Another >area that the ST would have trouble in is networking. Most colleges consider >a machines ability to fit into future networking (ethernet, primarily). Yes, >the Atari can be 'made' to do a lot of things, but I would not think there >would be very many computer center staffs willing to support that type of >environment. If Atari were to concentrate on the Educational Market and >prove that it would support the colleges, then OK. But right now, IBM, >Apple, and HP are the major players in the market, with Commodore beginning >to show more interest (and support). Atari is making business decisions >that may be good for the company, but it just happens that they are un- >fortunate for educational institutions. Well good news for you then. StarTrak a local company is working on a fast multi-Dma newtworking for the ST that is lowcost (100 or less,thereabout). The way it works is several STs can be hooked up together to one Hard Drive. (Eg. I have a 250MEG hard drive that I want Two STs to access simultaneously, or as close to simultaneous as I can get. One ST runs a BBS the other is use for professional programming, yet both use the Hard drive info at the same time.) This has already been accomplised no big feat! However after several years of research and totally wiping out several 16 meg partitions in the process, I have come out with a way to do it cost effective and yet Multi-DMA. If all goes well, I will finish writing it in assembler and it will be available to the public. The reason it can be considered a networking feature is that all rs232 ports can be used at the same time. An interesting side-kick to all this was I had Two BBS's running off of one Hard drive at the same time. When one person finished writing his message the other person on the other line could read his message he just saved one second earlier, kinda wierd when you see it work. There are other similar systems but I have never heard of any Multi-Dma type before. If anyone is interested call me voice sometime. I wont tell you how I managed to do it but Ill give you more info on availability. Dave Tomesch , Super BBS (519) 749-1206, voice (519) 749-0757. "A view to a Kill, a good James Bond Movie"
Ritzert@DMZRZU71.BITNET ("Dr. Michael Ritzert, Dept. Geophysics, University Mainz, BRD") (02/15/90)
if You want to sell Atari computers to colleges, become an Atari dealer and leave us alone with this useless discussion. Even Rich Covert's Atari bashing (which I hated) was more interesting than this subject. Dr. Michael Ritzert Dept. Geophysics University Mainz West Germany mjr@dmzrzu71.bitnet