uccjcm@ecsvax.UUCP (John McLendon) (06/14/89)
Now that OSF has announced the release of Motif (scheduled for the end of
July says Unix Today), when will hp be releasing a version? Is CXI now
officially Motif? Is the HP widget set dead? Is Motif faster than
the hp widget set? (Please say YES!) Is someone going to put an
interactive screen painter in front of the UIL? Can we get specs,
code examples,etc? (I've already sent for the OSF spec)
Inquiring minds want to know...
Come on CWO, let's hear something,
if only to get the boss off my back!!!
John...
--
Signed: John McLendon uunet\
(919) 846-7931 (home) >mcnc!ecsvax!uccjcm
(919) 941-5730 (play) gatech/jbb@hpcvlx.HP.COM (Jim B. Byers) (06/15/89)
> Now that OSF has announced the release of Motif (scheduled for the end of > July says Unix Today), when will hp be releasing a version? We expect shipments of real product quality code (where we save you time by not making you do most of the QA :-)) to begin this fall. The code that OSF will receive from HP will be solid stuff, with a high level of testing. We will still need to due further testing across all out displays and networkingconfigurations because we want to find even the corner cases. > Is CXI now officially Motif? CXI (Common X Interface) has been the name for HP's X11 and User Interface offering. Thus HP-UX 6.5/3.1 X11 products implement CXI (read behavior and 3D appearance of the window manager [hpwm] and the widgets). This technology was submitted to OSF under the name CXI. Since Motif has adopted CXI behavior, is CXI Motif? Hmmmm. I expect that we will refer to the HP Widgets and supporting toolkit as the CXI tools and the Motif widgets and Xt intrinsics as the Motif tools. Likewise the Motif window manager, mwm, although very, very much like hpwm will be called mwm. >Is the HP widget set dead? It will be supported through 7.0 HP-UX. The Motif tools have noticeable advantages for new development - greater portability of code, speed etc. No enhancements to the CXI tools are expected. > Is Motif faster than the hp widget set? (Please say YES!) YES. There are many areas where performance has been noticeably improved. I have yet to hear of an area where there are degradations. A *lot* of effort went into making this so. It is no panacea for a system with a "not too fast processor and not much memory". This stuff takes a lot of umph that some processor/memory combinations will not provide. I honestly believe that the kind of benefits X11 and Motif provide make the investment well worth it. Of course you have your own goals, tradeoffs, resources, etc. > Is someone going to put an interactive screen painter in front of the UIL? I am not sure what you mean here. I am still trying to understand the benefit of learning what essentially is another language (UIL), given the benefits it provides. What do you expect UIL will provide you? >Can we get specs, code examples, etc? (I've already sent for the OSF spec) We are sifting through what can and can't be distributed in terms of early, preliminary copies of the documentation. HP can not distribute Motif documentation before other OSF vendors receive it. This may seem odd since we are producing this documentation, but we are an ethical company and it is important that we play by the rules that we agreed to. Please work with your sales rep or SE (let her/him know that Corvallis is their contact point). We are querying OSF to understand if this early documentation can legitimately be distributed by OSF vendors. If so we may be able to help you out. I believe the spec that you are talking about is the preliminary functional spec. The cover letter describes it as the most recent snapshot of the spec. Since the code is functionally complete I would say that the spec is solid. For others wishing to order it, the spec can be obtained by sending a letter asking for the Motif functional spec and $30 to: The Open Software Foundation 11 Cambridge Center Cambridge Ma 02142 Attn: ANDF DESK This currently is the only Motif ducument that OSF distributes. > Inquiring minds want to know... > Come on CWO, let's hear something, > if only to get the boss off my back!!! > John... You certainly got my attention. CWO has been renamed CIS to more accurately reflect the contribution we make. I hope this helps. Jim Byers CIS Marketing/Lab Team Corvallis Information Systems jbb@hp-pcd