[comp.windows.news] OPEN LOOK Availability

pete@relay.nixctc.de (Pete Delaney at Nixdorf Cim Technology Center) (03/31/89)

In article <8903291906.AA10842@ATHENA.MIT.EDU>, ruthlk@attunix.att.COM writes:
> Path: nixctc!unido!mcvax!uunet!lll-winken!ames!mailrus!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!bloom-beacon!attunix.att.COM!ruthlk
> 
> I'd just like to provide the correct information about OPEN LOOK availability:
> 	1) An OPEN LOOK Beta distribution has been available since Jan.
> 	   Information about the OPEN LOOK beta program was posted to this
> 	   net several months ago. All companies, not just UNIX International
>	   companies, have been able to participate in the beta program.

Is that just the ATT OPEN LOOK toolkit or also the X11/NeWS Merge that
has been available since Jan?  I have been having difficulty getting a clear
picture of the X11/NeWS merge project.


> 	2) General Availability of the OPEN LOOK source is
> 	   3/31/89. (This Friday!!)

I've talked to Christina Hahn at AT&T Unix Europe this week and she
provided Licensing Terms for the AT&T OPEN LOOK GUI source product,
with a Source Fee of $1,000.  Is it safe to assume this is all that is
being made available on 3/31/89?  What about the NeWS/X11 merge?

Also, the AT&T product sheet quotes a XWIN product that appears to be
the MIT/DEC X11R3 with support for VGA and CGA on the 386 port, for just :-)
$17,000.  

cjc@ulysses.homer.nj.att.com (Chris Calabrese[mav]) (04/01/89)

In article <1025@nixctc.DE>, pete@relay.nixctc.de (Pete Delaney at Nixdorf Cim Technology Center) writes:
> 
> Is that just the ATT OPEN LOOK toolkit or also the X11/NeWS Merge that
> has been available since Jan?  I have been having difficulty getting a clear
> picture of the X11/NeWS merge project.
> 
> I've talked to Christina Hahn at AT&T Unix Europe this week and she
> provided Licensing Terms for the AT&T OPEN LOOK GUI source product,
> with a Source Fee of $1,000.  Is it safe to assume this is all that is
> being made available on 3/31/89?  What about the NeWS/X11 merge?

This source (I assume) is the OPEN LOOK widget set for X which AT&T has
developed and has just started marketing (it's already on the market
in binary).  I don't know the availability dates of the source, but
this seems reasonable.

I can't say much about the X/NeWS merge other than it exists and will
be on the market in a few months, along with NDE (NeWS Development
Environtment), and View2 (SunView libraries implemented under X).

> Also, the AT&T product sheet quotes a XWIN product that appears to be
> the MIT/DEC X11R3 with support for VGA and CGA on the 386 port, for just :-)
> $17,000.  

That's exactly what it is.  I was under the impression that it wasn't
_quite_ that expensive, however.
-- 
Name:			Christopher J. Calabrese
Brain loaned to:	AT&T Bell Laboratories, Murray Hill, NJ
att!ulysses!cjc		cjc@ulysses.att.com
Obligatory Quote:	``Now, where DID I put that bagel?''

fischer@iesd.dk (Lars P. Fischer) (04/01/89)

In article <11394@ulysses.homer.nj.att.com> cjc@ulysses.homer.nj.att.com (Chris Calabrese[mav]) writes:
>I can't say much about the X/NeWS merge other than it exists and will
>be on the market in a few months, along with NDE (NeWS Development
>Environtment), and View2 (SunView libraries implemented under X).
		    ^^^^^

I seem to remember from a Sun briefing that this has been renamed
"Xview" (to emphasize that it is not tied to Sun), and that it will be
donated to MIT, for free distribution on the X tape. It should be
ready for distribution "sometime this spring..".

Anyone care to comment?

/Lars
--
Lars Fischer,  fischer@iesd.dk, {...}!mcvax!iesd!fischer
Dept. of Math. and Comp. Sci., University of Aalborg
Strandvejen 19, DK-9000 Aalborg, DENMARK
Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.
			-- Arthur C. Clarke

pete@nixctc.DE (Pete Delaney) (04/01/89)

In article <1627@iesd.dk> fischer@iesd.dk (Lars P. Fischer) writes:
>
>I seem to remember from a Sun briefing that this has been renamed
>"Xview" (to emphasize that it is not tied to Sun), and that it will be
>donated to MIT, for free distribution on the X tape. It should be
>ready for distribution "sometime this spring..".
>
>Anyone care to comment?

That sounds like what the a Sun technical support guru told me 
the-week-before-last while at the Hannover Fair.  Unfortunately however 
I was unable to confirm it with Michael Arden (the Product
Manager for NeWS).   Her secetrary was able to send out a NeWS license
form for $25,000 however I was hopeing the technical support guru at 
Hanover was correct.  

With this stupid OSF vs. UNIX Incorporated nonsense going on,
I doubt I could get my management to sign off on a $25,000 license;  and
with X windows being accepted so well by the market I doubt the guys
at Sun expect to sell many more of these $25k licenses any longer. 

I like programming NeWS more than X, perhaps because I started with it 
first, perhaps because it's easier.  Clearly Po Cheung's xdbx and Don Hopkins CyberSpace make programing both of these windowing systems more enjoyable.
I find Don's code (as well as that from Josh Siegel and Don Woods) particularly
interesting.  Having to switch back a forth between the X and NeWS server's is
rather uncomfortable.

I have asked the guys at Sun to be a beta for the X11/NeWS merge but
haven't heard anything. I was hoping to try integrating it into one of the
System V Release 3 (yek!) X servers but ....

--pete
-- 
Pete Delaney - Nixdorf UCC	| pete@NIXCTC.DE		Prefered Addr
Loffel Strasse 3		| pyramid!nixctc!pete		UUCP from Calf
7000 Stuttgart 70		| pete@RELAY.HUJI.AC.IL		Backup Address
West Germany			| Phone: +49 (711) 7685-128

bob@tinman.cis.ohio-state.edu (Bob Sutterfield) (04/03/89)

In article <1028@nixctc.DE> pete@nixctc.DE (Pete Delaney) writes:
   In article <1627@iesd.dk> fischer@iesd.dk (Lars P. Fischer) writes:
      I seem to remember from a Sun briefing that this has been
      renamed "Xview" (to emphasize that it is not tied to Sun), and
      that it will be donated to MIT, for free distribution on the X
      tape. It should be ready for distribution "sometime this
      spring..".
      
      Anyone care to comment?

   That sounds like what the a Sun technical support guru told me
   the-week-before-last while at the Hannover Fair.

If you're concerned about something for the X world, you should be
reading comp.windows.x, not comp.windows.news.  Here's a fairly
authoritative-sounding article that appeared there recently:

|From: tomj@snowking.Sun.COM (Tom Jacobs)
|Newsgroups: comp.windows.x
|Subject: Re: SunView to X Windows 11?
|Message-ID: <94886@sun.Eng.Sun.COM>
|Date: 20 Mar 89 17:54:52 GMT
|Reply-To: tomj@sun.UUCP (Tom Jacobs)
|Organization: Sun Microsystems, Mountain View
|
|In article <571@ubbpc.UUCP> wgh@ubbpc.UUCP (William G. Hutchison) writes:
|> How hard is it to port from SunView to X Windows 11?
|
|With XView, the port to X11 is relatively simple.  Sun has migrated
|SunView onto X11 and retained retained most of the Application
|Programming Interface (API).  What this means is if you can program
|to SunView, you can program to XView pretty easily.  Existing
|applications (of which there are >2100) can be converted in a few
|days to a few weeks (if heavy graphics) .  Our early ISVs tell us
|that conversion is very straight forward.  In addition, XView source
|will be donated to the X Consortium for inclusion with X11 release 4.
|XView is also portable.  We did a "proof-of-concept" port to Ultrix
|2.0 (just for fun :-) and demoed it at the OpenWindows press
|conference at Uniforum.
|
|XView is implemented to Xlib and the X Consortium's ICCC
|(Inter-Client Communications-Conventions).  XView, unlike its
|predecessor, is object-oriented (ie. all objects are opaque objects
|where clients get() and set() values on objects).  It is also has a
|static class-based (single-inheritance) system model.  The system is
|extensible (ie.  create new classes, or subclass existing ones), but
|it is not a collection of "widgets" and is not based upon Xt.
|
|Tom Jacobs
|Sun Microsystems. Mountain View, CA
|Internet and Smail:  tomj@sun.UUCP
|              uucp:  uunet!sun!tomj


   Unfortunately however I was unable to confirm it with Michael Arden
   (the Product Manager for NeWS).

Michelle oversees the product stuff for the X11/NeWS merge, but XView
is coming from a different group.

   I have asked the guys at Sun to be a beta for the X11/NeWS merge
   but haven't heard anything.

I think you're about 18 months too late to be a beta site, and they
aren't adding any more to the list these days.  I groveled before Ms
Arden at SUG in Miami to be one of their early-ship (gamma?)  sites,
but there seems to be no action on that front either.  Bummer...