[net.micro] Software costs..

mwm@ucbtopaz.CC.Berkeley.ARPA (03/31/85)

In article <1588@watcgl.UUCP> jchapman@watcgl.UUCP writes:
> I can get msdos (not a great system but it works), an assembler,
> linker, pascal compiler, fortran compiler, modula compiler and
> a screen editor for under $1000 - what will software support
> for other machines cost? 

For the 68K family:

$350	CP/M-68K, with C compiler, assembler, linker and (lousy) editor
$50	RED screen editor. Others (mince) are available.
	F77, Forth, APL and LISP are all available. Probably others.

Of course, CP/M isn't quite as nice a system as MSDOS. So...

$600	OS/9-68K, with C compiler, assembler, linker and screen editor.
	LISP and Forth are available.  Also BASIC09, a Pascal with BASICs
	concept of types.

OS/9 is a much better system than MSDOS, or CCP/M, or Concurrent DOS,
etc. A good case can be made for OS/9 being a better system than Unix.

In other words, the cost is comparable to MSDOS. The result is a much
nicer system: multi-tasking, multi-user, with enough address space to
let me run a LISP system comfortably.

	<mike