mat@zeus.opt-sci.arizona.edu (Mat Watson) (06/22/91)
I need to make sure that I can port nemacs to the NeXT before buying the machine. Has anyone used nemacs (wnn, and egg) on their NeXTstation? In principle I should be able to install X (mouse-X) and then compile nemacs et al.; however, I'm well aware that porting software to new machines may be difficult. I've mentioned Nemacs since I *know* that it is a free Japanese (Kanji) word processor. Can anyone suggest an alternative (even if it costs money) in the event that I am unable to get Nemacs running? --Mat mat@zeus.opt-sci.arizona.edu
mrc@milton.u.washington.edu (Mark Crispin) (06/24/91)
In article <MAT.91Jun21123852@zeus.math.arizona.edu> mat@zeus.opt-sci.arizona.edu (Mat Watson) writes: >I need to make sure that I can port nemacs to the NeXT before >buying the machine. Has anyone used nemacs (wnn, and egg) on >their NeXTstation? DANGER DANGER Will Robinson! I don't use nemacs (not enough disk space), but I do use wnn as well as kterm under co-Xist on both a NeXTstation at home and a NeXTcube in the office. There is a bug in 2.0 and 2.1 that causes the NeXT kernel to *crash* when jserver (the server end of the Wnn4 system used by wnn, kinput, nemacs, etc.) is halted. This happens whether you kill jserver by hand, run wnnkill, or attempt to shut down or reboot the system. co-Xist has nothing to do with it; the problem is jserver which is completely independent of any X stuff. The result is that all the mounted filesystems are potentially marked as being "damaged" and fsck has to be run before they can be used again. It is annoying enough waiting for fsck to finish on a 105MB NeXTstation. It is infuriating to wait for it to finish on a 330MB + optical NeXTcube. I can only imagine what it'd be like for a n-GB user. I haven't lost any files yet, but I assume it's only a matter of time. I try to cover my ass by running sync a few times and swatting the machine immediately afterwards, with only partial success. I complained to NeXT about it in March when I first encountered it in 2.0 and they told me it's fixed in 2.1. It isn't; when I got my NeXTstation in April (with 2.1) I found it has the bug. I got an acknowledgement of my repeat bug report for 2.1 but that's all. If, as you suggest, nemacs is going to be a primary application on your new machine, you may want to consider getting a cheap SUN or DECstation instead of a NeXT. I can not recommend a NeXT for a Wnn4 user until and unless NeXT commits to fixing this bug and getting the fix out in the field. It is inexcusable that NeXT has been so careless with 2.1 (including shipping me a 68040 upgrade with the obsolete 2.0 two months after shipping a NeXTstation with 2.1). I'd give more details of the bug, but the blather scrolls past on the screen a mile a minute and is immediately erased when the machine automatically reboots. All I can see is that it is some kind of unexpected kernel page fault. It may be that this is to induce those of us who use Wnn and kterm freeware to cough up JPY60,000 (about $435) to Canon for 2.1J instead.
mat@zeus.opt-sci.arizona.edu (Mat Watson) (06/24/91)
Mark Crispin writes: (much stuff deleted. Mat Watson) Mat Watson writes: >I need to make sure that I can port nemacs to the NeXT before >buying the machine. Has anyone used nemacs (wnn, and egg) on >their NeXTstation? DANGER DANGER Will Robinson! There is a bug in 2.0 and 2.1 that causes the NeXT kernel to *crash* If, as you suggest, nemacs is going to be a primary application on your new machine, you may want to consider getting a cheap SUN or DECstation instead of a NeXT. I went ahead and bought the NeXT when I heard that this stuff ran on the older version. Since then I've learned that the bug in 2.0 causes page faults, and not harmless segmentation faults. Others who use this software under 2.0 (2.1?) say that they are actually running the binaries they created under 1.0 without problems. It may be that this is to induce those of us who use Wnn and kterm freeware to cough up JPY60,000 (about $435) to Canon for 2.1J instead. That was the alternative some others wrote me about. If one can still use English, as well as Japanese, then that would be a good solution. Really though, this bug in the OS should be fixed. --Mat mat@zeus.opt-sci.arizona.edu
mizo@helmine (Hideo Mizoguchi) (06/25/91)
In article <MAT.91Jun24071350@zeus.math.arizona.edu> mat@zeus.opt-sci.arizona.edu (Mat Watson) writes: > Mark Crispin writes: (much stuff deleted. Mat Watson) > It may be that this is to induce those of us who use Wnn and kterm > freeware to cough up JPY60,000 (about $435) to Canon for 2.1J instead. > > That was the alternative some others wrote me about. If one can still > use English, as well as Japanese, then that would be a good solution. > > Really though, this bug in the OS should be fixed. > > --Mat mat@zeus.opt-sci.arizona.edu OS 2.0J (2.1J?) is still beta as far as I believe. We have one cube running 2.0J here at the University of Tokyo. You can type in Japanese characters in Edit and Draw programs. WriteNow doesn't accept them. I phoned Canon and asked about this Japanese OS but I was told that you can buy OS 2.0J for JPY 60,000 *IF YOU HAVE BOUGHT YOUR CUBE THROUGH CANON*. If not, you'll have to pay JPY360,000. Yes, it's about $2,500. Hideo Mizoguchi Department of Mechanical Engineering University of Tokyo
mcohen@ac-next2 (Michael Cohen) (06/25/91)
In article <1991Jun24.033405.25855@milton.u.washington.edu> mrc@milton.u.washington.edu (Mark Crispin) writes: > It may be that this is to induce those of us who use Wnn and kterm > freeware to cough up JPY60,000 (about $435) to Canon for 2.1J instead. 2.1J, which was to have been released by now, is indefinitely delayed, due to late discovery of (undisclosed) problems. They're working on it, but i didn't get the sense that we'd see it real soon. Michael Cohen Room S-08 NTT Human Interface Labs 3-9-11, Midori-cho, Musashino-shi Tokyo 180 Japan voice: [+81](422)59-2077 fax: [+81](422)60-7808
mrc@milton.u.washington.edu (Mark Crispin) (06/26/91)
In article <2422@solvalou.mech.t.u-tokyo.ac.jp> mizo@helmine (Hideo Mizoguchi) writes: >I phoned Canon and asked about this Japanese OS but I was told that you can buy >OS 2.0J for JPY 60,000 *IF YOU HAVE BOUGHT YOUR CUBE THROUGH CANON*. If not, >you'll have to pay JPY360,000. Yes, it's about $2,500. Kya! 36-man-en (about $2,600 in today's exchange rate) is the worst price I've heard (the previous worse rumor I heard was 20-man-en). Nobody will pay that. Is NeXT serious about the Japanese market?