kevinh@cmi.com (Kevin Hegg) (04/17/91)
ESL does a lot of classified work and this may account for their lack of response to your question. Kevin Hegg, EDS Corp - Center for Machine Intelligence 2001 Commonwealth Blvd., Ann Arbor, Michigan 48105 Phone: (313) 995-0900 Internet: kevinh@cmi.com Applelink: D5990
thomsen@spf.trw.com (Mark R. Thomsen) (05/01/91)
In article <1991Apr9.224224.22619@potomac.ads.com> jtn@potomac.ads.com (John T. Nelson) writes: > Anyway, I wanted to ask one more question. I know that ESL uses > NeXT's rather heavily. Is there anyone out there at ESL who reads > this bboard? Could you send me some info on what you folks do on > NeXT's? I'm trying to get an idea of what sort of work is being done > in the corporate environment as well as in the LISP world on the NeXT. > > So thanks again and keep those responses coming! ESL, and the wholly owning TRW, are doing some work with NeXT as registered developers and, in ESL's case, as a 'federal system integrator'. This is not a secret - it has been put out to the press. In addition to spacecraft, electronics, and such both ESL and the folks here in Redondo Beach do a lot of software and systems. This includes practically countless custom workstations. Because of a wide variety of customers (mostly in government) and available technologies, we use practically every workstation on the market. NeXT happens to be a current hot button because of price/performance (it is pretty well #1 for the ratio of what you get and perform vs. cost), because of advanced development environment, because of Unix compatibility, and because of the ease of integrating lots of applications. Both ESL and my division have been involved with NeXT for over two years. The relationship has been very positive and is becoming fruitful. There have been postings here (I just recently started reading this again ... so much time!) on varying (dis)satisfaction with NeXT Inc.'s customer service. From our perspective it is fantastic - they are responsive, informative, ready to go beyond expectations we have developed from interactions with other vendors, and willing to share the vision. This included an early color NeXT system here last spring as precursor to NeXTdimension. Though quite unusual and certainly not a common experience, it does show that they will bend over backwards when both sides will benefit (we did a good job debugging parts of V2.0 and the color technology and we got to present a wildly successful customer demonstration). I expect that aerospace and government research labs will be a significant market for NeXT in future years. In these markets we build and integrate state-of-the-art applications for mortal users (not scientists or trained engineers). A 'Unix system for mere mortals' is important. Motif is gaining attention, but the long term future indicates that NeXT will be a player. I hope that this provides an answer to your question. I do not know if my friends at ESL are on this net. Mark R. Thomsen