mra@srchtec.uucp (Michael Almond) (10/23/90)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.sysv386 Subject: Re: Who sells 4.0? Does Intel?? Summary: Expires: References: <34996@cup.portal.com> <267@srchtec.UUCP> <1990Oct19.222636.9227@ico.isc.com> Sender: Followup-To: Distribution: Organization: search technology, inc. Keywords: In article <1990Oct19.222636.9227@ico.isc.com> rcd@ico.isc.com (Dick Dunn) writes: >mra@srchtec.UUCP (Michael Almond) writes about a chat with UHC. (BTW, has >anyone suggested to the UHC folks that they might join in here on USENET?) I got a call from UHC about a posting I made a few weeks back. >> Just like all the other suppliers they don't offer online documentation... > >All which other suppliers? ISC and SCO both offer online documentation >(after, among other things, being beaten up about it by netfolk:-)... Hmm, I didn't know they were offering online manuals. I'd heard people mention on here that none of the vendors offer the online manuals. I'm glad at least a few have come to their senses. ESIX seems to be strongly against it. >> Also, they said the main part of the high price involves the fees from AT&T. > >Could some other folks who've been reading this group for a while help me >out here. I'm *sure* I remember that one of the great things about V.4 was >supposed to be that the royalties were going to be so much lower than V.3 >that the end-user price would be dirt-cheap. Did I just hallucinate that? I haven't heard anything about V.4 being less expensive. Maybe so. >> Apparently AT&T is moving away from 3.2... > >This just doesn't follow, somehow. It sounds like "We want to move from >X to Y, so we'll encourage it by raising the price on Y." Note - I *don't* >mean this as a criticism of what Michael wrote. I assume he's just >reporting; I'm just trying to make sense of it. Yeah, that's pretty much it. I was justing repeating what they told me. >> Does anyone know why they charge from X Window's. It is free software >> to anyone who wants it from MIT. I could understand maybe $100 for media >> and manuals, but $795? > >Several possibilities; lots of conjecture here: > - What you get from MIT needs a lot of work to turn it into product > quality with good performance. (I certainly spent enough time in > the assembly-language mud for the one X server I worked on!) I compiled the X stuff directly from MIT on DECstation 2100's without any problem (DECwindows su*ks). I've also heard people have the X11R4 running on PCs under Esix using the MIT stuff. > - Their X package included X11/NeWS, OpenLook, XView toolkit. > Don't these all require some Sun licensing fees? I don't think > they're too expensive (since Sun is trying to encourage use of > OpenLook and XView) but I thought there was some cost. No, that is what is great about XView. XView is free software and Sun is porting it to PCs and will distribute it freely. > - Is this a developer's X package? Since the rest of the system > is developer-oriented, it seems likely. This might include some > of UHC's development tools. It would also mean they're expecting > small quantities at this point, which requires larger margins > than the eventual end-user product. Never heard of a Developer's X package. If you get X running on a machine, there isn't anything additional needed to develope software. All you need is the library files to link with and the X clients (xterm, xclock, ...) use these. - Michael --- Michael R. Almond mra@srchtec.uucp (registered) search technology, inc. emory!stiatl!srchtec!mra Atlanta, Georgia (404) 441-1457 (office) .'.'.'.'.'.'.'.'.'.'.'.'.'. Georgia Tech Alumnus .'.'.'.'.'.'.'.'.'.'.'.'.'.'.'.
bill@unixland.uucp (Bill Heiser) (10/23/90)
>Hmm, I didn't know they were offering online manuals. I'd heard people mention >on here that none of the vendors offer the online manuals. I'm glad at least >a few have come to their senses. ESIX seems to be strongly against it. I wonder what their reasoning is for being "strongly against" online manuals? Cost maybe? It sure would be nice to be able to do a "man -k" when I need some obscure command, rather than wasting time poring through the hard-copy manuals -- but then, the price is right for Esix... (or at least better than the others...) -- home: ...!{uunet,bloom-beacon,esegue}!world!unixland!bill bill@unixland.uucp bill%unixland.uucp@world.std.com Public Access Unix - Esix SYSVR3 - (508) 655-3848
shwake@raysnec.UUCP (Ray Shwake) (10/23/90)
mra@srchtec.uucp (Michael Almond) writes: >I compiled the X stuff directly from MIT on DECstation 2100's without any >problem (DECwindows su*ks). I've also heard people have the X11R4 running >on PCs under Esix using the MIT stuff. There's a big difference between having something compile and run, and having it run well. UnixWorld had a good survey (May, 1990) of the various efforts to turn the generic MIT code into viable products.
mra@srchtec.UUCP (Michael Almond) (10/24/90)
In article <112@raysnec.UUCP> shwake@raysnec.UUCP (Ray Shwake) writes: >mra@srchtec.uucp (Michael Almond) writes: > >>I compiled the X stuff directly from MIT on DECstation 2100's without any >>problem (DECwindows su*ks). I've also heard people have the X11R4 running >>on PCs under Esix using the MIT stuff. > > There's a big difference between having something compile and run, >and having it run well. I'm not sure what constitutes running well, but the X11R4 code from MIT runs faster than DECwindows code (which I would guess is suppose to be a version of MIT's that runs well [what a joke]). What are these vendors adding to the code to make it run well? I plan to add XView later this year/early next year when SUN releases the code for the DEC's. BTW, they will also have the code ready for IBM PC's (YES!!). --- Michael R. Almond mra@srchtec.uucp (registered) search technology, inc. emory!stiatl!srchtec!mra Atlanta, Georgia (404) 441-1457 (office) .'.'.'.'.'.'.'.'.'.'.'.'.'. Georgia Tech Alumnus .'.'.'.'.'.'.'.'.'.'.'.'.'.'.'.
davidsen@sixhub.UUCP (Wm E. Davidsen Jr) (10/29/90)
In article <1990Oct23.022053.1299@unixland.uucp> bill@unixland.uucp (Bill Heiser) writes: | >Hmm, I didn't know they were offering online manuals. I'd heard people mention | >on here that none of the vendors offer the online manuals. I'm glad at least | >a few have come to their senses. ESIX seems to be strongly against it. | | I wonder what their reasoning is for being "strongly against" online manuals? SCO has been offering online manuals for some years, contrary to the original posting. They came to their senses early. I regard this as absolutely essential for reasonable systems use, since I tend to use every system from multiple locations, and can't have manuals in every location. -- bill davidsen - davidsen@sixhub.uucp (uunet!crdgw1!sixhub!davidsen) sysop *IX BBS and Public Access UNIX moderator of comp.binaries.ibm.pc and 80386 mailing list "Stupidity, like virtue, is its own reward" -me
larry@nstar.uucp (Larry Snyder) (10/29/90)
davidsen@sixhub.UUCP (Wm E. Davidsen Jr) writes: > SCO has been offering online manuals for some years, contrary to the >original posting. They came to their senses early. I regard this as >absolutely essential for reasonable systems use, since I tend to use >every system from multiple locations, and can't have manuals in every location. Interactive has on-line manuals as well - but they use a non-standard format for them (at least none of the other software packages get their man pages installed correctly). I've had to manually pipe the man pages for cnews, smail3, nn, elm and other packages through nroff using "nroff -man < in > out". Is that the same for SCO? -- Larry Snyder, Northern Star Communications, Notre Dame, IN USA {larry@nstar, uunet!sco!romed!nstar!larry, nstar%larry@iuvax.cs.indiana.edu} backbone usenet newsfeeds available Public Access Unix Site (219) 289-0282 (5 high speed lines)
cpcahil@virtech.uucp (Conor P. Cahill) (10/31/90)
In article <1990Oct29.120300.4512@nstar.uucp> larry@nstar.uucp (Larry Snyder) writes: > >Interactive has on-line manuals as well - but they use a non-standard format >for them (at least none of the other software packages get their man pages No. They use the standard format. If they didn't send the manuals out in already nroffed mode, you would be flaming them left and right about the on-line manual pages requireing the text processing subset. Another thing is that the source code for the manual pages (i.e. the nroff stuff) probably would require larger licensing fees. >Is that the same for SCO? This is the typical mechanism for binary installations on most systems today (although they sometimes compress/pack the nroffed output to save disk space). -- Conor P. Cahill (703)430-9247 Virtual Technologies, Inc., uunet!virtech!cpcahil 46030 Manekin Plaza, Suite 160 Sterling, VA 22170
davidsen@sixhub.UUCP (Wm E. Davidsen Jr) (10/31/90)
In article <1990Oct29.120300.4512@nstar.uucp> larry@nstar.uucp (Larry Snyder) writes: | Interactive has on-line manuals as well - but they use a non-standard format | for them (at least none of the other software packages get their man pages | installed correctly). I've had to manually pipe the man pages for cnews, | smail3, nn, elm and other packages through nroff using "nroff -man < in > out". | | Is that the same for SCO? No. I can take man pages right from any old net software and put it in the right directory and it works. And when it's used the formatted versions sits in another directory, where I can delete it with a find looking for man pages not used in N days (and for which I have the original). Oh, and you can store the roff format pages compressed with pack. That's not as good as compress, but a lot better than nothing. In short I find the SCO man system to be highly reliable, convenient, and well thought out. And I don't give complements often ;-) -- bill davidsen - davidsen@sixhub.uucp (uunet!crdgw1!sixhub!davidsen) sysop *IX BBS and Public Access UNIX moderator of comp.binaries.ibm.pc and 80386 mailing list "Stupidity, like virtue, is its own reward" -me