HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: mjsagar@sandia.gov (Mathias J Sagartz)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.advocacy
Subject: The saga of Next
Date: 12 Jan 93 21:25:45 GMT
Article-I.D.: cs.1993Jan12.212545.24547
Organization: Sandia National Laboratories


        The reason that I'm posting this is because Next has taken very
much of the approach demanded for the Amiga by many of advocacy's
marketing whiz kids.  Pay big bucks to have "mainstream" business apps.
ported.  Run big ads in the Wall Street Journal and other business
publications.  Get into the mainstream as defined by the Intel and Apple
crowds.  Next may yet make it big, but I'll bet Stanford and Carnegie-
Mellon would take 50 cents on the dollar for their shares right now.

From the Wall Street Journal, 1/11/93

   ANOTHER EXECUTIVE QUITS A NEXT INC., RAISING SPECULATION 
               ABOUT FIRMS HEALTH

        On Friday, Next Inc. ..... said that Richard A. Page resigned
   from Next.  Mr Page was the closely held company's top hardware
   executive, as well as a co-founder. ......

        The departure of Mr Page is one of at least six defections by
   high-level managers in recent months.  It suggests a growing malaise
   at the closely watched company, and raised speculation about its
   overall health and direction.  ........

        Peter van Cuylenberg, Next's president, downplayed the
   significance of the management departures and said that the company
   is performing solidly.  "What's going on here is a positive process
   of renewal," he said.......

        Mr. van Cuylenberg also took pains to emphasize that Next is
   performing up to the expectations of Canon Inc., Next's biggest
   shareholder and a vital contributor of capital.  In May, Canon agreed
   to invest an additional $55 million in Next, based on a business
   plan containing specific performance targets spelled out by Mr. van
   Cuylenburg.

        Recently, news reprots have suggested that Canon is displeased
   with Next's performance, but Mr. van Cuylenberg said that is "totally
   unfounded and completely untrue."  While he wouldn't give specific
   figures, he said Next is within 5% of meeting the revenue target
   contained in the business plan, and has "met or exceeded every other
   key financial parameter" such as gross margins, inventory and
   expenses.  "Canon has every reason to be delighted with our
   performance," Mr van Cuylenberg said.

        Nonetheless, the departure of Mr. Page and other top executives
   has stirred up more skepticism about Mr. Job's ability to make Next a
   success....... Next's sales have in the past fallen short of his
   projections.  It had revenue of $127 million in 1991; it had a stated
   goal of $200 million that year.....

     .....And there are recurring rumors that Next will soon announce
   layoffs, and may even be contemplating closing its costly, 
   state-of-the art manufacturing plant, one of Mr Job's pride and joys.
   "Steve's got his work cut out for him," said one acquaintance.

END OF ARTICLE


Mat
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.advocacy
From: lindblad@klaava.Helsinki.FI (Jarkko Lindblad)
Subject: Re: More Amiga OS weaknesses and strengths
Organization: University of Helsinki
X-Newsreader: TIN [version 1.1 PL6]
Date: Mon, 4 Jan 1993 20:32:26 GMT

Marc N. Barrett (barrett@iastate.edu) wrote:
> In article <1993Jan4.114316.11600@klaava.Helsinki.FI> lindblad@klaava.Helsinki.FI (Jarkko Lindblad) writes:
> >MB is so objective: approximately 2 lines of Amiga OS strenghts, and
> >70 of weaknesses...:)
> 
>    I could have had 70 more lines of weaknesses.  On the surface, the AmigaOS

We know. _YOU_ could have had 7.000.000 lines of weaknesses easily.
Now you could ask yourself, weather anyone in this earth is interested
in hearing your endless whining.

> clicking it is almost completely broken.  It needs to be replaced with 
> something that actually works.

You need to be replaced with something that actually works.

>    Commodore USED to have something called NotePad that could have eventually
> been expanded to an all-purpose document viewer like TeachText.  But, true to
> form, Commodore abandoned it.  I wish Commodore would do two things: come up

If they hadn't abandoned it you would have whined that it's useless
because 'it does not have all the features Word for Windoz has'.

> But it seems so easy to whittle off a list of a hundred or so things with 
> the surface features of the AmigaOS that are broken or unworkable or badly
> in need of improvements.  It should not be so easy to come up with such a
> list.

We know that you'll find such lists very easily - you do have exellent
imagination and are extremely talented in whining and bashing. I'm
sure that everyone in this area is interested to see the list we all
know youre going to write as you have nothiung better to do than to
whine in several comp.sys.amiga-areas. Please do post the list of
hudred things of these lousy/idiotical/MB-style/broken 'surface
features'.

-- 
Jarkko Lindblad         | sleep my friend and you will see
lindblad@cc.helsinki.fi | that dream is my reality
------------------------| they keep me locked up in this cage
          - MetallicA - | can't they see it's why my brain say rage
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.advocacy
From: jerry@msi.com (Jerry Shekhel)
Subject: Re: HELP--AMIGA OR IBM PC CLONE?
Organization: Molecular Simulations, Inc.
Date: Tue, 12 Jan 1993 21:56:44 GMT
X-Newsreader: TIN [version 1.1 PL8]
X-Posted-From: hemi.msi.com
NNTP-Posting-Host: sol.ctr.columbia.edu

Jarkko Lindblad (lindblad@klaava.Helsinki.FI) wrote:
: > 
: > Wow. So you're saying the FPU in the 040 is incomplete. And yet its
: > still faster than a 486 at floating point.
:
: Not to mention it multiplies faster than 486 integer unit...:)
:

Jarkko, where do you get this info?  From a benchmark, maybe? :-P

:
: Jarkko Lindblad         | sleep my friend and you will see
:
--
+-------------------+----------------------------+---------------------------+
| JERRY J. SHEKHEL  | Molecular Simulations Inc. | Time just fades the pages |
| Drummers do it... |     Burlington, MA USA     | in my book of memories.   |
|    ... In rhythm! |        jerry@msi.com       |         -- Guns N' Roses  |
+-------------------+----------------------------+---------------------------+
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.advocacy
From: Hamish.Macdonald@bnr.ca (Hamish Macdonald)
Subject: Re: Byte's Amiga 4000 review...
Organization: Bell Northern Research
	<1993Jan10.181620.13665@nntp.hut.fi>
	<C0np2J.69C@undergrad.math.waterloo.edu>
Date: Mon, 11 Jan 93 19:42:40 GMT

>>>>> On Sun, 10 Jan 1993 21:01:31 GMT,
>>>>> In message <C0np2J.69C@undergrad.math.waterloo.edu>,
>>>>> papresco@cantor.math.uwaterloo.ca (Paul Prescod) wrote:

Paul> As soon as multitasking was feasible (with the advent of the
Paul> 286) IBM started work on OS/2, the multitasking OS for it.  The
Paul> amiga was not an influence.

Looks like Quantum Software Systems beat IBM to it, with QNX running
on an IBM XT.
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.advocacy
From: tmc@spartan.ac.BrockU.CA (Tim Ciceran)
Subject: Re: Advocacy? What do you want for the Amiga?
Organization: Brock University, St. Catharines Ontario
Date: Mon, 11 Jan 1993 01:18:09 GMT

In article <C0nJ4M.HGM@news.iastate.edu> barrett@iastate.edu (Marc N. Barrett)
writes:

>>Given the waning popularity of Geoworks Professional in the PC market,
>>why not simply have Berkeley develop an Amiga-specific version of
>>Geoworks?...

>   That's a very good idea.  I don't really care who Commodore has develop the
>package, as long as the package is done well.  And you are right that it is
>better for Commodore to subcontract the writing of the software to a third-
>party than to do it themselves.  I think it can be argued that one of the 
>reasons why the first incarnation of AmigaVision was halfway good was because
>it was done by a third-party and not by Commodore.

I imagine that the in-house development situation is shared by many
companies in this industry, most notably IBM. Commodore needs to provide
some incentives for the smaller players. The market is certainly less
crowded and opportunities abound. Skewing the direction of the platform
to be completely niche-oriented market is counter-productive in the long
run. 

Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.advocacy
From: barrett@iastate.edu (Marc N. Barrett)
Subject: Re: HELP--AMIGA OR IBM PC CLONE?
Organization: Iowa State University, Ames, IA
Date: Mon, 11 Jan 1993 02:07:55 GMT

In article <1993Jan10.134839.2037@msus1.msus.edu> martin@TIGGER.STCLOUD.MSUS.EDU writes:
>In article <C0nIsp.H9K@news.iastate.edu>, barrett@iastate.edu (Marc N. Barrett) writes:
>>In article <1993Jan10.112010.11073@athena.mit.edu> fihsu@athena.mit.edu (Hsu I-wei) writes:
>>>In article <1993Jan10.043322.7254@src4src.linet.org> scottw@src4src.linet.org (Scott Weintraub) writes:
>>>>WB 3.0.  Gateway then enables you to choose from a small assortment of   
>>>>software.  I choose Paradox 4.0 (considered the best piece of database
>>>>software) and Borland C++ 3.1 (considered by many the best C compiler).
>>>>Gateway's cache is small.  It's only 64k but for a mere $45 you can jack that
>>>
>>>Ok, but the A4000 comes with one or two software packages itself. I forget what
>>>they are, but you fail to mention them for some reason.
>>
>>   You conveniently forgot what they are.  They are Final Copy and ADPro.  Both
>>are garbage, and can't even begin to compare with Word for Windows or a 
>>Windows image-processing program.  (I say that ADPro is garbage because it is
>>a totally hands-off image processing program.  Almost everything is done 
>>completely blind, so that you cannot see what you are doing.  And it has no
>>image editing and painting features.  This is more escusable for a program
>>running on an older Amiga, but for a program for an AGA Amiga it is garbage)
>>
>
>And you conveniently remembered INCORRECTLY....it's ADPro and DPaintIV
>AGA...and I think even you marc can agree that Dpaint is a GOOD program.

   OK, I was partly right and partly wrong.  It's ADPro and DPaint IV for
the A4000 and Final Copy and DPaint IV for the A1200.  DPaint IV is OK,
but Final Copy and ADPro are both garbage.  Thus you really only get one good
program with each system.

 The following was taking from the message posted to announce about the
power-up program:

>The Amiga 4000-25/120 plus ASDG Art Department Professional TM and
>Electronic Arts DeluxePaint IV TM AGA will be available for an MSRP of
>$2693, a savings of $1500 (if these items are sold separately). The A4000
>was introduced in September 1992 as Commodore's premier multimedia
>computer.
>
>The Amiga 1200 plus SoftWood Inc.'s Final Copy 1.3 TM and Electronic
>Arts DeluxePaint IV AGA, will be available at an MSRP of $599, a savings
>of $600. Both the A4000 and the A1200 feature Commodore's new
>Advanced Graphics Architecture TM (AGA) chip set that enables users to
>display and animate graphics in multiple resolutions at up to 256,000
>colors from a palette of 16.8 million colors.

---
| Marc Barrett -MB-  |  email: barrett@iastate.edu
--------------------------------------------------------------------
"No, I just think that a computer grafted on top of another computer
is a kludge.  It has nothing to do with the AGA chipset." -- me
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.advocacy
From: skip@tacky.cs.olemiss.edu (Skip Sauls)
Subject: Re: Byte's Amiga 4000 review...
Organization: University of Mississippi, Dept. of Computer Science
Date: Tue, 12 Jan 1993 18:38:32 GMT

In article <1993Jan12.152940.10325@sol.ctr.columbia.edu> jerry@msi.com (Jerry Shekhel) writes:
>David Tiberio (dtiberio@engws10.ic.sunysb.edu) wrote:
>:
>: 	I have the book "OS/2 - How We Made History", and on page 32 it says,
>: and I quote myself when I say, 
>
>Who wrote this?

Slu Aspiks and Sunga Rettaf, published by BLAZEMONGER, Inc.

>: 	"After lots of planning, we decided that OS/2 needed a good solid
>: base to develop on, so we decided to copy everything that we thought was
>: good about the AmigaOS, and then we had the skeleton for OS/2. We then
>: multiplied the overhead and size of the executables by 10x to prove that it
>: was meant to run on IBM clones."
>
>Are you seriously trying to submit this clearly sarcastic and fanatical
>statement as proof of your claim?

No, he's just yanking your chain because you are so much fun to pick on.

>: 	He said 'comparable', not 'fast or powerful'. Actually, it is anyway,
>: so your point is moot. AGA moves sprites an infinite time faster than SVGA.
>: Animation is also faster, and special screen handling is much better.
>
>But the resolution is lower, and in the high resolution modes, it's quite
>slow.  Local bus SVGA blows it away for GUI use.  When there's a need for
>things like CPUBlit, there's got to be something wrong with the hardware.

Sorry Jerry, but my 914x612 Workbench is quite snappy.  As for SVGA, when
there's a need for things like "TurboET4000" drivers, LocalBus to get the
data rates required, etc., there's got to be something wrong with the
hardware.  But you knew that, didn't you.

>: Plus AGA is a standard, and SVGA is not. 

>Uh-huh.  Commodore already has three such "standards", right?

And just like SVGA is backwards compatible with VGA, EGA, and CGA, AGA 
is backwards compatible with ECS and OCS.  The difference is that there
is an AGA standard whereas the only one for SVGA is the slow VESA.

>+-------------------+----------------------------+---------------------------+
>| JERRY J. SHEKHEL  | Molecular Simulations Inc. | Time just fades the pages |
>| Drummers do it... |     Burlington, MA USA     | in my book of memories.   |
>|    ... In rhythm! |        jerry@msi.com       |         -- Guns N' Roses  |
>+-------------------+----------------------------+---------------------------+

Skip Sauls, Amiga Advocate
skip@tacky.cs.olemiss.edu

Xref: sparky comp.sys.amiga.advocacy:32568 comp.sys.amiga.graphics:8358
From: fheitkamp@desire.wright.edu
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.advocacy,comp.sys.amiga.graphics
Subject: Re: VistaPro & clones
Date: 4 Jan 93 07:03:57 EST
Organization:  Wright State University 

In article <1993Jan4.010026.24307@mksol.dseg.ti.com>, stevew@mksol.dseg.ti.com (steve wootton) writes:
> In article <1993Jan3.103609.6395@desire.wright.edu> fheitkamp@desire.wright.edu writes:
>>In article <1993Jan2.201806.27708@samba.oit.unc.edu>, John.Carver@launchpad.unc.edu (John Carver) writes:
>>> 
>>> No mention of Amigas, or the fact that this is hardly new and that the
>>> same software, written for the Amiga in the first place, costs a lot
>>> less than $130.  
> 
>>	Yes, I've noticed this too.  I think the reason is is that most
>>	people who use PCs and MACs see the Amiga as a toy ( ignorant
>>	SOBs ) and if the software products like VistaPro, SuperBase,
>>	and Mathematica advertise versions for the Amiga, then they will
>>	not be taken seriously.
> 
> Hardly a fair characterization.  I would say that most people who use PCs
> either (1) don't see the Amiga at all, or (2) see the Amiga as an
> ill-supported, low-volume, niche-market graphics machine that won't run any
> of the MS-DOS or MS-Windows applications that they're used to running.
> 
> I doubt that any PC user, short of a gamer, sees the Amiga as a "toy."  A
> complete non-issue perhaps, but not a toy.

	Ok.  Ok.  But all the points you are making about PC users opinion
	of the Amiga market are negative.  Now do you see what I mean?
	Us people who use the Amiga *know* it is a capable machine and
	would not see "Amiga version available" as negative.

> -- 
> Steve Wootton  --  stevew@mksol.dseg.ti.com
> Hey, don't blame TI... they haven't told me what to say.
Fred Heitkamp, ** Not an organization.  My opinions only **

Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.advocacy
From: abuhr@owlnet.rice.edu (Aaron M. Buhr)
Subject: Re: Byte's Amiga 4000 review...
Organization: Rice University
Date: Wed, 13 Jan 1993 00:25:02 GMT

In article <1993Jan12.063742.1639@ra.msstate.edu> skip@tacky.cs.olemiss.edu (Skip Sauls) writes:
>Sure, the 486sx has a lot of raw CPU power, but not much more.  It doesn't
>have a blitter, it doesn't have a copper, it doesn't have sprites, and it
>doesn't have a sound coprocessor to help it out.  It may run Lotus 123 and
>other boring apps very quickly, but it pales next to the A1200 for the 
>exciting stuff.

      Amiga advocates like to point to the Amiga's coprocessors and say that
they guarantee higher performance than single-processor PCs.  However,
coprocessing only guarantees less latency, not higher throughput.  It is
quite possible that a 486sx, which has probably three or more times the
performance of a 68020 (of equal speed, even), could spend 1/3 of the time
on CPU calculations, 1/3 of the time on graphics, and 1/3 of the time on
sound output and equal or better a 68020 system with graphics and sound
processors.  The throughput of both systems could easily be comparable, if
not in favor of the 486sx system, especially since DMA-driven sound is
commonplace in the PC world (SoundBlaster and up).  And higher througput
is what enables you to do more neat things, not less latency.


Aaron Buhr
abuhr@owlnet.rice.edu
From: bruce@zuhause.MN.ORG (Bruce Albrecht)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.advocacy,comp.sys.amiga.programmer
Subject: Re: More Amiga OS weaknesses and strengths
Distribution: world
Date: 7 Jan 93 22:39:04 CST
Organization: Society to Stamp Out Bogus Organizations

In article <C0CFro.MuE@news.iastate.edu> barrett@iastate.edu (Marc N. Barrett) writes:
>   Another feature that is totally broken on the Amiga is launching of 
>applications by double-clicking a project.  On the Macintosh, when you
>double-click a project, the 'creator' application is always found and launched
>and the project is loaded, no matter where the creator application is located
>on the disk.  On the Amiga, tooltypes are almost always hard-coded.  There 
>is almost no flexibility to the way the Amiga does it.

Not true.  I nearly always remove paths from tooltypes of icons I get from
elsewhere.  If you load your paths before loading workbench, or issue the
LoadWB command to update the paths, you don't need to hard code it.  One
problem with Mac icons, is that if you're doing development, and you have
several versions of the application, you have to click on the application
in order to guarantee you're using the right application.  

--
bruce@zuhause.mn.org
Youth is wasted on the young.

Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.advocacy
From: ntustu1@iti.gov.sg (NTU Student 1)
Subject: Re: Advocacy? What do you want for the Amiga?
Keywords: Amiga,Workbench,Operating System,Application,OS
Reply-To: ntustu1@iti.gov.sg
Organization: Information Technology Institute, National Computer Board, S'pore
Date: Tue, 12 Jan 1993 04:43:08 GMT

Alright, what is Commodore doing about improving Kickstart, AmigaDOS and 
(most importantly for end-users) Workbench? Is there anyone who can provide
more details than vague descriptions of DIG, Network support etc? 

A VERY important aspect we all wish would improve and which C= can try harder
doing is the USER INTERFACE. I'm all for an even newer look than the current
WB2/3 3D 4-colour window border design. As well as other decorative elements 
like engraved lines/seperators/grouping boxes (check out WordWorth and Final
Copy requestors and message boxes. They're cool.)

That's all for now. 

Later,
-tomwoof-


Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.advocacy
From: g.coulter@daresbury.ac.uk (G. Coulter)
Subject: UK A4000 Dealers & Prices?
Reply-To: g.coulter@daresbury.ac.uk
Organization: Daresbury Laboratory, UK
Date: Mon, 11 Jan 1993 16:12:30 GMT

I am looking for a good dealer from where I can buy an Amiga4000
with the following spec.

	A4000/040
	120 MB/HD
	2 MB  CHIP RAM
	16 MB FAST RAM
	CBM 1960 monitor

My best offer so far is 3100 pounds does anyone know of anything
better?

Thanks for any info & help Gary ...

g.coulter@daresbury.ac.uk
From: TomK@cup.portal.com (Tom R Krotchko)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.advocacy
Subject: Re:  Amiga OS weaknesses and strengths
Date: Fri,  8 Jan 93 18:34:10 PST
Organization: The Portal System (TM)
Distribution: world
  <1i896tINN224@uwm.edu> <C0BJCq.MK9@news.iastate.edu>
  <1ia9asINNb7c@uwm.edu> <bruce.0drx@zuhause.MN.ORG>

>Yes, I'd much rather have the system interface pop up a window saying "the
>disk is unreadable, do I want to format it?" every time I pop in an IBM disk,

Augggh! Where's the smiley? That's the single biggest thing I dislike
about the Mac, forcing me to make a decision about the disk as soon as I
pop it in.

It would even be acceptable if one of the button choices was "hey, stupid
computer, I KNOW its unreadable. Just wait until I tell you to do something
with it".


TomK@cup.portal.com
Tom Krotchko
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.advocacy
From: barrett@iastate.edu (Marc N. Barrett)
Subject: Re: More Amiga OS weaknesses and strengths
Organization: Iowa State University, Ames, IA
Date: Wed, 6 Jan 1993 21:27:04 GMT

In article <58341@dime.cs.umass.edu> barrett@astro.cs.umass.edu (Daniel Barrett) writes:
>>>Of course, there's ARexx, the like of which has been drooled for for
>>>a long time on the mac.
>
>>And something that I've, to date, never used.  I was really excited about
>>it when Commodore announced that ARexx was going to be standard with 2.0.
>>Then I found that I could not find any uses for it, mostly because none of
>>the programs that I want to write ARexx scripts for support ARexx.
>
>	That's strange.  There are over *250* programs that support ARexx
>right now.  Virtually all the major apps support it.  Over 100 of these
>ARexx-supporting programs are freely distributable.  What programs are you
>running, anyway?? 

    JRComm, Word Perfect, and PageStream.  These are the applications I use
the most, these are the applications that I would most like to write ARexx
scripts for, and none of these support ARexx.  
  
> BTW, non-ARexx-supporting programs can still be
>controlled by ARexx using "Scripit" from Fish Disk 288.  (I haven't tried
>this.)

   I have.  I used it when Khalid Aldosehri (or however his name is spelled)
first posted it to CompuServe about five years ago.  ScripIt is nice for
some operations, but kludgy.  By using ScripIt to control a program instead
of ARexx, what you are reduced to doing is basically making the menu and
gadget selections as the user would, but under the control of a script.
Getting it just right is hard work.

>	No wonder you think Amiga word processors and other apps are "bad."
>You haven't extended them with ARexx! 

   ARexx is no micacle scripting language.  It only allows you to slightly 
integrate the abilities of two applications.  But if no application has a
certain feature, then ARexx is useless to give you that feature.  For example,
I would like to have an Amiga word processor with lots of structured fonts
and which can import IFF DR2D or EPSF structured clip-art.  But even
collectively, none of the Amiga word processors supply these features.

  BTW, ARexx also not very useful if you are on a tight budget and can only
afford a small number of productivity programs.  For example, to be able 
to link ProWrite and Final Copy II together with ARexx, you have to purchase
ProWrite and Final Copy II, unless you are a pirate.  And this gets very
expensive.  I purchased Mac WordPerfect for $150, which includes a drawing
program. To get the equivelent base functionality from Amiga software, I
would have to spend about $400 on Amiga word processors and a drawing program,
and it would still be lacking in features over Mac Word Perfect.

---
| Marc Barrett -MB-  |  email: barrett@iastate.edu
--------------------------------------------------------------------
"No, I just think that a computer grafted on top of another computer
is a kludge.  It has nothing to do with the AGA chipset." -- me
From: skip@tacky.cs.olemiss.edu (Skip Sauls)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.advocacy
Subject: Re: RISC Amiga?
Date: 12 Jan 93 06:19:52 GMT
Organization: University of Mississippi, Dept. of Computer Science

In article <73380@cup.portal.com> TomK@cup.portal.com (Tom R Krotchko) writes:
>>They are selling PCs that can use the Pentium already.
>
>Who are "they"?

The doodz who put together Clones and sell them to the doodz who want 
the way cool stuff, of course.

>TomK@cup.portal.com
>Tom Krotchko

Skip Sauls, Amiga Advocate
skip@tacky.cs.olemiss.edu
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.advocacy