From: pfkeb@kaon.SLAC.Stanford.EDU (Paul Kunz)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.misc
Subject: Re: NeXTstep 3.0
Date: 19 Aug 92 04:11:54 GMT
Organization: Stanford Linear Accelerator Center
In-reply-to: nathan@laplace.biology.yale.edu's message of 18 Aug 92 16:54:46 GMT

In article <1992Aug18.165446.25866@cs.yale.edu> nathan@laplace.biology.yale.edu (Nathan F. Janette) writes:

   In article <57135@mentor.cc.purdue.edu> ab@nova.cc.purdue.edu (Allen B) writes:
   > In article <59702@mimsy.umd.edu> alex@cs.umd.edu (Alex Blakemore) writes:
   > > In article <1992Aug13.055619.1064@net23.uucp> coke%net23@spectrx.saigon.com  
   > (Brian Policky) writes:
   > > > Is there an official release date for NeXTstep 3.0?
   > > On Friday, someone at 1-(800)Try-NeXT told me the release date is Aug 24.
   > > > And how long before the Universities get it?
   > > good question
   > 
   > I hate to flame, but I'm really tired of hearing this.  I
   > feel completely betrayed and more than a little angry.
   > 
   > Considering our semester starts on the 24th, the 3.0
   > release is really too late for me whenever it is.  I got the
   > impression from early news of 3.0 that I'd have it up and
   > running by now.  The date kept slipping and so did my chance
   > of using it any time soon.  
   > 
   > A big "Boo!  Hiss!" to missing a summer release date.

   It's a drag, but I would rather wait for a stable release
   than go through the SGI Irix 4.0.3-Irix 4.0.4-Irix 4.0.5
   contortions that we've been through since the "release"
   of Irix 4.0.

   Given the choice, I would have had NeXT make separate
   (later) releases of the new packages (dbkit, 3D stuff,
   etc) and just work on getting the stable base release out
   on time. 

I'll add to what Nathan has said when I compare my experiences with
NeXTSTEP 3.0 prelease 1 and 2 with what my collegues are going through
with AIX 3.1.5, 3.1.7, 3.2, 3.2.1, and 3.2.2.

First of all, NeXTSTEP 3.0 is a snap to install.  Mount the CD-ROM on
one machine and install, then install it on the others via the
network.  Second of all, hardly anything broke with NS 3.0.  Some apps
available from the archives did, but no commerical apps did and
nothing that we heavily rely on, including our in house stuff, broke.
Yes, new NeXTSTEP 3.0 features were buggy with prerelease 1, but
pretty stable with prerelease 2.

The situation with AIX is completely different.  First of all, no
CD-ROM.  Second, lots of things break, so you want to keep an older
release to run some applications.  Thirdly, some kernal patchs to
older systems that make some things work, are not yet available with
the newer systems.  Worst yet is the network upgrading.  A machine
that upgrades via the network also inherits the IP address of the
master.  Thus, you can not boot the machine when it is on the net and
if you attempt to boot it off the net, it hangs while waiting for
network services.

NeXT is doing very well (IMHO) on their upgrades.   If I fault
NeXT for anything with NeXTSTEP 3.0, is that they tried to do 
too much and it took them much longer than expected.   Maybe they
need to switch over to a mode in which product announcements,
such as DBKIT, PhoneKit, Renderman, etc., are independent of
OS release announcements.

--
Paul F. Kunz	(NeXT mail ok)
Stanford Linear Accelerator Center, Stanford University
Voice: (415) 926-2884   (NeXT) Fax: (415) 926-3587
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.misc