From: acb@Ziggy.csl.ncsu.edu (Andrew C. Burnette)
Subject: Re: Sun's GUI and OS mistakes (was Re: LX and SUNOS 4.x)
Organization: North Carolina State University
Date: Fri, 18 Dec 1992 07:35:24 GMT

In article <richard.724631493@dutepp13>, Richard.Kooijman@dnpap.et.tudelft.nl (Richard Kooijman) writes:
|> drl@vuse.vanderbilt.edu (David R. Linn) writes:
|> 
|> >>We use Motif.  Our lives would be so much easier if Sun got rid of olwn
|> >>and supported mwm.  At least Sun supports X11.  They have some nice
|> >>utilities such as Tooltalk but all in all, Sun's attempts to lead
|> >>the open systems marketplace has really been a failure.
|>                                    
|> olwm and mwm are just window managers. They have nothing to do with the
|> underlying libraries that were used in the programs.
|> 
|> >Ah, ... surveys ...
|> 
|> >I'll publicly state that I prefer OPEN LOOK* to Motif and I know several
|> >other people who also prefer OPEN LOOK to Motif.  A lot of people were
|> >strongarmed into using Motif by being told "that's what *everyone* is
|> >going to use; you don't want to make the *wrong* choice, do you?"
|> 
|> >What a bunch of lemmings. :-(
|> 
|> I also prefer Open Look over Motif.
|> 
|> Motif reminds me of Windows on the PC. Yugh.
|> 
|> 
|> Richard.
|> 
|> --
|> -- ir Richard Kooijman ------------------- Email: R.Kooijman@ET.TUDelft.NL --
|> -- Intelligent Network Management Project (INEMA) ---------------------------
|> -- CARDIT, Delft University of Technology ------------ Tel: (31)-15-786209 --
|> -- P.O.Box 5031, 2600 GA Delft, The Netherlands ------ Fax: (31)-15-784898 --
I can't resist any longer......
Motif comes from the Open Software Foundation.  Either source or binary form costs
money.  Doesn't sound open to me IMHO.  XView(Open Look's Tool kit) is free,
and anyone can pull it off the net.  That is open software.
OSF and Sun don't mix well,  since OSF was created by the BIG computer companies
in response to Sun's market presence.  Maybe some day,  but not yet.

Open Look (I assume the complaint is about the olwm window manager) is just
X11R4 plus the XView libraries.  Seriously taake a few minutes and try XView out.
You'll like it...I found XView programming more intuitive than motif,  but 
that is just my experience.  Since XView is smaller (and probably less powerful),
the executables such as olwm require 1/3 to 1/2 of the memory to run as mwm.
Most folks I know don't have unlimited memory resources.

As for the look,  motif I believe was intended to look like a pc.  sigh.

I have also found that *most* executables will run under mwm or olwm(olvwm too),
as long as your .Xdefaults are correct.  this includes lots of commercial apps as
well as home brew here at NCSU.

So what are we left with a choice. Run one or the other.  I haven't yet seen a
setup on anyone else's machine which won't allow the user to choose at runtime
which window manager he/she wants,  proviede both execs are there.  Sounds like
a win-win situation.  Let the User choose.  Not so scarey is it?

-- 
******************************************************************************
Andrew C. Burnette  acb@ncsu.edu 
Electrical and Computer Engineering

"Silence is not only golden, it's seldom misquoted."
Newsgroups: comp.sys.sun.hardware,comp.sys.sun.admin