From: dtaylor@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu (Douglas A Taylor)
Subject: Re: GeoWorks' future (was Re: An SDK in 1993, did he say?)
Reply-To: doug-taylor+@osu.edu
Organization: The Ohio State University
Date: Fri, 14 Aug 1992 13:09:31 GMT

In article <1992Aug13.223141.21964@gn.ecn.purdue.edu> shawmd@gn.ecn.purdue.edu (Michael D Shaw) writes:
>Good argument but still missing the big picture, along with advancement
>of technology the price of it comes down.

It's true that the price of a given machine configuration (eg, 386SX
with 2 megs RAM) comes down.  However, the price of the current
high-end configuration has remained relatively constant, whether it's
the 386's of two years ago, the 486's of today, or the P5's of
tomorrow -- it'll still run around $3000 to $5000 dollars for whatever
the current high-end machine is.  Microsoft and IBM have geared their
products towards this high-end configuration.  GEOS is aimed more at
the (current) $500 to $1500 configuration.  If you buy an entry-level
machine (whatever the current one is) and have the choice of running
last year's Windows or this year's GEOS, then the choice for Windows
is not so clear-cut, and GEOS looks better by comparison.

>Let's talk about Comdex... I went and was sadly disappointed in Geoworks'
>showing.

I agree that GeoWorks' marketing of their product has been less than
stellar.

>>programmers take time to train, especially on a radically new concept
>>like an object-oriented operating system.
>
>Sorry, I can't buy this one.  OOP isn't that difficult that there are only
>a handful of programmers out of Shoalin Temple that know the method.

That's true.  However, GEOS isn't about OOP.  If it were, they
wouldn't be supporting C development, now would they?  GEOS is an
object-oriented operating system, which is a totally different animal.
I know of only two OOOS' that are currently shipping -- GEOS and
NextStep.  I assume you've written for a normal OS, like DOS.  Have
you ever written for an OOOS?  Neither have I, and neither have the
vast majority of programmers.  From all accounts, though, it requires
a fairly major shift in thinking, like OOP required when it was first
coming out.

I just think it would be a mistake for GeoWorks to hire a bunch of
programmers and try to bring them up to speed in just a couple months
on the Swat debugger, Object Assembler, and OOOS concepts, which most
of them have probably never seen before.

>Sometimes you need to look at the short-range view.  And in this case, as fast
>as technology is moving, it's a must!

That's also true.  However, one must face reality.  If GeoWorks can't
get the SDK finished before '93, then they can't get it finished
before '93.  I hope they don't pay too high a price for it.

Personally, I think the two-machine SDK represents a compromise
solution.  Obviously the first major release of the SDK shouldn't
require a developer to go out and buy a Sparc workstation.  Just as
obviously, developers shouldn't have to wait an extra six months while
GeoWorks rewrites the Swat debugger to make it run on a single
machine.  Instead, they saved some development time by keeping the
two-machine configuration that they evidently use in-house, and they
made it more accessible by making the debugging machine a high-end PC
instead of a Sparc station.  I think that was the best choice *for the
first release of the SDK*.

>Sorry if any of this come out like flames, nothing personal against you but
>Geoworks is starting to piss me off just a little. :)

No offense taken; we're all friends here.  However, I'd like to cut
this discussion off before the flame levels start to rise.  I have no
desire to act as GeoWorks' net.apologist; I'll leave that to John
Mitchell in his less busy moments. :-)  This will be my last post on
this particular thread.


-- 
   Doug Taylor                         |   Nothing real can be threatened.
   The Ohio State University           |   Nothing unreal exists.
   doug-taylor+@osu.edu                |            - A Course in Miracles