From: Bob_BobR_Retelle@cup.portal.com
Newsgroups: comp.sys.atari.st
Subject: *I* an NOT making THIS up either...
Date: Sun, 27 Dec 92 16:33:10 PST
Organization: The Portal System (TM)
  <1h00msINNaou@life.ai.mit.edu> <1992Dec21.194623.23026@news2.cis.umn.edu>
  <1h6aabINNo0a@life.ai.mit.edu> <27DEC92.05003748@meena.cc.uregina.ca>

Brook (mackie@meena.cc.uregina.ca)  asks:

>Please, no flames.  I just don't understand.

>Why would Atari invite you to a meeting to show off something that they were
>obviously interested in, only to treat you the way you've described?

>Is it at all possible that you've misunderstood them?

Well, I don't understand either..  but just to show that David Baggett
is NOT an isolated case, here are two messages from prominent Atari
developers which recently appeared in the Atari Productivity Forum
on CompuServe.  I'm assuming everyone here knows who GST Software and
CodeHead Technologies are.
 
And remember please..  *I* am not making this up..

#: 78078 S17/Community Square
    23-Dec-92  09:01:42
Sb: #77942-#Falcon:  Flies or Dies
Fm: GST Software 71351,332
To: CodeHead Software 76004,2232 (X)

Yup - classic moments at a developers conference - Leonard and I had
arrived at this thing never having met but already having managed to develop
a deep dislike of each other via fax.

Halfway through the meeting he moves onto the topic about which we had
been faxing him and says

"Unlike what some people here think, we are not idiots, I will say that
again, we are not idiots".

before I could respond another developer who had *no* idea about what was
going on behind the scenes of all this happily chips in with "But you've got
to admit you've done some bloody silly things in your time."

Cue Leonard going nuclear.

I always handle such meetings now by reminding myself that a reject dwarf
from Tolkiens Lord of the Rings isn't worth getting that hung up about.

Whereas we have nothing really but praise for Bill Rehbock.

Tony

*** There is a reply:   78108


#: 78108 S17/Community Square
    23-Dec-92  13:38:53
Sb: #78078-Falcon:  Flies or Dies
Fm: CodeHead Software 76004,2232
To: GST Software 71351,332 (X)

Tony,

  >> a reject dwarf from Tolkiens Lord of the Rings...

  Thanks for the first good laugh of the day!  :)

  Since we're trading stories, here's a good one.  One day, we got a call
from L______, who promptly started belittling us (in an extremely
condescending and obnoxious manner) for "not following the rules" in
MultiDesk.  The actual issue in question was rather technical, hinging on
whether or not it was permissible to rely on register D1 to retain its value
through a Trap #2 call.  When we pointed out that Atari's own documentation
does _not_ state that D1 is unsafe to rely upon, we got an immediate
blustery "Yes it does!" response.  (It doesn't.)  When we pointed out that
TOS itself saves and restores _all_ registers during Trap #2 calls, we got a
short silence, and then a hang-up.

  About an hour later, we got a call from someone else (not L______, he'd
never admit to a mistake), acknowledging that we were correct.  And yet, to
this day, FSMGDOS (and probably SpeedoGDOS too) trashes register D1 during
its Trap #2 processing.

  Unfortunately, this sort of thing isn't unusual at all; it's very
routine treatment for Atari developers.

- Charles