HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: Larry Margolis <margoli@watson.ibm.com>
Subject: Re: OS/2 2.0 w/o WPS
Date: Thu, 27 Aug 1992 23:50:28 GMT
Distribution: comp
Reply-To: margoli@watson.ibm.com
Disclaimer: This posting represents the poster's views, not necessarily those of IBM
Organization: The Village Waterbed

In  <1992Aug25.2712.4184@dosgate>  "bill dehaan" <bill.dehaan@canrem.com> writes:
> In message <1992Aug22.074516.435@ringer.cs.utsa.edu>,
> mlevis@ringer.cs.utsa.edu (Mike Levis) writes:
>
> BD>Well, I  can run  OS/2 without  Excel. Can  you tell  me how to run OS/2
> BD>without WPS?
>
> ML>I can.  Did you read the OS/2 FAQL?
>
> Yes, but that's running OS/2 without PM. The question is not how to  run
> a command line OS/2, but rather how to run a PM OS/2 without using  WPS.
> I haven't seen a way to do that.

I don't know where you'd get that impression; the FAQ
(Release 2.0d; August 1, 1992) states:
# If you wish to dispense with the Workplace Shell (and its overhead),
# particularly on low memory systems, change the line SET RUNWORKPLACE...
# in CONFIG.SYS to read SET RUNWORKPLACE=C:\OS2\CMD.EXE (replacing "C," if
# necessary, with a different drive letter).

It says nothing about running without PM.

Larry Margolis, MARGOLI@YKTVMV (Bitnet), margoli@watson.IBM.com (Internet)
From: thompson@kuhub.cc.ukans.edu
Newsgroups: comp.os.os2.advocacy
Subject: Hercules is obsolete--Upgrade!
Date: 1 Sep 92 17:49:17 CDT
Organization: University of Kansas Academic Computing Services

In article <liuyu.715302746@kramden>, liuyu@kramden.nyu.edu (Liuyu) writes:
> sip1@ellis.uchicago.edu (Timothy F. Sipples) writes:
> 
>>>Not to put too fine a point on it but $25 for a video card doesn't cut it,
>>>you still need a monitor to go with it.
> 
>>No, that is not correct.  I refer you to my original reply to the
>>person asking about Hercules support under OS/2.
> 
>>(Hint: get an ATI EGA Wonder or Paradise Monochrome EGA card.)
> 
> When I have something that should have worked, why in the world should I waste
> my money on another obsolete video? I'm asking for Herc support, not EGA 
              ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
> support. I want a FREE driver.
> If I upgrade, I get at least a SVGA. So I get my money worth.

You said it yourself.  Hercules is obsolete.  Why would IBM want to 
spend resources on drivers for an obsolete video card?  It doesn't 
matter if it was standard--today it is NOT standard.  It is obsolete.
You should upgrade.  At least it will do your eyes some good.

-- 
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
|  Charles A. Thompson               |  thompson@ukanvm.cc.ukans.edu         |
|  University of Kansas              |  thompson@ukanvax.cc.ukans.edu        |
|  _Avid_ SkiBum                     |  OS/2 2.0 is for YOU!!!               |
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
|  Look for Recipe Pro(tm), an interactive recipe database, coming soon...   |
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Newsgroups: comp.os.os2.advocacy
From: linstee@dutecaj.et.tudelft.nl (Erik van Linstee)
Subject: Re: IS IBM UK STILL IN THE STONE AGE???
Organization: Delft University of Technology, Dept. of Electrical Engineering
Date: Sun, 30 Aug 1992 10:35:39 GMT


>First let me say that I agree with you, that IBM's OS/2 2.0 should
>support Hercules.  LAN servers, for example, don't really need color
>monitors.

>However, in my original reply I did point out that the remedy is as
>little as $25 away, which is not likely to break anyone's bank
>account.

Not to put too fine a point on it but $25 for a video card doesn't cut it,
you still need a monitor to go with it.

Erik
Newsgroups: comp.os.os2.advocacy
From: TW.FY4@isumvs.iastate.edu (Timothy I Miller)
Subject: win-os/2 tweaks
Organization: Iowa State University, Ames IA
Date: Tue, 1 Sep 1992 15:39:05 GMT

  Well, I've changed the settings in my win-os/2 sessions, and it
loads pretty quick.  My win-os/2 session used to take 21 seconds to
load, and now it only takes 11.  I guess I don't have as many icons
loading as everybody else does, as everyone else has reported much
longer load times.  Now I have a few questions about these tweaks.
  1)  Why so little EMS and XMS?  Should I worry about running out
      memory?
  2)  Why should I switch the Video_8514A_XGA_IOTRAP to off?  I
      thought it was faster with it on!
  Thanks for the info.
From: jorgense@irisa.fr (Finn Jorgensen)
Newsgroups: comp.os.os2.advocacy
Subject: Re: OS/2 Advocacy
Date: 31 Aug 92 16:40:05 GMT
Organization: Irisa, Rennes(FR)

In article <2A9CE72A.635A@tct.com> jim@tct.com (Jim Kunzman) writes:
>Now that the OS religious wars have settled down, this group needs
>to have some life put back into it. 
>
>To start the bandwagon rolling, here are my requests for improvements
>to OS/2:
...

One small suggestion that should be *very* easy to implement by someone
who has the source code: (I've tried to disassemble bits of the drivers
to no avail...)

Mouse setup with more parameters. As it is now, you can only change speed 
and double click interval. Some people might like to: 
   - adjust only the lower speed (It looks like the mouse has two
     speeds around a fixed threshold) leaving the high speed unchanged
     (or the opposite)
   - change the threshold, or use linear tracking, single speed
   - use different vertical and horizontal speed 
   - ... ?


-- 
Finn Bo Jorgensen   Mail : jorgense@irisa.fr    Tel : 99 84 72 01
IFSIC, bureau TB122, Universite de Rennes
Campus de Beaulieu, 35042 RENNES CEDEX, FRANCE
Newsgroups: comp.os.os2.advocacy
From: TW.FY4@isumvs.iastate.edu (Timothy I Miller)
Subject: Re: OS/2 vs NT features list, Revision 1.5
Organization: Iowa State University, Ames IA
Distribution: usa
Date: Fri, 4 Sep 1992 18:42:22 GMT

  Well, Brian, this list seems to be getting better (and longer)
every time you post it.  It is very informative, and is getting less
biased (I hope that doesn't mean you are! ;-)  ).  I think that you
are missing another important point in OS/2's favor, though.  The
amount of room required on a hard disk of OS/2 is around 30 M, while
NT seems to require a lot more (not sure how much).  This is one of
the reasons I won't even *look* at NT on my computer, as I have
*only* 300 M of hard drive space.  10% of my HD is a lot to give up,
but 25-30% is really out of line for me (and I imagined a lot of
other people).
  Well, at least consider it...
From: eletanjm@nuscc.nus.sg (TAN JIN MENG)
Subject: Re: OS/2 vs NT features list, Revision 1.3
Organization: National University of Singapore
Date: Wed, 2 Sep 1992 08:30:15 GMT

Mr. Sturgill. Thanks for taking the trouble.

jin meng
Newsgroups: comp.os.os2.advocacy
From: rick@sjsumcs.sjsu.edu (Richard Warner)
Subject: Re: Tex Advantages (was Re: TeX an archaic religion?)
Organization: San Jose State University - Math/CS Dept.
Date: Sun, 30 Aug 1992 15:13:16 GMT

rommel@Informatik.TU-Muenchen.DE (Kai-Uwe Rommel) writes:

>In article <1992Aug28.160629.17181@sjsumcs.sjsu.edu> rick@sjsumcs.sjsu.edu (Richard Warner) writes:
>>hpw@cunixb.cc.columbia.edu (Harry P Warren) writes:

>I assume how TeX works. Then you know that TeX itself is absolutely
>device independent. For any of the device you mentioned, the same DVI
>file is used (guess what DVI means!). What is device dependent is the
>dvi driver as is the printer driver used by PageMaker etc.

Not the same, by a long shot.  Once I get the PostScript output from
PageMaker, FrameMaker, WordPerfect, etc. that ouptu file is device
independent.  I can output that file to ANY PostScript device and get 
good output.  The dvi file is an intermediate file, *NOT* the final output
file.  You need to generate an output file for each device.  That is 
device dependence - despite the name.  TeX (dvi) is device dependent,
PostScript is device independent.

>Although the currently used dvi printer driver most often use bitmapped
>fonts (pre-generated ones), one could easily implement a different one
>directly using scalable fonts. In fact, the dvips program I use allows
>to use the normal Type 1 fonts, if I remember correctly. You just need
>font descriptions for TeX so it knows about the metrics. This feature of
>dvips is called "virtual fonts" but you may ask a TeX expert about this
>if you want to know more details.

dvitps and dvi2ps that I have seen attempt to rasterize the Adobe fonts
on their own - and do not seem to know about the Adobe hints.  The result
is output that is not as good as output when the rasterization is done
by the device's RIP.

Newsgroups: comp.os.os2.advocacy
From: brian%jaguar.cs.utah.edu@cs.utah.edu (Brian Sturgill)
Subject: Re: OS/2 vs NT features list, Revision 1.3
Date: 2 Sep 92 13:08:10 MDT
Organization: University of Utah CS Dept

In article <1992Sep02.165501.14652@watson.ibm.com> cnadler@vnet.ibm.com (Cliff Nadler) writes:
>In  <1992Sep2.095057.15396@hellgate.utah.edu>  brian%jaguar.cs.utah.edu@cs.utah.edu (Brian Sturgill) writes:
...
>> Let's assume one has a server that reads 1K of data, quickly analyses it
>> and stores some value.  Let's suppose it's not unreasonable that the server
>> might have to service 100 clients at a time and that the data comes in
>> via file handles.
>> 
>> Threaded approach... fork 100 threads, each has it's own 1K buffer.
>> Here you have the overhead of 100 threads and 100 1K buffers.
>> 
>> Async I/O approach... issue 100 async reads each calling the same routine
>> for I/O completion.  Here you need the overhead of recording the 100 async
>> reads (8 bytes per?), one thread, and only the number of reads actually
>> being done at that instant's worth of 1K buffers (assuming the
>> read_is_ready routine allocates the buffer on the stack).
>
>You seem to not understand that the DosReadAsynch and DosWriteAsynch calls
>actually created a thread for the real DosRead or DosWrite to wait on, and that
>thread would then release the semaphore. Therefore, the Asynch I/O and threaded
>approaches are equivalent.
>
>From what I understand, the DosReadAsync and DosWriteAsynch were bad performers,
>and that IBM suggest that you create a permanent separate thread for reading
>from the file, and communicating with it via semaphores or queues for
>performance reasons.

All you seem to be saying is that OS/2 had a bad implementation of Async I/O.

The problem I describe above cannot be done as efficiently
using a thread based I/O approach.  It might be true that restructing
entirely how you go about the task might lend itself to a threaded approach,
but the idea behind such abstract facilities as thread and async I/O is
that you get to choose the one you can use most comfortably to solve the
problem in a efficient manner.

>
>--
>Cliff Nadler (cnadler@vnet.ibm.com)
>IBM Federal Systems Company - TEAM OS/2
>
>Disclaimer: This post represents the views of the poster, not IBM Corporation.


Brian
-- 
C. Brian Sturgill                       *** OS/2 2.0 is for YOU! ***
University of Utah                  Microsoft needs some competition, but
Center for Software Science        -I- want to be one of the many using NT.
brian@cs.utah.edu; CIS: 70363,1373           :-) :-) :-)
From: dab6@po.CWRU.Edu (Douglas A. Bell)
Newsgroups: comp.os.os2.advocacy
Subject: Would IBM consider adding these features to OS/2 ?
Date: 4 Sep 92 14:52:35 GMT
Reply-To: dab6@po.CWRU.Edu (Douglas A. Bell)
Organization: Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, Ohio (USA)
NNTP-Posting-Host: hela.ins.cwru.edu



Looking at the list of windows NT features, the two that catch my
eye as a user are the generalized registry and the improved ntfs.

For joe avarage user, the config.sys is unreadable and the os2.ini
files inaccessable.  The generalized registry database seems like a
nice clean way of controlling these unruly files.  Is there any chance
that IBM might consider adding a similar feature to OS/2, even though
microsoft thought of it first?  It would make things easier to maintain
for a home user.

The NTFS also looks interesting.  While hpfs has a lot of similar features,
it does have some problems such as chkdsk's that take hours, no support
for removable media, an it is difficult to undelete files.
Newsgroups: comp.os.os2.advocacy
From: brian%jaguar.cs.utah.edu@cs.utah.edu (Brian Sturgill)
Subject: Re: OS/2 vs NT features list, Revision 1.5
Date: 4 Sep 92 14:11:26 MDT
Organization: University of Utah CS Dept
Distribution: usa

In article <1992Sep4.184222.17552@news.iastate.edu> TW.FY4@isumvs.iastate.edu (Timothy I Miller) writes:
>  Well, Brian, this list seems to be getting better (and longer)
>every time you post it.  It is very informative, and is getting less
>biased (I hope that doesn't mean you are! ;-)  ).  I think that you
>are missing another important point in OS/2's favor, though.  The
>amount of room required on a hard disk of OS/2 is around 30 M, while
>NT seems to require a lot more (not sure how much).  This is one of
>the reasons I won't even *look* at NT on my computer, as I have
>*only* 300 M of hard drive space.  10% of my HD is a lot to give up,
>but 25-30% is really out of line for me (and I imagined a lot of
>other people).
>  Well, at least consider it...

Good point, I had already considered it though.
Currently NT itself doesn't take that much space... the whole SDK
including compiler fits in 90 megs, including swap file (which currently
has to be at least 20 megs, but I think it's due to a bug in the current
implementation).

My guess is that that it currently needs only about 30-40 megs for
what would be the distributed OS.  However this OS is missing a lot
of things like a fair bit of the on-line doc... it's clear it will
be bigger later.

OS/2 takes ~ 30 megs now, but by the time you account for MM, TCP/IP,
and LAN Server Entry the number get's quite large.

Also it's too early for NT to have a selective install in place.

I believe NT will use more disk than OS/2's base when it is released
but it looks like it may well considerably slimer if compared against OS/2
with it's add-ons.  It's hard at this point to make a reasonable estimate
or comparison.
In the end I decided I couldn't really say anything truly useful about
disk space usage.

Brian
-- 
C. Brian Sturgill                       *** OS/2 2.0 is for YOU! ***
University of Utah                  Microsoft needs some competition, but
Center for Software Science        -I- want to be one of the many using NT.
brian@cs.utah.edu; CIS: 70363,1373           :-) :-) :-)
Newsgroups: comp.os.os2.advocacy
From: brian%jaguar.cs.utah.edu@cs.utah.edu (Brian Sturgill)
Subject: Re: OS/2 Advocacy
Date: 29 Aug 92 02:13:54 MDT
Organization: University of Utah CS Dept

In article <2A9CE72A.635A@tct.com> jim@tct.com (Jim Kunzman) writes:
>Now that the OS religious wars have settled down, this group needs
>to have some life put back into it.  Since the topic is supposed to
>be advocacy, I would like to see some advocacy for new features
>for OS/2 posted here.  I would be happy to collect messages and
>periodically summarize requests.  Since IBM representatives monitor
>usenet's OS/2 groups, this might be a good place to provide feedback.
>
>To start the bandwagon rolling, here are my requests for improvements
>to OS/2:
...

Here are some possible additions:

   Proposal:  Logons and a limited file ownership mechanism.
  Rationale:  Logons will allow per user profiles (i.e. different
	      screen colors, desktops).  Many OS/2 users share their
	      systems and this makes it much easier.  A limited
	      file ownership mechanism will allow the sharing of
	      a system with a child or novice user without fear
	      of accidental file deletion.

   Proposal:  Multimedia as a part of the base OS/2 package.
  Rationale:  Windows 3.1 comes with multimedia features as a part
	      part of its base package and already numerous low-end
	      packages are appearing that use it.  OS/2s $149 price
	      tag means that most of an already small user base will
	      not purchase the MM extentions.  In the end this means
	      that the only ISV's developing using the MM extentions
	      will be those developing high-end packages for vertical
	      markets.

   Proposal:  Inexpensive peer-to-peer networking w/file and printer sharing.
  Rationale:  Even the home user with 2 PCs can afford the hardware
	      necessary to network.  Packages such as Novell Netware Lite
	      and Windows for Workgroups provide this capability very
	      cheaply.  OS/2 2.0 needs an add-on in the < $100 range
	      to compete (or it could be a part of the base package).

   Proposal:  Support for OS/2 Monthly and other independent efforts.
  Rationale:  Were it not for independent efforts (efforts outside IBM)
	      the number of copies of OS/2 2.0 GA shipped would have been
	      much smaller.  IBM does not seem to realize the importance
	      of independent magazines like OS/2 Monthly, and of
	      shareware/freeware developers, etc.

Brian
-- 
C. Brian Sturgill                       *** OS/2 2.0 is for YOU! ***
University of Utah                  Microsoft needs some competition, but
Center for Software Science        -I- want to be one of the many using NT.
brian@cs.utah.edu; CIS: 70363,1373           :-) :-) :-)
From: dic5340@hertz.njit.edu (David Charlap)
Newsgroups: comp.os.os2.advocacy
Subject: ICC optimizes out tail-recursion!
Date: 2 Sep 92 19:22:57 GMT
Organization: New Jersey Institute of Technology, Newark, N.J.

In article <1992Sep02.155848.24011@ans.net> db3l@ans.net (David Bolen) writes:
>I finally decided to get the actual program and compile it myself with ICC.
>The behavior that Bert saw was due to optimizations being turned on.  The
>ICC optimizer was smart enough to note that the recursion was not necessary,
>so it turned it into a simple loop.  This only used a single stack frame,
>and therefore it would always run, no matter what value of n was chosen.
>
>Actually - it seems quite an impressive optimization to me,,,

That's amazing.  If the compiler can detect and optimize out
tail-recursive algorithms, then it becomes almost trivial to write
LISP-like code under C without much of a performance penalty!  This
could become quite useful in the future.
-- 
   |)  David Charlap           "TELEPHONE, n.  An Invention of the devil which
  /|_  dic5340@hertz.njit.edu   abrogates some of the advantages of making a
 ((|,)                          disagreeable person keep his distance."
  ~|~                              --- Ambrose Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary
Newsgroups: comp.os.os2.advocacy
From: ameline@vnet.ibm.com (Ian Ameline)
Date: Mon, 31 Aug 92 15:16:15 EDT
Subject: Re: Goddam the Goddam IBM C Set/2 Install!!!!!!!!!
Newsgroups: comp.os.os2.advocacy
Organization: C-Set/2 Development, IBM Canada Lab.
Disclaimer: This posting represents the poster's views, not those of IBM

In article <7221@lib.tmc.edu>,
jmaynard@oac.hsc.uth.tmc.edu (Jay Maynard) writes:
>
>In article <l9gnzvm.feustel@netcom.com>,
>feustel@netcom.com (David Feustel) writes:
>>This is a horror story. Type n now if you don't like horror stories
>
>[horror story deleted]
>
>In article <19920830.182331.454@almaden.ibm.com> ameline@vnet.ibm.com (Ian
>Ameline) replies:
>>    Something very weird is going on -- It's not supposed to do that.
>>If you send me your phone number in a note, I'll have the guy who wrote
>>the install program give you a call and try to straighten things out.
>
>...to which I reply:
>
>Yet another example of IBM's support. This is *not* uncommon for the mainframe
>guys; I'm tickled to see that the same culture is shining through in the OS/2
>groups.
>
>Now the advocacy part: I expect to get this from IBM. I don't expect to get it
>from Microsoft. Guess who I buy my PC OSes from?
>
>[Followups directed to .advocacy, where they belong.]
>--
>Jay Maynard, EMT-P, K5ZC, PP-ASEL | Never ascribe to malice that which can
>jmaynard@oac.hsc.uth.tmc.edu      | adequately be explained by stupidity.
> "Keep in mind that Amateur Radio As We Know It Today will cease to exist
>            at midnight tonight." -- Dave Newkirk, WJ1Z
>

   We found the problem -- turned out to be a downlevel version of
unpack.exe on his system. Once it was renamed, everything worked
properly.

Regards,
Ian.
Newsgroups: comp.os.os2.advocacy
From: eletanjm@nuscc.nus.sg (TAN JIN MENG)
Subject: Re: Misinformation about os2-dos HW access
Organization: National University of Singapore
Date: Sun, 30 Aug 1992 17:35:36 GMT

brian%jaguar.cs.utah.edu@cs.utah.edu (Brian Sturgill) writes:
: In article <BUHR.92Aug29192209@ccu.umanitoba.ca> buhr@umanitoba.ca (Kevin Andrew Buhr) writes:
: >If Microsoft had NT certified on a single hardware platform, it would
: >go a long way to lending credibility to their claim that NT and C2
: >have any kind of relationship.  Analogies are dangerous, but it seems
: >to me MS is spouting a "zero out of five dentists recommend us, but
: >we're still a toothpaste" claim.
: Question, why do people expect that Microsoft should have an OS, not yet
: released, go through a many-month certification process.
: Would it not make more sense for them to do so after the OS is generally
: available?  Or am I just missing something?
: 
: If I were doing it, I probably wouldn't even put version 1.0 through, but
: would let it shake out a bit.
: 
: >
: >Kevin Buhr <buhr@ccu.UManitoba.CA>
: 
: 
: Brian
: -- 
: C. Brian Sturgill                       *** OS/2 2.0 is for YOU! ***
: University of Utah                  Microsoft needs some competition, but
: Center for Software Science        -I- want to be one of the many using NT.

: brian@cs.utah.edu; CIS: 70363,1373           :-) :-) :-)

Well, I believe that among the many features that people mention for NT,
one of the more prominent is C2. It bloats up the feature list for NT
unecesarily in my opinion since...

1) most places don't need or would find it impractical to have C2
security and that includes all those UNIX sites which NT is supposed to
woo.

2) actual certification of any machine/NT combo is probably sometime
away (correct me if I'm wrong). It is thus misleading. I think that IBM
is probably working on C2 for OS/2 also but they aren't trumpeting that
(also correct me if i'm wrong).

which brings me to another point. Much has been made of NT being
vapourware etc... While more or less true, It doesn't detract from the
fact that NT will come. In the meantime of course IBM isn't standing
still. I think a more decent comparison of the 2 OSes would be to
compare NT now + NT in near future( up to '95 maybe) and OS/2 now + OS/2
in near future.

jin meng
Newsgroups: comp.os.os2.advocacy
From: brian%jaguar.cs.utah.edu@cs.utah.edu (Brian Sturgill)
Subject: Re: OS/2 vs NT features list, Revision 1.4
Date: 4 Sep 92 11:37:08 MDT
Organization: University of Utah CS Dept

In article <3037@accucx.cc.ruu.nl> nevries@accucx.cc.ruu.nl (Nico E de Vries) writes:
...
>
>>IBM may well eventually put OS/2 on Mach... but until we see them
>>putting a time frame around it, we'd probably be best off assuming
>>it is quite some time away.
>
>Agreed. But why not put that in your list. Combined perhaps with some
>relativism about the Microsoft dates. Seems more fare IMO. You can't
>punish IBM for their less vaporish attempts IMO.

Whether or not IBM is "less vaporish" is at highly subjective.
My current favorite case in point is the "June" CSD.

If IBM cannot see fit to let people have an idea of when things
are coming out, then it is their problem.  I'm not about
to get in the middle of deciding who's "less vaporish" and I have to
set rules for what can and cannot go into the list in a described, fair
manner.  Nor do I want to create a situation where I'm warning the
reader about all aspects of IBM and MS's business practices.
People that see this list are in the NT and OS/2 programmer and advocacy
groups.  I find it quite unlikely that there's many people there that
haven't heard of IBM or MS and their respective corporate philosophies.

Brian
-- 
C. Brian Sturgill                       *** OS/2 2.0 is for YOU! ***
University of Utah                  Microsoft needs some competition, but
Center for Software Science        -I- want to be one of the many using NT.
brian@cs.utah.edu; CIS: 70363,1373           :-) :-) :-)