From: tmc@spartan.ac.BrockU.CA (Tim Ciceran)
Subject: Re: Bus Standards
Organization: Brock University, St. Catharines Ontario
Date: Sun, 20 Dec 1992 22:12:40 GMT

In article <BzKntz.2C7@undergrad.math.waterloo.edu> papresco@cantor.math.uwaterloo.ca (Paul Prescod) writes:
>
>>Compatible? As in cooperate or assimilate?

>Both!  The assimilation of the Amiga would not be a bad thing for Amiga
>users.  If the Amiga was part of the "mainstream" they could have
>access to our software base and we to their multimedia and OS.

At the risk of taking a hit, I'll agree in principle. But if this is to
come, it must be through RISC. The existing architectures are too
divergent and emulation is not currently feasible.

>only because instead of trying to ADVANCE this "open architecture" C=
>set off with it's own, you can't get our MS-Excel, and we are just
>awakening to your multimedia.  It's unfortunate that we have all this
>wasted energy duplicating work.

No, the inavailability of Excel is entirely the result of corporate
politics, not bus standards. As others have said before, there is nothing
preventing MS, Borland or Lotus from developing Amiga versions of their
programs. But as recent movements in the Mac market attest, many
developers would like to create applications for a single OS.

>Unix isn't a binary standard.  I can't take a Sparc program and run it
>on an Amiga.  I am talking about a binary standard for software,
>compilers and CPUs.

I realize that it isn't a binary standard: this would be impossible.
But, Unix code is highly portable.

>Yes, but if the rest are just duplicating efforts anyways!  Making
>spreadsheets for the Amiga and raytracers for the PC!  If they were
>binary compatible, those efforts could be used to ADVANCE the state of
>the art.

Ok. I'll give you this one. From the heart anyway :).

>Who knows how much money NewTek is wasting trying to make a
>real PC version of the toaster.

Probably they aren't. 

>Or how much WP wasted making an Amiga version.

They reportedly recouped their investment in the first week of sales.
Looking at the program, it looks like it took about a week to write as well.

>Binary compatibility would get rid of most of these problems.

OS-level compatibility perhaps.

>Nobody reads the manuals now!  Why do you expect them to do it in the
>future?  There is a huge market in QUE books, consulting, training, and
>wordperfect/lotus/dbase classes.  These people want to learn but DON"T
>LIKE MANUALS.

You missed the point. If there is a huge market for books, consulting
and training, is it likely that this will be supplanted by multimedia?
Try telling a secretary to use a CD-ROM to learn WP. It would be cheaper
to have the person go through a training course.

>Limited corporate value is what I mean.  It appeals to that small part
>of industry that creates videos and demos.

This is the largest proportion of the industry, not a small part.

>WordPerfect *OBVIOUSLY* has
>a much larger audience.  Multimedia wordperfect, which makes
>wordperfect easier to use and learn will have a similarly huge
>audience.

WordPerfect needs to fix the code, not add another level of abstraction.
Why do you think the DOS version outsells all WYSIWYG word processing
packages combined? 

>But they go hand in hand.  I learned more about emus playing with
>mammals for five minutes then I would have learned in a lifetime of
>having a row of encyclopedias on my desk.  With multimedia, the
>education comes to YOU in a form you will find interesting.  It's like
>T.V., only interactive.

Television is testament to the fact that multimedia-based CAI is a
short-term fad. You can't simply throw technology at a problem and
expect it to resolve itself. Before CAI of any sort becomes effective,
fundamental changes have to be made to the educational paradigm.
It's a logistical nightmare.

>I wholeheartedly believe in the benfit of multimedia as an educational
>tool, but I think that C= is ignoring that by not pushing CDs in it's
>mainstream Amiga's.  As a multimedia educational medium, CD-I is going
>to destroy CDTV, because Phillips understands home electronics.

In all its promotion and development, Phillips has sold less CD-I
units than CDTVs. The consumer market hasn't got a clue where interactive
CD technology fits in with game consoles, computers and stereo
equipment. I've yet to see a CD-I unit anywhere in Canada. Photo CD
compatibility may change this.

Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.advocacy