From: bergstro@src.honeywell.com (Pete Bergstrom)
Subject: ST/V-PM (was OS/2 complete prog..)
To: comp.os.os2.programmer
Summary: Digitalk is trying to alienate customers
Posted-Date: Tue, 6 Oct 92 08: 41:27 CDT
Organization: Honeywell Systems & Research Center
Date: Tue, 6 Oct 1992 13:41:27 GMT
Received-Date: Tue, 6 Oct 92 08: 41:28 CDT

postma@gaul.csd.uwo.ca (WARREN POSTMA) wrote:
>I was at the "World's Biggest Bookstore" in Toronto, Ontario. They had a few 
>dozen OS/2 oop programming books.
>
>What I want is a book or set of books that cover these topics:
>
>     (1) Complete listing of all standard OS/2 32 and 16 bit APIs and
>         DLLs

Get the IBM OS/2 Toolkit - the online documentation of 32 bit API
calls is superb.  Each call is documented, showing parameters, return
and error values, and describing briefly the actions it performs.  All
messages are also documented.

>     (2) A learn by doing book for C++ prorgramming in OS/2 from the 
>         "hello world" type of program to PM programming, DLLs, GDI,
>         IPC/Semaphores/QUeues/Pipes etc, and so on.  

Haven't seen such a beast.

>     (3) A good reference/tutorial on creating user interfaces

Several books for UI work exist - I've heard (secondhand) that "Tog in
interface" (guy from Apple - Togazini or something like that) is
pretty good.

>     (4) OOP encapsulation for C++ and OS/2 - OS/2 PM classes

There are several commercial products that do this.  They tend to be
expensive.   I've also heard rumors that Interviews is being ported by
someone. 

>ANy suggestions? Please mail me replies, much appreciated.
>
>Also DOES ANYONE DO SMALLTALK/V PM?  Does it make your apps slow? Do your
>clients complain?  Do they love it hate it, or are they indifferent, or
>can't tell? (The latter would be best.)

I have had ST/V-PM for about a month now and it's pretty nice.  For
the application I'm doing which is mainly user-interaction oriented,
the speed is nearly as good as that in C (speed is 75-90% of
moderately optimized C).  There is a good external function interface
so I expect to be able to isolate performance problems and rewrite
speed-critical sections in C, placing them in a DLL.  (BTW, you should
be able to use most DLLs from Smalltalk with a bit of function
interface code in ST)

***HOWEVER*** - Digitalk's upgrade prices are outrageous!  I just
bought my copy September 11.  The following week, I saw the
announcement of the new version (2.0).  I called for the upgrade and
they told me that it was $275 - regardless of when it was purchased.
So I just paid $300 for the software and they expect me to do it
again.  Unless they change their position, it's going to be a year
until I upgrade and in the meantime, I'll be warning everybody I can
that they actively intend to ***SCREW*** their customers over!


>And how do you like it?  I've learned C++, but it seems C++ is a 500lb
>canary, and smalltalk is more like a hummingbird (which happens
>to be caged in by a 5 tonne birdcage -- you win some and lose some.)
>Does anyone know whereof I speak?)

I happen to like Smalltalk much better than C/C++.  Your learning
time will be dominated by learning class libraries rather than the
language in any case and it seems to me that I reuse more code without
changes in Smalltalk than I would in C/C++.

(Oh, and I have written graphics programs in C++, so I've run into a
lot of problems there.)


Pete
Newsgroups: comp.os.os2.programmer