HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: vhs@rhein-main.de (Volker Herminghaus-Shirai)
Subject: Re: 64-bit CPUs (was DEC's alpha is "way fast")
Reply-To: vhs@rhein-main.de
Date: Mon, 16 Nov 92 11:30:17 GMT

In article <1992Nov13.183026.29335@adobe.com> byer@adobe.com (Scott Byer)  
writes:
> Steven T. Abell writes
> 
> >> Partially true.  The standard 'char' is 8 bits, and on a char-by-char
> >> basis, 32- & 64- bit processors tie.  However, a 64-bit processor
> >> can do >string moves and compares close to twice as fast as a
> >> 32-bit, other >things being equal.
> 
> > No, they can't, in general. Please note that my comment is phrased
> > in terms of bus interfaces. Try doing a *general* full-width string
> > move where you often have unaligned data. i86s do it at a
> > substantially higher cost for unaligned data; 68Ks will do the
> > aligned cases only, and *crash* on the unaligned cases. There is
> > *no way* to correct this problem short of 8-bit comparisons. Without
> > a bus interface that none of the vendors seems to want to develop,
> > even a 16-bit CPU is no better than an 8-bit machine for these
> > problems.
> 
> Pardon?  This is true only if you assume a brain dead strcpy
> algorithm.  An intelligent algorithm, which always grabs an aligned
> 64-bit word, and uses masks for the beginning and ending can indeed
> run nearly twice as fast as the same algorithm on a 32-bit machine.
> There is no reason all the quad-words in the middle of the string
> can't be copied as is.

'cuse me but how is your strcpy routine going to find the end of the string?
Strncpy is OK, but strcpy?

--
Volker Herminghaus-Shirai (vhs@rhein-main.de)

Computer industry: Industry in which the number of units sold of any
given product is inversely proportional to its technical excellence.
See also: MS-DOS, Windows, IBM-PC, X, QWERTY,
          80x86, TrueType, Survival of the shittest.
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.advocacy
From: abell@netcom.com (Steven T. Abell)
Subject: Re: 64-bit CPUs (was DEC's alpha is "way fast")
Organization: Netcom - Online Communication Services  (408 241-9760 guest) 
Date: Wed, 18 Nov 1992 01:08:24 GMT

cs4w+@andrew.cmu.edu (Charles William Swiger) writes:
>abell@netcom.com (Steven T. Abell) writes:
>> The lack of autoincrement on a RISC makes other economies worth attempting.
>> You *need* a 64-bit CPU to make these fancy string movers worthwhile on a
>> 68K-like machine. On a smaller CPU, the fancy method is *slower* than
>> byte-by-byte.

>Auto-increment mode ala the PDP-11?  It's no surprise that this works
>well; the C string definition was designed with auto-increment
>addressing in mind.  Using a different string definition (pascal,
>perhaps? [ie, requiring that each string has an initial length byte])
>makes auto-increment much less useful.  Pascal strings (or substrings)
>can require to be aligned so that the simpler algorithm can be used. 
>Agreed, this is a restriction, but there are environments where it's
>better not to be able to arbitrarily mangle pointers.

C has little to do with it.

Most CISC machines have some form of autoincrement, the 68K being one of them.
A Pascal-like string definition makes autoincrement no less useful.

Extracted substrings can indeed be aligned, but this might, and often does,
require the ugly string movement algorithm discussed previously in this
thread. Therefore, we still need a full range of ugly-but-efficient in-situ
string ops.

BTW, C-strings suck.

>>>You can use calloc() rather than malloc() to allocate space for
>>>structures, so the holes created by alignment restrictions will be
>>>zero-filled.  No performance loss involved.

>> What if your struct is on the stack? K&R recommend against simple-minded
>> block comparison of structs for just this reason. If you want to specify
>> no structs on the stack, there's a performance loss right there.

>You refer to passing structs on the stack *by value*, I assume?  You can
>do it by making sure that the holes are zero-filled and that the struct
>is correctly aligned in the stack.

I often allocate structs on the stack as *locals*, which contain absolute
trash at function entry. Struct comparators *must* mask their holes.

Steve abell@netcom.com
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.advocacy
From: thomsen@spf.trw.com (Mark Thomsen)
Subject: Byte, Silliness, and Journalists
Organization: TRW Inc., Redondo Beach, CA
Date: Wed, 18 Nov 92 17:10:01 GMT

Remember that journalism is, at heart, a profession created because there is  
too much blank paper in the world.

The best journalists attempt to fill that blankness with first-hand, unbiased  
(or at least even-handed), mostly complete accounting of what is happening  
currently that people are willing to pay to find out about. Byte is filled with  
articles that often appear to be biased and incomplete. Since good articles  
sneak in occasionally, and many times with the same bylines as hack articles,  
one needs to develop a theory.

My theory, formed years ago, is Byte is either

	A.  Aiming to be the Datamation of microcomputing, or

	B.  Rushing too hard to fill hundreds of pages every month and
	    sacrificing journalistic professional standards.

I don't know where to turn to for journalism regarding NeXTs. NeXTWORLD may  
still be a fanzine while NeXT volume (and NeXTWORLD readership) grows. The Unix  
rags occasionally publish articles on NeXT and have gotten it more right than  
wrong. Too few articles, though.

I guess it has to be the nets, like here, for journalism. So my point is, when  
finding information about NeXT, it may be worthwhile to think as a journalist  
and post as completely and even-handedly as practical. We have, here, probably  
the best journalistic vehicle for NeXTnews we shall see for a couple of years.

Don't bitch about Byte - work on improving the net!

Mark R. Thomsen
From: charuhas@virtual4.harvard.edu (Thomas Charuhas)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.advocacy
Subject: Re: Byte Magazine pans the NeXTstation
Date: 17 Nov 92 21:54:14 GMT
Article-I.D.: das.1992Nov17.215414.12562
Organization: Division of Applied Sciences, Harvard University

I don't understand why everyone is so surprised. I was an avid Byte
reader before it became a useless PC rag. ( > 5 years ago)
My world would be turned upside down if a trash magazine like today's Byte
actually said something good about the NeXT. Then it would be time
to sell my NeXT machine and buy whatever is the new, and actually
innovative machine.
If, in the future, we were all using the 
8 millionth inncarnation of the PC and
Microsoft Windows 1000, all wore blue suits etc, then Byte
may be happy...

I praise the intelligent few who still belive in innovation
and resist.
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.advocacy
From: jimu@orthanc.cs.su.oz.au (James Uther)
Subject: NeXT sighting (sort of)
Reply-To: jimu@orthanc.cs.su.oz.au (James Uther)
Organization: Basser Dept of Computer Science, University of Sydney, Australia
Date: Mon, 16 Nov 1992 07:01:40 GMT


I've been reading a book bye Thomas Bass called 'The Newtonin Casino'. It's
about a bunch of UC Santa Cruz hackers developing a computer to beat roulette.
(interestingly enough they are largely the same bunch who formed the 'chaos
cabel', one of the first groups researching chaos theory). 
ANYWAY.. they have since moved on, and one of them '... a professor of chaos
at the University of Illinois, was designing strange attractors into Italian
fabrics by connecting his NeXT computer to the Peduzzi fanily's weaving 
machines...'. 

just goes to show..
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.advocacy
From: shiva@vega.Stanford.EDU (Marcos Javier Polanco)
Subject: Re: Really stupid Question: NS486 (WHEN??) - Q2 '92
Organization: DSO, Stanford University
Date: Thu, 19 Nov 92 19:18:57 GMT

In article <1992Nov18.185345.28016@cbnewsl.cb.att.com>  
coco@cbnewsl.cb.att.com (felix.lugo) writes:
> In article <92322.18284434II5MT@CMUVM.CSV.CMICH.EDU> John Goggan  
<34II5MT@CMUVM.CSV.CMICH.EDU> writes:
> | When I asked the Michigan NeXT Rep. (Kent Foster) if the January date  
was
> | still valid, he said "no" and that it would most likely be around  
April,
> | plus or minus (which do _you_ think?!?) a month...

To my way of thinking, moving shipping into the spring makes no business  
sense whatsoever, particularly if it is to write "hundreds of drivers."  
Why not ship on a specific configuration of a Dell or Compaq or HP we KNOW  
NS486 works on? Then NeXT can meet a January date and worry about making  
the release more general, making it work with all the conceivable devices  
out there, into the summer. REMEMBER THAT THE MICROSOFT HYPE MACHINE WILL  
BE GOING FULL TILT BY THE SUMMERTIME RELEASE OF NT! NeXTstep 486 will be  
lost in the noise, so being out there first is what's important.

-Marcos J. Polanco
-shiva@vega.stanford.edu
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.advocacy
From: cmcurtin@bluemoon.use.com (Matthew Curtin)
Subject: Re: Where are they now?
Organization: Blue Moon BBS ((614) 868-998[024])
Date: Fri, 20 Nov 92 11:06:18 EST

slhw4@cc.usu.edu (Jason Hunsaker) writes:

> What ever happened to Steve Wozinak (sp?) co-founder of Apple?

He started the Electronic Frontier Foundation with Mitch Kapor a few years 
back...

> -----------------------------------------------------------------
> Jason Hunsaker  -|-  Logan, Utah  -|-  Internet: slhw4@cc.usu.edu


 __________________________________________________________________________
| C. Matthew Curtin             ! "But I am the enlightened one, they are  |
| P.O. Box 27081                ! but mere sheep, following each other in  |
| Columbus, OH 43227-0081       ! the name of compatibility." -B. Heineman |
| 614/365-3272 (voice mail)     !              Apple II Forever!           |
|_cmcurtin@bluemoon.use.com_____!_____________GNO_your_AppleIIGS!__________|
From: low00001@bullnext.mc.duke.edu (Richard Low)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.advocacy
Subject: Re: Does anybody want to build an xbase system for the NeXT?
Date: 19 Nov 92 18:45:59 GMT

In article <1992Nov19.052950.23228@leland.Stanford.EDU>  
shiva@vega.Stanford.EDU (Marcos Javier Polanco) writes:
> 
> 
> Every other category is covered. If we are going to sell NeXTs en-masse 
> we are going to need a dBase compatible (xBase) environment. With their
> purchase of Fox, Microsoft has virtually assured the future viability of 
> the xbase language. And there exists no "medium" database for the NeXT 
> of any repute: the options seem to be Dataphile or Sybase. Any takers?
> 
> -Marcos J. Polanco
> -shiva@vega.stanford.edu
> -415-691-2255

Given that the dBASE file format is pretty basic and flat, that's not the  
draw to an Xbase product.  I think most people are drawn to the language  
(as with Clipper) or the environment (as in Fox) as well as the tremendous  
third party support.  Considering the NeXT environment and the Objective-C  
language and IB, I can't see why anyone would want to write Xbase code on  
a NeXT.  If it's compatibility you're interested in and providing Xbase  
program availability to users, go with SoftPC.

--
Richard Low
Duke University Medical Center
low00001@bullnext.mc.duke.edu
NeXT Mail welcome
From: mrothste@keiko.acs.calpoly.edu (Rothstein)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.advocacy
Subject: Re: Concerns about NeXT Prices are warranted
Date: 19 Nov 92 01:41:00 GMT
Reply-To: mrothste@data.acs.calpoly.edu
Organization: Cal Poly State University, San Luis Obispo

In article <1992Nov16.181812.25376@cbnewsl.cb.att.com>  
coco@cbnewsl.cb.att.com (felix.lugo) writes:
> In article <1e8bebINNk0t@emory.mathcs.emory.edu> kim@unix.cc.emory.edu  
writes:
> |
> | I wonder if NeXT will have a response.
> | 
> | --------------------------------------------------
> | | Kim Wallen                        Internet: kim@unix.cc.emory.edu 
> | | Department of psychology          Bitnet: kim@emoryu1             
> | | Emory University                                                  
> | | Atlanta, GA 30322                                                 
> | |                                                                   
> | | Phone: (404) 727-4125             FAX: (404) 727-0372             
> |  -----------------------------------------
> | 
> 
> 	Since it's not a direct ATTACK at Steve Jobs, their response will
> probably be to stick their heads further into the ground and ignore the  
whole
> thing!  I mean, isn't this what they've been doing for a long time?   
You've
> got to accept the fact that the new Sun hardware is very attractive and  
WILL
> make potential NeXT customers think twice about which platform to  
support.
> NeXTSTEP is great, but it's value is transitory.  Hardware investment is
> THE primary concern involved when purchasing for a big project (and I'm  
not
> talking about a one time purchase by an individual).  Software for  
devel.
> purposes comes after that.
> 
> --Felix

I have to disagree there.  Not only do many people buy hardware because  
some app works on it (an office of DOS/Win machines, a publishing company  
with macs for DP, graphics etc.) but companies do so much more.  Take the  
medical profession for example.  Medical software starts at ~$8000 and  
goes to ~$50,000 per COPY.  That is just a little more than the hardware  
(sarcasm!) and thus wieghts more on the decision to purchase.  Hardware  
comes more into play when equivalent apps are available on different  
platforms.

--
-Mont

   NeXTmail OK :-)
   President CP-NUG (Cal Poly NeXT User Group)
   mrothste@data.acs.calpoly.edu
Organization: Senior, Chemistry, Carnegie Mellon, Pittsburgh, PA
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.advocacy
Date: Tue, 17 Nov 1992 12:34:36 -0500 
From: Charles William Swiger <cs4w+@andrew.cmu.edu>
Subject: Re: DEC's alpha is "way fast" according to WSJournal

Excerpts from netnews.comp.sys.next.advocacy: 16-Nov-92 Re: DEC's alpha
is "way fas.. by Lars Peter Fischer@iesd. 
> Charles> I don't see a major revolution occurring with the transition
> Charles> between 32-bit and 64-bit processors because the computer
> Charles> industry really hasn't max'ed out the possibilities of 32-bit
> Charles> machines yet.  (How many people do you know have complained
> Charles> that their machines can only address 4 gigs at a time?
> Charles> Anyone ever seen a machine with more than 4 gigs?

This quote has gotten me into more trouble.... :-)

> I've seen Sun workstations with 512 M *RAM*. 1 G swap is not uncommon
> for some tasks. VLSI simulations (for RISC chips, say) often run at
> around 2 G these days -- and, yes, people are doing these things on
> their UNIX workstations, not Crays. We regularly set up machines with
> 64 M for average stuff. 32 M should be considered common for a single
> user machine these days.

A Sun workstation w/512M?  It's either a SPARC-10 or not a workstation,
but one of SMI's multiprocessor server machines.  I'm almost certain
that the SPARC-2 and older machines can't have more than 128M.

> The NeXTstation Turbo takes 128 M. This is only 4 G / 32. It is also
> 640k * 204. So, the maximum memory of the NeXTstation (a rather modest
> workstation) is much closer to maxing out the 32-bit address space
> than it is to the PClown limit, once considered more than anyone could
> ever need.

Look, I don't disagree that machines are moving towards 64 bit CPU's and
larger amounts of memory, and that changes will occur because of this. 
I simply believe that the transition between 16 & 32 bits was more
significant then the transition between 32 & 64 bits that's currently
underway.  Yes, there are people that do max out the 32-bit limit, and
they are looking for the newest technology.  But they are in the
minority of the people who use workstations (perhaps the most important
minority in the field of computers, but still)....

-Chuck

+------------------------------------------+ "Foosh.  Aaughh!!"
| Charles William Swiger -- CMU...crunch!  | "Foosh.  Aauuggghh!!"
| AMS & normal mail: cs4w+@andrew.cmu.edu  | "Cold spray deodorant...."
| NeXTmail: chuck@mon.slip.andrew.cmu.edu  |
+------------------------------------------+   -- Opus, Bloom County [RIP]

Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.advocacy
From: wilcoxt@cuug.ab.ca (Terrance Wilcox 260-8100)
Subject: Byte silliness.
Organization: Calgary UNIX Users' Group
Date: Tue, 17 Nov 1992 20:43:19 GMT

I've been sitting here wondering why Byte used such a low end NeXT in their
comparison. It just doesn't fit with the other machines. It isn't a color
machine, its got low memory and a small HD, and it doesn't run AutoCad.

Imagine the review without the NeXT. All the results come in. The obviously
favored Indigo finishes dead last. I say obviously favored because the
article recommends the Indigo even though it finished dead last. One of
the authors has one and really likes it. They describe it as outstanding
(it was sloooooowww).

So here they are, the favorite in last place. This is clearly unacceptable.
They need someone else to finish last. What have they got handy?

How about that NeXT? It's not color, low memory and HD, won't run AutoCad.
It's perfect. Even if it's faster than the Indigo, they can rate it last
because of these reasons.

They test it. It's faster than the Indigo. Oh well. Better luck next time.

Terry Wilcox
From: fernandeza@merrimack.edu
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.advocacy
Subject: Re: Byte unfairness(?)
Date: 18 Nov 92 13:56:01 GMT
Organization: Merrimack College, No. Andover, MA, USA

In article <92321.003655UD124895@NDSUVM1.BITNET>, <UD124895@NDSUVM1.BITNET> writes:
> BYTE is shooting 0 for 2 on the NeXT with their latest issue.  It has
> a large section on Objects, and NeXT is only mentioned in a table
> stating who the "major players" are.
> 
> What bugs me is that Apple and Sun have lengthy sections on their
> object achievements(huh?) and future strategies.  NeXT has nothing
> listed.  Some of the "new" innovations that Apple and Sun will have
> real soon now have appeared in NeXTSTEP since 1988.......

It sometimes makes me wonder if there is some conspiracy going on!

> 
> What bugs me even more is the inability of most magazines to capitalize
> NeXT correctly.
> 
> Matthew McCowan
> LHCC/CCDP Data Manager (and unhappy Byte reader.....)
> "Hope is where you find it"
From: khare@cco.caltech.edu (Rohit Khare)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.advocacy
Subject: Re: NeXTSTEP 486 Keyboard Question
Date: 23 Nov 1992 10:17:13 GMT
Organization: California Institute of Technology, Pasadena
NNTP-Posting-Host: punisher.caltech.edu

In the beta NS486 copies that will go out to developers in January, the
keys mirror the keyboard of the Dell450DE it's designed to run on: alt for
Alt, control for Cmd, and CapsLock for control; it's not logical, it
just physically maps the Dell's keyboard


Rohit Khare


>In article <1992Nov19.233920.19537@pencom.com> ricardo@lush (Ricardo  
>Parada) writes:
>> I'm just curious.  Does anybody know how NS 486 handle the PC keyboard.   
>> For instance, in the NeXT there is a Control, Alternate and Command.  On  
>> the PC there is a Control and Alt key.  So what does NS 486 use for  
>> Command?
>On the PC are two Control and two Alt keys. So it is possible to use one  
>Alt key as command (On the german PC keyboard the right Alt key is named  
>Alt Gr and makes special characters), but I don t know how NS 486 handle  





>the keyboard
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.advocacy
From: abell@netcom.com (Steven T. Abell)
Subject: Re:  DEC's alpha is "way fast" according to WSJournal
Organization: Netcom - Online Communication Services  (408 241-9760 guest) 
Date: Sat, 21 Nov 1992 20:12:13 GMT

axel@tumbolia.sta.sub.org writes:
>So far, everybody in this group obviously is convinced, that the
>future lies in 64 bit-architectures.

I think you haven't been reading very carefully. Several posters, including
myself, have voiced the opinion that these machines are probably wasted on
most of us.

As regards the microprocessor wars, I'm actually a little sick of these
bigger and bigger CPUs. I've worked on several embedded systems, where these
enormous critters are simply a curse. What the world really needs is a good
8-bit CPU with a no-nonsense programming model, lightning-fast interrupt
response, and hardware that doesn't derive from the design desperation of
the late '70s.

Steve abell@netcom.com
From: khare@cco.caltech.edu (Rohit Khare)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.advocacy
Subject: Re: Really stupid Question: NS486 (WHEN??) - Q2 '92
Date: 20 Nov 92 01:15:07 GMT
Organization: California Institute of Technology, Pasadena
NNTP-Posting-Host: punisher.caltech.edu

>To my way of thinking, moving shipping into the spring makes no business  
>sense whatsoever, particularly if it is to write "hundreds of drivers."  
>Why not ship on a specific configuration of a Dell or Compaq or HP we KNOW  
>NS486 works on? Then NeXT can meet a January date and worry about making  
>the release more general, making it work with all the conceivable devices  
>out there, into the summer. REMEMBER THAT THE MICROSOFT HYPE MACHINE WILL  
>BE GOING FULL TILT BY THE SUMMERTIME RELEASE OF NT! NeXTstep 486 will be  
>lost in the noise, so being out there first is what's important.

>-Marcos J. Polanco

For you trivia watchers out there, the last line of an article on NS486 in
this week's PCWeek (p 72, i think), it says that NeXT will NOT OEM NS486---
There will be no Dell NeXTSTEP boxes from the factory. All sales will be
through VAR's.. and this makes perfect sense, since NS486 sales will not
be demand-driven...  they need the extensive sale-support and demand creation
only VARs can provide.. after all, one does not by NeXTSTEP piecemeal... only
by selling to the entire company can it be successful. Finally, MIS types are
already *very* skeptical of NT... they are NeXT's market, and they are much 
more likely to look at the situation objectively, as opposed to Byte and othe
PC rags, for example.

Rohit Khare
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.advocacy
From: byer@adobe.com (Scott Byer)
Subject: Re: NeXTSTEP on DEC Alpha?  Rumor in Digital News & Review
Reply-To: byer@adobe.com (Scott Byer)
Organization: Adobe Systems Incorporated
Date: Thu, 19 Nov 1992 18:01:00 GMT

Chuck (Non-Peon) Waltrip writes

> The "Rumor Roundup" column in the November 12th Digital News &
> Review mag.  reports a rumor that DEC is going ahead with a project
> to put the Mach microkernel on Alpha and that it will then be
> possible to run VMS, OSF/1 and NeXTSTEP (yup, that's what he said)
> concurrently (similar, I guess, to the way that NT supports Windows
> and Posix, etc).

I find it difficult to believe this, since VMS requires some
different microcode to be downloaded to the chip than OSF/1 does.
It's easy enough to have the two OS's on a single disk and boot
them up one at a time, but at the same time?  Not unless you do a
very heavyweight task switch between OS's to re-download the required
PALcode.

NeXTStep on the Alpha would be great.  The Alpha chip does have a
32-bit compatibility mode so it could be an easy port.  But market
size would have to be a consideration...

--
Scott Byer                             NeXTMail: byer@mv.us.adobe.com
Adobe Systems Incorporated               These are *my* opinions, and  
1585 Charleston Road, P.O. Box 7900        do not necessarily reflect
Mountain View, CA 94039-7900             the opinions of my employer.
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.advocacy
From: frank@atlas.physchem.chemie.uni-tuebingen.de (Frank Siegert)
Subject: Re: 64-bit CPUs (was DEC's alpha is "way fast")
Organization: Comp. Center (ZDV) U of Tuebingen, FRG
Date: Tue, 17 Nov 1992 20:43:54 GMT

ptok@void.caltech.edu (Phil Tokumaru) writes:

>In article <1992Nov12.235151.8019@netcom.com> abell@netcom.com (Steven T.  
>Abell) writes:
>>Actually, I'm working on an app right now that could use 64-bit integers,
>>but I'm willing to bet that it's one of *very few* such apps I'll
>>ever write or use.

>64 bit integers are big enough to do many calculations currently requiring  
(deleted stuff about floats/64bit ints)

According to CT (a german computer magazin) 12/92 page 20 decided Motorola
not to use a 64 bit databus because even nummerical applications will only
gain 1.5 % aprox. speed. Therefore the 68060 will use a 32 bit databus.

Even with 32 bit it will triple the speed of a 040.        

Have a nice day

Frank


--

// HAPPY HAPPY JOY JOY  - famous last words

Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.advocacy