HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: essmann@igd.fhg.de (Essmann Gerrit (rath))
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.sysadmin
Subject: HELP!!! Optical Disc stuck in my drive
Date: 26 Jul 92 11:03:42 GMT
Organization: IGD FHG Darmstadt, FRG

We have a 030 cube with an OD drive running NeXTstep 2.1. One of these
days when I needed to reboot the machine, the cube didn't recognize the
OD, telling something from unexpected signals. The machine was not able
to boot until we disconnected the OD power plug. The current situation
is like this: When booting, in verbose report mode, it says:

  odc0 at .....
  od0 at odc0 slave 0
  od1 at odc1 slave 1
  :
  :

The cube then boots without problems, but the OD can't be accessed. There
is still an optical disc inside the drive, ejecting it with disk -e /dev/rod0a
doesn't work.

When having the OD connected, boot process finally breaks very late with the
following message:

  panic: (Cpu 0) od: empty q
  panic>

So I have two questions:

1. How do I eject the optical disc that is stuck right now?

2. What do I do connect my OD to the machine again?

Thanks for any help,

Gerrit


------------------------------------------------------------------------------
  essmann@igd.fhg.de  -  Gerrit Essmann, 6100 Darmstadt. NeXT-Mail welcome.
          Remember: It ist not enough to succeed. Others must fail.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.sysadmin
From: cpm@fnbc.com (Paul Merriman)
Subject: Re: machine does not recognize my account
Organization: First National Bank Of Chicago, Chicago IL, USA
Date: Fri, 24 Jul 92 11:45:02 GMT

In article <STATMAN.92Jul21001718@pilot.stat.ufl.edu> statman@stat.ufl.edu  
(Chuck Kincaid) writes:

> 	A knowledgable friend suggested I try 'nidump' into a file and
> then 'niload' back from the file.  However, it would not let me do the
> niload.  I can't remember the error message right now and, of course,
> I didn't right it down.  Maybe something about can't make connection?
>...
> 	Does anyone have any ideas about this?  or seen it before?  I
> appreciate any help.  Thank you.
> 
Sounds like netinfo wasn't running properly, Ive seen this sort of
problem before when booting into single user mode (boot sd -s from NeXT>  
prompt). Without netinfo running (even locally) the machine uses  
/etc/passwd for its user information - so if your not in there you have a  
problem! I discovered this when trying to change the password in single  
user mode then going multiuser - the change hadn't been noticed (going  
multi-user starts the netinfo daemons and from then on /etc/passwd is  
ignored). I sorted this out by starting the netinfo daemons by hand (you  
can see which ones by examining /etc/rc) then doing niload to load  
/etc/passwd into local netinfo.

Still all that doesn't explain why rebooting sorted things out - are you  
sure nothing else had changed?.
 --
Paul Merriman				cpm@fnbc.com (US)
Global Trading Financial Systems	cpm@fnbc.co.uk (UK)
First National Bank of Chicago

Tel: 071 240 7240 x3368			Fax: 071 438 4181
From: jeffo@ux1.cso.uiuc.edu (J.B. Nicholson-Owens)
Subject: Re: Let's complain to the developers and not USENET
Reply-To: jeffo@uiuc.edu
Organization: University of Illinois at Urbana
Date: Wed, 22 Jul 1992 03:52:58 GMT

Leaving Sherwood Botsford's article alone (I've replied to it
elsewhere) and attempting to make this thread grind to a halt, I agree
that PixelMagician was a good demo (I never saw the DiagramDemo, I
just bought the program because it came with two other programs in the
Educational Package).

There are some (what I think to be) really good demo ideas on the
other thread.  I'd like to add two things: telling the user how much
time there is left on the demo (if the programmer *must* limit the
usage by time) would be helpful.  Nothing fancy, just a little exiting
note of "You have 40 minutes left on this demo, thank you for trying
it out."  would be nice.  Also, I don't think that time should be
ticked away when a screensaver is going, another window is active and
foremost (signifying that the demo window is not the current
application) or the user slides the window off the visible screen.  To
me, that just wouldn't be fair.
-- 
-- Jeff (jeffo@uiuc.edu)
-- No NeXTmail please
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.advocacy
From: lemson@fnbc.com (David Lemson)
Subject: Re: Cube Owners -- Are we shut out from RISC Upgrades?
Reply-To: lemson@fnbc.com
Organization: First National Bank Of Chicago, Chicago IL, USA
Date: Tue, 28 Jul 92 13:57:19 GMT

In article <Bs2JFJ.J5z@atherton.com> dlw@atherton.com (Remo Williams)  
writes:
> This drives at the heart of existing customer base satisfaction. This is  
> something that the minicomputer vendors understand quite well. Even SUN  
I  
> believe did the same thing to woo its SUN3/xxx base to the SPARC line.  
Does  
> NeXT have the resolve to do this sort of thing for its customer base?

But remember, Sun did this to try to ease the pain of their migration away  
from the Sun 3 line.  They are actually dropping support for that  
architecture in new OS releases!  That's a little different from NeXT,  
whose new OS will run on 030 machines (no comment on the useability - the  
important thing to note is that they haven't alienated those people with  
old machines like Sun has)

--
David Lemson                                           (312) 732-4741
FNBC Sys Admin (Summer) UIUC NeXT Campus Consultant(rest of the time)
E-mail to: lemson@fnbc.com                          NeXTMail accepted
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.advocacy
From: sanguish@digifix.com (Scott Anguish)
Subject: Re: Open letter to NextDevelopers (long)(Flamebait)
Reply-To: sanguish@digifix.com
Organization: Digital Fix Development
Date: Tue, 21 Jul 1992 04:51:04 GMT

Jess Anderson writes:
> Scott Hess writes:
> >For real stuff, even ten minutes is about 20 minutes too few.  If I
> >want a word processor or writing utility, I want to write a paper
> >using it.  If I want a drawing tool, I want to draw a diagram in it. 
> >If I want a spreadsheet, I want to balance my checkbook one
> >month.  If I want a database, I want to have time to enter a section
> >of my bug database into it.  If I want a programming utility, I
> >want to use it to develop a program.  If I want a screensaver, I'd
> >like it to save my screen at least once.
> 
> I think that's *way* too little time.  For one thing, the
> more deserving the software of being bought and used, the
> more likely it is to have a complex of features appropriate
> to nontrivial tasks, and therefore the longer it will take
> to give the package a fair trial.  Indeed, since the better
> packages are (fairly) going to fetch a higher price, it's
> even more important that a demo allow the prospective buyer
> a liberal trial period (at a minimum, I should think this
> would be 10-20 hours of use).

	The "two minute" demo may be a little short for some types of packages.   
5 minutes would be more appropriate for some packages.  

	However, at least in the case of the Simson Garfinkel and Associates  
packages that use the Registration object that Simson made available, you can  
re-start the Demo again after you are supposed to have registered.

	It makes it inconvenient to work with, not impossible.  While you will  
be interrupted, you can still experiment with all the features.

	The "crippling" of demos really needs to be based on the individual  
application and how it is intended to be worked with.  Whether it be based on  
printing, saving, time-crippling or whatever.


-- 
- Scott Anguish -
sanguish@digifix.com (NextMail)

Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.advocacy
From: jim@ljkiraly.lerc.nasa.gov (L J "Jim" Kiraly)
Subject: Re: $$$ NeXT Developer Support $$$
Organization: NASA/LeRC
Date: Tue, 21 Jul 1992 12:20:51 GMT

Well I guess I understand the notion that NeXTEdge as a separate division wants  
to show a profit but it would appear to me that the new developer support  
scheme will hurt NeXT considerably.

(1) As has been discussed, the cost of support will keep folks from using it.   
But it isn't only the cost- it's also the hassle.  I work at a government Lab  
and could probably find the funds to support developer per incident or even 6  
pack incident charges- but the shear volume of paper work and justifications  
required to spend what is, after all, taxpayers money will prevent me from ever  
trying to pursue this option.

(2) There are a number of system "features" and required options that are  
required and simply aren't documented (thank god for USENET and the archives).   
A number of people have commented on a range of such items.  So long as these  
features aren't well documented, folks need access to some kind of support.  In  
particular those that don't have network connectivity.  Without that support  
they are effectively shut out of using those features.

(3) And what about NeXTAnswers?  I think that NeXTAnsweres is a great resource-  
which has come about to cover some of the "features" that aren't documented or  
understood.  If users feel that they can't address questions to NeXT, how will  
NeXT know what questions need to be answered?  If the source material for   
NeXTAnswers comes only from question raised by the large software development  
houses, I think they may miss the concerns of the isolated and possibly less  
sophisticated users who could represent a large volume customer base.

(4) And what about Mission Critical Custom Apps?  This new developer policy  
seems to 180 degrees out of phase with NeXT's marketing plans.  It appears to  
be a policy aimed at software firms developing Shrink Wrapped Apps, who can  
afford and amortize these new costs of developer support.  But, what about the  
small businessman who wants to use his NeXT to manage some unique  
characteristic of his business and needs to get a few things figured out which  
simply aren't documented.  What about the pioneer who gets a NeXT and tries to  
convince established SUN-heads and SGI-jocks that a NeXT is a worthwhile and  
useful development tool- did NeXT just shut the door on him?

If the goal is (as someone suggested) to shut down the trivial questions and  
well documented questions, I think another approach could be used: perhaps an  
email response referring to the on-line docs, NeXTAnswers, and digital  
librarian.

--
__________________________________________________________________
Jim Kiraly- jim@ljkiraly.lerc.nasa.gov- NASA Lewis Research Center
----------------- NeXT Mail preferred ----------------------------
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.advocacy
From: erik@westworld.esd.sgi.com (Erik Fortune)
Subject: Re: X11 must die (was Re: IRIX vs. NeXTStep).
Organization: Silicon Graphics, Inc.  Mountain View, CA
Date: Thu, 23 Jul 92 18:41:23 GMT


In article <1992Jul23.011956.6508@math.ucla.edu>, barry@arnold.math.ucla.edu writes:
> Are you sure? I'd swear I was using X11R4 circa 1987-8. Didn't
> X11R5 just come out (or not even come out yet)?

X11R4 was released on January 3 1990.  X11R5 was released in the middle
of last year.   Many vendors are still shipping systems based on X11R4 --
as vendor X implementations get better (and diverge more from MIT),
it takes longer to switch over to a new release.

> If X11R5 has been out awhile, I've got bad news for you: no one
> seems to be too excited about upgrading to it. Strange....
Where is it that no one is excited about upgrading to it?  Our customers 
seem pretty excited about it.  So do most of the X literate people I talk
to (in industry, education may be different).

-- Erik
From: jrg@doc.ic.ac.uk (James Grinter)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.advocacy
Subject: Re: RightBrain ad in Fall '92 NeXTWORLD
Date: 30 Jul 92 11:44:22 GMT
Organization: Department of Computing, IC, London

In article <1992Jul27.151922.10001@fnbc.com> lemson@fnbc.com writes:
>In article <1992Jul24.222227.533@Trirex.COM> mmelling @Trirex.com(Michael  
>Mellinger) writes:
>> [comments about advertising audiences]
>Nah, I wouldn't make that assumption.  I know of plenty of people with  
>NeXTs who don't have any source to read usenet and their sole source of  
>information is the NeXT Support Bulletin and NeXTWorld magazine.  (scary  
>thought, eh?)

Well, not subscribing to NeXTWorld means that I only see stuff mentioned
on Usenet. Unfortunately, being in the UK, I've never yet found a newsagent
where I can wonder in and pick up a copy of NeXTWorld off the shelf.

Advertising is best put to both specific format magazines (to let the owners
know you care) and to specific application magazines (to let those who might
want to use your product know about it). You don't need to go for big adverts
unless you're trying to retain customers. The best adverts are usually those
which are small and make the reader want to know more so that they actually
make an effort- they'll remember it more that way.

Anyone in the UK care to give their hints on finding NeXTWorld. I'm quite
surprised I haven't found a newsagents with it, as I do live in London...

James
-- 
James Grinter,                              Dept of Computing, Imperial College
jrg@uk.ac.ic.doc (JANET)                     180, Queen's Gate, LONDON SW7 2BZ
jrg@doc.ic.ac.uk, (everyone else!); jgrinter@nyx.cs.du.edu (slower replies)
UUCP:  jrg@icdoc.UUCP, ..!uknet!icdoc!jrg   "If it ain't broke, don't fix it!"
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.advocacy
From: nathan@laplace.biology.yale.edu (Nathan F. Janette)
Subject: Re: NeXT to ship128MB EO's as replacements for 3.5" drives--Nice thought?
Reply-To: nathan@laplace.biology.yale.edu
Organization: Yale University, Department of Computer Science, New Haven, CT
Date: Fri, 24 Jul 1992 16:11:55 GMT

In article <1992Jul23.224330.189@digifix!uunet.ca> sanguish@digifix.com (Scott  
Anguish) writes:
> > to have that.  At $49.00/128MB's there would be a lot of happy users. 
> 
> 	I hope for everyones sake that NeXT just sticks with the floppy drive  
> and leave it at that.
> 
> 	$49 for media is too high for product distribution.
> 
>  	Don't get me wrong, the MO format is my preferred form of archiving  
> data, but I don't want it as the primary distribution media.
> 
> 	NeXT was "innovative" when they shipped with 5 1/4 ODs, and it didn't  
> work out.

I think your right, NeXT should never innovate again.  Steve should
sell out to Bill Gates, and NeXT should adopt Windows NT.  Go with
the flow, I say.

--
Nathan Janette		"I'm a NeXTstep man,
Dept MB&B, Yale Univ	 I'm a NeXTcube guy"
New Haven, CT
nathan@laplace.biology.yale.edu (NeXT)

Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.advocacy
From: zmonster@engin.umich.edu (Eric Hermanson)
Subject: NeXT used in Ad Business
Date: Wed, 22 Jul 92 15:42:07 EDT
Organization: University of Michigan Engineering, Ann Arbor
Distribution: usa

 Does anyone know of any advertising companies that use 
NeXT systems for ad layout, photo retouching, cpm
typesetting, etc?

Please send me mail with the names, addresses,
email or telephone #'s of these companies
if you know of any.  I am interested in buying
a dimension system for the use, but I want to 
talk to someone who already uses NeXT for this
purpose.

Thanks,
Eric Hermanson
zmonster@engin.umich.edu

Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.advocacy
From: samurai@uriel.cs.mcgill.ca (Darcy Brockbank)
Subject: Re: Object Design's ObjectStore to be part of NeXTstep
Organization: SOCS, McGill University, Montreal, Canada
Date: Wed, 22 Jul 1992 11:47:32 GMT

In article <1992Jul22.000747.11693@leland.Stanford.EDU> shiva@vega.Stanford.EDU  
(Marcos Javier Polanco) writes:
> BTW, Steve gave an inspired presentation at Object World, managing to take  
> swipes at Taligent, Borland, and SunSoft in the process. NS3.0's drag &  
> drop, Novelll & Appleshare support, and the DBKit are all crazy hype!!!!


Why take a swipe at Borland?

Why are those features "crazy hype?"

Confused,

- db

--
-------
I always thought that NeXTStep was very good in its approach to color since
the tasteless are protected from their own stupidity. -- Jason Breckenridge
(I know Jason, Jason is a close personal friend of mine, and I am not Jason!)
From: mneideng@thidwick.acs.calpoly.edu (Mark Neidengard)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.advocacy
Subject: Re: Define a new platform . .
Date: 24 Jul 92 05:00:33 GMT
Organization: Academic Computing Services, Cal Poly San Luis Obispo

>peer@ccrma.stanford.edu (Peer Landa) writes:
>> 
>> Incidentally, while SGI now releases an 85 mips 16 mflop Indigo @  
>$12,000 --  

(munch)

>> there in the RISC vs. CISC wars -- we really believe in high-performance  
>RISC  
>> processors, I think the NeXT machines tend to be very low-performance  
>machines  
>> compared to what our customer want. But you admire the fact that he's  
>doing  

Well, from what I understand the IRCAM SPW board for the NeXT cube features
two 40 MHz i860's and a 56001.  If we ignore the DSP for a moment and only
concentrate on the RISC processors, each i860 has the potential for
aggregating 80 megaflops.  That means that with finely-grained floating
point code, the IRCAM could easily clock upwards of 140 megaflops on
optimized code.  Of course, development tools are also available.  I think
that this set up would let the NeXT outdistance the Indigo (and the Crimson
for that matter) but a substantial margin for many tasks...

Mark Neidengard
mneideng@cosmos.acs.calpoly.edu
"The probability of a Unix machine crashing
 is in direct porportion to the number of
 people administrating it..."
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.advocacy
From: andrew@cubetech.com (Andrew Loewenstern)
Subject: Re: RightBrain ad in Fall '92 NeXTWORLD
Keywords: Empty Headed Pasteup Advert In NeXTWORLD
Organization: Cube Technologies, Inc.
Date: Tue, 21 Jul 1992 17:33:58 GMT

In article <1992Jul20.181430.29015@liveware.com> attila@liveware.com writes:
>Hey, at a price of around 4 thousand dollars
>for a centerfold double page layout, I guess they have some dough
>to toss around.  Lets hope sales for them continue to reflect
>the advert image. ;')

4k???  Do you know someone at NeXTworld or something??

Last I checked a single 4-color page was about 8k...


andrew
-- 
andrew@cubetech.com
Andrew Loewenstern      | "If I am not for myself, who will be for me?
Cube Technologies, Inc. |  If I am only for myself, who am I?" -Hillel
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.advocacy
From: mmelling @Trirex.com(Michael Mellinger)
Subject: Re: RightBrain ad in Fall '92 NeXTWORLD
Organization: Trirex Systems Inc.
Date: Thu, 30 Jul 1992 00:24:07 GMT

In article <1992Jul27.151922.10001@fnbc.com> lemson@fnbc.com (David  
Lemson) writes:
> In article <1992Jul24.222227.533@Trirex.COM> mmelling  
@Trirex.com(Michael  
> Mellinger) writes:
> > They might be better off spending the money on a two page add in a  
> > magazine like Publish. Everyone in the NeXT community will know about  
> > PasteUp.  It's the people in the non-NeXT community that need to be  
> > informed.
> > 
> Nah, I wouldn't make that assumption.  I know of plenty of people with  
> NeXTs who don't have any source to read usenet and their sole source of  
> information is the NeXT Support Bulletin and NeXTWorld magazine.  (scary  
> thought, eh?)

NeXTWorld Magazine did a preview of PasteUp in their latest issue.  Like I  
said before, everyone in the NeXT community will know what PasteUp is  
before it is even released.  Mac and PC publishing magazines would be a  
better place for RightBrain to spend their money.  But hey, it's only  
money.  Glenn's probably got plenty of it. :-)

-Mike
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.advocacy
From: samurai@uriel.cs.mcgill.ca (Darcy Brockbank)
Subject: Re: Objective C for other environments (long)
Organization: SOCS, McGill University, Montreal, Canada
Date: Thu, 30 Jul 1992 16:40:56 GMT

In article <1992Jul28.200335.409@glocke.hotb.sub.org> frank@glocke.hotb.sub.org  
(Frank Thomas) writes:
> About your problem with sending messages the object doesn't know:
> You are right, there's no guarantee that there is no such day in the future 
> where this could happen. But I never felt that this is a real problem for me.

I didn't catch the start of this thread, but won't 

[myObject respondsto:@selector(<asciiStringHere>)]

take care of checking to see if the object responds to the selector?

- db

Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.advocacy
From: nathan@laplace.biology.yale.edu (Nathan F. Janette)
Subject: Re: Cube Owners -- Are we shut out from RISC Upgrades?
Reply-To: nathan@laplace.biology.yale.edu
Organization: Yale University, Department of Computer Science, New Haven, CT
Date: Wed, 22 Jul 1992 19:14:25 GMT

In article <1992Jul22.181550.9200@cs.ucla.edu> esky@marathon.cs.ucla.edu  
(Eskandar Ensafi) writes:
> Hi,
> 
> Things are getting confusing now.

Things have always been confusing ;-)

Everything we talk about is just a rumor, both the "good"
news and "bad" news about NeXTcubes, risc machines, etc.

Until NeXT speaks up, it really doesn't matter what we say.

If it makes you feel better, let your local sales rep know
how important a risc upgrade path for the cube is to you.
The measure of how important, BTW, is in real $$$.

--
Nathan Janette		"I'm a NeXTstep man,
Dept MB&B, Yale Univ	 I'm a NeXTcube guy"
New Haven, CT
nathan@laplace.biology.yale.edu (NeXT)

Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.advocacy
From: greg@afs.com (Gregory H. Anderson)
Subject: Publicity in Unix Review
Reply-To: greg@afs.com
Date: Thu, 30 Jul 1992 15:15:31 GMT

More evidence that NeXT is out generating PR: The September issue of Unix  
Review has a "Tested Mettle" on the NeXTstation Turbo Color. They got most  
of the hardware stuff right, but completely glossed over NeXTSTEP. Of  
course, the author was just a *little* biased towards X: "with the X11  
[eXodus] package, the NeXT can be used like any other UNIX workstation in  
our environment, which is our definition of 'easy to use.'" He also threw  
out the unfounded assertion that "the NeXTstep environment... is difficult  
to learn to program." 

We always thought 'NeXT' stood for 'Nobody enjoys X-Windows Tedium'...

Even with the mistakes and oversights, it's a review. It's publicity. It's  
invaluable. I'm getting tired of hearing "Oh yeah, NeXT, are they still  
around? Haven't heard anything about them lately." Most people remember  
that you GOT reviewed, not all of the hosed-up content. Keep it up!

--
Gregory H. Anderson          | "We're very tolerant around here,
Benevolent Dictator-for-Life |  being only amateurs ourselves."
Anderson Financial Systems   | - Tortoise (Godel, Escher, Bach)
greg@afs.com  (Nextmail OK)  | 
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.advocacy