From: sjb5@ns1.cc.lehigh.edu (STACY JOHN BEHRENS)
Newsgroups: comp.os.os2.advocacy
Subject: Re: Silence on the Windoz Front...
Date: 29 Sep 92 22:33:26 GMT
Organization: Lehigh University

In article <1992Sep29.000020.29492@fcom.cc.utah.edu>, brian@jaguar.cs.utah.edu (
Brian Sturgill) writes:
>In <BvAv6s.4oB@acsu.buffalo.edu> v053qpgh@ubvmsd.cc.buffalo.edu (Eric W Sarjean
t) writes:
>>
>>Has anyone been keeping up with the OS/2 and the MS Windows newsgroup
>>fronts? As of late, I have noticed a considerable decline in the comp.
>>windows.ms group. Typically only around 10-15 messages appear daily,
>>whereas the os2 forums are constantly bustling with nearly 100 messages
>>each per day.
>
>This got me curious... I keep an longish term archive of all the
>windows and OS/2 groups... so I went and did some checking.
>
>Messages per day (I expire my archive at different rates per group).
>
>comp.os.ms-windows.advocacy            601/60          =       10.01
>comp.os.ms-windows.announce            57/150          =        0.38
>comp.os.ms-windows.apps                        3126/150        =       20.84
>comp.os.ms-windows.misc                        968/30          =       32.26
>comp.os.ms-windows.programmer.misc     648/150         =        4.32
>comp.os.ms-windows.programmer.tools    1017/150        =        6.78
>comp.os.ms-windows.programmer.win32    1171/150        =        7.80
>comp.os.ms-windows.setup               1423/150        =        9.48
>Total for Windows:                                     =       91.87
>
>comp.os.os2                            835/150         =        5.56
>comp.os.os2.advocacy                   4244/120        =       35.36
>comp.os.os2.apps                       4438/150        =       29.58
>comp.os.os2.misc                       3125/30         =      104.16
>comp.os.os2.networking                 1470/150        =        9.80
>comp.os.os2.programmer                 3132/150        =       20.88
>Total for OS/2:                                                =      205.34
>
>Conclusion... OS/2 users must have 22 times *** the number of problems that
>Windows users do.  (Think about it... ignoring advocacy postings, most
>postings are requests for information about how to solve a problem... or
>how you figured out how to solve a problem.)

Bull.  Talk about jumping to illogical conclusions.  Did it ever occur to you
that most OS/2 users are genuinely excited about their product?  Look at the
numbers for advocacy.  People don't generally ask questions there.  I rarely
see Windows users get anywhere near as enthusiastic about Windows as OS/2
users do about OS/2.

>There are about (optimistically) 1 million OS/2 users, and about
>(optimistically) 11 million Windows users.
>Another possibility is that Microsoft support is better than IBM's, but
>a tremendous number of OS/2 people assure me that my own personal experiences
>with the two are incorrect and that IBM support is MUCH better than
>Microsoft's.

Another BS conclusion with nothing to back it up.
>
>***Yeah, I know... the population distribution of the net will skew things
>towards OS/2 (i.e. probably a greater percentage of OS/2 users have net
>access than Windows users).  Also I notice that pretty well every OS/2
>group has "advocacy" postings -- OS/2 users are more defensive?  Still
>it does appear that a significantly larger per user problem count
>exists for OS/2.

No, windows users are more offensive.  (get it?)  OS/2 is a much larger more
powerful new system.  Of course there are going to be questions about it.
Anytime there is added functionality, there are going to be more questions.  I
fully expect that when the NT groups get going that they will have even more
tech related questions..
>
>The one that shocked me the most was the volume in the OS/2 apps group...
>I mean, what would they discuss?  A quick scan of the group reveals that most
>of the traffic is OS/2 installation questions and can I find an app to do
>X questions.  Also a lot of Windows/DOS app -- how do I get it to run stuff.
>How do I do backups is also quite popular.

Installation is OS/2's biggest problem.  No suprise there.  I might ask how
Windows groups are so different?  They basically ask, how do I get Y app to do
X and nothing else.  (aside from blasting OS/2)
>
>Brian
>--
>C. Brian Sturgill                I strongly encourage you to read Ross Perot's
>University of Utah                             United We Stand
>Center for Software Science             How we can take back our country.
>brian@cs.utah.edu; CIS: 70363,1373  (It's more important than OS/2 vs NT! :-))
>

Stacy John Behrens
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