HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: ivory@tower.com (John E. Ivory)
Subject: test ... ignore
Date: Thu, 21 Jan 93 07:59:54 EST
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Testing e-mail posting access to USENET News.  Please ignore.

I'm sending this in through decwrl.dec.com.  If there are any
better routes, could somebody let me know?  Thanks.

							ivory@tower.com
Newsgroups: comp.software-eng,comp.answers,news.answers
From: bhahn@sw.stratus.com (Bill Hahn)
Newsgroups: comp.software-eng
Subject: Re: Delta (Difference) File Generation Algorithm
Date: 21 Jan 1993 19:12:55 GMT
Organization: Stratus Computer, Inc.
Distribution: world
NNTP-Posting-Host: oldno7.sw.stratus.com

In article <899@ulogic.UUCP>, hartman@ulogic.UUCP (Richard M. Hartman) writes:
> RCS likes a difference program called "diff3" that is not (if I remember
> correctly) included in the RCS distribution.  I think diff3 is one of
> the GNU products.  That's the program that generates the differences
>[stuff omitted].

Danger!

There is a diff3 which is part of GNU diff, and there is an older diff3
which can be found on UNIX systems; these programs, while having
similar intent, and the same name, take a different number of
command line arguments -- and can thus cause much confusion.  The
older diff3 expects as arguments some diff files - check out your
local 'merge' script to see if both 'diff' and 'diff3' are run, and
whether diff3 takes 3 or 5 filenames as arguments.

Just thought I'd warn about a potential frustrating time-sink.  "Yes,
*this *diff3 is different than *that* diff3."

-- 
Bill Hahn               bhahn@sw.stratus.com
Stratus Computer        "Meetings are places where minutes are kept
Marlboro, MA, USA        and hours are lost." From V. Weisskopf's memoirs.
--------- These are my opinions and not necessarily those of Stratus.------
Newsgroups: comp.software-eng
From: mr@delfin.com (Mark Rosenberg)
Subject: Where can I ftp ShapeTools from?
Reply-To: mark@delfin.com
Organization: Delfin Systems, Sunnyvale CA
Date: Tue, 26 Jan 1993 21:51:45 GMT

I've tried to pull the ShapeTools source from the sites specified in the FAQ,
but have met with no success. gatekeeper.dec.com no longer appears to have it
and I was not able to create an anonymous ftp connection to
coma.cs.tu-berlin.de. Are there any other sites that I can try? Thanks.
-- 
Mark Rosenberg
internet:mark@delfin.com
phone: (408) 562-1126	fax: (408) 748-1140
snail: Delfin Systems, 3000 Patrick Henry Drive, Santa Clara, CA 95054-1814
Newsgroups: comp.software-eng
From: lobsang@vnaact.dec.com (Lobsang Gyalpo)
Subject: Re: Clean Room
Organization: Digital Equipment Corporation
Date: Fri, 22 Jan 1993 10:17:53 GMT


In article <C17nGz.Aur@world.std.com>, dyurman@world.std.com (Dan Yurman) writes...
>This is a query on references for the subject "clean room."  It has
>been identified to one of our programmers as a statistical method for
>testing software.  We cannot find anything on it in our company's
>technical library.  If people will reply to me directly via email I will
>post a summary for the list.  Thanks.
> 
>Dan Yurman, dyurman@world.std.com 
> 
> 
There is something called Clean room software development. Perhaps the
reference is to this method. There is an article on this in "Software
State of the Art" by Tom de Marco and Tim Lister. Clean room software 
development was practised in IBM (I believe) and mandates that the people
who write the code are not allowed to execute their programs. Only the
test group is alloweed to run the programs and then report the results back to
the programmers. Basically it calls for the complete separation of programming
from testing. Imagine not being able to run your program immediately after
having written it in order to debug it. This enforces people to write correct
code the first time instead of after n code & debug cycles. The name is
analagous to a production system in a factory e.g. manufacturing chips.

--------------------------------------

Lobsang Gyalpo	lobsang@vnaact.dec.com

Systems Development & Engineering
Digital Equipment Corporation
Vienna
Austria

Tel : (222) 60105-5166
X25 : 262210214201::GYALPO
x400: X=AT;A=ADA;P=Digital;O=Digital;OU=VNO
-------------------------------------------
Newsgroups: comp.software-eng
From: stevenw@hpstevenw.mentorg.com (Steve Whitchurch)
Subject: Wanted GUI testing tools info
Originator: stevenw@hpstevenw
Date: Fri, 22 Jan 1993 22:40:39 GMT
Organization: Mentor Graphics 
Keywords: 
Followup-To: 


Hi ....

I'm building a list of GUI testing tools and would like
input from the net. 

 Are you using a GUI testing ?
    If so, what tool ?
 Can you send me your comments about the tool you are using ?

Thanks

Steve

stevenw@pdx.mentorg.com
From: mounil@mathworks.com (Mounil Patel)
Newsgroups: comp.software-eng
Subject: Re: Why is the Software Process NOT working
Date: 26 Jan 93 22:32:48 GMT
     <1993Jan26.093339.9599@nntpd.lkg.dec.com>
     <1993Jan26.104221.2983@lmpsbbs.comm.mot.com>
Organization: The MathWorks, Inc.
X-Useragent: Nuntius v1.1

In article <1993Jan26.185901.12145@Veritas.COM> Joshua Levy,
joshua@Veritas.COM writes:
>If you are a prof, and reading this, I hope you will look at your
>degree requirements, and ask yourself two questions:
> 1. Is my department teaching people how to be graduate students,
>    or engineers?  Remember, most of your studies will become 
>    engineers, not grad students.
> 2. Is it possible to graduate from my department without writing a
>    test suite, modifing existing code, porting code between machines,
>    writing requirements, or undestanding version and release control?
>    These are the things that software engineers spend most of their
>    time doing in the real world.  If you do not teach (or try to teach)
>    these things, your engineering degree is a fraud.

I couldn't agree more. In today's market place, I don't  think we've
found a single undergrad (and few grads) that have had the training in
their degree program to prepare them for "real world" software
engineering tasks. It is a fraud to hand these kids a diploma and tell
them they're ready to work when they haven't been taught anything nedded
to work on today's applications. It's like teaching a journalism major
how to speak english and then telling them they're ready to be reporters.
Its time that colleges began teaching what students have come to learn,
not some arcane program based on what technology was like in the 1950's.
Xref: sparky comp.software-eng:5452 comp.answers:22 news.answers:5472
From: amby <amby@mixcom.mixcom.com>
Subject: Re: Why is the Software Process NOT working
Organization: Milwaukee Internet Xchange BBS, Milwaukee, WI U.S.A.
Distribution: usa
Date: Wed, 27 Jan 1993 12:38:46 GMT

In <1993Jan26.093339.9599@nntpd.lkg.dec.com> lobsang@vnaact.dec.com (Lobsang Gyalpo) writes:

>After all if an organization already has a decent Software Process in place,
>then most probably the newcomer will adjust and grow into it. Here in Austria,
>I have seen many organizations that are at the Initial Level of the CMM. In
>such organizations I observed that the people in power were the ones that rose
>up in the organization heirarchy and that their knowledge of modern Software
>Development technology was absolute zilch. ...

	My experience tells me it is the same here (at least in companies
	that I have worked for).  In these organizations, some of the
	managers have no degrees at all, while the software engineers
	have the necessary training, but are not allowed to apply it.
-- 
Donald E. Amby
    amby@mixcom.com             414-797-6713 (voice)   414-797-6533 (FAX)
    Harnischfeger Engineers, Inc., P.O.Box 1512, Milwaukee, WI 53201-1512
From: guy@mais.hydro.qc.ca (Guy Harel)
Subject: Looking for an X based 'rcs'
Organization: Hydro-Quebec (DSB)
Date: Wed, 27 Jan 1993 18:54:54 GMT


Hello,

We are looking for a good 'Revision and Control System' for our numerous 
C and ORACLE (*.inp) modules, maintained by numerous programmers.

We want a sound Xwindow support, straightforward access to our source,
staightforward and customizable 'make'.

We know about the freeware solutions (rcs, cvs), but would like to 
consider a commercial product (since our needs might increase).

The recentely FAQ file failed to mention some commercial products
we`ve heard about. I would appreciate any comments or recommendations
on them

Thanks a lot.


Not in the FAQ file:


	PVCS 5.0			Intersolv

	ClearCase			Atria Software

	CaseVision 			Silicon Graphics (SUN?)
	(ClearCase)

	Config Mgmt			IBM (AIX line, SUN, HP)
	Version Control

	ClearCase			Atria Software	



In the FAQ file:

	DSEE				Apollo (only)

>	Softool				Softool Corp 

>	Aide-de-Camp			Software Maintenance & Dev Sys, Inc

	CaseWare/CM			CaseWare Inc

	SMS				Intasoft
-- 
llllllllllllllllllll
--
llllllllllllllllllll
Newsgroups: comp.software-eng
From: auro@mri.com (Aurobindo Tripathy)
Subject: Info Request on mkmf - makefile creation utility
Summary: info request  - mkmf
Keywords: mkmf
Organization: Microtec Research Inc., Santa Clara, CA
Date: Fri, 22 Jan 1993 23:34:55 GMT

From where can I obtain more information about mkmf? Is there a public 
domain version  of mkmf.

Any information will be useful

thankyou

-auro@mri.com

Xref: sparky comp.software.licensing:141 comp.software-eng:5393
From: jc@ri.cadre.com (Joe Cascio)
Newsgroups: comp.software.licensing,comp.software-eng
Subject: Usage based licensing?
Date: 21 Jan 93 13:48:34 GMT
Article-I.D.: fripp.1993Jan21.134834.26730
Reply-To: jc@ri.cadre.com
Organization: Cadre Technologies Inc., Providence, RI

Is anyoone out there familiar with any commercial or public domain
licensing products that support usage based licensing?  That is, the
user is charged when the program actually does something, rather than
just being "connected"?

I am interested in this for licensing short-lived, file filter type
programs that have almost no "connect" time.

Thanks,
---
==============================================================
* Joe Cascio                u----wm-
* Cadre Technologies Inc.        /\
* 222 Richmond St.              0_/  "$@@#!$#@$^&"
* Providence, RI 02903 USA       \
* phone: 401-351-5950             |     . .
* FAX  : 401-455-6803            /|   .    .   . .
* email: jc@cadre.com           / | .       . .   . . .
                               ^  ^          .     .   . ....
==============================================================
From: BPHEINTZ@UCSVAX.UCS.UMASS.EDU (BRADLEY P HEINTZ)
Newsgroups: comp.software.licensing
Subject: Shareware
Date: 26 Jan 93 23:53:21 GMT
Organization: B. P. Heintz & Associates
NNTP-Posting-Host: phobos.ucs.umass.edu
X-News-Reader: VMS NEWS 1.24

Does anyone out there have the lowdown on the copyrighting, licensing, and 
general legal intricacies (if any exist) of shareware?

Thanks ahead of time,

- Brad

*=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=*
I'm not into money.  I'm into freedom.

(413)546-5152
bpheintz@phobos.ucs.umass.edu
Newsgroups: comp.software-eng
From: stephen@moclips (Stephen L Nicoud)
Subject: Re: Request Info: Code Analysis Tools
Reply-To: stephen.nicoud@Boeing.Com (Stephen L Nicoud)
Organization: Boeing Computer Services Research and Technology, Bellevue, WA USA
Date: Tue, 26 Jan 1993 02:56:12 GMT


   On Wed, 20 Jan 1993 06:36:05 GMT in a comp.software-eng article, isckelly@nuscc.nus.sg (KELLY CHIANG-THAM) wrote:

   I would appreciate pointers to software tools that perform low
   level program analysis (on any procedural language).  I'm looking
   for something that I can build on for further reverse engineering
   into the domain, so the analysis data (eg. intermediate
   representation) should be accessible.

Consider Software Refinery and the family of program analysis /
understanding tools for Ada, C, FORTRAN, COBOL from Reasoning Systems,
Inc.

    Reasoning Systems Inc
    3260 Hillview Ave
    PALO ALTO   CA  94304
    USA
    Email:  help@reasoning.com
    Phone:  (415) 494-6201
    Fax:    (415) 494-8053

Neither The Boeing Company nor any of its employees, makes any
warranty, whatsoever, implied or express, or assumes any legal
liability or responsibility regarding any information, disclosed, or
represents that its use would not infringe privately owned rights.  No
specific reference constitutes or implies endorsement, recommendation,
or favoring by The Boeing Company.  The views and opinions expressed
herein do not necessarily reflect those of the The Boeing Company, and
shall not be used for advertising or product endorsement purposes.

Stephen
--
Stephen L Nicoud  <stephen.nicoud@Boeing.Com>  bcstec!bcsaic!stephen.nicoud
Boeing Computer Services Research and Technology
Bellevue, Washington  USA
Newsgroups: comp.software-eng
From: davidal@comm.mot.com (UK702 DavidAlexander)
Subject: Re: Why is the Software Process NOT working
Organization: Motorola Land Mobile Products Sector
Date: Tue, 26 Jan 1993 10:42:21 GMT

In article <1k1tasINNan0@andre.d.umn.edu>, kpierce@andre.d.umn.edu (Keith Pierce) writes:
|> I believe that University courses CAN teach students
|> industrial-strength processes, because I've been doing it.
|> 
|> I teach the senior project-based software engineering course at my
|> institution.  A few years ago I began basing the project on maintaining
|> a large software product. And I carried the project across terms,
|> requiring each class to work with the product as it was left by the
|> previous class.

I am quite willing to believe that lecturers that have current experience
of commercial projects are able to teach good software engineering
practice.

What I doubt are that those who have spent their lives in further 
education or whose experience is number of years old. They might be
able to teach theory to pass exams but I doubt they have a sufficiently
robust approach to go further.

TTFN
David

--
The opinions expressed above are mine and not necessarily Motorola's (yet).
===========================================================================
=  @mail : David Alexander, Channel Tunnel Software, Motorola, Lyon Way,  =
=                           Camberley (ZUK20), Surrey GU15 3QG, U.K.      =
= Email : (Internet) davidal@comm.mot.com  Motorola X400-gateway : CDA004 =
= Telephone : (office) +44 (0)276-413340   (home)+44 (0)276-24249         =
===========================================================================
From: svp@po.CWRU.Edu (Scott V. Pasternak)
Newsgroups: comp.software-eng
Subject: Looking for software related to Diabetes...
Date: 27 Jan 1993 04:41:17 GMT
Organization: Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, OH (USA)
Reply-To: svp@po.CWRU.Edu (Scott V. Pasternak)
NNTP-Posting-Host: thor.ins.cwru.edu


I am looking for software that could take entered blood glucose values,
and according to preset limits, suggest modifications (over time or
immediate) in the regimen of care...  It would be even better if it was
made (and I think there is some stuff out for this) to interface with the
RS-232 connection on the OneTouch III Blood Glucose Meter by Lifescan.

If anyone has any suggestions, please reply...

Scott Pasternak
svp@po.cwru.edu
From: sarr@sinshan.citi.umich.edu (Sarr J. Blumson)
Newsgroups: comp.software-eng
Subject: Re: Why is the Software Process NOT working
Date: 28 Jan 1993 16:31:56 GMT
Organization: University of Michigan, CITI
Distribution: usa
NNTP-Posting-Host: sinshan.citi.umich.edu

In article <1993Jan27.230924.3213@tcsi.com> miket@hermes.tcs.com (Michael Turner nmscore Assoc.) writes:
>In article <1993Jan27.170835.7333@ncar.ucar.edu> ethan@earl.scd.ucar.edu (Ethan Alpert) writes:
>>
>>If there is a problem it is the lack of really experienced role models for
>>new employees. SWE is not like any of the other engineering disciplines. 
>>In the software industry individuals with 30 years experience are considered
>>obsolete where in most other engineering disciplines someone with 30 years
>>of experience is a gold mine of usefull pratical relevant information.
>
>I'm trying to think if I've *met* anyone in SWE with 30 years of experience
>(and who was still practicing).  Maybe one, but even then, he really
>started out as a HW engineer.

I met my first computer in 1963.  Now you know two.  I know some
others.  I was also never a hardware engineer.

>Another is that, unlike in many fields, 30 years ago, even the term
>"software engineering" was not well-accepted, so how many people were
>properly called "software engineers" back then?  For a person to be
>considered a goldmine of information, there has to be a value placed
>on gold!

Of course nobody was called a software engineer then.  I would think
that the question is what we did, not what we were called.  What we
did was design, build and test software.  Is that, perchance, what
software engineers do.

>Finally, there is the vicious circle: because of a lack of engineering
>tradition, and the pace of technological change, management has a harder
>time doing its job, leading to early career burnout for SWE.  I don't
>know many SWE's in their forties.  People move on.  Where?  I don't know.
>I'm 37 now, and would like to at least plan for a possible exit. 

This has nothing to do with software, it is true of ALL engineering
disciplines (if not life in general); IBM is dumping all its older
people, not just software people.  The primary reason for this is that
new grads are cheaper.  But underlying this, or at least helping to
managers convince themselves that the short term savings are not a
long term loss, is the claim, advanced by many (usually academics but
not always) engineers, that tools and methodologies can reduce
engineering to a no brain operation that can be done by anyone who has
been toaght to use the tools and methodologies, and so experience has
no value.




(Sarr Blumson)
Newsgroups: comp.software-eng
From: nh@cbnewsg.cb.att.com (nicholas.hounsome)
Subject: Re: Why is the Software Process NOT working
Organization: AT&T
Date: Wed, 27 Jan 1993 08:53:29 GMT

I think that all this discussion about whether universities turn
out suitably trained graduates may well be missing the point.

When graduates start work they almost invariably find that whatever
amount of useful knowledge they do have is ignored because it 
conflicts with existing procedures carved in stone ten years ago.

Forced into compliance with a system they do not believe in they
have no choice but to pretend approval in order to have some hope
of getting promoted to management positions.

When they finaly get there in usualy at least six years time, things
have moved on and in any case they have worn the mask for so long
most have forgotten the ideas and ideals  that they used to have.

Obviously something must filter through but this mechanism gaurantees
that progress will be sloooooow.

More has to be done in the area of on-the-job training. Most companies
send their employees on at least one course a year. If these courses
were of the right kind then maybe things would be better.

Nick Hounsome
Newsgroups: comp.software-eng
From: dalamb@qucis.queensu.ca (David Lamb)
Subject: status of FAQ
Keywords: FAQ
Organization: Computing & Information Science, Queen's University at Kingston
Date: Tue, 26 Jan 1993 17:10:17 GMT

The FAQ postings should now be up-to-date with everything people have sent me
via electronic mail for the last few months.  It is still out of date with
respect to things that have appeared directly posted in comp.software-eng; I
have saved all postings that reached my site, but have not gone through them
to include relevant subsets in the archives.  I hope to make time over the
next few weeks to do more updating.

There is a new 'blurb' subdirectory of the archives with individual files
commenting on specific products.  When companies send me blurbs that are too
long for the FAQ, this is where I'll put them.
-- 
Software Technology Laboratory      dalamb@qucis.queensu.ca (David Alex Lamb)
Computing and Information Science   phone: (613) 545-6067
Queen's University, Kingston, Ontario, Canada K7L 3N6
From: mr@delfin.com (Mark Rosenberg)
Newsgroups: comp.software-eng
Subject: CVS on RS-6000
Date: 25 Jan 93 17:50:54 GMT
Organization: Delfin Systems, Sunnyvale, CA.
X-Newsreader: Tin 1.1 PL4

Anyone using CVS on IBM RS-6000s or similar AIX machines? Any serious
porting problems? 


--
Mark Rosenberg
internet:mark@delfin.com
phone: (408) 562-1126	fax: (408) 748-1140
snail: Delfin Systems, 3000 Patrick Henry Drive, Santa Clara, CA 95054-1814
Newsgroups: comp.software-eng
From: mitu@me.utoronto.ca (Adrian Mitu)
Subject: Re: Configuration management in C++ projects
Originator: mitu@cam.me.utoronto.ca
Organization: University of Toronto
Date: Thu, 28 Jan 1993 02:44:18 GMT

rss@ri.cadre.com (Rich Scire) writes:

>Hi,

>If you are a DSEE site and are happy with it, consider using ClearCase from Atria.
>These are the same people who brought you DSEE and now do it better.
B

Then again, you may be ready to move up to a Configuration Management 
system that gives you more than just a nice source code repository
and build facilities.
Take a look at a product by SQL Software called PCMS or one by IBM
called CMVC. Amplify Control by CaseWare is a close runner-up.

Cheers!
Adrian


-- 
Adrian Mitu
(mitu@me.utoronto.ca)
Newsgroups: comp.software-eng
From: mattb@plato.ds.boeing.com (Matt Baney)
Subject: Re: Why is the Software Process NOT working
Reply-To: mattb@plato.boeing.com (Matt Baney)
Organization: Boeing Defense & Space Group
Date: Thu, 28 Jan 1993 15:54:16 GMT

In article <1993Jan26.115203.89@dallas.sil.org> titus@dallas.sil.org writes:
>In article <1k1tasINNan0@andre.d.umn.edu>, kpierce@andre.d.umn.edu
>  (Keith Pierce) writes:
>> I believe that University courses CAN teach students
>> industrial-strength processes, because I've been doing it.
>
>I can speak from my own experience as a student.
>
>  My own pet peeve is programmers who can't comment their
>way out of an empty loop.  Maybe I was spoiled by starting
>out professionally in assembler, where good source
>documentation is a live-or-die issue.  I also had the (in
>retrospect) good fortune to do a major maintenance job on a
>device driver that had little or no documentation; it took
   I think this is an excellent way for a programmer just out of
college to learn software engineering!!  The problem I see is that
there are too many hackers coming out of college that would have
a fit if they had to tackle a job like that.  There is too much of
the "I just want to write my own code" syndrome, most hacker types
aren't willing to document their own code let alone spend time
learning someone elses code.

I keep thinking back to a college CS instructor I had who 
kept telling us that a well documented program that DIDN'T
work was much better than an undocumented one that did, the
rational being that it would be easy for someone to learn
the documented version and get it working and make changes/
enhancements.  While it would be difficult (if not impossible)
to make any changes or fix any bugs?

FWIW
matt



-- 
|  Matt Baney         | Boeing Defense and Space Division    |
|  -----------------  |   Knowledge Systems Group            |
| "I can't tolerate   | UUCP:        ..!bcstec!plato!mattb   |     
| intolerant people!" | Internet:  mattb@plato.ds.boeing.com |