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- From: paulr@fulcrum.oz.au (Paul Rosham)
- Newsgroups: comp.sys.sun.hardware
- Subject: Re: Sun's GUI and OS mistakes (was Re: LX and SUNOS 4.x)
- Message-ID: <1992Dec21.005114.457@fulcrum.oz.au>
- Date: 21 Dec 92 00:51:14 GMT
- References: <1992Dec10.141925.4177@epas.toronto.edu> <1992Dec10.213305.18495@news.dfrf.nasa.gov> <BEAULIEU.92Dec16084643@piranha.bose.com> <1992Dec16.185356.17158@midway.uchicago.edu>
- Organization: The Fulcrum Consulting Group
- Lines: 79
-
- [I can't resist...]
- epc1@quads.uchicago.edu (Merlin) writes:
-
- >beaulieu@bose.com (Larry Beaulieu) writes (about OPEN LOOK):
- >>
- >> Oh, you mean 'BrokenLook'.
-
- >I wholeheartedly agree with this. I mean, what is Sun's problem? No one
- >I know uses OpenLook or wants to.
-
- Your prerogative to agree. Sun's problem is marketing its strategy to its'
- customers so that they can understand them. How many people do you know,
- anyway? A significant proportion of Sun's customer base?
-
- >The last several surveys I've seen
- >showed that Motif on Suns are more popular than OpenLook on Suns.
-
- I have seen these, as well. Doesn't matter how much you look at these figures
- they neither add up or make any sense. If this fact is applicable in the US,
- what a bout the rest of the world, huh?
-
- >We use Motif.
-
- That's your business. Sorry to be cynical :-). Many people think it is fugly.
- Many people can't be bothered to go and buy it.
-
- >Our lives would be so much easier if Sun got rid of olwn
- >and supported mwm.
-
- Mine wouldn't. I use olvwm. You have a choice in which window manager you
- use. I'm glad that you are free to make your choice.
-
- >At least Sun supports X11. They have some nice
- >utilities such as Tooltalk but all in all, Sun's attempts to lead
- >the open systems marketplace has really been a failure.
-
- How so. Can you name another vendor that has actually started an Open Systems
- marketplace? Anyone else that comes up with products like ToolTalk and NFS
- and enables other vendors to ship compatible software. Think carefully.
-
- >SunOS 4.1.3 has nothing wrong with it.
-
- Respectfully, crap.
-
- >Sun's implementation of DNS nonstandard file locations are irritating
- >but I'm willing to live with them.
-
- That's nice. Does this make a difference?
-
- >However, having all of their customers switch to System V Unix is ridiculous.
- >BSD Unix is popular and well supported. Why would they want all of their
- >customers to switch overnight? I support change and technological innovation.
- >However, going to AT&T Unix is not change for innovation as far as I can
- >tell.
-
- BSD Unix is well supported? By who? Popular? How so?
- The PC market is dominated by System V vendors. Workstations are dominated by
- Sun (SunOS != BSD), and larger systems are very System V'ish. Does anyone
- ship a nice BSD/System V merge that they don't have to merge every time? No.
- Thats the point of the whole Solaris 2 effort. It's a _merge_.
-
- >Sun's strategy has really made me consider not buying any more Suns. On
- >the other hand, I really like Dec's support of OSF/1. Maybe I'll
- >only buy Alphas until Sun develops some real leadership and understanding
- >of the marketplace.
-
- Which marketplace? The real world, or your fictional one? The real world, more
- often than not, buys product from vendors that *sell* it to them. The real
- world usually respect a company that says clearly what it is doing, and then
- does it.
-
- How do you measure leadership? I think it is by comparing sales performance and
- growth year to year.
-
- Are you going to have Ultrix, OSF/1 or OpenVMS with your Alpha?
-
- -PaulR.
- [The above is not a personal flame, but I still wish people would stop
- parading their personal preferences as reality for everyone.]
-