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- Hi folks,
-
- We finally got 1.99j (1.99i was not made available to the general
- public) out. As far as I know, it's much better in all ways but one
- than anything else that we've put out so far. The one exception is
- that the DOS version currently will not allow you to run code that
- uses SANE (i.e. floating point system calls) on a PC without an FPU.
- The file "emu387" is still there, but with the new DOS extender
- technology we're using, it's not being used. This will change by the
- time 2.0 comes out.
-
- In addition to 1.99j being more stable, we have added the serial
- number, authorization code that I mentioned before. The user
- interface is a bit rough, but we really needed to get 1.99j out there
- ASAP, since 1.99h was in many ways the worst experimental version
- we've released to date.
-
- So far, we haven't handed out any serial numbers or authorization
- keys. We'll begin doing that tomorrow (Tuesday), when we'll e-mail
- information to every Executor/DOS user who put down an e-mail address
- on his/her registration card and sent that to us. At the same time,
- we'll be sending serial number/key pairs to all our paid
- Executor/Linux customers -- there was no registration card to fill
- out; we have your e-mail addresses.
-
- After we do the e-mail mass mailing, we'll do a U.S. mail mailing to
- everyone who sent in a registration card but who did not provide us
- with an electronic mail address. If you purchased Executor/DOS, but
- did not yet send in your registration card, please do so now.
-
- New orders will automatically be sent with serial numbers and
- authorization keys.
-
- I realize that it's a bit ackward to be assigning these numbers after
- so many of you have already purchased the product, but in the long
- run, such numbers and codes will make it easier for everyone. Please
- don't phone us about these numbers until Thursday, at the earliest.
- We had to redo some of our customer database and we still have a
- little work to do on that end.
-
- NEXTSTEP users: within an experimental release or two, we'll start
- building Executor/NEXTSTEP experimental versions again. In some ways
- you've been lucky to be spared the ups and downs of 1.99c,d,e,...,h.
- That's the good news. The bad news is we've had very little response
- from NeXT in our request to have them give us the documentation needed
- to make our color version fast. We're hoping that after they see a
- new version that does everything the other ports do, but isn't as fast
- as it can be that they'll give us the time of day.
-
- We believe that 1.99j is fairly stable. As such, 1.99k won't be out
- until we have integrated our new file browser and fixed the filesystem
- bugs that remain that show up in the file browser. After that, we'll
- add System 7 spoofing, and as always, we're doing tons of bug fixing
- as we add features.
-
- We're sufficiently happy with the 1.99j release that we're putting the
- Linux version on sunsite and the DOS version on SimTel. It will be a
- little while before they appear there.
-
- ftp.ardi.com and www.ardi.com will be on-line soon, but they will
- initially be (until we get Executor sales ramped up) fairly slow and
- we may have to limit access to mirror sites.
-
- --Cliff
- ctm@ardi.com
-
-