Path: utzoo!attcan!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!cs.utexas.edu!uunet!murtoa.cs.mu.oz.au!munnari.oz.au!mimir!hugin!augean!sirius!eco!nt!levels!marwk
From: marwk@levels.sait.edu.au
Newsgroups: comp.databases
Subject: Re: dBASE IV - is this for real?
Message-ID: <661@levels.sait.edu.au>
Date: 30 Jun 89 15:14:37 GMT
References: <9383@xanth.cs.odu.edu>
Followup-To: comp.databases
Organization: Sth Australian Inst of Technology
Lines: 69

In article <9383@xanth.cs.odu.edu>, aiko@cs.odu.edu (John K Hayes) writes:
> This is to anyone at Ashton-Tate who may be listening.  I cannot believe they
> went ahead and put out something so bad as dBASE IV.  I am embarrassed for
> initiating it's purchase at my workplace.  It takes about 20 seconds just
> to load up enough to start listening - and most of this time is spent painting
> some ridiculous moving logo graphic and an extremely long and annoying
> license agreement (and this is on a 12 MHz machine).
> 
> Everything it does seems to take about twice as long as dBASE III.  It's all
> very pretty - the BROWSE screens are a whole lot more pleasing to the eye as
> long as you don't mind waiting a year to shift columns around or just to sift
> through the data.  Ashton-tate seems to have sacrificed efficiency and speed
> for pretty screens with nice colors.
> 
> They've also added a "feature" which forces any programs you try to run with
> dBASE IV to be "compiled" into dBASE IV object files before they are run.  Then
> when they run they are just as slow as when they were interpreted line-by-line.
> This is because they do not get linked (although there is some sort of LINK
> command which really does not link - I guess all it does is allow you to 
> distribute slow programs that cannot be edited - big help there; what to they
> think I use Clipper for?  and Clipper is fast).  So, with this "upgrade" you
> now have to wait for a program to compile before it is run and then it runs
> just as slowly as if it were not compiled.  AND...if you make any changes to
> the programs - you have to delete the old object file before running it or it
> just runs the old object file.  
> 
> I hope Ashton-Tate gives out free upgrades to dBASE IV to those of us who
> were stupid enough to pay piles of money for a near worthless copy of v 1.0
> (one of our operators has deleted her copy and replaced it with her old
> dBASE III).
> 
> -- 
>     ---{john hayes}  Old Dominion University; Norfolk, Virginia USA
>                      internet: aiko@cs.odu.edu
>                      Home: (804) 622-8348     Work: (804) 460-2241 ext 134  
> 
>                       <++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++>
> Are you a Have or a Have_Not?  Because if you're a Have_Not, you've probably
> had it; whereas, if you're a Have, you've probably got it and are going to 
> give it away at some point in the future!       --- The Clash
>                       <++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++>

I can hardly believe that people are still buying Ashton-Tate products,
especially dBASE products:  These have more bugs and cause more problems than
any other product I have ever used.  I have hundreds of examples but here is
one:

dBASE III+ was used last year by 2nd year computing studies students for their
group project.  Many students came to me saying they counld not understand the
errors they were getting.  I ran the programs myself and discovered that the
ELSE clause is sometimes bypassed in an IF statement when the if condition
fails.  

I did not find a pattern as to when this effect would occur, so I suggested
that the students use a DO CASE statement instead, for all instances of IF
statements.

This makes the product dBASE III+ UNRELIABLE and it is my opinion that it
should not be used.

Furthermore, having spoken to both Ashton and Tate some years ago while I
was developing a moderately large system, I am very dissatisfied with their
attitude. 

I recommend to all my students (and anyone else who mentions a dBASE product)
to steer well clear of their products.  There are plenty of better products on
the market.

Ray Kennington