Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!ames!bionet!apple!chuq
From: chuq@Apple.COM (Chuq Von Rospach)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac
Subject: Re^4: Red Ryder 11.0
Message-ID: <32960@apple.Apple.COM>
Date: 7 Jul 89 21:07:04 GMT
References: <32956@apple.Apple.COM> <788@bridge2.ESD.3Com.COM>
Organization: Life is just a Fantasy novel played for keeps
Lines: 59

>Well Chuq, what can I say, not sure what hype you received, and not sure
>what expectations you expected it to live up to. Somehow a jump from $40
>shareware to $80 commercial does not seem like a major increase in price
>to me, perhaps it is to you.

When someone takes a program and doubles the price, I expect something for
the money. RR 9.4 and RR 10.3 are not significantly different products
functionally. Before RR went commercial, new features and new releases were
fairly common, Scott was responsive and things got done. It went commercial,
three releases were sent out almost simultaneously and then silence
(actually, not just silence: I remember the arguments on GENie about the
excessive download problems with INITs that went from "you're crazy" to
"well, I tested it and maybe you're right" -- but which still aren't fixed).

Scott doubled the price of the product and one of the main features of RR --
the support Scott gave his customers -- went away. This is an improvement?

You say Scripting is a pain, in comparison
>to what?

Not in comparison to anything. It's just amazingly nasty to write decent
scripts. A good part of this is the complete lack of any non-trivial
examples and unreadable documentation.

>You think the documentation can be improved.

The document is unimproved from 9.4 to 10.3. It was unreadable (and
electronic) as shareware. It's unreadable (and printed) in hardcopy. I've
spent a number of hours looking for things that should have been easy to
find in that silly thing.

>I have yet to find a manual that did not have room for improvement.

Agreed. But there's a big difference between a manual that can get better
and a manual that needs improvement to be useful.

>but you will still spend
>a lot more for your next choice of terminal if you go the commercial 
>route, and you are complaining about an increase of $40??? 

Yup. I'll spend more on the next program, but it'll be something with
reasonable support and a useful manual, neither of which I currently have.
My *real* complaint is not that the cost of RR increased $40, but for that
extra $40 I'm getting less than I did when it was shareware.

>Oh well, what can I say, the bottom line is always up to you.

True. But this came out because you made some really snide comments about
Word 3 and Word 4 -- that were not only inappropriate, but in my eyes were
commenting about things that Freesoft is just as guilty of, if not more so.
Glass houses and all that, Norm.


Chuq Von Rospach      =|=     Editor,OtherRealms     =|=     Member SFWA/ASFA
         chuq@apple.com   =|=  CI$: 73317,635  =|=  AppleLink: CHUQ
      [This is myself speaking. No company can control my thoughts.]

You are false data. Therefore I shall ignore you.