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From: jnh@ecemwl.ncsu.edu (Joseph N. Hall)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac.programmer
Subject: Re: MPW target market
Message-ID: <4194@ncsuvx.ncsu.edu>
Date: 15 Oct 89 23:56:33 GMT
References: <4743@internal.Apple.COM> <16153@dartvax.Dartmouth.EDU>
Sender: news@ncsuvx.ncsu.edu
Reply-To: jnh@ecemwl.UUCP (Joseph N. Hall)
Organization: North Carolina State University
Lines: 49

In article <16153@dartvax.Dartmouth.EDU> erics@eleazar.dartmouth.edu (Eric Schlegel) writes:
>In article <4743@internal.Apple.COM> chewy@apple.com (Paul Snively) writes:
>>In article <16124@dartvax.Dartmouth.EDU> erics@eleazar.dartmouth.edu (Eric 
>>Schlegel) writes:
>>> THERE DO EXIST some people (such as me) who
>>> are lowly college students, who run MPW 3.0 on a Mac Plus...
>>
>>You have my DEEPEST sympathy!  How much memory is on your Plus??  If it's 
>>one megabyte, how do you COMPILE anything???
>
>My Plus has 2.5 meg in it - I'm looking forward to upgrading it 4 sometime
>soon, hopefully by Christmas. Small compiles actually aren't that bad, maybe
>30 seconds to a minute. Running MacApp 2.0b9 is pretty ridiculous, though.
>MABuild itself takes something like 30 secs - a minute to generate the build
>script. To wait 3 or 4 minutes for the compiler to find a simple syntax error
>is somewhat annoying.
>
Well, I consider it quite a good performance when my VAXstation II/GPX
compiles at as much as 3000 lines/minute.  Typically it is 1/2-2/3 that fast.
The linker is not what I would call speedy, either.  MPW on my wife's Plus
seems about as fast (somewhat faster with #pragma load/dumps); on the IIcx
it zips along quite nicely.  I think THINK C is pretty much I/O bound by
the time it gets to one of the faster platforms; there is not all that much
difference between the speed on a Plus and a IIcx, especially when you use
a really large pre-compiled header (I normally include all of the normal
class headers in addition to the standard Mac headers) -- might be a factor
of 2 or something, but not the percentage speedup evidenced by MPW as it
goes to a faster machine.

>Nonetheless, I do put up with it - it's the only system that has the power
>I want. Not fun, and I wish very much that it was faster - but I live with it.
>
Well, my experience with 30-minute builds of <50,000 line programs on my
VAXstation has imbued me with a considerable sense of patience.  I would
kill (well, almost) to compile on my VAXstation at the same speed I compile
on a Mac Plus with THINK C.  MPW?  Ehh -- it's slower, but I think it's
tolerable.

>Informal poll idea: I'd be interested in hearing from people on the net who
>use MPW. How many of you _are_ using in on Pluses/SEs? How many on II-class
>machines?

I use both; what I'd like to know is why the execution of shell commands is
SO much slower on a Plus or SE than on a II-something.

v   v sssss|| joseph hall                      || 4116 Brewster Drive
 v v s   s || jnh@ecemwl.ncsu.edu (Internet)   || Raleigh, NC  27606
  v   sss  || SP Software/CAD Tool Developer, Mac Hacker and Keyboardist
-----------|| Disclaimer: NCSU may not share my views, but is welcome to.