Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!clyde.concordia.ca!uunet!mcsun!unido!fauern!fauern!csbrod
From: csbrod@medusa.informatik.uni-erlangen.de (Claus Brod )
Newsgroups: comp.sys.atari.st
Subject: Re: poolfix3, poolfix4; naming conventions.
Message-ID: <2709@medusa.informatik.uni-erlangen.de>
Date: 7 May 90 16:32:43 GMT
References: <1579@lzsc.ATT.COM> <1990May4.152329.24790@pcsbst.pcs.com>
Organization: CSD, University of Erlangen, W-Germany
Lines: 85


Dear Mr Pratt,

since I don't have regular access to Usenet, this letter might be somewhat
late. People have told me about your reactions towards my version of POOLFIX,
and I would like to add some comments.

You're right, naming my POOLFIX version "POOLFIX4" was foolish. I've
changed that quite a while ago; unfortunately, Chris posted POOLFIX4
before I renamed it to POOLF_CB (just a suggestion, I've not settled
yet about the final naming). So if this is your only problem with it -
it's been solved. Sorry.

I always thought ATARI had an interest to spread TOS bug fixes as widely
and as fast as possible. Everyone owns FOLDRxxx, for example, and ATARI
doesn't moan about it - though not everyone has bought an original
ATARI hard disk. I didn't want to infringe any copyrights, as you
supposed, I have always stated very clearly in the POOLF_CB readme file
that this program was originally written by you, that I didn't claim
any rights on it, and that I only improved it a bit.

You also felt unhappy about me possibly being a malicious hacker spreading
dangerous code under the hood of an original ATARI program's name. POOLF_CB
and POOLFIX4 are no Trojan horses, and I've invested much time and effort
to verify that it works properly. I've sent POOLF_CB to ATARI Germany
hoping that it might find it's way to you. I didn't wait for your
approval, true, and I regret this, but I had my reasons: People found
out that POOLFIX3 (your version) didn't work when my hard disk driver
was running, and soon there were rumours that my driver was faulty. This,
however, isn't true, but it started to damage my reputation among European
users. I didn't like that, so I sat down to find out more about it,
disassembled POOLFIX3, found out why things went wrong, and patched it.
Some friends needed this version badly, and so I gave it to them, and I
even allowed Chris overhastedly to spread it via Usenet because I felt
strong demand for it.

Another point: You were in doubt whether it's worthwhile to optimize
the POOLFIX code in order to obtain a smaller program. Well, I think
it is. (This isn't much of a surprise for you, I know.) True, it will
save you just a few bytes, but if ATARI had done a little-bitzy-eenie-
weenie bit of optimization in their ROM code it would have been possible
to include GDOS into the TOS ROMs. (When the ST appeared here, ATARI
officials always said that GDOS was published separately because it
didn't fit into the ROMs.) Think of all the trouble this would have
saved us: Thousands of proprietary printer drivers and hundreds of
GDOS incompatible programs. It also would have improved the reputation
of ATARI's implementation of GEM. If you don't believe me you can
squeeze GDOS into the 192 KB ROMs, ask our German hackers for a version
of their improved TOSses. (Besides: I recently did a bit of optimization
on the current German GDOS version, AMCGDOS, and it lost some 2 KB in
size out of nearly 8 KB. Don't worry, I won't spread it, I'm just
using it for my own ST - only the author of AMCGDOS received a copy.)
Some of those hackers mentioned above saved so much code that it became
possible to include a new Macish DESKTOP, new window features, a complete
hard disk driver, and, last but not least, GDOS. Needless to say that
they also squeezed TOS 1.6 into 192 KB ROMs. Don't panic, since ATARI
doesn't seem to want outside improvements for TOS, they won't spread
it. Some of them, however, have written long and detailled letters to
ATARI about ways of optimizing TOS, and apparently there has been no
reaction. (The bug patched by POOLFIX, for example, has been known
here since the 8-8-88 beta version of TOS 1.4, and it has been
reported to ATARI before the end of the beta test phase.)

POOLFIX will find it's way into thousands of AUTO folders, so it will
cost most of us some of our precious RAM. Yes, I think it's worthwhile
investing some effort in it.

I will stop optimizing POOLFIX and copying it to my friends who beg for
it if you want me to. But then, I'd like to ask YOU for an official
POOLFIX4 version from you that doesn't collide with my hard disk
driver and numerous AUTO folder programs any more, so that I can
stop wasting time telling readers twice a day that my driver is OK,
and that the problem lies in POOLFIX3, and they should use POOLF_CB
if they can get it anywhere, but no, I won't copy it because ATARI
doesn't want me to, or they should delete POOLFIX3 from their AUTO
folder or use another hard disk driver. Please!

I strongly hope we will come to a good compromise that satisfies the
needs of all ST users. Apart from that, I really appreciate that you
follow this discussion and comment on selected items. It has been
a great help for us here in Germany. Keep it up!

Sincerely,

	Claus "all-time optimizer" Brod