Path: utzoo!utgpu!watserv1!watmath!att!rutgers!mit-eddie!uw-beaver!sumax!polari!6sceng!blm
From: blm@6sceng.UUCP (Brian Matthews)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac.apps
Subject: Re: Hilarious Disinfectant 2.0
Message-ID: <456@6sceng.UUCP>
Date: 16 Jul 90 18:55:07 GMT
References: <oab=bvC00WB88TN0NP@andrew.cmu.edu> <452@6sceng.UUCP> <14039@wpi.wpi.edu>
Organization: Six Sigma CASE, Inc.
Lines: 65

Well, as expected, there was a lot of reaction to my comments that I'd
rather not have the fancy About box in Disinfectant 2.0, and have the
20K of disk space instead.

First, a couple of general comments:

1.  I think all of the versions of Disinfectant have been great, particularly
    2.0.  I use the application and I use the INIT.  John (and all of those
    involved in Disinfectant) have done a great service to the Mac community
    by providing Disinfectant.

2.  On the other hand, no program, no matter how wonderful or how great
    the author is, is immune from constructive criticism.  I simply saw
    an area where I thought Disinfectant could be a little better, and I
    posted my opinion.

Now some specific responses to various articles:

In article <14039@wpi.wpi.edu> macman@wpi.wpi.edu (Chris Silverberg) writes:
|Perhaps about five years ago, 20K could buy you alot. It just ain't worth
|it now. Sure, i'm concerned about saving a megabyte here or there... but
|20K? Pleeze......

I just took a quick look at my hard disk, and I have about 150 applications.
If only a third of those spend 20K on about boxes, that's 1Meg.  20K alone
may not be much, but it adds up quickly.

Also, Disinfectant is in a slightly different class than other applications,
because one of its uses is on a "virus eradicator" floppy.  On floppies,
20K becomes very significant.

And as a general note, it's comments like "but 20K? Pleeze......" that
result in the huge applications we see from Microsoft and others, and the
huge systems we see from Apple.

In article <1990Jul16.032446.15840@swbatl.sbc.com> george@swbatl.sbc.com 
(George D. Nincehelser) writes:
|Yeesh!  I don't like the direction this is going.  John wrote a 
|wonderful and useful program and is giving it away free for the
|benefit off all, yet some folks are bitching about a measly 20K  
|of disk space!

First, I wasn't "bitching", I was offering constructive criticism.  Some
people don't seem to know the difference.  Second, as I stated above,
Disinfectant *is* wonderful and useful and free, but that doesn't make
it immune from criticism.  And third, you may consider 20K of disk space
"measly", others may not.

And finally, from John himself:
|Just because my program is free doesn't mean it's beyond criticism.  The 
|large size of version 2.0 is one of its drawbacks, and the person who 
|complained had a valid point.

Thank you.  John seems to be one of the few people who knows what the
phrase "constructive criticism" means.


In summary, I feel the 20K spent on a function used once could be better
spent elsewhere.  Others feel differently.  But I also feel that
Disinfectant is amazingly useful, and the disadvantage of the extra
20K is far outweighed by the usefulness of the application as a whole,
so I'm certainly not going to toss Disinfectant because of the About
box.  That's my opinion, and in the end, it's up to John to decide.
-- 
Brian L. Matthews	blm@6sceng.UUCP