Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!usc!apple!altos!altos86!ti
From: ti@altos86.Altos.COM (Ti Kan)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.i386
Subject: Re: Altos 5000
Message-ID: <3864@altos86.Altos.COM>
Date: 27 Aug 90 21:07:12 GMT
References: <3854@altos86.Altos.COM> <1990Aug25.014213.17353@fiver>
Reply-To: ti@altos86.UUCP (Ti Kan)
Organization: Altos Computer Systems, San Jose, CA
Lines: 64

In article <1990Aug25.014213.17353@fiver> palowoda@fiver (Bob Palowoda) writes:
>From article <3854@altos86.Altos.COM>, by ti@altos86.Altos.COM (Ti Kan):
>>>ti@altos86.Altos.COM (Ti Kan) responds to a flame-ette from Foulk about the
>how Altos fined tune there hardware software that makes it more reliable
>than ISC's or SCO's UNIX (includeing the third party vendors).    
>

Without delving into technical details (and possibly divulging proprietary
information), all I can say is that being in a team of software engineers
working closely with the source code, I cannot imagine how we could
have developed our UNIX kernel, device drivers, and utilities to the
degree of reliability and performance -- given the
time and resources available -- if we didn't have a specific list of
target hardware configuration.  Granted that SCO and Interactive may
have a larger UNIX software development group than we do, but the sheer
number and variety of PC-class hardware on the market that they support
means that they cannot spare as much development effort into all these
nitty gritty optimizations that we could do.  In many cases, we as
software engineers can have a say in our hardware design specifications,
so that the software/hardware integration can be more efficiently
implemented.  You may not find this significant, but in reality it is
an incredible value to be able to simply walk to a different part of
the building and talk to the guy that designed a particular expansion
board, which you are implementing a device driver for.  Moreover, our
Software Test and QA team work closely with the engineering team, on
our own target hardware, to ensure that everything in various combinations,
hardware and software, will work reliably together.  To a VAR and a
customer who would rather spend their time selling/using a system rather
than debugging it, this is also extremely important.

>> The fact that SCO UNIX-compatible device drivers and application
>> can drop-in shrink wrapped, and other PC-class expansion boards
>> can plug-n-play in an Altos 5000 is simply bonus that you don't
>> get with proprietary hardware/software vendors like Sun, Pyramid,
>> DEC, etc.
>
> But if they don't pass your strict QA standards what good are they?

We obviously can't QA every piece of third party software and
hardware packages in house, but we have provided a reliable platform
on which not only all basic (and some not-so-basic) functionality have
been tested and proven to work, but with fine-tuned performance as an
added value.

>> Again, the original point of the discussion was the question why
>> one would choose a box like the Altos 5000 with standard EISA bus
>> and 486 CPU, but with special expansion I/O cards and special UNIX
>> release, over a generic PC with SCO or Interactive UNIX.  I think
>> I have made my argument pretty clear.
>
> And your ego!

I would rather not comment on this, but Tom Yager's follow-up
article on this topic eloquently reinforces my point.  I am not
being ego-centric, I am simply an engineer who is proud of his work
and the quality of his company's product.  Is there anything wrong
with that?

-Ti
-- 
Ti Kan                                                                  \\\
vorsprung durch technik!                                                 \\\
Internet: ti@altos.com                                                /// \\\
UUCP: ...!{sun|sco|pyramid|amdahl|uunet}!altos!ti                    ////////\