Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!samsung!uunet!motcid!sorber
From: sorber@motcid.UUCP (Russell C. Sorber)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga
Subject: Re: SAS/C Compiler Version 5.10 for AmigaDOS Upgrade
Keywords: In response to my previous posting, and further replies.
Message-ID: <4506@feldspar19.UUCP>
Date: 28 Aug 90 17:03:50 GMT
References: <13385@mentor.cc.purdue.edu>
Organization: Motorola Inc., Cellular Infrastructure Div., Arlington Heights, IL
Lines: 49

hutsonda@mentor.cc.purdue.edu (Dwayne Hutson) writes:

>  The point was not that I spent $200 on Lattice and I got a bad deal, the
>point is that they said they would honor an agreement and it was sort of, well
>lost in the shuffle. 

It seems that Lattice and SAS provided you with a near state of the
art product at a reasonable price, which seems to me to be nothing
to complain about.  The 1 900 number on the other hand ...

>Besides SAS was according to the letter the original
>writer of Lattice C, so they did play a role before. 

SAS did play a role before, but this statement is not really
true.  Lattice was the original writer of the compiler for the Amiga
In fact, Lattice was involved in the development of SAS C 
for the mainframe, not the other way around. Engineers at SAS and the
Software Distillery were involved in the
the Amiga C project since the appearance of BLINK, however and probably
should have followed the already established numbering scheme.

>I really don't think
>my posting had anything to do with a purchase your father made of a $300
>program.  But, thanks again, for the info.

It has a lot to do with it! Lattice was not making a go of it financially,
and this is directly related to how much money they receive from you and
me, the customer.  

Most software, expecially on other platforms
costs a lot more money and most upgrades are more expensive, if they are
offered at all! It is the same work to develop a product for the Amiga
as it is for another platform. A C compiler is about two man years of
work in development, plus development for a state of the art debugger, 
plus manual, diskette and advertising costs, plus supporting the product
after the (usually) one time only sale.  

Many users (especially, I'm sad to say, Amiga users) expect the software
free of charge, or for not much more than the price of a diskette. 
Perhaps the marketing person that you talked to would still be employed
at Lattice if the Amiga market had allowed them
to charge  more money for the product to begin with! 

If you want a state of the art product you should be willing to pay for it.

----------------------------------
Russ Sorber (former Lattice Employee)
now a software contrator at Motorola, Inc.
Opinions are my own.