Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!wuarchive!udel!arnold
From: arnold@freezer.it.udel.edu (frederick arnold)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next
Subject: Alternatives to the Window System from Planet X
Message-ID: <34207@nigel.ee.udel.edu>
Date: 22 Oct 90 15:54:26 GMT
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Organization: University of Delaware -- ACIT Sun Lab
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Not to clutter up the NeXT group with posts concerning its technical
and moral antithesis, X11, however there are two good options to
replace that hulking obscenity.

1) Ideal (to the next community) follow the lead of IBM and port
   NeXTstep.

2) Follow Silicon Graphics lead with the use of the Sony NeWS system.
On the iris in our lab this allows a windowing environment that is
responsive, easy to program, and extremely customizable. (it better
be, as it's running something very similar to postscript(so say the
manuals), and can use postscript fonts (so say I, having done it.))

Finally, a glowing ember to the X11R? supporters out there.  X is very
much an example of what Petr Beckman in his book, "A History of Pi",
refers to when he says that what distinguishes the engineering of a
healthy society from the Engineering of a Pathological society (in his
example ancient Rome and Stalinist Sov Union), is that the engineering
of healthy societies gets better, while that of the gangster states
becomes bigger and more grandiose.  Yes, X will do the job, but it's a
performance hog, it bogs down networks, is difficult to program in,
and all around a Nasty Thing, a prime product of an unholy alliance
between the DoD and MIT.  It's time to realize that just because it's
popular, doesn't mean it's worth while; it just had better marketing.
It's time the producers of better solutions banded together, enforced
their own standards, and did away with that monstrosity.

In my personal opinion, option 1 above is the ideal path, and I look
forward to the day we have it running on the RS/6000 in the office.

(now if I can only convince my advisor to buy a cube, and not another
Mac)

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* Wenn die wirkliche Brandstifter                      Frederick P. Arnold, Jr*
* w\"aren, du meinst, die h\"atten                     Dept of Chemistry,     *
* keine Streichh\"olzer?                               University of Delaware *
*      -Gottlieb Biedermann                                                   *
*      Biedermann und die Brandstifter              ARNOLD@FREEZER.IT.UDEL.EDU*
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