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From: knrgroup@garnet.berkeley.edu (Raymond group)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac.misc
Subject: Re: Not another NeXT defector???!!!
Message-ID: <1990Nov8.064222.20009@agate.berkeley.edu>
Date: 8 Nov 90 06:42:22 GMT
References: <1990Nov7.223221.14989@agate.berkeley.edu> <1990Nov7.230807.17914@agate.berkeley.edu> <911@casbah.acns.nwu.edu>
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jln@casbah.acns.nwu.edu (John Norstad) write:
>The NeXT users I know...do almost all of their housekeeping from terminal
>windows...Maybe our NU NeXT users are just ignorant, I don't know.

Actually, the reverse is probably true.  Your NU users are too sophisticated.
Academic users generally do know Unix and prefer to do things the old Unix-y
way (not all academic users mind you, but many of them).  My point is that
the user has the option of doing it either way, and the novice user can use
his system without working from the Unix shell.  All NeXT would have to do
to make their computer behave like a Mac is to disable the shell and prevent
more than one user account from being on a machine.  Now you would have a
fancy Mac and could ignore Unix altogether for most things.

>I wonder about the 50-75% figure (for software-development time savings on 
 the NeXT)

It's true.  I'm responsible for a large commercial product on the NeXT and 
I would say that I saved at least 50% in development time.  Moreover, our
company also does custom software for large businesses, and we can do their
software in 1/3 or 1/2 the time.  We may all be super-geniuses, but we're
not THAT smart :-).  

Where does this time savings come from?  Not only do you save on interface
time, you also save on program design and debugging time.  Objective-C 
enforces an OOP structure on your code and is ideal for quick design and
development of software in graphical, event-driven environments.  
Objective-C is also as easy or easier to debug than C because it nicely
compartmentalizes your code.   

>The other topic on this thread has been the issue of Mac vs. NeXT for 
>non-hackers.  I have to laugh at this one--99% of the people I know
>and work with who use Macs without much help from anybody wuld be
>hopelessly lost trying to use a NeXT or any other Unix workstation

Are you comparing single-user-account Macs with multi-user/networked NeXTs?
Yes, you need Unix if you're administrating a network of NeXTs.  Otherwise,
how is using a Mac and a NeXT that much different?  Ten minutes after
sitting down in front of my first NeXT, I could use a NeXT to the extent
that I could use my Mac.  I never even took a look at Unix that first time
around.  I had used Macs for several years before this and am a dyed-in-the-
wool mouse and GUI man.  I don't even use key equivalents for cut and paste.
However, I had no problem learning the NeXT way of things very quickly.  

Young-Kyu Yoo 

Please address all e-mail to yoo@well.sf.ca.us   
kngroup@garnet.berkeley.edu is a friend's class account and I don't want
to flood their mailbox with my mail.  Thanks.