Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!usc!rutgers!gatech!mcnc!ecsgate!ecsvax!jfreem From: jfreem@uncecs.edu (Joe Freeman) Newsgroups: comp.sys.next Subject: Re: Dissatisfaction with NeXT the company Message-ID: <1991Jan21.134352.1524@uncecs.edu> Date: 21 Jan 91 13:43:52 GMT References: <1991Jan19.200318.10586@macc.wisc.edu> <1991Jan20.214014.18419@uncecs.edu> <1991Jan21.053328.26979@mp.cs.niu.edu> Distribution: na Organization: UNC Educational Computing Service Lines: 49 > In November I bought one of B'land's clearance sale machines. It >arrived with a 1.0a disk and *some* of the documentation. One missing >manual refered to by other documentation was called "System Reference >Manual." I called the 800 number and was told that I could no longer >get a copy of it, that I would have to shell out the $195 for release >2.0, and that if I really wanted that sort of documentation--and why >wouldn't I if I'm a systems programmer, not a Lotus eater? ;-| --, I'd >have to shell out a further $125 for the rest of the documentation. (I like the Lotus eater comment) The manual you are missing, "System Reference Manual" is part of the programming docs. It is the manual that has all of the subroutine calls in the kit. Average users will find very little of value in it. (kind of like the unix brick section 3) For those that don't know. The additional documentation is the programmers documentation. It is the equivalent to "inside macintosh" for you former mac folks. It is NOT of much use to those people that are not trying to program the system. For those programming the system, NeXT provides docs online. The printed docs are $195? and consists of a 3 volume set. We probably could have sold it in seperate volumes, like our competitors, and hit the user up for each one. Every vendor, I can think of, sells the toolkit reference manuals seperately. (Those that know of machines otherwise can EMAIL me) The mac does. Workstations are sold with optional extended manuals. PCs come with user docs, window docs and GW basic docs. Now if the issue is that 2.0 user docs (included with the upgrade/system) are inadequate, then you need to feed that back through your campus support centers. Registered developers have their own email channel they can feed the comments back through. ... >>> Why not send 2.0 Extened s/w OD to those who order 2.0 upgrade. >> We are doing that. It took longer than we would have liked. > Well? Why *has* it taken so long? (looking around to see if anyone here is looking over my shoulder) Disk avail is the problem. (yes I have read the section below and I can't explain it) ... ... -- Joe Freeman jfreem@uncecs.edu jfreeman@next.com I work for NeXT but this is not an official posting from them. The opinions espressed here are my own and are not shared by my employer or