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From: daveh@cbmvax.cbm.UUCP (Dave Haynie)
Newsgroups: net.micro.mac,net.micro.amiga
Subject: Re: Easy of programming, Mac, Amiga
Message-ID: <741@cbmvax.cbmvax.cbm.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 16-Sep-86 13:30:01 EDT
Article-I.D.: cbmvax.741
Posted: Tue Sep 16 13:30:01 1986
Date-Received: Fri, 19-Sep-86 21:13:37 EDT
References: <1274@jade.BERKELEY.EDU>
Organization: Commodore Technology, West Chester, PA
Lines: 77
Xref: mnetor net.micro.mac:7045 net.micro.amiga:4701

> Xref: cbmvax net.micro.mac:2661 net.micro.amiga:2575
> 
> I am not a great amiga expert, 
Obviously...
>   Resources - The Mac has a what-you-see-is-what-you-get editor called
>   the resource editor that allows you to change menus, fonts, icons, and
>   every detail of alerts and dialogs (requestors on the Amiga) without 
>   ever recompiling.  An amiga programmer must laborously speel out these
>   things in C code that does not look at all like the finished product.
The Amiga has a Font Editor and an Icon editor shipped with it (the Font 
Editor is officially new for release 1.2).  I've got a public domain
Menu editor which lets me define menus, graphically, then produce C code to 
create them.  And a full featured gadget editor is just around the corner
(can you edit MAC gadgets as easily as all the other stuff?).

>   Fast dynamic linking, the Mac's control definition procedures, menu
>   definition procedures, window definition procedures, and packages allow
>   programmers to substantially change the behavior of compiled code
>   without recompiling it ... 
Amiga resident/disk libraries and device handlers do the same thing.  All 
previously compiled programs on the Amiga immediately take advantage of
any modified libraries.  For instance, the various math libraries could
be modified to support the 68881 coprocessor.  Once done, every program
run on the machine that does floating point math will use the 68881 for
its floating point.  Also, no matter how many tasks use it, a library 
exists only once in memory, loaded as needed, discarded if unnecessary.

> The standard amiga linker is so slow it is known as "Deep Thought"
True.  I use BLink, a free, ALink compatible linker that MUCH faster.

>   High level printing - Since mac applications comminucate with printers
>   as if they accepted high level graphics calls, most applications did not
>   need to be recompiled to accept laser printers, even though the
>   applications had not been designed with laser printers in mind.  Amiga
>   applications have to have special code for each kind of printer.
FALSE, LIES, UNTRUE!  For each different style of printer, there is a 
configuration file, run by the printer device, that translates all printer
specific functions into generic Amiga functions.  This is more powerful 
that the MAC's printer interface.  The Amiga can support any printer via
any I/O port in a program transparent fashion.  This includes graphic 
dumps (which may be scaled in various ways) as well as a generic text
interface that the MAC doesn't have.  I can switch from Epson printer to
HP Laserjet or Apple ImageWriter just by selecting the printer option
through the Amiga's Preferences program.  How many type of printers will
the MAC support, anyway (other than Apple, of course).

>   Disk Operating system interface - The mac's operating system takes a Pascal
>   view of the world.  this is not great for a C programmer, but most Mac
>   compilers have a pascal keyword that handles the details.  The system
>   itself is pretty decent.  The Amiga's operating system is written in
>   BCPL [etc.]
The Amiga's disk interface is far faster than the MAC's.  That should say it 
all.  There's very little in the DOS that requires byte boundary access anyway.

> ... Although
> the hardware of the Amiga should be faster than a Macintosh, the superior
> software of the Mac consistantly makes it easier to use, faster, and more
> powerful at the kinds of tasks that I like to do.
Can't comment on ease of use, that's a personal preference, though I like the
option of not having to use a mouse all the time, only when I want to.  With
a few minor exceptions (circle/ellipse drawing, I believe), BYTE found the
Amiga to be consistantly faster than the MAC, in graphics, disk, sound, etc.
I like to do my tasks a few at a time, thank you.

> --- David Phillip Oster		-- "The goal of Computer Science is to
> Arpa: oster@lapis.berkeley.edu  -- build something that will last at
> Uucp: ucbvax!ucblapis!oster     -- least until we've finished building it."
-- 
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Dave Haynie    {caip,ihnp4,allegra,seismo}!cbmvax!daveh

	"I gained nothing at all from Supreme Enlightenment, and
	 for that very reason it is called Supreme Enlightenment."
							-Gotama Buddha

	These opinions are my own, though for a small fee they be yours too.
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