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From: dillon@CORY.BERKELEY.EDU (Matt Dillon)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga,comp.sys.mac
Subject: Re: Mac vs. Amiga
Message-ID: <8701231020.AA18287@cory.Berkeley.EDU>
Date: Fri, 23-Jan-87 05:20:47 EST
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Posted: Fri Jan 23 05:20:47 1987
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To Everybody in General
To Mr Chuck Fisher Specifically

	The excerp that CF posted originally (which started this war) is
essentially correct.  One of your added comments (below), however, is
completely incorrect and has already been brained to death in previous
wars between these two newsgroups:

>Flame on: Although Amiga touts its multi-tasking capability,
>how many programs are written to take advantge of it?  I would
>agree that "background printing" is desireable, but a Mac can
>do that as well as an Amiga.  Most of the work that I do on the
>Mac are interactive in nature, and don't lend themselves that
>well to true multitasking.  Switcher and Servant provide most
>of the capabilities needed to integrate foreground tasks in my
>opinion.

	You obviously don't understand the concept of multitasking. 
To-wit, the idea is that you can run several completely unassociated programs
at the same time without any of them knowing or caring that the others are
also running.  There doesn't have to be any 'software' that 'takes advantage
of multitasking', the multitasking allows the user to fully use the
machine and however much memory it has in any way he chooses.  For instance
(and I take a standard example), I frequently use my terminal program while 
compiling large sources.

	There seems to be the misconception that multitasking
presumes a slowdown in throughput.  Certainly running two compiles 
simultaniously from RAM disk would cause each compile to run half as fast,
but consider more common occurances:  Taking the former example one 
notes that the terminal program takes almost no CPU (it's continuously 
waiting for keystrokes or chars from the modem), and thus both tasks run
at essentially full speed. The same goes for most other programs one might
be using... the USER is still a single tasking entity with limited interrupt
capability.  The USER knows exactly what is running when, and why, because
he has full control over all the programs he runs. 

	But you should remember that what this user views as a sequential
singularity usually requires multitasking on the computer in question:
"Ho Hum reading my mail with my terminal program. Let's see, I want to
do a compile. OK, start the compile, go back to my terminal program..."

	Switcher and Servant attest to the fact that most MAC people
understand what multitasking is and want it on their machines.  I can but
agree with them.

					-Matt