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From: kent@xanth.UUCP (Kent Paul Dolan)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga
Subject: Re: Question about Manx C updates
Message-ID: <2195@xanth.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 20-Aug-87 12:59:07 EDT
Article-I.D.: xanth.2195
Posted: Thu Aug 20 12:59:07 1987
Date-Received: Sat, 22-Aug-87 12:12:39 EDT
References: <8708191652.AA06573@THYME.LCS.MIT.EDU>
Reply-To: kent@xanth.UUCP (Kent Paul Dolan)
Organization: Old Dominion University, Norfolk Va.
Lines: 43
Keywords: Huge maintenance headache, big cash sink
Summary: Don't maintain parallel copies of software

In article <8708191652.AA06573@THYME.LCS.MIT.EDU> atheybey@ptt.lcs.mit.edu
writes:
>
>I just called Manx about getting an update for my relatively ancient
>(February 86) 3.20a version of their C compiler.  I was told that
>there are two types of update that I can get.  I can send them two
>disks and get a free "standard update," which consists of "bug fixes
>and 1.2 AmigaDOS support."  (These are more-or-less correct quotes.)
>Otherwise, I can pay $50 for the "enhanced update" which apparently is
>3.4a complete with the utilities make, diff, grep, vi, etc.

>[... This] seems to imply that I will just be getting a fixed 3.2
>compiler, rather than 3.4.

(I hope somebody from Manx is listening.)  [No personal axe to grind here,
I wouldn't use a C compiler if you gave it to me.  ;-)]

Back in 1981 I worked for a company that let itself be sucked into the
trap of maintaining multiple parallel versions of the same software.
It was a raging disaster.  Not only do you have more than double the
maintenance costs (because no one is actively developing the old
version, no one is day to day familiar with it, and it takes a lot
longer to fix mistakes), but also you end up with folks getting
confused about what works where, and adding bugs to the new software
based on how they just saw the old one work, and vice versa.  You add
lots of extra costs for storage, and for keeping track of what version
goes where, and ... you get the idea.

That $50 Manx thinks it is making with this deal is an illusion.
Worse yet, it is a subtle one, and the money will evaporate without
anyone at Manx being the wiser about why it never showed up on the
bottom line.  It will be just another example of: "Maintenance costs
are eating us alive", without the added "Aha!" of: "and it's our own
fault."  Giving away the latest version to buyers of the old version
builds great customer relations, and extracts you from what is
otherwise a real quagmire.  You make up for the lossage on passing out
the fruits of your labor free to the old customers by the gobs of free
word of mouth advertising they give you in return, and the resulting
increased sales to their friends and relations.

A word to the wise is supposed to suffice.

Kent, the man from xanth.