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From: apratt@atari.UUcp (Allan Pratt)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.atari.st
Subject: Re: The Mega ST's arrive! (and the first problems too :-))
Message-ID: <799@atari.UUcp>
Date: Wed, 29-Jul-87 14:07:23 EDT
Article-I.D.: atari.799
Posted: Wed Jul 29 14:07:23 1987
Date-Received: Sat, 1-Aug-87 02:12:02 EDT
References: <8707271604.AA11579@ucbvax.Berkeley.EDU>
Distribution: world
Organization: Atari Corp., Sunnyvale CA
Lines: 52
Summary: Send us your PD software!


in article <8707271604.AA11579@ucbvax.Berkeley.EDU>, Simon says:
> 
>    Another point to note is that UniTerm will not run on the ST-4 (I
> haven't tried it on a ST-2) with german ROM's [...] (BTW it would be nice 
> if some of the more widely spread PD and Freeware stuff could be tested 
> for problems with new ROM releases). 
> 
>                                    Simon Poole

We tested a *lot* of commercial software, but hardly any PD stuff.  This
is because people don't send us their software.  Leonard says all the
developer newsletters have been pleading for people to send their
programs to the software library here.  The way to get in the pool of
software which might be tested is to send *two* copies of the program
and documentation to our librarian:

	Julie Wade, software librarian
	Atari Corp.
	1196 Borregas Ave.
	Sunnyvale, CA 94086

Once in our library, it *might* be tested -- that's not my decision to
make.  I guess you could expect the top 20 or so PD programs to get a
going-over before the next big ROM release, but not every program. 
(Think about it -- how many *are* there?)

Far and away, the reason most programs won't work with the new ROMs is
that they broke the rules by depending on unpublished addresses in RAM
or ROM.  Since people seem to have fewer compunctions about this when
writing PD stuff, that is the case even more often for that class of
software.  It takes a long time to determine that a program doesn't work
with the new ROMs, then to determine WHY, and if the reason is that they
broke the rules, we don't learn anything.  We do tell the authors about
it, so they can come out with more rule-abiding software, but the
cost/benefit ratio is pretty poor. 

Before sending us your PD software, please try it on a Mega.  If it
doesn't work, please ask yourself if you have used any addresses in low
RAM that aren't published as SYSTEM VARIABLES in Atari's documentation. 
The system BSS is scrambled pretty well by the linker, and there's no
telling where a given unpublished variable ended up. 

(To look at this another way, what if somebody wrote a program which
depended on the order variables in UniTerm -- would he be right to
compain if a new version of UniTerm had its variables in a different
order?)

/----------------------------------------------\
| Opinions expressed above do not necessarily  |  -- Allan Pratt, Atari Corp.
| reflect those of Atari Corp. or anyone else. |     ...lll-lcc!atari!apratt
\----------------------------------------------/	(APRATT on GEnie)