Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!clyde!att!osu-cis!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!mailrus!ulowell!page
From: page@swan.ulowell.edu (Bob Page)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga
Subject: Re: Amiga public impressions
Keywords: new machine old user
Message-ID: <9757@swan.ulowell.edu>
Date: 21 Oct 88 18:56:11 GMT
References: <12626@eecae.UUCP>
Reply-To: page@swan.ulowell.edu (Bob Page)
Distribution: na
Organization: University of Lowell, Computer Science Dept.
Lines: 55

conklin@eecae.UUCP (Terry Conklin) wrote a pretty level article.
A couple comments:

>For me, the Amiga is a virtual Ensonic Mirage.

There's a product (software) that turns your Amiga into a Mirage
player.  Just stick your Mirage disk into the Amiga and you can play
them.  You can do a *little* editing, but that's not what the package
is about.  It can also save the samples in IFF format.

>Workbench itself is - hmm - unprofessional. Sorry!

Fortunately, Workbench is simply an application program, and will be
removed from the ROM in version 1.4 of the OS, so they can squeeze
more goodies in.  Workbench will go to disk, and will probably be
rewritten to such a large degree that you'll barely notice it.
Commodore isn't blind, deaf or stupid - they see what PD and
commercial software people are using.  Although I haven't spoken to
anyone at CBM about a new Workbench, I'll eat my mouse if they don't
have a way to see ALL files from workbench (not just .info files),
some kind of browser capability, and much more user control over what
workbench looks like.

Even if for some reason I have to eat my mouse, I'm sure there will be
loads of Workbench replacement programs available, both commercially
and in the public domain.  But I don't think they will be necessary,
because CBM has a good idea of what people want in a new Workbench.

>The existence of CATS makes a real difference, on the street, to people just

Amen.

>The machine is NOT a total "Click-and-point" system,

I think the focus of that comment is against Workbench.  I agree with it,
but wanted to point out that CBM has said over and over that one of their
priorities for 1.4 was to overhaul workbench.

I'll let everybody read this, it's easy to miss:

>This message, being almost totally negative, is largely unrepresentative of
>our experience with the machine.

Lastly, agreed on the 'need to have a cheap network (presumably
through the MIDI port)'.  I think CBM knows that too, but doesn't know
what to do about it.  Remember, CBM is not a software company - I
think they'd rather see something like SLIP or DNET take off without
any work on CBM's behalf.

These are just conjectures, mind you.

..Bob
-- 
Bob Page, U of Lowell CS Dept.  page@swan.ulowell.edu  ulowell!page
Have five nice days.