Xref: utzoo comp.lang.c++:2351 comp.sys.ibm.pc:22824
Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!tektronix!tekcrl!tekgvs!toma
From: toma@tekgvs.GVS.TEK.COM (Tom Almy)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.c++,comp.sys.ibm.pc
Subject: Re: Zortech C++ compatibility with existing graphics libraries
Message-ID: <4457@tekgvs.GVS.TEK.COM>
Date: 5 Jan 89 15:50:13 GMT
References: <211@imspw6.UUCP> <39008@clyde.ATT.COM>
Reply-To: toma@tekgvs.GVS.TEK.COM (Tom Almy)
Organization: Tektronix, Inc., Beaverton,  OR.
Lines: 32

In article <39008@clyde.ATT.COM> feg@clyde.ATT.COM (Forrest Gehrke) writes:
>> From Ted Holden, HT enterprises:
>> I don't know what your definitions of primitive/serious are, but the Zortech
>> compiler strikes me as awfully serious and as a soon-to-be major player in
>> the DOS programming world and, hopefully, in the 386/486 desktop UNIX world
>> which is around the corner.
>
>I ordered an update to C++ from Zortech in October which was promised
>for late November.  This update was supposed to be compatible with
>MS Codeview.  Anybody else seen this yet?  I have received nada.

Well, when my copy of C++ came, the BUNCH.EXE program, which is supposed
to make it posible to use Codeview (except for local variables, of course),
was a *ZERO* length file.  Two phone calls later, they promised to send
out a disk with the program.  A disk arrived with a label which had penned
on it "Bunch.exe", but the disk contained only two mysterious .lib files.
My conclusion is that BUNCH.EXE does not work.

My opinion is that the only way they will become "serious" and a "major
player" is via the steam roller effect C++ is having.  I found about a
dozen bugs, worse than any compiler I have used.  When I called with a
bug report I found that they were distributing *simultaneously* two 
different versions (perhaps they will go with the one that produces the
fewest bug reports?).  One of the compiler's most common error message was
to crash.

The package also shows immaturity in that there are no C++ example programs
on disk, and the only provided class is "stream", which is not documented.

Tom Almy
toma@tekgvs.tek.com
Standard Disclaimers Apply