Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!ames!hc!lanl!cmcl2!esquire!sbb
From: sbb@esquire.UUCP (Stephen B. Baumgarten)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next
Subject: Re: source code
Keywords: don't do it, it's a trap...
Message-ID: <1022@esquire.UUCP>
Date: 15 Feb 89 17:30:07 GMT
References: <490@nanovx.UUCP> <89474@sun.uucp> <1234@dukeac.UUCP> <445@garcon.cso.uiuc.edu> <925@mailrus.cc.umich.edu>
Reply-To: sbb@esquire.UUCP (Stephen B. Baumgarten)
Organization: DP&W, New York, NY
Lines: 46

In article <925@mailrus.cc.umich.edu> shane@chablis.cc.umich.edu (Shane Looker) writes:
>In article <445@garcon.cso.uiuc.edu> dorner@pequod.cso.uiuc.edu (Steve Dorner) writes:
>>>could buy so much user-friendly software for Macintosh ...
>>
>>Snicker.  UNIX has changed a LOT less in the last five years than the
>>macintosh operating system.  Every system release breaks some developer's
>>code.  They change the ROMS.  They add HFS.  They add color.  They add
>>multiprocessing.  All these things radically change the environment; Apple
>>sometimes patches to work around specific applications, but eventually
>>things have to be rewritten.  The macintosh, no source included, is a
>>developer's nightmare.
>>
>>The ``gentleman at NeXT'' is feeding us a lot of digested grasses, to
>>use a polite term.
>>Steve Dorner, U of Illinois Computing Services Office
>
>Actually, I could say the same thing about you.  If you follow the rules of
>how to program the Macintosh, then your application is very likely to run
>when a new release of the system comes out.
>
>You might not understand that, comming from a Unix background, but it is what
>happens in the Mac world.  If applications break, you can be pretty sure they
>were written taking shortcuts which were pointed out as not being stable in
>the future.
>
>(I found a demo windowing program written in 1984, which ran correctly under
>MultiFinder on a Mac II with color.)

Yes, in general correctly written programs will work even when Apple
upgrades its System software.  Just because Microsoft's stuff breaks
all the time is no reason to blame Apple; Inside Mac and the tech notes
are quite explicit about what is and isn't approved behavior for an
application.

Of course, no application written in 1985 is going to be able to take
advantage of 16.7 million colors on a Mac II, but if it was written
correctly it should at least run under both the Finder and Multifinder,
it should be able to work on any size monitor (or on multiple
monitors), and it should still be able to run on any current Apple
Macintosh.

-- 
   Steve Baumgarten             | "New York... when civilization falls apart,
   Davis Polk & Wardwell        |  remember, we were way ahead of you."
   cmcl2!esquire!sbb            | 
   esquire!sbb@cmcl2.nyu.edu    |                           - David Letterman