Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!purdue!decwrl!ucbvax!bloom-beacon!usc!elroy!hacgate!ashtate!dbase!awd From: awd@dbase.UUCP (Alastair Dallas) Newsgroups: comp.databases Subject: Re: dBase IV Bug(s)? Summary: dBASE IV is not all bad Message-ID: <60@dbase.UUCP> Date: 25 Apr 89 15:51:27 GMT References: <1762@muvms1.bitnet> <45@mdi386.UUCP> Organization: Ashton Tate Devlopment Center Glendale, Calif. Lines: 51 In article <45@mdi386.UUCP>, bruce@mdi386.UUCP (Bruce A. McIntyre) writes: > In article <54@dbase.UUCP>, awd@dbase.UUCP (Alastair Dallas) writes: > dBASE was invented, and first advertised, NOT as a database for users, but > as an Application Development Language for database applications. Wrong. dBASE was invented to be used interactively, not as a programming language. It was based on in-house JPL software which was itself based on TymShare software for data retrieval called Retrieve. > I know these are rambling thoughts, but I get irrational every time I hear > that dBASE IV is such a great improved product. Ashton-Tate has abandoned > those people, the developers, that made their product so popular, since > they "don't need those people any more". I'm sorry you get irrational. Like it or not, dBASE IV offers a laundry list of significant improvements over dBASE III PLUS. Read the reviews--even when we get hosed (as multi-user dBASE IV was in InfoWorld recently), they all mention the increased power and flexibility. Several of the people I work with (and I) were among the programmers who created dBASE III--our commitment to our developers is as strong as it ever was. Developers made dBASE, and many of the improvements in IV (like the SCAN command, the LOOKUP() function, the compiler) are primarily for working applications developers. > Back when they introduced dBASEIII, > I had a discussion with George Tate at the New York introduction, and we > talked about how dBASE was developed and was running on Vaxen with C under > UNIX. But that there would never be enough of a market there to release it > as such. George, however, was smart enough I beleive, that in today's market > he would have changed his mind. There are still problems (distribution, support) with making dBASE available on minicomputers. We've graduated from a Vax to a Pyramid with some Sun workstations, but a Unix version is still in the future. If you have a well thought-out business plan for making as much money in that market as we do in the PC market, come on down and make some big bucks in Torrance. > (He also, I believe, would have never called > that abortion they shipped for the MAC, a version of dBASE). > bruce I think we can all agree here. dBASE Mac is not an abortion; it's an excellent product, actually, but it's not dBASE. The people responsible for that naming decision (with the exception of Ed Esber) have all moved on to greener pastures. /alastair/