Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!usc!brutus.cs.uiuc.edu!apple!mattd From: mattd@Apple.COM (Matt Deatherage) Newsgroups: comp.sys.apple Subject: Re: P8/GSOS Switching Message-ID: <37417@apple.Apple.COM> Date: 20 Dec 89 00:53:12 GMT References: <1967210@mtsg.ubc.ca> Organization: Apple Computer Inc, Cupertino, CA Lines: 51 In article <1967210@mtsg.ubc.ca> Les_Ferch.@MTSG.UBC.CA writes: > >It's not very good PR to tell us that using ATINIT with ProDOS 8 on >a GS is not supported and that we "have to boot into GS/OS", when it >certainly does work (at least on a ROM 01 GS). Well, consider the alternative quote: "Oh, sure , that works fine! Try running some really intensive network software over it! " I assume you'd rather hear the truth than something more convenient. If this is a bad assumption for network posting, someone please correct me. > On a GS that only >has one 3.5" drive or even just a 5.25" drive and 256K or 512K >memory, this is the *only* practical way to print from classic >AppleWorks (or any other ProDOS 8 program) to an appletalk connected >LaserWriter. Why Apple refuses to support or reccommend a solution >to people that works fine I don't know. Perhaps it's just another >way to make uninformed users buy more hardware than they really >need. The irony is, that I learned of this technique from somebody >at Apple! It "works fine" because you haven't run across a program it doesn't work for. If it works fine for you, then use it. If you try running another network application that dies a horrible death, don't say you weren't warned. Apple doesn't support it because the programming documentation lists a set of more robust AppleTalk calls and vectors that are available on the IIgs under AppleTalk - if you run IIe network software on the IIgs, the software could (and will, in many cases) identify the machine as a IIgs and try to use networking features which should be there but aren't, because you didn't boot GS/OS and let them get loaded. The minimum requirements for networking an Apple II are ProDOS 16 v1.6 and 256K memory (although this is now unsupported, it still works. "Unsupported" means "we're not worried about bugs in it") or 768K of memory and System Software 5.0.2. We don't make these requirements because we like people not using our System Software's capabilities. We make them because trying to jam it into less memory creates unacceptable performance or capability limitations. There are several stock watchers in this news group who will happily inform you that Apple doesn't do it because they own a memory factory. :) -- ============================================================================ Matt Deatherage, Apple Computer, Inc. | "The opinions represented here are Developer Technical Support, Apple II | not necessarily those of Apple Group. Personal mail only, please. | Computer, Inc. Remember that." ============================================================================