Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!uunet!crdgw1!crdos1!davidsen
From: davidsen@crdos1.crd.ge.COM (Wm E Davidsen Jr)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.xenix
Subject: Re: Xenix Executables
Keywords: 8086, not 80386
Message-ID: <1990@crdos1.crd.ge.COM>
Date: 9 Jan 90 17:21:40 GMT
References: <165@raider.MFEE.TN.US> <857@jetsun.WEITEK.COM>
Reply-To: davidsen@crdos1.crd.ge.com (bill davidsen)
Organization: GE Corp R&D Center, Schenectady NY
Lines: 30

In article <857@jetsun.WEITEK.COM> brothers@jetsun.WEITEK.COM (bill brothers) writes:
| In article <165@raider.MFEE.TN.US> root@raider.MFEE.TN.US (Bob Reineri) writes:
| >  [  ...  ]
| >Could someone tell me, why on earth would SCO not simply recompile these things
| >to take advantage of the 80386 ? SCO ?? I almost can't believe my eyes. This is
| >quality control ? 
| >
| 
| It is pretty simple: If it works, don't fix it. There are many utilities
| that will never need more data space, etc.  

  They do the same thing with troff, too. They charge you for the "386
version" of troff, and then deliver an 8086 version which has not been
updated to make it run with ksh. I reported the ksh problem four bloody
years ago and sent them the diffs to fix it!

  Now they offer to sell me Elan, which they say *is* compiled for 386.
However, not only do they charge more than Elan for the same product,
but if you want man pages which come with their (8086) troff package,
you can buy the whole troff all over again for $400. The man pages don't
seem to be available as a separate product.

  Interestingly enough the troff with (another vendor's) UNIX, which
*is* a 386 executable, runs about 50% faster. Some vendors care about
their troff/nroff users, I guess.
-- 
bill davidsen	(davidsen@crdos1.crd.GE.COM -or- uunet!crdgw1!crdos1!davidsen)
"The world is filled with fools. They blindly follow their so-called
'reason' in the face of the church and common sense. Any fool can see
that the world is flat!" - anon