Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!swrinde!ucsd!ucbvax!hplabs!hpfcso!hpfcmgw!chan
From: chan@hpfcmgw.HP.COM (Chan Benson)
Newsgroups: comp.windows.news
Subject: Re: Docs for tNt, & what is Sun doing?
Message-ID: <1200005@hpfcmgw.HP.COM>
Date: 5 Mar 90 20:54:21 GMT
References: <9002280125.AA17726@brillig.UMD.EDU>
Organization: HP Fort Collins, CO
Lines: 20

> It seems that when two nearly equivalent products appear, one
> of them can take over because of random market forces.  So VHS beat out Beta
> video.  The point is that one product can win even if it is technically
> superior because it got the grab on the market first.  Well NeWS is technically
> superior, but Sun is being so stupid that they are letting the window slip
> by---if it's not to late already!

VHS beat out Beta because the licensing was more liberal. X is ahead of
NeWS for the same reason. When anyone can get source for only a media
charge, a software system will get a lot of exposure.

> I think that NeWS is superior for a simple reason: it is based on PostScript.

Oh barf. I do not wish to program a windowing application in PostScript.
I think that NeWS has some definite advantages, but the PS language is not 
one of them (this is not to say that some of the characteristics of PS
are not advantages in NeWS). If they had used Lisp as the base language
I would be much more interested in NeWS.

			-- Chan