Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!lll-winken!lll-tis!helios.ee.lbl.gov!pasteur!ucbvax!decwrl!labrea!rutgers!mtunx!whuts!whutt!mls From: mls@whutt.UUCP (SIEMON) Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac.programmer Subject: Re: Technotes in FullWrite??? Summary: yeah, but ... Message-ID: <3273@whutt.UUCP> Date: 3 Jun 88 16:13:38 GMT References: <13005@shemp.CS.UCLA.EDU> <10493@agate.BERKELEY.EDU> <568@natinst.UUCP> Organization: AT&T Bell Laboratories Lines: 30 In article <568@natinst.UUCP>, brian@natinst.UUCP (Brian H. Powell) writes: > In article <10493@agate.BERKELEY.EDU>, jmm@thoth4.berkeley.edu writes: > > Why even put out tech notes in MacWrite, much less FullWrite? > Because, as they say, a picture is worth a thousand words... One problem is that MacWrite is no longer an integral part of a Macintosh; we have, in effect, Apple touting for Claris. I am in full agreement with the need for diagrams in tech notes, but I observe that e.g. my copy of WriteNow has some difficulties importing some illustrated MacWrite files. No format converter is going to be perfect (consider putting the new color PICT2 files into a document -- whatever may be true of NEW versions of some word processors, old ones won't handle them.) The cost of tech notes now has a hidden cost for at least one purchase of a (possibly expensive) word processor -- and may require multiple purchases if the format used by Apple changes over time. (Has this been the case? is the format frozen???) This posting is not mere complaint: I (a new Mac owner) am in fact about to plunge for the set of tech notes from APDA, and I DON'T KNOW whether I can read the disk versions! As I said, I have the current version of WriteNow; I don't want to buy MacWrite (old or new) or WordPerfect or FWP or any other while the editor wars are as heated as they now are. Any advice? Oh yeah; one other point. I have Turbo Pascal as my toy introduction to Mac programming and am planning to get MPW 3/C++ when they arrive. Does that seem sensible to anyone? -- Michael L. Siemon contracted to AT&T Bell Laboratories ihnp4!mhuxu!mls standard disclaimer