Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!clyde!att!osu-cis!killer!woodsb
From: woodsb@killer.UUCP (Brent L. Woods)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga
Subject: Re: comp.binaries.amiga (was Re: Picture swap)
Message-ID: <4546@killer.UUCP>
Date: 22 Jun 88 09:10:03 GMT
References: <8806161902.AA16559@cory.Berkeley.EDU> <417@jc3b21.UUCP> <2827@umd5.umd.edu>
Reply-To: woodsb@killer.UUCP (Brent L. Woods)
Organization: Artificial Realities, Inc.
Lines: 39

In article <2827@umd5.umd.edu> louie@trantor.umd.edu (Louis A. Mamakos) writes:
 >The binaries group is worthless to me.  I don't run (non-commercial) programs
 >distributed in binary-only form.  Who knows what lurks in there.

     Who knows?  Well, we (the moderators) try to.  We test everything
we get.  You betcha we have virus checkers (thy name is legion...)
running full blast...

 >All of the Amiga owners that I know have a C compiler.  Maybe I have weird
 >friends.  

     Maybe you do...  Just the opposite for me (as I've said before, I
know).  Also, C is not the only language that is currently popular on
the Amiga.  How about Modula2?  Or Pascal?  Or FORTH?  Or even (shudder)
DRACO?  Lots of people don't have those languages (me, for instance).

 >But wait..  If you were given a choice of having comp.sources.amiga OR
 >comp.binaries.amiga but not both, which would *you* choose?  Which is more
 >educational?  Which is ultimately more useful to you?  I know I'd pick 
 >the sources group, no questions.  I can't learn anything from binary-only
 >postings, and I can't fix bugs in binary-only distributions.

     No contest.  Definitely comp.binaries.amiga (yeah, one of the
moderators said *binaries*).  I keep the sources postings around, sure,
but just to have them in case I want to compile a new binary.  I never
look at them (keep them compressed, in fact).  If I want to *learn*
something, I'll buy a (another) book.  I don't want to learn from the
postings, I want to run the programs.


--
     Brent Woods, Co-Moderator, comp.{sources,binaries}.amiga

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