Path: utzoo!utgpu!attcan!uunet!husc6!bloom-beacon!bu-cs!dartvax!eleazar.dartmouth.edu!earleh From: earleh@eleazar.dartmouth.edu (Earle R. Horton) Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac Subject: Re: Microsoft cuts corners, actually Message-ID: <9877@dartvax.Dartmouth.EDU> Date: 20 Aug 88 02:40:25 GMT References: <429@rose3.rosemount.com> <870217@hpcilzb.HP.COM> <9867@dartvax.Dartmouth.EDU> <9872@dartvax.Dartmouth.EDU> <9874@dartvax.Dartmouth.EDU> Sender: news@dartvax.Dartmouth.EDU Reply-To: earleh@eleazar.dartmouth.edu (Earle R. Horton) Organization: Dartmouth-Thayer Radio Astronomy Research Group Lines: 31 In article <9874@dartvax.Dartmouth.EDU> erics@eleazar.dartmouth.edu (Eric Schlegel) writes: >In article <9872@dartvax.Dartmouth.EDU> earleh@eleazar.dartmouth.edu (Earle R. Horton) writes: >>When Apple changes things, it is very hard to determine from the >>documentation... >For example? It's always seemed to me that Apple is fairly good about >documenting what an application programmer can do and what he or she shouldn't >touch. What specific instances have you seen to the contrary? Popup menus. SCSI interface changed. *PRINTING* Who outside of Apple (or inside) has any idea how printing works? I have written a printer driver for the Mac, and sold an article to MacTutor about it (which they were very happy to buy). I don't have the foggiest if half the code in my driver is "compatible" or not, and no way to find out except by waiting for the System release that breaks it. (That's why it's free.) Required documentation for writing the driver was the PHONEBOOK edition of IM, and two Tech Notes. They ain't sayin' nuthin' about printing. I have read thousands of pages of computer documentation, and the Apple stuff is on nice slick paper, but it doesn't have half the informational content of, say, VMS documentation. I am not blaming Apple for this because if they were to raise the quality of the documentation to an acceptable level, I know I couldn't afford it. At 20 bucks or whatever I paid for IM V, it was definitely a bargain, but I just wish I could have paid 40 bucks and got twice as much. Maybe I'll buy Joel West's book... Mr. Spock! This disk is damaged! Do you want to initialize it? Earle R. Horton. H.B. 8000, Dartmouth College, Hanover, NH 03755