Conference 7.286::digital

    There are versions of LOTUS-123 and dBASE IV which run under VMS at
    this time.
    
    Dick

    sounds sorta like .0 has been reading some of the PATHWORKS literature.
    
    For starters:  Pathworks offers the PC/MAC/OS2 desktop environment
    (which so many users have become familiar with) the vitally needed
    enhansements of ... security... expanded and shared resources and
    services... centralized management... speed and ease of operation...
    plus file/service sharing with the VMS or Ultrix world on VAX or
    RISC platforms.  The best of both (several?) worlds.
    
    t.

    re .0
    
    Unless you work in the Legal Department, I doubt if you are a Principle
    Engineer. You are more than likely a Principal Engineer... Check your
    dictionary...
    
    q
    

If you're going to pick on spelling (and I certainly don't blame you), you
might start with your own personal name:

    <<< Note 1589.3 by BUNYIP::QUODLING "What time is it? QUITING TIME!" >>>
                                                             ^TT

Or did I miss some subtle joke?

-steve-

For the record: I'm not very good when it comes to spelling. I try and cover 
all that bases by using decspell but every now and then things slip through. 
I appoligize to those who are offended by people such as my self who have poor 
written skills. Please show some grace and review the note on its content and 
not its written structure. 

							Thanks Dave

       <<< Note 1589.2 by SYSTMX::BEAN "Attila the Hun was a LIBERAL!" >>>
                          -< did we do this already? >-

    sounds sorta like .0 has been reading some of the PATHWORKS literature.
    
    For starters:  Pathworks offers the PC/MAC/OS2 desktop environment
    (which so many users have become familiar with) the vitally needed
    enhansements of ... security... expanded and shared resources and
    services... centralized management... speed and ease of operation...
    plus file/service sharing with the VMS or Ultrix world on VAX or
    RISC platforms.  The best of both (several?) worlds.
    
    t.

	>> You'll have to excuse me if I'm not completely familar with 
	   Pathworks but I have used at least what I think is pathworks and It
	   is not what I'm sugesting at all. 

	>> Let me try and clarify, The current pathworks requires you to have a
	   Personal computer You then load the pathworks software on Your PC 
	   (which has to have an either(sp) net board). The you have to load 
	   the VMS Piece on the Vax. 

	>> The funcionality You get is that the Vax then becomes a giant 
	   storage device for Your PC along with the capability of using the 
	   mail service and coping files across the network to other users. 

	>> What I sugesting is a system that RUN's PC applications in VMS on a 
	   "smart terminal" Not a PC more like our VT1000. The differance is 
	   that the application would run on say a small vax that had 128 meg
	   of memmory and that unlike a PC the user would be able to run 
	   several applications concurently in an window type enviroment 
	   without the headache of applications crashing or out of memory 
	   please close an application etc...

	>> I hope I've clarified myself....If I'm wrong about PCSA please 
	   explain in more detail  Thanks Dave!

    FWIW, complaining about spelling is sort of a violation of a largely 
    unwritten noting rule.  We're wasting time if we're spending it on
    spelling corrections and get offended by misspellings.  It's the ideas
    that are important.  And, correcting each others spelling leads to
    ratholes, a violation of another largely unwritten noting rule.
    
    Back to the original idea, what steps do you think need to be taken to
    cover the market that Pathworks does not already address?
    
    Steve

	It sounds like what you really want is SoftPC and MSwindows.  I
	don't know if it'll run on a VT1200 or not.  You might check the
	SoftPC conference for details.  One of my customers is running it
	on a VAXstation M76 now and is quite pleased.  The software lists
	for about $500 if I remember correctly.

If the speculation in Digital Review is any sign, we are going to come
out with some sort of cheap PCterm soon. 

While I think SoftPC has its place, there are many people who will
not use an emulator. I've noticed that SoftPC tends to lag behind
in emulating the latest (or latest minus one) display technology
(VGA, XGA, etc).

The other thing that might work better for people used to real PCs
is the Logicraft server, which allows users to bring up DOS applications
running on real Intel hardware, in a DECwindows display environment.

Then you get to the real question, which is why do you need the VAX?
X terminals and a gonzo PC server box would work fine. For more 
storage, a cheap DECsystem x with a bunch of RZs might work.

I like the idea in .0 though and if we did come out with it, we should
advertise where the big boys do (TV). After all, computers are commodities
now, right?

erik

    About 7 years ago DEC was developing a diskless PC called the
    Pandamate. It was to run MS-DOS applications, but use the VAX for
    storage (more secure than individual floppies), and make system
    management easier (updates would be done once and downloaded to all the
    Pandamates). I don't recall all the product details, but the product
    never was completed. It was to be targeted to government environments
    where security and a bit of MIS control are necessary.
    
    K. Baine
    

    	Oooooh, what a flashback. I remember Panda and Pandamate (that
    clever naming scheme still gets me right here). I was fortunate enough
    to work on something like 9 cancelled workstation products during my
    7-year tenure in Workstation Engineering, and Panda wasn't even one of
    them...but I'm trying to forget about all that now...

    The trouble with .0 's suggestion is that it ignores what customer
    really want. 
    
    Customers today don't want Digital to tell them what they want.  There
    are now _thousands_ of PC companies, both hardware and software,
    creating products at a pace that would cause Digital's PAC to go dizzy.
    Some (many) fail, but the industry grew by 30% or so last year.
    
    PC hardware is a cheap commodity.  How cheap?  I bought one last
    weekend for my wife's new business.  A 386SX, 2MB/40MB HD / SVGA color.
    Even FCC-legal (unlike many cheap clones).  Total price was UNDER
    $1100, cash and carry.  That's cheap hardware.  Buyers like that.
    
    PC software runs the gamut of price.  Street price for a serious word
    processor, like Word or Word Perfect, is about $250/desk; spreadsheets
    are in the same league.  You can spend a few hundred on hacks needed to
    patch DOS weaknesses, to be sure, but you can pick and choose quite a
    bit there too.  VAX-native software is YEARS behind PC software in many
    areas.  WPS-PLUS, f'rinstance, can't hold a candle to MS-Word of a
    couple years ago, not to mention the latest & greatest Windows flavor.
    VAX versions of major DOS software tend to lag PC versions, and tend to
    cost more per user.
    
    Since PC software assumes a local screen/keyboard device, it can't
    always be run on a multiuser system.  But there are multiuser
    DOS-compatible minicomputers out there, with terminals, doing
    timesharing.  Some applications (but not all) will work.  These are a
    niche product, playing mostly to small businesses who use them in place
    of a LAN.
    
    Every time Digital has entered the PC space, we've blown it.  We've
    NEVER respected the customers!  We always have the business managed by
    people who don't like PCs, and try to "one-up" the marketplace by being
    a little bit incompatible, etc.  (Tandy boxes are the happy exception,
    but that's just a resale deal, and they're overpriced.)  Our latest
    attempt was the VAXmate II (Intel DECpc 433), another semi-compatible
    bounded system that tells customers "We're Digital and we're smarter
    than you!"  Why should we continue this in order to try to salvage a
    time-sharing model that the marketplace doesn't want?
    
    VMS and Unix timesharing will be with us for years.  The PC won't
    replace them, though it will tend to replace dumb terminals on many
    desks.  Let's look outside of our own closed world and see what real,
    live smart PC users are doing with their billions of dollars/ECUs
    and see how we can get our share!
         fred

    
    	Re: .0
    
    	The thing that disturbs me most about the base note is
    	that someone in a position of responsibility, a principal
    	engineer, seemingly does not understand the company's
    	PC, desktop, or integration strategies and plans yet 
    	determines there's a problem and proposes a "solution."
    
    	I would hope that actual projects are researched with more
    	care before committing time and funds.

Re .6:

>	>> What I sugesting is ... the user would be able to run 
>	   several applications concurently in an window type enviroment 
>	   without the headache of applications crashing or out of memory 
>	   please close an application etc...

Hmmm.  Crashing windows.  Out of memory - kill a subprocess.

Sounds like VAX/VMS to me.


However, this topic seems to have little to do with the purpose of this
conference.  I suggest you move it to someplace relevant, such as
NODEMO::MARKETING (q.v.), the Marketing conference.  Things like this are
discussed all the time in there.  I'd point at a PC conference, but that would
require PC knowledge.
				/AHM/THX

    Re: .10,.11 
    
    Seven years ago! More like five--it was during 1986. Panda was the name
    of the original VT330/340. Pandamate was named because it was supposed
    to use the Panda monitor and skins.

RE: .7

Actually, there isn't any "unwritten rule" about complaining about spelling
mistakes in NOTES on the EasyNet.  It's not a violation of NOTES etiquette
to complain about such things (although it's best done by private MAIL
rather than a reply).  However, most of us who care about such things long
ago gave up complaining about it.  Functional illiteracy seems to be
a graduation requirement for engineering schools these days.  Complaining
about NOTES spelling mistakes would be a full-time job, so most of us don't
bother any more.

--PSW

We do have something to what .0 is refering to, at least I believe so.
It's called a VAX Station.  The only problem is that the current
price/performance is not the same as a PC.  Maybe once the new machines come
out, and we can figure a way to make them real cheap i.e. 1-2 thousand dollar
range, we'll have something.  And lets not charge 1800.00 for media and docs!
Also 2500.00 for a TK50 is quite absurd.

- Mike

    Some points about this conversation that disturb me:
    
    Lots of people talk about the PC world and the market like it was fixed
    and immutable, where the opposite is true.  The PC space is changing
    faster than any other portion of the computer industry, and companies
    who made zillions on PC's five years ago are now losing their shirts.
    Until DEC as a company learns to keep up with this pace, it doesn't
    matter what we come out with, it will always be too little, too late.
    
    Currently the PC industry pundits say price/performance is the *top*
    criteria for success.  Digital and minicomputers in general remain
    near the bottom of the price/performance curve in many people's minds.
    
    Some of our competitors already have much the same functionality as
    described in .0 but have yet to make major inroads into the market.
    Lots of mainstream PC applications exist in SUNos and SCO UNIX flavors.
    There are companies who sell PC's with multiple displays and multi-
    user operating systems.  And there are a few companies that are doing
    well with client-server applications that use an inexpensive PC for
    a user interface and a high-performance server for compute jobs and
    database managers.
    
    My own advise:  If you're just trying to find a way to use Digital's
    existing hardware technology in the new desktop environment, then you 
    are facing an insurmountable task.  Even if we could come up with a
    neat product, we can't create it economically and sell it profitably
    in our existing mode of operation.  That's the problem we should all
    be working on ...
    
    Geoff