This is NeXTs-awesome-developer-relations-NOT in view mode; [Up]
Date: Sun 16-Sep-1991 15:44:35 From: bhead@hfs.wimsey.bc.ca (Bradley Head) Subject: NeXT's awesome developer relations - NOT! Okay NeXT, I hope you're listening. In July our company ordered 3 stations, one printer, a toner cartridge, several ethernet cables, and TECH DOCS! Well, of these, we have YET to receive the toner cartridge and the F*ing TECH DOCS! The bone heads at shipping sent us an opened half pack of the damn tech docs, and now all they say is they'll be sending us the complete TECH DOC package RSN. At first, in there superior wisdom NeXT thought we were bullshitting when we said that we'd received only half of the box of tech docs... FINALLY, they took our (the lowly customers word, and said they'd re-ship RSN! Of the 10 volume tech doc set, we only received Concepts, Reference V.1, V.2 and Development Tools. This leaves out the complete second half consisting of: Sound, Music... Reference, Sound, Music... Concepts, OpSys Software, Writing Loadable Kernels Servers, Tech Summaries, and Supplemental Docs. Come on, NeXT get your shit together... I'm trying to churn out an app up here. It's gonna be getting cold here in canuckland RSN - I was planning to stoke the fire with them when WE FINALLY GET THEM! :-I
Date: Sun 17-Sep-1991 06:35:50 From: bhead@hfs.wimsey.bc.ca (Bradley Head) Subject: Re: NeXT's awesome developer relations - NOT! Bradley Head (in a bad mood) writes Okay NeXT, I hope you're listening. In July our company ordered 3 stations, one printer, a toner cartridge, several ethernet cables, and TECH DOCS! Well, of these, we have YET to receive the toner cartridge and the [expletive deleted...] TECH DOCS! The bone heads at shipping sent us an opened half pack of the damn tech docs, and now all they say is they'll be sending us the complete TECH DOC package RSN... [horrible stuff gladly deleted....] Apologies to all for having to read this very rude exercise in prose. Hey, I was in a bad mood, okay. Now that I'm in a better mood, perhaps I'll re-word my point: I'm not too impressed (understatement) with whatever entity at NeXT is supposed to take care of shipping and customer/developer relations. I find the 2 month delay in shipping of Tech Docs to a registered Developer site inexcusable. These docs (of which the first half seem very well written ;-) are a vital tool to a developer. Giving us (developers) the run-around does not aid in getting apps out into the market on this fine platform. I would like to think that NeXT will never get too big to ignore the smaller application developers. Overall, I must say that I believe in NeXT and think they are a fine company with a great vision and a gutsy leader. The gist of all this is that NeXT sorely lacks on these important - Compendious and caring developer and/or customer relations. - An effective, accurate and timely shipping/receiving dept. - Marketing and advertising strategy. These are, as always IMHO.
Date: Sun 17-Sep-1991 18:36:20 From: shanega@athena.mit.edu (Shane G. Artis) Subject: Re: NeXT's awesome developer relations - NOT! In article <1991Sep17.063550.3856@hfs.wimsey.bc.ca> bhead@hfs.wimsey.bc.ca (Bradley Head) writes: > > >Bradley Head (in a bad mood) writes > >Okay NeXT, >I hope you're listening. In July our company ordered 3 stations, one >printer, a toner >cartridge, several ethernet cables, and TECH DOCS! >Well, of these, we have YET to receive the toner cartridge and the >[expletive deleted...] TECH DOCS! > ... > >The gist of all this is that NeXT sorely lacks on these important >issues: >- Compendious and caring developer and/or customer relations. >- An effective, accurate and timely shipping/receiving dept. >- Marketing and advertising strategy. > >These are, as always IMHO. > I don't doubt that this person has had a difficult time with NeXT, and has tried to be fair. I just want to add another data point, however... I first bought my 68030 developer system two years ago, and ordered the original 0.9 tech docs. Since then I have received two free upgrades of the documentation within two weeks of their announcements as shipping products. I have only one system, and am a very small developer, but NeXT has treated me VERY well. This includes extremely courteous and efficient processing of my 68040 upgrade order. I feel that I have received universally excellent service from NeXT for two years straight. Shane
Date: Sun 18-Sep-1991 03:04:46 From: cnh5730@maraba.tamu.edu Subject: Re: NeXT's awesome developer relations - NOT(NOT)! Bradley Head writes [... preliminary detail deleted ...] The gist of all this is that NeXT sorely lacks on these important - Compendious and caring developer and/or customer relations. - An effective, accurate and timely shipping/receiving dept. - Marketing and advertising strategy. -regarding developer relations: Just today I was at home writing an app, and I had a problem I couldn't solve (what's new ). So, being a registered developer and an alumnus of the California Deveoper's Camp, I called the 800 number and left a message with a request for help. I then went back to work, and just this evening came up to my office to check my email. And there it was: a warm, friendly, humorous reply from a real live human being in NeXT Developer Support, with an excerpt from NeXT Answers, and an invitation to "drop me a line as I'd love to help you with your problem." No rude comments, no "read the fubar manual (RTFM)," just a prompt and very warm "I'm here to help." -regarding Marketing and advertising strategy: Just last week I got the latest u.s.mail package sent to all NeRD's (NeXT Registered Developers) urging me to assemble demo versions of my products for the newest up-and-coming NeXT CD-ROM that will be distributed world-wide by NeXT. This is free advertising to any and all NeXT's 3rd-party partners, please note. And have you seen the Back-To-School promo program NeXT is running? - regarding effective, accurate and timely shipping/receiving: Yes, this is (to date) NeXT's weakest point. But they are working on it. And, judging from every other effort that NeXT has made, I have no doubt that when they get this problem fixed, it will prove to be a "best-of-breed" solution. So look at it this "best-of-breed" shipping/receiving solution is bound to knock our socks off. If we can be just a tad more patient (and I think Brad is evidencing the patience of Job! As a parting comment: Brad, if you'll send me your u.s.mail address, I'll mail you ON LOAN my set of Tech Docs... Since everything is on-line anyway, I use them a lot less these days. Yay for Digital Librarian!! I've got practically my entire hard disk indexed!! (just kidding, but you know what I mean) Be well, Chuck Herrick <cnh5730@calvin.tamu.edu>
Date: Sun 18-Sep-1991 07:40:10 From: sef@kithrup.COM (Sean Eric Fagan) Subject: Re: NeXT's awesome developer relations - NOT(NOT)! In article <3559@tamsun.TAMU.EDU> cnh5730@calvin.tamu.edu writes: Another feat of amazing wastage. 38080 bytes; 47 lines of "readable" text (I can't tell which text was from which article), and 572 lines of garbage. 370 lines worth of graphical information -- two "smilie.eps" and one "frownie.eps" -- which are further wastage, as they are lost on anyone who does not use a proprietary newsreader. Absolutely amazing.
Date: Sun 24-Sep-1991 06:12:34 From: michael@maui.cs.ucla.edu (michael gersten) Subject: Re: NeXT's awesome developer relations - NOT! shanega@athena.mit.edu (Shane G. Artis) writes: >> [Someone complaining about not receiving docs from NeXT] > > [ Someone else mentioning that they've been given 2 free doc upgrades] So? I don't think this is likely to continue. I ordered my docs through UCLA, and I don't expect to get upgrades on it from NeXT at all. In fact, I've had nothing but problems with support from NeXT. I bought my machine used from soneone at Stanford (there was some confusion as to whether I qualified as a UCLA student at the time of my purchase, so I went elsewhere), and all NeXT will tell me is "Buy a support contract ($2500), go to developer camp ($1500), or go to stanford (ouch!)". No support anywhere in their system for the small end developer. Fortunately, the UCLA NeXT representetive is more understanding, and has been able to answer some of my questions. But I still don't know how I'm going to get the new Mathematica (which I understand will be shipped to the original owner care of Stanford, so I'm kinda in a small stream of water with excrement in it.) NeXT -- Love the machine, small problems with the UI, dislike the company.
Date: Sun 25-Sep-1991 15:32:02 From: john@cayman.com (John Stephens) Subject: Re: NeXT's awesome developer relations - NOT! In article <1991Sep17.063550.3856@hfs.wimsey.bc.ca> bhead@hfs.wimsey.bc.ca (Bradley Head) writes: Bradley Head (in a bad mood) writes Okay NeXT, I hope you're listening. In July our company ordered 3 stations, one printer, a toner cartridge, several ethernet cables, and TECH DOCS! Well, of these, we have YET to receive the toner cartridge and the [expletive deleted...] TECH DOCS! The bone heads at shipping sent us an opened half pack of the damn tech docs, and now all they say is they'll be sending us the complete TECH DOC package RSN... [other stuff deleted....] I just wanted to add my 2 cents here. I got my copy of the next Tech Docs in late April or early May. I got two sets of the OS, SMSP, Tech. Summaries and Sup. Doc box and none of the other half. Made two phone calls to NeXT to get the problem fixed, last one (from my DayTimer) on May 20 to someone named Ken at extension 4365. Both time was promised that the set was on the shipping dock and I should see it within a week. I gave up, and have stopped working on the NeXT stuff I was doing nights and weekends and gone back to Mac and Sun stuff in my spare time. Who knows what I would have come up with? I'm willing to put in a certain amount of effort, but at some point, you just stop banging your head... John * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * John Stephens Internet: john@cayman.com Cayman Systems, Inc Phone: 617/494-1999 26 Landsdowne Street FAX: 617/494-9270 Cambridge, MA 02139 AppleLink: D0523 I don't know why I don't know anything at all!
These are the contents of the former NiCE NeXT User Group NeXTSTEP/OpenStep software archive, currently hosted by Marcel Waldvogel and Netfuture.ch.