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Newsgroups: comp.sys.next.announce
Path: digifix!sanguish
From: mahoney@csulb.edu (Mike Mahoney)
Subject: Executive Briefing / SCaN Meeting Summary (May 4)
Message-ID: <1993May6.030901.322@digifix.com>
Keywords: NEXTSTEP, NeXTWORLD Expo, NeXT, SCaN, User Groups
Sender: sanguish@digifix.com
Reply-To: mahoney@csulb.edu (Mike Mahoney)
Organization: Digital Fix Development
Date: Thu, 6 May 1993 03:09:01 GMT
Approved: sanguish@digifix.com
On Tuesday 4 May NeXT presented an executive briefing at the Westin-Bonaventure
in downtown Los Angeles to 120-130 people. There were lots of developers,
system integrators, CEOs, and other good folks in attendance. The briefing
was followed by a SCaN (So. Cal. NEXTSTEP Users Group) meeting in the
same room with a separate group of 80-90 people. Steve Jobs, Brett Bachman,
Ron Weissman, Cindy Larson, Erna Arnesen and Bob Longo spoke at the briefing.
Steve and Bob couldn't stick around for the SCaN meeting. There was a NEC
Versa Ultralite portable with 12 MB RAM, 120 MB disk (60 MB free), running
the NEXTSTEP 3.1 user edition in the room. It was very cool!
The following comments are taken from the notes I took at the briefing.
NeXT is in no way responsible for the comments made here.
(Much of this has appeared before on the net).
1. NeXT has $25,000,000 cash in the bank (so obviously NeXT isn't going
to fold - these folks are truly committed to getting the word out that
NEXTSTEP is a vastly superior OS to others currently available. People
who say NeXT is dead (e.g., UNIX Review Editor) are simply uninformed.)
2. McCaw Cellular has upped their buy to 5,000 copies of NEXTSTEP, a
midwestern health care company will probably commit to 6,000 systems.
3. NEXTSTEP 3.1 on May 25 will contain support for 6 languages. NeXTSTEP
3.2 in Q1-Q4 1993 (simultaneous releases for black and white hardware).
For black hardware owners it will cost $75 to upgrade from 3.0 to the 3.1
user edition ($49 with no docs), and $99 to upgrade from 3.0 to the 3.1
developer edition. (If you're running 2.x, upgrading to 3.0 now and then
to 3.1 is cheaper than upgrading from 2.x to 3.1.) NEXTSTEP 3.1 has been
"put to bed" and is being pressed into CD-ROMs.
4. Compaq joins Dell, DG, Epson, HP, NEC, Siemens in supporting NeXTSTEP.
5. A major relationship with a leading enterprise computing provider
will be announced soon (it's not a 3-letter company, it's better!).
6. Enterprise standards DCE, DME, and CORBA will be supported eventually.
7. Portable Distributed Objects (PDO) available before long (3.2?);
This means objects from the one NeXTSTEP program can run on Sun, HP,
DG, etc. simultaneously (WOW!). There will be cross-compiler switches
in Project Builder to make this happen.
8. Steve said he knows NeXT's credibility was low, but also that it has
risen significantly with the stable 3.1 beta and multiple partnerships.
He also noted the irony that NEXTSTEP's credibility is very high (surely
you've noticed articles that say NeXT is in trouble, but their operating
system is fabulous).
9. 3.1 enhancements include scalability (laptops, portables), DOS/Windows
support (with up to 80% performance of native 486), and Token Ring support.
AppleTalk is unbundled (will be supported by IPT and be much better).
3.1 developer enhancements include multi-architecture (fat) binaries,
a new HeaderViewer, enhanced C++ support (AT&T 2.1), new APIs (Novell,
POSIX), and documentation from NeXT. SoftPC is not on the 3.1 CD-ROM.
Novell support is still bundled.
10. 3.2 enhancements will include additional configurations, SoftPC on the
CD-ROM (valid for 60 days, then a simple phone call/payment will enable
you to license the product), Netware on Token Ring, and bug fixes (which
can be reported until late July).
11. NeXT has a testing program and has validated NEXTSTEP 3.1 on 40 systems.
They will validate 120 systems by the time NEXTSTEP 3.2 is released.
(There are many other systems which run NeXTSTEP fine, but NeXT won't
test the thousands of configs available.)
12. Motorola 68040 (black hardware) software releases will continue through
1995, hardware service has been taken over by Bell Atlantic, and existing
warranties will be honored.
13. 175 third party developers have committed to port to NEXTSTEP for Intel,
which includes 230 products. 14 DB Kit adaptors are available, including
DB2, IMS, Sybase, Oracle, etc. Only Sybase and Oracle are bundled.
A CD-ROM with 50 demo apps (multi-architecture) will be available in June.
Lotus hasn't committed for Improv and Frame hasn't committed for
FrameMaker. If you want these apps upgraded for NEXTSTEP, let it be known.
14. NeXTWORLD Expo is expected to have 7000 attendees and ~100 exhibitors.
15. NeXT's message is: "Object-Oriented Interface to Client/Server Computing."
NeXT has a chance to become the "Microsoft of Objects."
16. An evaluation kit for new developers will be pushed. It will be very
inexpensive and geared towards bringing in new people.
17. NeXT has no time to even think about going public.
18. If sound is important to you, buy EISA.
19. NEXTSTEP 3.1 runs great on local bus systems.
20. Photo CD support is bundled in a demo app (it works, but isn't supported).
You will be able to copy from this demo app and paste elsewhere.
21. 24 or 32-bit color will be supported eventually, but the hardware must
first be in place. 8 bit gray scale to come soon (didn't catch when).
22. Educational pricing is very cheap (no dollar figure was announced, but
I'm extremely happy with the figure that was whispered in my ear!).
..
99. I came away from the briefing/meeting very enthused. I believe that
NeXT hit a low in the February thru April time period, and has been
slowly but surely rising in their credibility, believability, and
confidence ever since. It appears they'll be peaking at the time of
NeXTWORLD Expo. Do not miss this conference! It will be one to
remember and also be a lot of fun.
--
- Mike Mahoney, SCaN President
Professor and Chair
Computer Engineering and Computer Science Dept
California State University, Long Beach
Long Beach, CA 90840-8302
These are the contents of the former NiCE NeXT User Group NeXTSTEP/OpenStep software archive, currently hosted by Marcel Waldvogel and Netfuture.ch.