Conference hydra::amiga_v1

I called and ordered a 5.10 update. SAS has made some nice changes to the 
C compiler and are working on updates to the C++ compiler now.

john

    When you make that first call to Tech Support ... be sure to keep a
    clock running. $2.00 a minute is a steep price to pay for technical
    support. Sure wish my time were worth $120 and hour!

    I was a little surprised about that also. Do they intend to have BBS
    support? I was very happy with Lattice (except for the fact that
    they left it to you to learn that an update was out). I'm not please
    about the 900 number at all.

    
    Excuse my ignorance - What's the relationship between SAS and Lattice ?
    I have 5.04 from Lattice and didn't get any update notification. Does
    Lattice still own and support the C stuff?  Who is SAS?
    
    Thanks
    Frank
    

 I think SAS owns Lattice, and has been doing most of the compiler work
 for a while.  They recently moved all of the compiler work to SAS.  I
 got a letter last week explaining the move as well as announcing V5.10.

 Mike

SAS has moved much of their BBS support to BIX. They are still trying to decide
whether to start a BBS for SAS C support. Call them and ask about it.

SAS is the Statistical Analysis System, an excellent stat pack used on large
IBM mainframes (among other places), along with a long line of additional
packages that you can add. SAS Inc is the company that produces SAS. Years ago,
the decided to make SAS portable, the first step of which was to rewrite it
in C. They bought Lattice to obtain the large IBM C compiler Lattice had (at
the time, clearly the best available). Several sharp Amiga people work for
SAS, and wound up doing the Amiga compiler development work for Lattice, even
though marketing and support were still handled by Lattice. The recent decision
was to bring all of the Amiga C compiler inhouse.

If you didn't register, or your registration is out of date, you'll not
get an upgrade notification. You can call SAS to change any of this and order
your upgrade (they'll bill you for it, as well as take plastic) at
+1 919 677 8000, extension 7001. Note that they have just relocated, so things
may have gotten lost, and they're still some confusion about what is going on.

I'm somewhat upset by the $2/minute charge as well. However, the BBS support
was always excellent, and I expect the BIX support to be better. I only used
the phone for things that left me unable to work, and usually got next-day
replies. I expect the same from BIX, so hopefully the phone will also get
proportionately faster, so I'll probably use it less than before - which
was once every 24 months.

	<mike

    BIX doesn't do any good to those that don't subscribe to it. I'd
    rather have the BBS and "pay" for the one call I make every 60 days
    -- so in that respect I'm losing out.

If you're not interested in BIX per se, try one of the "pay-per-call" options
I vaguelly recall them having. In my case, the compiler support moving was
the last straw that made me subscribe to BIX.

	<mike

    Exactly how much punishment is my plastic going to endure for the
    5.10 upgrade?

    Keith.
    

if your a registered Lattice V5 owner, it's $40.00. New users will shell out 
$300.00

john

    re: .10
    
    If you're a V4 owner there is an intermediate price (which I don't
    recall).
        John Sauter

    re .10
    Version 5.0		$40.00
    Version 4.0		$100.00
    prior to v 4.0	$125.00
    
    								bill

I found the following in the sas.c/amiga.c conference on BIX last night. Here's
a chance to complain about the 900 number.

As for the 900 number, I can't really comment.  The choice of it is based on
what other companies in the industry are doing - the price is taken from
what Lotus charges.  If you wish to make any comments on it, please send a
WRITTEN letter to:  Ingrid Ammondson /  SAS Institite Inc. / SAS Campus Drive.
/ Cary NC 27513.

In the same missive was a comment that SAS had monitored the support lines
at Lattice, and found that many requests were answered in less than 1 minute,
the average was less than 2, and all but 2 in less than 5. Those 2 stumped the
entier Lattice/SAS support & development staff, and were never answered.

	<mike

    re: .13
    
    I just plain don't believe those statistics.  DEC's Customer Support
    people in the Colorado Springs CSC generally spend 15 to 30 minutes
    on a call, and the long ones can run for hours, including callbacks.
    (I don't have the real numbers that they gather; the times are based
    on my experience working with them in May of 1989.)
        John Sauter

re .14

I do - because what CSC is providing is in no way similar to what SAS is
providing. It's closer to what I used to do at a university help desk. CSC is
limited to paying customers, and generally only one or two knowledgeable
people per site (at least, that's what the way I saw it when I was an
unsatisfied customer; if CSC actually takes calls from anyone using a DEC
machine, then ignore the first following paragraph).

How many times did someone call CSC and say "the compiler doesn't let me
declare my variable named 'volatile' any more." You certainly got none from
my users - I fielded them all, usually in less than 1 minute apiece. SAS has
no such filter on their calls.

On the other hand, SAS isn't going to get a timesink call like "The TA78
tied to the UBA on our 8800 is flaky when reading or writing blocks
longer than 32K." SAS is getting calls on a single application program, not
a system. What were the times you wpent dealing with questions - not bug
reports, but questions about usage - on a compiler?

	<mike

    re: .15
    
    Well, my experience isn't precisely comparable, since DECforms isn't
    a compiler, but it does have a language, so I think they are close
    enough that support situations will be similar.
    
    Although it is policy at the CSCs that they will talk to only the
    "designated contact" at each site, in fact they will talk to anyone.
    The people who operate the phones are motivated to fix customer's
    problems.  They aren't too patient with silly rules that get in the
    way of finding such solutions.
    
    While I am sure that some customers have people to field easy
    questions, I can tell you that many do not.  I listened to one
    Datatrieve call in which the customer obviously hadn't read the manual.
    The specialist very skillfully led the customer through the relavent
    pages of the manual, even reading some parts over the phone.  This was
    done so delicately that the customer was never offended.  As you can
    imagine, the call took rather longer than two minutes.  I have heard
    of cases in which the specialist could hear the customer removing
    the shrink wrap from the manual.
    
    I suppose it is possible that Lattice C customers are all much less in
    need of lengthy support than DEC customers.  But reading comp.sys.amiga
    I don't believe it.
    
    One kind of DECforms call to the CSC is from a customer who doesn't
    know the first thing about DECforms.  He has some very elementary
    questions about its capabilities.  The specialists answer these
    questions easily, but there are enough questions that the call takes more
    than two minutes.  I am willing to believe that SAS wouldn't get 
    these kinds of calls.
    
    However, more common is the kind of call in which the customer has
    developed some significant amount of code, and something doesn't work
    correctly.  This kind of call starts with a description of symptoms,
    followed by a question-and-answer session between the customer and
    the specialist to determine the source of the problem.  Sometimes
    the problem is recognized immediately, other times the specialist makes
    a suggestion and asks the customer to call back if the problem is
    not fixed.  In hard cases the specialist asks the customer to reduce
    the problem to a simple example and send it to the CSC.  A few of 
    these "hard cases" make it to Engineering as SPRs, and result in bug
    fixes.
    
    Intermediate between these two is the customer who has developed some
    code but doesn't know how to accomplish some particular effect.  For
    the common requests the CSC has examples which it can FAX to the
    customer.  The first time a request comes in the call is put into
    "research" to create the example, which can take several hours spread
    over days or weeks.
    
    It seems to me that both of the latter two kinds of calls can easily
    last more than two minutes, and they could reasonably be expected to
    be made to SAS by Lattice C customers.
        John Sauter

 re: .15

	I am a little suspicious of that 2-5 min average call...

	The Lattice package IS in fact a system, and not just a
	compiler.  It consists not only of the c compiler, but
	also the LMK facility and Code Probe, not to mention a
	host of link-libraries...  During the course of my
	upgrades from 4.x - 5.x, I've seen a LOT of quirky 
	behavior from Lattice-supplied code.  (That's not 
	intended as a criticism of Lattice by the way; anything
	as complex as their package is going to need refinement.)

	I can tell you, if I spent 30 minutes on the phone, tracking
	down a problem that turned out to be a Lattice-bug, I
	certainly wouldn't be very happy about it...

	As for getting their $2/minute rate from Lotus... Lotus is
	one of the biggest nickel-and-dime gougers in the industry
	(in my opinion).  It's an outrageous rate.

Lattice did deal with those kinds of questions on their BBS. Since you could
get overday response on almost anything by leaving a note on the BBS the
night before a workday and picking up the answer the next evening, I
believe that a lot of the more difficult calls, or the calls for which
CSC provided an example, were answered there. That also meant you got
access to much more expertise than you could get to on the phone lines.

I suspect that the customer base Lattice deals with is closer to what I was
dealing with than what CSC was dealing with - people working on learning
the language, or the machine, and doing it as part of a hobby, not their
daytime jobs. Most of the problems I saw were solved in under 5 minutes, and
many were of the nature of "make this comma a period", which took nothing
more than reading the error messages. I don't know anyone who talked to
CSC except as part of their daytime jobs.

John's a reasonable person. He's got no reason to lie (though some to be
defensive), and doesn't appear to be defending the $2.00/hour charge. Reminds
me of how my friends who worked at Apple are about the various Apple
lawsuits. And they're all under orders not to discuss it.

	<mike

I'm really pissed off about this $2.00 an min. charge.  If called Lattice
probably 20 times in the last year and every time it was to report
bugs.  Why should I pay them for me to find bugs.  If can believe the
2-3 min per call average because not once was lattice able to solve
my problem over the phone.

    In looking through the CSC's call logs today for DECforms I found a
    call that is typical of many.  At 0914 August 22 a customer asked
    how FORTRAN's Double Precision relates to DECforms data types.  The
    specialist answered that if you compile your FORTRAN program with
    /G_float then Double Precision corresponds to Gfloating in DECforms;
    otherwise it corresponds to Dfloating.  The call was completed at
    0932, which means more than 15 minutes were spent on the phone with
    the customer.
        John Sauter

    Does the $2 per minute charge also include time spent on "hold"?
    
    Ken
    

Re: .21

>    Does the $2 per minute charge also include time spent on "hold"?

I think the billing on 900 numbers is done by the phone company.  Once
the call goes through, the meter begins running.  The phone company
doesn't know if the person (or machine) that answered the phone put
you on hold.

Does this mean the MANX C compiler is going to increase in popularity ?

Mike

    re -1
    	Well that would depend on how the 5.1 update performs. I have it
    on order,and am just learning "C". I figure it may be awhile before
    I work through the simple stuff,and reach a point where I'll be 
    calling the 900 #. Then that will be after I check with friends 
    using the SAS/C compiler,and users here on the net. Experiance 
    tells me that Manx vs SAS (lattice) is a religious war that will
    continue forever. I opted for Lattice because I felt they were 
    closer to the standard at the time,and offered much more in the
    debugger area etc. I know that since I have owned Lattice 5.0 I
    have seen many upgrades,including a full set of disks for 5.04 .
    All this and I did not spend a dime. So support goes beyond the
    phone. I also can see where the 900 # policy could be changed
    given enough feedback from SAS users. After all SAS(Lattice) has
    been fighting very hard to hold their place in the market,and 
    may find the 900 # will hurt them more than help them. I really
    don't care, at this point I am more concerned about how they 
    respond to bug fixs etc.
    							bill

    Re <several>:
    
    I've been giving the 900-number approach some thought.  While I think
    that $2/minute is pretty steep, it makes some sense to me that (once
    out of warranty) the publisher should be able to charge for support
    services.  I'd think a better charge structure would be $5 for the call
    (first minute) and .35/minute thereafter.  That way, a 16-minute call
    would cost $10.25, which feels about right to me.

    Well, my feeling is that if your are going to pay $300 for a program,
    there should be some free support to go along with it.  They might set
    up a program where you get x number of free calls after which you are
    charged.
    
    We must remember that the majority of Amiga users are private
    individuals who cannot afford the $2 per minute charge.  With Lotus,
    I would think that the majority of users are either professional 
    programmers or business users who are earning income off of the
    program.
    
    And as noted previously, many questions have to do with bugs and there
    is no way a person should have to pay to find out what those bugs are.
    
    For myself, I already have version 5.  When I read about the charges in
    the letter, I threw the order form away.  SAS will not get either the
    $40 or the $2 per minute from me.
    
    Ken

	A couple quick impressions of SAS/C 5.10 --

	The installation procedure was (as usual) painless. My
	only gripe is that it wasn't smart enough to remove my
	previous compiler before attempting to lay down the new
	one; instead, the installation procedure just griped at
	me about an 'lc' directory already being present, and
	exited without doing anything.  I had to remove the old
	compiler by hand before the new one would go in.  It 
	did ask me whether I wanted includes for 1.3, 2.0 or
	both, and whether or not I wanted icons coped across.

	LSE is *still* LSE (I really just don't like it).  But
	it seems to do what it's supposed to...

	The thing that really stunned me was the speed of the new
	BLINK !!!  I linked three rather large files that used to
	sit and CHUNK, CHUNK, CHUNK for awhile; with 5.10 it was
	more like ZIP !  (I'm running on an '030 @ 33 MHz, so your
	mileage may vary.)  I don't what they did, but I'm real
	impressed.

    re .26 
    	Ken,
    	Does this mean you will be switching to Manx ? I ordered the
    upgrade asap because even though I haven't been using it I felt
    the $40.00 well spent in protecting my investment in the lattice
    compiler. As for the 900 #, well you could switch to Manx,and someday
    face the same situation. Now that SAS has in a sense cast the first
    stone it would be easy for Manx to jump on the wagon. I don't like 
    the Idea of the 900 #,and I plan to let SAS know I am not happy, but
    I still sent in the $40.00 . The thought that if you pay 300.00 for
    a program you should get free support does not really hold water in
    todays world. Contrary it seems that as the price of software
    increases, Especially for products used in a perfessional enviornment
    the cost of support goes up also. I really doubt that home users are
    the bulk of lattice customers. There is a lot of code being generated 
    for the amiga at the professional level,and in light of the fact that
    lattice has been the tool for much of the Amiga's OS development SAS 
    choses to place it next to their other professional software. We are
    dealing with a rather large company,and as always the small guy will
    suffer. Not Nice, but...  
    	We also have to consider that the 900# is not the only support 
    available. SAS has picked up support on BIX which seems to be the major
    platform for developers on the Amiga. There is a package we purchased
    here at DEC that I use on a DecStation. The first year was free (7000.00 
    package) now I pay 1000.00 a year for support. I support your decision
    not to upgrade,but feel it would have been better if you forwarded the
    notice with a letter of protest. As it stands SAS is building a new 
    Data Base,and will not even be aware you ever exsisted,much less how
    you felt about the support issue. 
    								bill
     
    

    re -.1
    
    I'm just going to stick with V5 Lattice.  I don't do that much C
    stuff and it's all personal so I see no reason to spend $$$ to
    change software and, as you mentioned, possibly face the same
    situation later.  I just believe in voting with my wallet since
    that is the only thing that most of these companies pay any attention
    to.  That's why I threw the update order form into the trash.
    
    Ken (who isn't going to pay $2 per minute to sit on hold)

    I plan to upgrade. Even if I was to drop Lattice/SAS, I'd still
    upgrade this one last time to get the WB2.0 abilities(at the least,
    it will make the resale of my compiler easier :-) ). I'll probably
    stick with Lattice until the upgrade fees after this are too high
    (compared with others) or I find myself using that 900 number (I
    won't mention the possible BBS issues right now - I use to use it).

        I'm happy enough with the compiler status that I could "freeze"
    with it after getting the 2.0 files if I wanted. CodeProbe, on the
    otherhand, I find very buggy and crashes my system often.
    
    Basicly; my attitude after this will be "wait and see", it's too
    early to make "final" decisions on switching compilers.
    

    re  .29
    
    >(Who isn't going to pay $2.00 /min to sit on hold)
    
    I'm not a software developer, I only use telephone support for
    applications that I have purchased.  I have been pretty frustrated
    trying to get some telephone support from some of the companies
    whose software I own.  Have you ever called Gold Disk?  I once tried
    for two weeks, dialing and dialing everytime I had some paperwork
    or report to do at my desk.  I never even got the phone to ring.
    It was always busy.  I often thought that if they charged, they
    could:
      a.  Provide better service with the money they collect.
      b.  Get people to read the manual before calling since it would
          cost them money, thus cutting drastically the number of calls
          they must handle drastically.
    
    Of course, $2.00 a minute was a little steeper than I than I had
    in mind.  But does anyone seriously thing they will need to put
    anyone on hold if they're charging $2.00/min?

Re: .28

>in light of the fact that lattice has been the tool for much of the
>Amiga's OS development

Strictly speaking, Lattice hasn't been the tool for the Amiga OS's
development.  Originally, Lattice was the "official" C compiler for
the Amiga because Commodore signed a marketing agreement to sell
Lattice C under Commodore's name (anyone remember the "white binder"
Amiga C system for $140?).  However, Commodore did not use Lattice
in house to develop the parts of the Amiga OS written in C.  Instead,
they used Greenhills C, a highly optimizing 680x0 C compiler, on a
SUN workstation as a cross development environment.

Lattice has continued to make references to being the official C compiler
for the Amiga, but that is probably not justified.  They were only official
when Commodore sold Lattice C under the Commodore name.  That hasn't been
true for a while.  Currently, Commodore endorses neither Lattice or Manx as
an official compiler.

I don't know if Commodore still does cross development on SUNs.  I suspect
that has become a lot less attractive as the speed and size of Amigas
increased.  However, they might find it worthwhile to do use Greenhills
to build the finial versions of their products because I suspect it
generates better code than either Lattice or Manx.

According to a USENET news article in COMP.SYS.AMIGA (Either by Randell Jesup
of Commodore or John Tobeus of SAS) Lattice V5.xx was used by C= for
2.0 development.

C= tested both Lattice and Manx against Greenhills for code size and a few
other factors.  Lattice came up with comparable sizes for the linked libraries
and other modules.

The code optimizer was worked on by SAS to support where C= needed better
optimization.

This may not make it the officially recommended C compiler for the Amiga,
however, it is the one Commodore uses for AmigaOS development...

-----Robert

Re: .33

That does put a different light on it.  It's also a sign that Amiga
software is maturing.

    re.34
    
    Yup, the article mentioned the joint effort to make the Lattice
    compiler produce as good or better code than the Greenhills C
    when compiling the AmigaOS.  CBM seems to want to move to native
    development on Amigas.  Makes sense now that they have 25Mhz 68030
    systems.  And SAS benefits from getting a more mature C compiler,
    even if it isn't the "official" C.  I wonder how long it will take
    before we see ads mentioning it.  Is MANX ready to try do to the
    same thing?  Seems like a good Amiga specific test of compiler quality
    :-)
    
    Dave

    Of course if CBM wants to push toward the professional market,and
    workstation status, then they should use their own products as an
    example. We use vax's, sun uses sun's etc. Their are exceptions but
    by far all the major players use their own systems. To do otherwise
    would be to admit you can't cut it.
    	I feel the $40.00 is a necessary step at this point. Remember
    that SAS said that 5.1 will be the only version supported in the 
    future. Now 900# aside this could mean anybody that fails to upgrade
    this time around will be shut out. I think the added features offset
    the upgrade charge at this time. It also give SAS the chance to
    concentrate on a single version of software. Hopefully this will add
    speed to the support lines. To hold at 5.0 at this time may be a grave
    mistake. While some may only hack at home(more than I do), when it 
    comes to a compiler you may find even this difficult. A lot of neat
    source code available through the public domain will not even compile
    with earlier versions of the available C compilers. This void will
    open wtih the advent of 2.0 of the OS. Lets face it the mainstay of
    the PD base will move to 2.0 just for the excitement of it. Here's
    a chance for them to explore new ground while they grind out their
    code.
    								bill

    Does anyone have the SAS/Lattice distributor's number for the
    UK/Europe?

    Thanks,

    Keith.
    

	Has anyone gotten their package yet ? I was told it contains
six disk,and a manual update. I asked when I ordered if it had a 
readme on disk. Steve at System Eyes sent back his last 5.0 to get
5.1 in it's new packaging. I realize it's no big deal but I've always 
had a love for documentation,and the written word. I'd be willing to pay 
SAS a bit more for binders if possible. 
	This last weekend I ran into a guy that was looking for a used
C compiler. He offered to trade me C++ for mine,and could not believe I
would not go for it. basically he wants to get a compiler,and then by 
hook,or by crook get it registered. Now getting the update may not be 
feasable,but if he were to get a set of disk's with a serial #, i can assure
you he could cause the registered owner some grief. after arguing about
this for an hour,and hereing of the many schemes he had to try for support
I walked away dazed. SAS by offering the upgrade thru the mail,and not
supporting anything less than 5.1 should put a stop to this guy, or drive
him to look for a used Manx compiler. I mentioned this only because there
should be a rash of 5.0 stuff shortly, possibly just a reformatted disk
used for scratch( I have 15 disks I can free up now),and this guy left a
lasting impression. make sure you remove any lables from the disks you
trash.
							bill

It looks like most Lattice ugprades, except it says SAS all over it. You get
the 6 disks and manual upgrades (a fair chunk of which are just title page
changes to turn Lattice into SAS). Disk #1 has a read.me file on it, which
is SOP for older versions.

You can call them and claim to have a pre 5.0 compiler (and pay the larger
upgrade fee) to get a new manual/binder. Or you could call them and ask about
buying just the part you wish.

The updates are at the same quality as the rest of the manual - not very good.
The SAS people on BIX have indicated that a new manual is in the works for
6.0, and are soliciting suggestions for things to add, and seem to view most
of the good ones (function indices by name & functional grouping, reference
cards to various things) as likely.

	<mike

Re: .38

Quite likely, the guy probably would manage to get support.  Lattice has
always had very a very generous upgrade policy.  If you aren't registered
but you can produce an original distribution diskette, they will register
you and provide an upgrade path.

Note that the latest upgrade offer in the mail includes prices for upgrading
the last version ($40), or for a bit more, the next to last version, or
for much more, any earlier version.

Lattice has cheerfully upgraded people who bought the original "Amiga C"
from Commodore, even though that product was marketed by Commodore and
no customer list was ever passed back to Lattice.  All the owners of
Amiga C had to do was mail in their original distribution diskettes.

Because of Lattice's policies, my personal belief is that it is not
ethical to sell previous versions of Lattice C *after you upgrade*.  To
do so enables the purchaser of the old version to upgrade at a cheap
price.  It isn't fair to Lattice to force them to sell multiple
upgrades to the same set of disks.

    Randy,
    	I feel the same as you on used versions of software. when I sold 
    Pagesetter to a friend I called Gold Disk,and transferred support to
    the other party. they had no problem with this as I was removed from
    the database as an owner of that product. This was before Pagesetter
    II came out. While lattice was very easy when it came to updates,I
    think SAS will not follow suit,after this initial offer. I feel good
    when I am about to recieve my 5.1 update,and hear word that a newer
    version is in the works. This is what seperates the professional 
    market from the could be professional market. Some companys seem 
    content to rest on their laurals,and then wonder why they arn't
    selling software in the amiga market. EA is a good example. DMCS
    could have been an excellent product(one I am in the market for)
    but I hesitate to buy it because I don't see a commitment to the
    Amiga Market from EA. They say there is ,but I see more going on for
    the clone market,and game cartridges. Of course you can call for
    support on an 800#,but in that case you get what you pay for.
    								bill

    re Randy and .41:
    A while back I bought for $20 a Lattice C from a person who had just 
    upgraded to the current version.  He obviously kept the registration.
    From my point of view, $20 for something to compile C code (with
    documentation) was worth it since I didn't have any C compiler at all.
    
    This got me using Lattice's C compiler (as opposed to their
    competition's...)  I also viewed it as a throw away to evaluate if I
    wanted to go with Lattice or Manx.
    
    I eventually bought a more recent version of Lattice C from somebody
    who was replacing their Amiga with a PC clone.  Lattice transferred the
    registration to me after we both contacted them in a joint letter
    requesting this.
    
    The net result is that I'll be sending in my $40 to upgrade.
    But, I might have gone with Manx if that used version of the software
    hadn't started me using Lattice C.
    
    my 2 cents worth,
    dennis
    

Re: .42

You've described a different situation entirely: at no point did Lattice
upgrade the same set of disks twice.  What I have problems with is when
the old owner and the new owner both get upgrades.  I am not generally
against the selling of used software.

I probably shouldn't have started this discussion: its too close to
the piracy discussions that ruined comp.sys.amiga.  Apologies to all
on the net.

    re .43
    Randy,
    	No apoligies required. We have made available the knowledge
    required for  someone  to have support transferred. We are all
    adults on the net,and I don't think someone should feel sorry about
    this sort of thing. I mentioned it because I ran into a jerk,and felt
    so disturbed I wanted to warn people. But I'll be darned if I will
    apologize, for discussing this type of thing. WE did nothing at all
    wrong. 
    	Back to the subject. It's been a week an still no package form SAS.
    They had said 7 working days, but I really thought I'd have it this
    week(ordered last friday). I have cleaned lattice off my drive,and 
    can hardly wait to put SAS on. How does it compare to lattice on
    disk space required(things critical to operation). From the sound of
    it I expect it takes considerably more space.
    							
    

   I was told yesterday that my 5.10 shipment would not take place until
    Wednesday (because of the holiday); so it looks like THEY don't
    ship it for 7 days, then add a few more for postal service.
    
    Re: -1
    
    I don't think there was anything to apologize for (although your
    statement about selling old copies of software is alot like piracy
    I thought was a bit bizzare). I do sell my old version of software
    on the original disks, although more often than not I give it to
    a friend.  I  am very  careful  in making  sure  that  no
    support/serial/id numbers are obtainable from the disks/docs, as
    I don't want someone screwing up my product support. I see nothing
    wrong in this as it helps recover my costs and makes available to
    someone who can't afford it a decent (most times) piece of software.
    Unfortunately, software updates don't always come with complete doc
    kits, so there isn't always documentation to go with the disks -
    making it useful only to people that may already have docs.
    
    Although I didn't ask for it (The SAS rep on the phone just told
    me that's what she was going to do), the 5.05 disk will allow me
    to give/sell/whatever a 5.05 kit; so it's useful in that respect.
    I was entitled to the disk anyway (being that I was a supported
    5.04 customer), so I don't see anything to feel bad about.
    
    I do hope that SAS is better than Lattice in informing people of
    the existance of an update -- I've always had to find out about
    it by word-of-conference.
    
    Keith

    Re: .44
    
    Randy I know your anxiously waiting, me to.  But!! I ordered my update
    this past monday and the girl I spoke with told me there was a backlog of
    5.10 orders and they were out of product at the moment.  She said they
    were expecting more product late this week and probably wouldn't ship
    until the middle of next week.
    
    Frank
    

re .43

Actually, in giving someone your old compiler (even though you're careful to
see that they don't wind up with sarial numbers), you're violating the
copyright laws. Lattice has some strange requirements before you can let
someone else have copies of the sources they provide on the disk, much
less anything else. I do agree that you've done nothing wrong, but I'm very
far to left on intellectual property laws.

	<mike

I called SAS this morning to do the upgrade (I was lazy about finding
by serial number).  The woman that took my order told me that they were
currently out of disks, and they probably would not have product to ship
until next Wednesday.

    Six weeks ago I ordered a 5.05 update from Lattice, and so far no reply
    (normally 2 weeks air mail to Australia) so have Lattice stopped
    sending any upgrades?
    
    Has anyone else in Oz ordered either 5.05 from Lattice or 5.10 from
    SAS, and what success/turnaround have you had.
    
    What's the address at SAS to send to for the upgrade?
    
    Simon.

I got my 5.10 upgrade about 1 week after I called. They even billed me so I 
can pay cash rather than charge.

The address on the envelope is:

	SAS Institute Inc.
	SAS Circle Square* Box 8000   
	Cary, NC 27512-8000
	Phone (919) 677-8000
	Fax (919) 677-8123


* the word "square" isn't in the address, it's a little graphical square!


I installed it this weekend and let me just say it's NICE!

I would have payed twice as much for this upgrade had I seen it's features
before hand (shhhh!)

The workbench support is fantastic. You double click on a "create project"
icon in the LC drawer and it asks for a project directory path. It will then
go and either create the directory if it doesn't already exist or, if there
are already files there, create icons for them (nice looking ones too!)

Now, you open your project drawer and you have icons specifying LSE for all 
.c, .h,  makefiles etc others for executable files and some others:

	one for executing LSE directly
	one called build which invokes lmk
	one called debug which you select then shift-double-click your
		executable to pop up cpr.
	one called options which pretty much lets you graphically set any of 
		the standard command line LC/Blink switches!


You click on the options icon and set the compile environment up. The you 
simply click on the build icon and lmk (in the absense of a makefile)
will compile and link all .c files in the project directory. If a makefile
is there lmk will use it and will magically add whatever options you selected
with the options icon (like debug etc!) without messing with your makefile.

The options program is real nice and simple to use. It even lets you do things
like specify additional link libraries, search directories etc.

It will invoke (if you want) LSE on compile errors. Otherwise you just
double click the file you need to edit and it pops up (and LSE is FAST!)
You could easily specify any editor you want since these are just project
icons. (unfortunetly SEDT doesn't take the project icon name as it's file name
:-( and compared to LSE it's a sloth on startup. But it's EDT!

I was literally able to get a few smaller projects up in a couple minutes. Once
set up this is a *tremendous* productivity enhancement. I almost never touched
the cli while "playing" for a few hours! (and when I did, it was strictly
out of paranoia :-)


The compiler seems faster and blink is blazing. The code generated is slightly
faster (from a couple examples I did) and smaller.


Do you use Lattice C? Do you use C?    GET THE SAS/C COMPILER! 


john

G'day,
	For those in OZ, I have done a little investigation re Lattice and SAS.

Cathy Fry of SAS institute in Sydney (DEC customer), tells me that they don't 
distribute Lattice themselves. She put me on to (so to speak) the distributer
in Melbourne who are:

	Fagan Micro Systems
	Ph: (03) 699-9899

Terese Moove of Fagan quoted me Lattice C (I don't know the version) 
for $aus425.00

I havn't compared this price with any others but I seem to recall most Amiga
shops selling it for $500 +

You may be able to get upgrades through them!

Stan.

    Well I called SAS today to check on my order. It was one of the orders
    that is on backorder. The saleperson promised it for next monday. The
    900# did not bother some people because she said they were 300+ orders
    behind. She also felt that the Workbench interface should attract a
    lot of new users. I tend to agree with this because I always thought
    the CLI was overwhelming(all those switchs and such). I have no problem
    with using the CLI but will appreciate being to set the option from 
    WB. The Salesperson was very excited by the response, so it appears
    that SAS will keep working on improving the product. Time will tell!
    								bill

     
    Hi all,
    	Being a registered Lattice C user (patched up to 5.04) what is the
    	state of play regarding getting an upgrade from SAS to 5.10.
    
    	o	Is it a new full kit (ie. no patching to do)
    
    	o	Do I have to pay for it ? (even media or handling charge)
    
    	o 	Can someone post a brief outline of additional
    		functionality?
    
    	I have popped a note in the post to the address listed here in a
    previous note, asking for the upgrade. As I am UK resident will this
    suffice or do you think a long distance phone call is in order?
    
    Anyone in the UK got any response from SAS yet, or even 5.10 ?
    
    
    Regards, MJ.
    

    The prices for the update are explained in one of the prior replys. The
    update is a complete set of disks(no patch),and pages that you add or
    replace in the manual. I ordered mine,and SAS is going to bill me for
    it. I don't know how it works on your side of the pond. I thought
    someone had put a blurb on that topic in one of the replys 1-50, but
    maybe I'm wrong.
    								bill

    
    
    I've still not received my 5.1 upgrade so I gave SAS a call to find
    learn that they had a disk problem and lost a bunch of phone orders
    that were taken around August 22,23,24 timeframe.  So! if you ordered
    around that time and have not received, give em' a call because they
    have no record, you have to re-order.  
    
    They'll take your order and express mail it a no chare (for shipping
    that is).
    
    ho hum!
    Frank
    

For those of you looking for a data point:

I ordered my 5.1 upgrade just before Labor Day, and I received it
yesterday.

    I ordered mine 7 working days ago and just got it today. I have noticed
    that the page numbers of the manual inserts do not fit perfectly
    in my manual (which was a 5.0 binderset that was updated to 5.02
    and 5.04) -- is this because I never upgraded to 5.05? What did
    5.05 consist of?

    I was talking to a developer and he informed me thst SAS was doing away
    with the 900# concept. I guess they were overwhelmed by the negative
    replies recieved over the phone,and on BIX. BIX was where this
    information was posted.
    								bill

    Wow -- can you post the discussion/results from BIX here (for those
    without BIX access)?

    I couldn't find the other note with my request for help on a
    couple of c sources so I am posting an answer to my own question.
    
    After RTM I found that my compile options were not appropriate for
    the source.  I compiled with lc -Lm when I needed to use lc -fi -Lf.
    Both q7.c and q8.c work as expected when compiled with the -f and -Lf
    options.  
    
    md

    Well it looks like SAS has revamped the support issue again. It is back
    to the 900#'s . The # is 900/786/1199, the cost $2.00 a minute. Of
    course you can aviode this if you want by choosing the option of a
    single payment
    	$150.00		for 60 days.
    	$500.00		for 1 year.
    
    Free service is still available through their FAX line(708)916-1190
    or the bulletin board (708)/916/1200, Although fast turnaround cannot
    be guaranteed with these methods.
    
    New Owners call (708)916-1100 to get a free 30 day support package.
    
    All that aside, I was talking to a developer and he said that SAS has 
    beta code out on 6.0 . He said that what they did was to pull the
    package they run on the Mainframes,and port the package over to
    the amiga. This should prove to be an interesting package for sure.
    					
    								bill

        This should possibly be under the "Easy AmigaDos" note but due
        to its connection to SAS/C I have put it here.

        I have an A500 with the extra 0.5Mb of memory and two floppy
        drives. I am using Lattice V5.1. As recommended in the
        documentation I am using a copy of Disk #1 of the distribution
        set as my boot disk. I believe I have installed Lattice
        correctly. Being a novice my small programs are working ok. I
        have compiled some of the PD examples which create screens,
        windows etc. no problem.

        I current have the Include: and Lib: areas on my second drive
        leaving just over half a floppy for my source code.

        I would like to put these areas into a RAD disk and leave df1:
        either for source code or other utilities which are part of the
        SAS package. This I have done in part. The RAD disk is created
        but it uses chip memory! 

        Question 1: How can I force it to be on the expansion memory? 

        I have tried using Fastmemfirst prior to the 'mount rad:'
        command in startup. To date I have not copied the include and
        lib data as part of startup but done it manually immediately
        the shell is available. This leaves about 2k of chip memory
        left. I then try to compile a prog and the Guru calls.

        Question 2: Why does INFO not show that a RAD: has been
        defined? I have to use it, even for a small file, to get Info
        to report the full RAD size.

        Thanks, Les

    Re. Question 2
    
    You must make some access to RAD: before it will be recognized.  What I
    do is simply do a "CD" to RAD: in the startup-sequence.
    
    Re. Question 1
    
    I believe there is a parameter in the mountlist which specifies whether
    the system should use chip, fast or available memory for RAD:.  I
    believe this is the "flags" parameter.  Check in your workbench 1.3
    booklet.  If I remember, I will check in mine tonight.  I am quite sure
    it is explained somewhere in there.
    
    Ken