Bell Tech Ad (was: Re: semi-review of Bell Tech Unix for the 386)

[Dimitri Rotow]

In article <263 at h-three.UUCP>, jimi at h-three.UUCP (jimi) writes:
> In article <148 at dcs.UUCP>, wnp at dcs.UUCP (Wolf N. Paul) writes:
> > In article <2321 at sugar.uu.net> karl at sugar.uu.net (Karl Lehenbauer) writes:
> > >... Nroff/troff are not included, because, according
> > >to BT, they haven't gone through the validation suite and aren't up to the
> > >quality of everything else, but they'll sell it to you....
> > 
> 
> These programs and their associated utilities (tbl, pic, etc.) are
> not part of UNIX SVR3; they have been unbundled from UNIX and are
> sold as Documenters' Workbench.  The last AT&T UNIX version that
> provided n/troff as part of the base product was SVR1. That was
> the C/A/T version of troff (no device independence).
> 
> I'm not sure exactly what Bell Tech is trying to say about n/troff
> and I don't know what you get when you ask for it. Since n/troff
> are no longer part of (AT&T) UNIX the fact that they aren't provided
> shouldn't be a reason to say Bell Tech's statement is "OUTRIGHT UNTRUE."
> 
>

Absolutely correct - AT&T has moved the "roffs" out of UNIX and into the
seperately licensed DWB to join device independent troff.  We license and
distribute everything in SVID volumes 1, 2, and 3: that is the official
definition of what UNIX is, and there is no more precise way to specify
accurately what is or is not part of "real, complete UNIX" than to reference
SVID.  The previous posting referred to a comment in our manuals wherein
we point out that DWB has not gone through System V Verification Suite (SVVS)
as has UNIX System V itself.  We said that therefore we were unenthusiastic
about selling DWB because it does not have the same quality (from us or 
anyone else except Elan) as does System V itself.  While we will sell 
(unsupported) a DWB package ported by us, we encourage all and sundry to 
purchase Elan's Eroff package.  Eroff is a wonderful, well-supported, 
surprisingly well debugged commercial port of DWB complete with a host of
features to support laser printers, X Window previewers, and other neat
stuff.  We don't sell the package (yet) because we feel that Elan's high
class support is an important part of using DWB or Eroff in a production
environment and that you best get the support by buying direct from Elan.

- Dimitri Rotow